Pennywise, Spider-Man, & Chucky top Google’s list of most-searched Halloween costumes

Google, about as good a large-scale barometer as any for taking the measure of what we’re all really thinking, has just released its annual list of this year’s most-searched Halloween costumes across the U.S. — and it’s top-heavy with the kind of fun stuff that’s on our minds pretty much every day.

According to Google Trends, IT (in the form of Pennywise) topped the overall list of the engine’s costume searches last month. Swinging close behind was Spider-Man at #3 (the generic “witch” search came in second), followed down the top-ten list by a mix of brand names (Disney’s Descendants, Fortnite, Chucky) and generic themes (dinosaur, clown, 1980s). 

Broken down into categories, the lists get even more interesting. Just about every single dog costume people searched Google for sounds irresistible. Child’s Play’s much-shared Chucky doggo suit took the top spot, followed by Ewoks, "Spider," Pennywise, "Dinosaur," a UPS worker, Stranger Things’ Demogorgon (up 300 percent in searches this year, according to Google Trends), Batman, and more. (Pennywise, by the way, is so popular this year that he’s not just for grown-ups and dogs — he even crept onto the top-ten list for baby costume searches, just behind the Grinch and just ahead of the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man.)

Couples’ costumes got plenty of searches from evident fans of gaming and animation, with Lilo and Stitch coming in as Google’s most-searched costume for pairs. The Fairly OddParents’ Cosmo and Wanda came in second, followed further down the list by Mario and Luigi, Chucky and Tiffany, Rick and Morty, and Phineas and Ferb.

For friends who aim to hit the Halloween streets as an entourage this year, franchises rich in distinctive characters are getting tons of Google love. Fortnite, Stranger Things, Star Wars, Toy Story, Power Rangers, Minecraft, and The Powerpuff Girls all made Google's "good-for-groups" top ten. 

An even deeper dive awaits if you’re interested in the finer details of how Google's search demographics play out. Google Trends’ “Fright Geist 2019” interactive site breaks it all down, letting you zoom in on what’s popular in cities and states through the U.S.. You also can check which cities are searching most furiously for which costumes, and even get the skinny on some fun facts — like “horror films make up 9 percent of all costume searches,” according to Google. 

If uniqueness is more your speed, the Fright Geist site is also a good way to do some homework if you’re serious about picking a costume that’ll help you avoid seeing yourself on every street corner this year. But whether it’s dressing your dog up as a killer clown, even going twosies as a meta-couple in matching Spider-Man suits  (you can even point at each other all night), we’re totally for it — whatever it takes, in fact, to help you bring home the good candy.