The busiest day of the year for Uber and Lyft drivers is almost here.
While you might guess that New Year’s Eve or St. Patrick’s Day would draw the most rider demand as people go out partying, Halloween actually wins the prize for ride-hailing drivers in the US, according to ride volume data and comments from executives.
The culmination of spooky season is likely to be big again this year, with Halloween falling on a Saturday, giving people more time to party — and creating more demand for rides.
Last year, the most ride-hailing trips occurred on October 31, according to Gridwise, a data analytics company. Ride volumes were 23% higher than median rideshare volume for the year, adjusted for day of the week and quarterly seasonal variation, Gridwise said.
The next-busiest days were November 1 and July 3, the day before Independence Day. Ride-hailing volumes were about 20% above the median on each day, Gridwise said. The day after Halloween may be big because rides run late into the night.
Halloween kicks off the busiest season of the year for Uber and Lyft. Besides getting a ride home from Halloween parties, riders also request trips to the airport for flights home around Thanksgiving and Christmas.
Earlier this month, Uber offered some drivers hundreds of dollars in bonuses for driving more — a potential sign that the company needs more drivers working as ride demand ramps up.
For Lyft, Halloween 2025 was “our biggest day” and “our biggest week, and not by a little bit,” CEO David Risher said a few days after Halloween 2025 on an earnings call last November.
A company spokesperson declined to say how many trips Lyft drivers completed on Halloween but said that it amounted to “millions of rides.”
Uber, meanwhile, “hit a new record over Halloween weekend” in 2025, with about 130 million ride-hailing and delivery trips worth $2 billion, CEO Dara Khosrowshahi said on an earnings call last November.
While lucrative, working on Halloween also comes with risks for drivers.
Raymundo Rodriguez, who drives for Uber on the island of Oahu in Hawaii, said he started driving for the app around Halloween two years ago.
There were plenty of riders, he said, but some trips involved dealing with rowdy or drunk passengers. Costumes can also pose risks: One rider dressed as a stripper left glitter on the black leather seats of his car after she got out — a mess that Rodriguez said he had to clean up himself.
This year, Rodriguez said, he’s planning to skip driving for the app and take his kids trick-or-treating.
“I don’t want nobody throwing up in my car,” he said.
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