The Mimic Nightmare Circus 2026: Ends Nov 1, 4 New Lanterns

Six days. That is all the time the rebuilt circus gets. The Mimic Nightmare Circus opened on Roblox on October 26 and closes at 06:22 UTC on November 1, which is late Halloween night in the US, so plan the run before trick-or-treating, not after. A second listing, The Mimic x Ken Carson, ends 33 minutes later. The Mimic has jumpscares, and its own page says so.

Checked Oct 26 from CTStudio's Roblox event listings, badges and game data. Fan-wiki details are marked.

What parents need to know:

• Roblox labels The Mimic Mild, with "Blood (Light/Unrealistic)" and "Fear (Repeated/Mild)". The game page warns: "This game contains Flashing lights, Loud Noises & Jumpscares!"
• No Halloween, Circus or Ken Carson pass was on the store when we checked. A limited pass called Lord of the Night costs 1,499 Robux; an Extra Life and a Revive cost 99 Robux each.
• Roblox's Parental Controls let you set "a monthly spending limit on how much money your child can spend on Roblox".

Key Takeaways

• Nightmare Circus Returns: October 26, 03:00 UTC, to November 1, 06:22 UTC. The listing promises 4 new lanterns and a redesigned monster.
• The Mimic x Ken Carson: October 26, 17:00 UTC, to November 1, 06:55 UTC, with an exclusive limited-time lantern.
• Shorter every year: Roblox's listings gave the Halloween event 37 days in 2024, about 11 in 2025 and about 6 in 2026.
• New label: Roblox rated The Mimic Moderate on October 10 and Mild on October 25.
• A circus badge, no codes: a badge called "Nightmare Circus Returns" passed 35,000 awards on October 26. No codes in the game or group descriptions.

When The Mimic Nightmare Circus Runs

CTStudio, the verified Roblox group behind The Mimic, posted two Halloween listings. Here they are in three time zones.

US clocks go back at 2 AM on November 1, so the Eastern times are standard time. Short version: Halloween night is the deadline.

The fan wiki's infobox dates this second revamp to October 25. The Roblox listing says October 26 at 03:00 UTC, which was still the evening of October 25 in the US. The start was first set for 02:00 UTC; The listing was updated at 01:08 UTC, and its start moved back an hour. Thirty minutes later, a post on the fan wiki's discussion board read, in full: "IT GOT DELAYED NOOOOO."

What's New in the Nightmare Circus Revamp

The listing is short and loud. "Nightmare Circus is BACK completely rebuilt from the ground up!" it says, then promises "brand-new puzzles, new monsters, updated gameplay, and reworked areas throughout the entire experience." The key line for collectors: "4 new lanterns, monster redesigned, discover new mechanics while surviving the circus once again." Its tagline has the best joke of the season: "Everyone else is doing skeletons, zombies or vampires and jack-o-lanterns? We're doing a circus!"

The circus itself is not new. The fan wiki says it first came out in October 2022 and was revamped on Oct 23 last year. In that older version, you had three lives, and dying more than three times meant starting over. The wiki splits it into three parts: a carnival maze with seven hidden music boxes, the Ringmaster's Tent with six hint cards, and a boss fight in the Ringmaster's Arena.

Treat those details as history. The 2026 listing calls this "a full revamp," so the old maze and card answers may not hold. Last year's prize, per the wiki, was a Ronnie lantern, which the wiki names both the Music Box Ronnie Lantern and the Chibi Ronnie Lantern. Players had to finish Halloween Trials Part I first. The 2026 listing does not mention any such step, and the game's description dropped its "Halloween Trial badges are now available again!" line on opening day.

GODEEPER: The Mimic is also one of nine horror games in Roblox's own Halloween event, with its monster Hiachi. Roblox The Hollow Event 2026: Dates, 9 Monsters and Badges →

The Mimic x Ken Carson Event

The second listing is billed as "AN OFFICIAL COLLAB EVENT!" Its story: "The Mimic officially collaborates with Ken Carson's Xperiment! Something has gone horribly wrong inside a secret research facility, and a deadly experiment is now on the loose." The monster is called XGATA. Finish the event and you "earn an exclusive limited-time lantern," per the listing.

Image: The Mimic on Roblox (CTStudio event listing)

Ken Carson is a rapper, and xperiment is one of his two 2026 projects, per the press release published by IMPRINT. The same release says The Mimic and Blade Ball get "in-game activations" on Monday, October 26, and Fisch follows on October 31 (Fisch's own Halloween event is in our FischFright 3 guide). It also lists a virtual Ken Carson concert in The Block on October 30 and 31, starting at 4 PM PT. One fan account on X claims the takeover starts October 27. The Roblox listing says October 26, and so does the press release.

Three Halloweens of The Mimic, by Roblox's Own Listings

Here is the pattern most guides skip. Roblox keeps The Mimic's old event listings, and each Halloween window has been shorter than the last.

Chart: ObbyDesk, from Roblox's event listings for The Mimic, read Oct 26

The 2024 listing, "Halloween Trials Revamp 2024 Event!", ran from October 25 to December 1. The 2025 "Halloween Spotlight Event" ran from October 23 to November 3 and sent players back to "the Halloween trials and Nightmare Circus." This year's circus gets 6 days and 3 hours.

Desk note: The 2024 badge "Halloween Trials Completed" had been earned 294,744 times by Oct 26. At 37 days, that event ran six times as long as this circus. The 2024 listing ran to December 1; this one stops on November 1.

Our tracker adds one more clue. From October 22 to 24, before the circus opened, The Mimic peaked at 5,074 players in the 14:00 UTC hour on October 24. With 45 players per server, that is enough to fill about 113 servers. On October 22 the quietest hour was 1,926. Opening day doubled the crowd: Roblox's game data showed 7,796 players at about 12:45 UTC on October 26, against 3,877 at 03:20 UTC on October 25.

Image: The Mimic on Roblox (CTStudio icon)

The label change is the other news. On October 10, our reading of Roblox's age check rated The Mimic Moderate, including "Violence (Occasional/Moderate)". On October 25 and 26 it said Mild, with only the blood and fear descriptors, so our horror games list now has it in the Mild tier.

Worth it? The Nightmare Circus: Yes. Its listing puts 4 new lanterns behind it for about 6 days. The Ken Carson lantern: Yes, if you can finish both before Halloween night.

• If you're new: start with the circus, since its listing opened first and ends 33 minutes earlier.
• If you're grinding: finish both before 11:22 PM Pacific on Saturday, October 31, when the circus closes.
• For parents: Roblox labels The Mimic Mild, and the page warns of jumpscares. The Ken Carson lantern is earned by completing its event, per its listing; the circus listing does not say how its lanterns are earned.

What we don't know yet: the names of the 4 new lanterns and the Ken Carson lantern, and whether Halloween Trials are still needed first. Roblox does not mark either new badge as the event badge: "Nightmare Circus Returns" (over 35,000 awards) says "Circus was closed down but now it's back and better under new ownership," and "One Last Show" (10,287) says only "???". We did not test the new version.

What players are saying

Early players liked it. On the fan wiki's discussion board, one player who finished on the first try called the revamp "absolutely stunning" and added: "I love the visuals, the setting, the art, voice acting, and gameplay!" The same post says "the lanterns REALLY cool." Another wrote that they beat the revamp and "got my first legendary lantern (litreally)." Reddit's archive tool was down when we checked, so these quotes come from the wiki board (Fandom, Oct 26).

Image: The Mimic on Roblox (CTStudio thumbnail)

Our take on The Mimic Nightmare Circus

Play the circus this week, not next. Its listing runs 6 days and 3 hours, far shorter than the 2024 and 2025 Halloween listings. Both listings close late on Halloween night in the US, so a Saturday evening plan is cutting it close.

For parents: the Mild label is new this month, and the game still warns about jumpscares. A first run together helps.

Our view, from the sources in this article.

How we checked this

We read The Mimic's game data, event listings, badges, game passes, developer products, age label and group through a public mirror of Roblox's official APIs on October 25, 2026, between 03:10 and 12:10 UTC, and re-read the listings, badges, passes, game data and label on October 26 after the circus opened. The October 10 age label comes from our horror games list's own reading. Player numbers come from ObbyDesk's hourly tracker and Roblox's game data. The Ken Carson schedule comes from the IMPRINT press release. Endgame Tools confirms The Mimic's place in The Hollow. Mechanics of the older circus come from the fan wiki on Fandom, which is unofficial, and player quotes from its public discussion board. We did not play the event. All 87 source rows are in our source file. Last reviewed October 26, 2026.

Frequently Asked Questions

When does the Nightmare Circus end? At 06:22 UTC on November 1, which is 11:22 PM Pacific on October 31.

How many new lanterns are there? Four from the circus, per its listing, plus one from the Ken Carson event.

Is there a Nightmare Circus badge? There is a badge called "Nightmare Circus Returns," created October 24, with more than 35,000 awards on October 26. Roblox does not label it as the event badge.

Are there codes? None in the game or group descriptions as of October 26. We could not check the developer's X or Discord.

Is The Mimic in The Hollow? Yes. Roblox's newsroom names "Hiachi from The Mimic" as one of its nine monsters.

Related Reading

• Best Roblox Horror Games 2026: 14 Ranked From Mild to Scary: where The Mimic sits among the big scary games.
• Roblox Halloween 2026: The Hollow and Every Game's End Date: every big game's Halloween dates in one table.
• Roblox Parental Controls: Spending Limits, Chat, Screen Time: how to set the monthly spending limit.
• Roblox events this week: every live Roblox event listing we track, with end times.

References

• The Mimic on Roblox
• CTStudio group on Roblox
• Nightmare Circus Returns event listing
• The Mimic x Ken Carson event listing
• Roblox newsroom: The Hollow
• IMPRINT: Ken Carson announces Halloween takeover on Roblox
• Endgame Tools: Roblox Halloween 2026 event dates
• The Mimic fan wiki: Nightmare Circus (unofficial)
• Roblox Support: Parental Controls Overview