Subscribe Now!Top 10 relatively harmless Halloween pranks
October 27th, 2006 by Anita Bath
April Fools day and Halloween: the two big days of the year when folks look to pull off pranks. Unfortunately, many pranks attempted by adults on Halloween are of the cheesy store-bought variety (e.g. fake hand in a candy bin), while many pranks performed by kids are borderline criminal.
10. Fake Bumper sticker (kids or adults)
Print out a fake ‘HONK IF/FOR …’ bumper sticker then tape it with scotch/masking tape to someone’s bumper. If you’re stumped for ideas, here’s a sample bumper sticker - just fold in half and tape. The idea is to write something that will cause lots of people to honk. If you’re a kid, try doing this to your own parents and see if they say anything after they come home from work. If you’re an adult, perform to one of your coworkers. This isn’t really a Halloween prank, just fun.
9. Pumpkin trading (for kids)
Smashing pumpkins is not a prank - it’s vandalism. Besides, it’s very unoriginal and not really funny. This prank is far better, and doesn’t create swarms of angry homeowners. Here’s the basic principal: swap people’s pumpkins. This may sound lame at first, but it can be pretty funny. Take a pumpkin from one house and put it on another’s porch, repeat. You can put them in funny places or right in front of the door, put funny notes on them (“Your pumpkin has been abducted, here are my demands…”), replace candles with stuff (e.g. fake mice, pumpkin pie filling), draw pictures on them, etc. To see their reaction, ring the doorbell, run, and watch from a distance.
8. Yard Bum (adults)
Dress up like a bum and stumble onto a neighbor’s front lawn (even better if they’re a friend). Make sure you are unrecognizable, or that it’s dark. Take a 1 liter bottle of water wrapped in a brown paper bag for effect. After wandering aimlessly like you’ve had a few too many drinks, and after making sure they’ve noticed you, drop onto their front lawn or front porch. You could act passed out, or just not move much except for taking drinks from your bagged water. Obviously if they act like they’re gonna call the police, clue them in (unless your local police have a sense of humor) … otherwise just have fun as they yell/look out the window.
7. Caramel onions (adults)
The basis of this prank is to cover peeled onions, instead of apples, with caramel and then put on a stick. Since you might get other parents mad at you if you give these out to other kids, this works best as a prank against your own kids (or coworkers/friends). There’s endless variations here. For example, if they come home with a caramel apple, tell them you have to wait until the next day to eat it so you can inspect the apple to make sure it’s OK. After they go to bed, replace their apples with caramel onions. You’ll both get a laugh, and it will help enforce the “Don’t eat anything that isn’t factory sealed” rule that most parents now have on Halloween. Even better, one guy suggested bringing the onions to an adult Halloween party and having a ‘caramel apple eating contest’. 
6. Stalker (kids or adults)
Good for kids or adults. Wear a scary costume that covers your face and find a group of kids to follow at a distance (slightly older kids work best). For a while, don’t get closer than one or two houses. Slowly get closer, until they start getting scared and recognize your costume. Finally, when they go into a house, stand on the porch and scare them when they come out. They’ll likely scream, but they also won’t be able to run away since they’re still in the house. If they’re younger than teens, you definitely want to take your mask off and say Happy Halloween (and possibly even give them some candy) … timing is everything on this one.
5. Pizza delivery trick or treat (adults)
On halloween, order a pizza right around trick or treating time. When he shows up, give him some candy and compliment him on his costume. When he then says something like “Uh, no … here’s your pizza ma’am”, say “WOW, most people just take the candy and run, you’re doing a great impersonation. Well, Happy Halloween, and have fun!” - then close the door. Open it soon afterwards and get a good laugh as you buy your pizza.
4. Polka dotted house (kids)
Egging houses is another non-prank that many kids perform on Halloween. Most kids don’t realize that when eggs can rot and cause permanent damage to some homes, and are just a royal pain to cleanup. Toilet Papering is slightly better, but unoriginal and awful after it rains. A better option is to polka dot a house. Get circular colored construction paper (or cut circles out of regular construction paper), put double sided tape on the back, and stick to a friend/neighbor’s home (if you put the tape on beforehand cover it with wax paper so it doesn’t lose its stickiness). The more the better. They’ll be totally confused and likely get a great laugh the next day (as will all the neighbors).
3. Christmas Caroling (kids)
Dress up as christmas carolers, take a hat with a sign that says “tips” (or “tips for college fund”, or if you’re bad singers “we stop singing for tips”), and do christmas carols from house to house. Sound lame? Not after you get money, and not as you watch the person open the door in complete confusion. Would probably work better in a wealthier neighborhood where you have a chance of actually being given money.
2. Total Darkness (kids or adults)
Here’s an oldie that still works great. Get a bunch of large black garbage bags and scotch tape. Tape the black plastic garbage bags to the doorway of someone’s door with the scotch tape. Ring the doorbell and watch from a distance. This prank is not funny on older or disabled homeowners, but great on family/friends/neighbors. If you feel like sticking around, video tape it for laughs on both sides afterwards.
1. Statue (kids or adults)
Stand completely still in someone’s front lawn or sidewalk. Don’t move at all. See how long it takes for them to come out and see if something’s wrong, start yelling, or send their kids out. When they get really close, yell “BOO!” Works best if you have a costume where they can’t see your face. Why is this #1? Because it will make them jump almost every time.
Have any others? How about cubicle/work pranks? Has someone performed a prank on you that you thought was pretty funny? Let us know!
Yard bum.
Magic just magic.
I love the caramel onions one. Have a camera ready for that one.
How about this: Fry a bunch of eggs and then tape them to someone’s house with double-sided tape. This would work best if you hold the frying pan at a slight angle, so it looks like the egg hit the house and then slid down a bit.
I think it would be great to add the yard bum and the statue as one fluid prank. a yard bum statue frozen in time.
Another prank I have heard of is finding a house with a door knocker. Then using some transparent fishing line and tying it to the knocker and getting back a couple hundred feet. Then ‘tap’ on their door. If you play your cards right and stagger the knocks this can realy baffle them for a while.
Love your blog (and the caramel onions bit - I think I might use that one myself) and thanks for passing by!
I just about pissed myself with the bumper sticker idea…. why cause i have dont it before its great concidering how long it takes people to find it… like weeks in some cases.
dont do the stalker one unless you know the vitoms IE your own kids…
door knocker works best if your young enough to climb a big tree or even be on the roof as you can give a knock wile the door is open… ps if you use a slip not and make the last knock wile they are standing at the door a hard pull then the line is gone when they inspect the knocker…. grin
this one requires 2 people. get a scarry mask and stuff it with news paper skrew a loop bolt into the under side of the roof right over the door way run a line through the loop to a near by window and tie the mask to the end over the door. wait for trick or treaters and just before they get to the door drop it right in front of thier faces…. ps dont do this to young kids not cool.
enjoy
This is a great list.
As far as other pranks go, I have to say the best one I’ve seen recently was in the Series Premiere of the American Version of the Office where one of the characters was putting the other characters things in Jell-O.
This works great. If you’re sneaky enough you should be able to “borrow” something from a friend or co-worker, then wait for the Jell-O to set a little and place the item in it. After it has set all the way you can either return it to them or leave it somewhere for them to find.
how bout taking saran wrap and puttin it between two stop signs HAHAHAHA pretty sweet
An even better thing for the pizza one is to have a friend sneak a twenty dollar bill in his car while he’s at your door, it helps make people happy while pranking at the same time.
Some people don’t like their car bumbers ruined by tape.
Someone had the stupid idea of putting saran wrap between two stop signs!!! Not so sweet of an idea when you ride by on a motorcycle. This lame idea should not have even been placed on this site!!! Does anybody monitor the crap that gets placed?
Hey John - the saran wrap idea certainly isn’t a very good prank (downright dangerous), but we typically don’t remove comments unless they are hateful or contain a ton of profanity. We usually let most stupid comments slide through.
Hey, have any of you ever thought of,……wellwait a secod, your mail women, or mail man, has 2 have a sense of humor, & has 2 be nice, now, get 100 envelopes, put paper in them, just like you are mailing them out, then put address on them, the address that is 5 houses behind you, he/she must’ve already gone 2 that house, put no stamps on the envelopes, then watch out you window, be quiet, cause what happened 2 me was that the mail man, got out of his car, got the letters, then knocked on my door, i didnt answer, so he put the letters back in my mailbox, i pretened i wasnt home 4 a whole week, it was funny, then 1 day, i came out 2 get mail, & there were 300 stamps in my mailbox, this is also a way 2 get stamps, lol lol lol serious,
Here’s one - My dad did this.
Decorate your yard with old clothes stuffed with hay and put masks on them so they look like scary stuffed scarecrows.. then on a bench or just standing by the door have someone dress in old clothes and put a mask on.. they will think it is a dummy and they will run when you say boo.
Make sure you don’t do this to young kids they will cry tell their parents on you and they will come down and yell at you (they did to my dad)
Here’s a variation on the Polka dot one: You can put wrapping paper on someones door (use somewhat strong but NON DAMAGING AND REMOVABLE tape, not glue).
You can also tie a fishing line to a door knocker, and hide, so you can knock from a distance.
For the past several years I had toilet papered my friends house. She called me and told me that I best not TP her house. So I didn’t. When my friend wasn’t home, I ,with the help of my daughters, shrink wrapped her house. She came home at night and had to dig through her car to find something to cut it with. We both had a good laugh.
the shrink rap is really a good idea halloweens in 4 days and I’ll do it. I am going to do it to my neighbor i hope you aren’ t them.
the shrink rap is really a good idea halloweens in 4 days and I’ll do it. I am going to do it to my neighbor i hope you aren’t them.
I’m thinking about trying this one on my boyfriend this year… He says he never gets scared so one night when we’re in the movies or the store I’m going to have one of my friends sneak in my back seat and cover up with some coats and trash to hide themself. This is especially going to help because of right now my dome bulb is out in my car. Then after we are driving down the road I’ll blare out to one of his favorite songs while the person in the back sits up. I’ll let them sit there for awhile until I comment wow, why is this guy riding so close behind me. When my boyfriend looks back to see the car, he’ll deffinantly see something else! Hopefully this will be a ton of fun just make sure the one doing the pranking is the one driving, we don’t want any wrecks!
Hey. on number 9. Pu,pkin trading, it’s better to find an empty open porch and pile all the pupkins on that one porch.
Ive been doing this one for at least two years. Amazimg funny, as long as you dont get caught.