The Top 13 Haunted Attractions In America 2023
The season is upon us again, and so is Scary Overload’s TOP 13 SCARIEST HAUNTED ATTRACTIONS FOR 2023! We’ve wandered across the entire country braving the scariest, most terrifying, most stomach-churning haunted attractions out there this year to bring YOU this list of the UNLUCKY 13 best we could find. Don’t enter any of these ghoulish masterpieces unless you’re prepared to face the finest frights the nation has to offer. Ready? Here we go!
Editor’s Note: We’ve put them in no particular order, as these haunts are all worthy of a number one spot. Enjoy!
MICHIGAN
Eloise Asylum – Westland
Kicking off our list is an extremely rare combination of historical site, paranormal location, and haunted attraction. The Eloise Asylum is a real-deal historical asylum that was full of patients for decades before being abandoned and left derelict. It’s now being rescued and restored, and during Halloween it’s an absolutely terrifying haunted attraction! With state of the art special effects, this multi-million dollar attraction is being expanded in 2023 with a new asylum ward being added along with even more effects, more patients, more everything! Paranormal tours are still available, because this is a very real haunted site. Do you dare enter the walls of this asylum and try to escape when so many failed before?
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MINNESOTA
The Dead End Haunted Hayride – Wyoming
This simply massive hayride in Minnesota returns in 2023 with, well, everything. In 2023 they’re going deeper into the woods than ever before. All HELL is breaking loose in the great white north, from vampires to clowns, from chainsaws to mutants. Name a nightmare, you’ll face it on the wagons of this incredible trip through terror. The onslaught comes at you from all sides, relentless, and that’s before you get thrown off the wagons to fend for yourself in the corn…and we’re not going to tell you what waits in the corn. It isn’t good.
https://thedeadendhayride.com/
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PENNSYLVANIA
Pennhurst Asylum Haunted House – Spring City
Opened in 1908, the Pennhurst Asylum became infamous before its closure in 1987. After becoming derelict for years after, it has reawakened and become Pennhurst Asylum Haunted House as well as housing a historical museum for daytime tours. Paranormal tours are also conducted throughout the site as this place is EXTREMELY haunted. But that doesn’t matter to you, right? You won’t worry a bit as you step into the Asylum to walk through its very haunted halls. If you make it out without getting checked into a room by one of the doctors on staff, you’ll tour The Morgue and see what the morticians are up to with the many, many dead. Finally, only the bravest of souls will venture into the Pennhurst Tunnels to try and escape the madness. VIP ticket holders can also visit The Catacombs, an all-new attraction!
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UTAH
Fear Factory – Salt Lake City
This MASSIVE complex of six buildings and two underground passages is the former Portland Cement Works…but now, they make FEAR. Rising six stories high, the haunt towers over the landscape and promises industrial-strength horror for everyone with the guts to make the trip inside the historic, haunted building. You can start your tour with the Zombie Bus taking you from parking to the plant, buy the Touch of Fear upgrade to allow the monsters to touch you, and did we mention everyone has to sign a waiver just to go in? This factory means business, and their business is FEAR.
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ILLINOIS
Midnight Terror – Oak Lawn
Once, there was a man named “Sledge,” for he was a hard, hard man. Sledge got up to some very bad things, and that sets the ball rolling at Midnight Terror in Chicago, a haunt with a very deep story covering both of its attractions. In Factory of Malum and Black Oak Grove: The Mark Of Willow, you’ll experience the story of Robert “Sledge” Dubois and his daughter, Willow, and their dealings with the demon, Malum. I’ll give you a hint…it doesn’t go well for anyone. This killer haunt is across the street from a cemetery, and that’s just perfect. Maybe they can find room for you if you get scared to death?
https://midnightterrorhauntedhouse.com/
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TEXAS
Dark Hour Haunted House – Plano
Some say there’s a coven of thirteen witches. Each has their own power. All of them are trying to bring about the Dark Hour, the hour of the end of the world. Each year, one or more of them come forward to try and make it happen using their special skills. Who will it be this year? Who will assist them? Dark Hour is the haunt that features that coven and their attempts to end the world every Halloween, with an all-new show every year. This year? It’s the RISE OF THE SEA WITCH as she brings forth the terrors of the deep to overwhelm the world with darkness. Come to Plano, TX just outside of Dallas and face the frigid deep this year. Don’t forget your water wings.
https://darkhourhauntedhouse.com/
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OHIO
The Dent Schoolhouse – Dent
We know that The Dent Schoolhouse opened in 1894. We know it was a school for a long time. The legend says that ol’ Charlie McFree worked there as a janitor back in the ‘40s. The legend also says that some kids went missing ‘round then, as kids did before Amber alerts and such. Thing is, the legend says after a smell came from the basement, they barged down there and found those kids…what was left of ‘em . Charlie? Him, they didn’t find. Not hide nor hair. But you might, because The Dent Schoolhouse is open again, and folks say ‘round about Halloween time it’s full of horrible things that’ll scare a fella half to death. Or maybe all the way, if Charlie has a say. All we know is, The Dent is open again this year, with bigger and better scares than ever, and a Monster Midway full of fun and games, to boot. Sounds like a good time…as long as you don’t end up in the basement.
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PENNSYLVANIA
Reaper’s Revenge – Scranton
Scranton is home to a collection of attractions under the name of Reaper’s Revenge that covers every base you can think of when it comes to scary goodness. To kick things off, you’ve got a gigantic 66 acre Haunted Hayride through a forest of spine-tingling thrills. After you disembark, you enter the Lost Carnival to play around with clowns and sideshow freaks in a midway of madness, maybe even finding an eternal companion in the Tunnel of Love! Speaking of clowns, Delirium has its share in a multi-dimensional spin through disorienting delusions. Enjoy the irony of a light bulb factory that’s Pitch Black in the next experience, a blackout attraction for those not squeamish when faced with the dark. Finally, there’s Sector 13, a post-apocalyptic journey through mutants, toxic sludge, and cannibals in a maze you might not escape. Reaper’s Revenge is not to be missed!
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NEW JERSEY
Brighton Asylum – Passaic
This legendary haunt has been scaring the HELL out of New Jersey for over 13 unlucky years now, and 2023 looks to be no exception. Three lethal attractions await on the grounds of the Asylum. The Asylum itself is open for business, offering the opposite of mental health for all who enter. Once called “The scariest place on Earth” by the Today Show, Brighton Asylum is no laughing matter. You need a waiver just to enter the grounds! Next up is SubCULTure…you’re going underground to the tunnels the staff used to move between the buildings of the facility. The worst of the worst housed at the Asylum escaped and now live in the dark tunnels out of sight. Will you fall for their tricks? Finally, the former staff quarters, site of despicable acts of degradation and slaughter, became known as The Bleeding Grounds. Go to the second floor and find out why!
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OHIO
Blood Prison – Mansfield
Keep your eyes forward, inmate. Step out of line, and the Warden’s Widow will have us all in The Hole. That’s right, we’re going to prison. The Ohio State Reformatory, to be exact. This is an infamously haunted prison seen on many ghost hunting shows over the years, but now it’s your turn to walk the cells in the dark. The Widow just might be on hand to greet you when you arrive…if you call that shriek a greeting. Inside, you’ll find prisoners, “screws,” and every sort of lockup phobia you’ve ever had. No appeal, no pardon, the only question is…will your sentence be death?
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PENNSYLVANIA
The ScareHouse – Pittsburgh
Pittsburgh. Where so much started, thanks to a man named George Romero. Here we are, back at a mall, full of terror. ScareHouse has relocated to the Pittsburgh Mills Mall after over 20 years of terrifying the city that birthed the zombie craze, and they’re bigger and better than ever! When you have people like Guillermo Del Toro saying they “could move in” you know you’re doing something right. Offering a mix of everything from clowns to ghosts to chainsaws, ScareHouse has the skills and the experience to scare anyone who comes to the home of Mr. Rogers and wants to get petrified.
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ILLINOIS
Evil Intentions Haunted House – Elgin
The Elgin Ghost Society of Elgin, IL is investigating the extremely haunted, historic, Elgin Casket Company. Over the years, it’s been the site of everything from ghosts, unexplained phenomena, cult activity, and even a murder, so they’re sure they’ll find evidence of some kind. The thing is…they’re in a little over their head, and there is some seriously bad mojo inside that factory building. Someone was doing some VERY BAD THINGS in this building, and now it’s very likely this group of ghost geeks will finish the job. If they do? Hell itself is coming to Chicago, and it isn’t stopping there. What will you find when you visit the Casket Company? Do you have Evil Intentions?
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MARYLAND
Legends of the Fog – Aberdeen
This is best described as the farm from hell. Nestled between Philadelphia and Baltimore, you have all the elements of a standard eastern seaboard farm…just helter-skelter. You’ve got hay, so you’ve got a hayride. This one is Haunted Hayride: RIDE OR DIE, so that’s a bit more intense than your standard fall trip through the fields. A lengthy trip through a hellscape where you’re threatened at every turn. If you survive, you’ll be left at the cornfields. Farms have corn. This farm has Cornstalkers, a newly expanded outdoor maze in the cornfields full of things that will hunt and track you if you make a sound as you find your way out. Assuming you do (and good luck with that) you’ll come to the meat processing facility. Farms do have to process their livestock. This SlaughterHouse is definitely unethical, however, and focuses on more exotic cuts of campers missing from the area. If you escape from all of these ordeals, you can settle in for a nice nap at the local hotel. Farewell Hotel, updated for 2023, with over 70 doors leading to…let’s just not get into it.
