If you planned your Day of the Dead weekend from the calendar that came out in January, which Saturday did you circle?
The Raincross Gazette's roundup of annual events coming to Riverside in 2026 lists the Día de los Muertos Festival for November 1–2, 2026. That is a Sunday and a Monday, and it matches the weekend the festival used last year. The newer listings give different dates. The Los Angeles Times listing published October 7 puts Riverside's 23rd annual Day of the Dead celebration on Saturday, November 7, from 1 to 10 p.m., and Sunday, November 8, from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. An earlier report from OC Music News in June had the same November 7 and 8 dates.
The one-week shift has an effect beyond the calendar. November 7 is also the Saturday before Veterans Day, which is when the City's Salute to Veterans Parade and Expo takes place. This year the two biggest downtown events of early November share a day and a block.
The Date That Changed, and the Block That Didn't
The festival has kept its two-day format and its daily hours. In 2025, Division 9 Gallery's festival ran Saturday, November 1, from 1 to 10 p.m. and Sunday, November 2, from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. The 2026 hours are the same, one week later on the calendar. Last year, the weekend just happened to fall on the holiday itself. This year it falls on the following weekend.
The location is what puts the festival on top of the parade. According to OC Music News, the 2026 festival is presented by Division 9 Art Gallery in downtown Riverside on Main Street between 10th and 12th. That block sits in front of the Historic Courthouse, where the Raincross Gazette's calendar says the Veterans Parade ends after leaving Riverside City College. The City's community calendar lists the Salute to Veterans Parade and Expo on November 7, 2026, from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m., along Market Street, 10th Street and Main Street.
Taken together, the published times overlap by one hour on the same stretch of Main Street.
How Saturday, November 7 Runs on Paper
Based on the published schedules, the day downtown looks like this:
- 10 a.m. The Salute to Veterans Parade and Expo begins along Market, 10th and Main. In 2025, the parade started at Riverside City College on Magnolia Avenue at Ramona Drive, ran onto Market, turned right on 10th and right again on Main, and finished at the Historic Courthouse, with the expo set up nearby. The City has not published a turn-by-turn route for 2026, so use that sequence as last year's pattern.
- 1 p.m. The Day of the Dead festival opens, with the veterans event still running nearby.
- 2 p.m. The veterans expo's listed hours end.
- Afternoon into evening. The festival runs on its own until 10 p.m., with dance performances, Aztec dancers, lucha libre and a Catrina pageant, according to the Los Angeles Times listing.
- Sunday, November 8, 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. The festival's second day has no parade sharing the streets.
As of this week, neither event has a street-closure schedule posted on the City's event calendar. If you plan to drive downtown that Saturday, check the City's notices shortly before you go. If you want the quieter version of the festival, Sunday is the day with only one event on the streets.
Why Main Street Between 10th and 12th Matters
Before this year, the festival's center was Market Street and White Park. In 2024, when it first expanded to two days, the Raincross Gazette described ofrendas in White Park and festival activity on Market between 14th and Mission Inn. In 2025, the Riverside Record reported that the festival ran along seven blocks of Market Street, with vendors, stages and community-built altars in White Park.
The 2025 festival also tested the Main Street block. Festival project manager Ariana Cordova told KVCR that car altars were placed on Main Street between 10th and 12th, in front of the courthouse, and that the expanded car-altar area was new that year. For 2026, that same block is the address the festival's announcement gives.
The 2026 announcements have not said whether White Park will hold altars again or whether the car altars will return. The January calendar described the festival as six to seven blocks with more than 80 community-built altars, two stages, lowrider displays and more than 75,000 visitors. Those figures come from the festival's recent history, not a confirmed 2026 site plan. When Division 9 Gallery posts a map, it will answer the White Park and car-altar questions.
A Hometown Band on the Detour Stage
The 2026 festival also adds a music headliner. According to OC Music News, Voodoo Glow Skulls posted a flyer in June announcing the Riverside Day of the Dead for November 7 and 8 and said the band will play the Detour Stage, at what the band describes as a free show. The same report notes that this appears to be the first time Voodoo or a significant music act has been part of the festival.
The band's ties to Riverside go back decades. OC Music News traces their history from shows at Spanky's Café and the Showcase Theater to the Barn at UC Riverside. The band's artifacts were also part of "60 Miles East," the Riverside Art Museum exhibit on the city's underground punk, hardcore and ska scene, which ran from last November through April. If you saw that show, the Detour Stage puts that history back on a downtown street for an afternoon. The set time has not been announced, so check the band's and Division 9 Gallery's channels before you plan around it.
The Week Before the Festival
With the main festival moved to November 7 and 8, the dates around the holiday itself are now filled by smaller events, each with its own host:
- Thursday, October 29, 3:30 to 4:30 p.m. Sugar Skull Decorating for children at Arlington Library, a Riverside Public Library program. Registration is required, and the library's event page already shows it as full.
- Sunday, November 1, 1 to 4 p.m. The Museum of Riverside's First Sundays: Día de los Muertos at the corner of Mission Inn Avenue and Main Street, with a history discussion and a butterfly clothespin craft. It is free and family-friendly.
- Friday, November 6, 5 to 9 p.m. Día de los Muertos Market Night at Mundial Coffee, 1725 Spruce Street #104, with mariachi, face painting, food and local vendors. It is free.
Mundial Coffee's Market Night is the evening before the parade and festival, so the Spruce Street event leads straight into the downtown weekend.
The Cheech Marin Center for Chicano Art & Culture at 3581 Mission Inn Avenue is the other place to watch. Last year, its community ofrenda in Sala Jose Medina was open Saturday and Sunday, November 1–2, from noon to 5 p.m., with a free workshop on November 2. As of mid-October, the museum's events calendar does not list a 2026 Día de los Muertos program. If you visited the ofrenda last year, check the calendar again as November gets closer.
This year, Riverside's Day of the Dead fills two weekends: a Sunday craft table at Mission Inn and Main on November 1, a Friday market on Spruce Street on November 6, and a full Saturday on Main Street between 10th and 12th that starts with veterans in the morning and ends with the festival at 10 p.m.
Events like these shape what a block feels like on a given weekend, and that matters as much as anything on a property listing. If you're weighing a move within Riverside, or wondering how downtown's event calendar affects a home near it, Jacqueline Johnson is glad to talk it through. Schedule a free consultation.
