Witches Potions for Halloween

Halloween is around the corner, so there’s no better time to make spooky witches’ potions. Potions are a much loved activity in our house at any time of year, especially at Halloween! Look through this collection of fizzing, slimy, colour-changing, and even dry ice potions and let us know if you try any.

Teaching with Potions

Potion making is a great activity just for fun, but it can also include lots of learning opportunities.

The BEST Witches Potions

Fizzy Witch Laboratory

Fizzy potions are easy to make with baking soda and vinegar and look very impressive. I set up a fizzy witches lab for my daughter, and she loved it.

I used test tubes instead of larger containers as it meant she could experiment easily with different colours and allowed her to make lots of eruptions with only a small amount of baking soda and vinegar.

Witches laboratory set up in a garden with test tubes, magnifying glass and gloop. A great Halloween science activity for kids

What you need to make fizzy potions

Baking Soda ( Bicarbonate of Soda )

Food colouring

Vinegar

Test tubes or other container

Pipette

Water

How to make a fizzy witch potions

Place a teaspoon of baking soda, a little water and a few drops of food colouring into each test tube.

Use the pipette to add vinegar to each tube. The mixture should fizz up out of the test tube.

TOP TIP – to make an extra foamy potion, add a little dish soap ( washing up liquid ) before adding the vinegar.

fizzy test tubes as part of a witches laboratory for Halloween

Experiment with different amounts of baking soda, washing-up liquid and vinegar to find the perfect fizz!

Spider Slime

This stretchy slime has a great texture and is very easy to make. It can be squished, stretched and poured and feels deliciously gloopy and slimy!

What you need:

Chia seeds

PVA glue

Cornflour

Water

How to make spider slime

Soak the chia seeds in water for a few hours.

When the chia seeds look thick and slimy, add a dollop of PVA glue and enough cornflour to make the mixture thick and gloopy. For a drier slime, add more cornflour.

If you’re worried about children trying to eat the slime, you can miss out on the PVA glue. It just won’t stretch as well.

spider slime made with chia seeds and cornflour

Magic Colour Changing Potions

Colour changing potions using red cabbage indicator are a great first introduction to acids and alkalis. Children can experiment to find out how many different colours they can make!

To make the red cabbage indicator, boil red cabbage in water for about 5 minutes. The red cabbage water is the indicator. It changes colour depending on whether an acid or alkali is added.

I used vinegar, lemon juice and baking soda to create the colours below.

colour changing potions made using red cabbage indicator

Edible Magic Potion

I really love the look of this steamy potion, on Fun Crafts Kids. However, remember to check out the safety warnings first.

steaming potions for a Halloween activity

Goblin Snot Juice

We shared some easy potion ideas with Day Out With The Kids a while ago. Including creepy Goblin Snot Juice and colour-changing bat broth!

This potion is green water with a layer of oil on the top. If the container is shaken, the mixture separates into oil and water again!

Green potion in a conical flask for Halloween

Witchy Density Jar

This witchy density jar is made in a similar way. Just pour coloured water into a jar with a layer of oil on the top, then try to find different creepy objects to float on the layers.

We found a bouncy ball eyeball floated on the top, and a coin sank to the bottom.

Witchy Density Jar made with oil ad water sat in a background of a witches hat and Halloween props

Wizard Potion made with different density liquids in a glass

More Potion Ideas for Kids

Print my FREE fizzy potion recipe and create your own potion with the blank recipe page.

spooky potion recipe for Halloween using baking soda and vinegar

Plain spooky potion recipe download for Halloween. Recipe sheet includes blank boxes for children to complete the ingredients list and instructions

More potion ideas for Halloween

The Imagination Tree has a beautiful Fairy Potion that you could turn into a Halloween potion.

We love the look of this polyjuice potion from This Grandma is Fun, too.

If you’re looking for an easy Halloween costume idea, Red Ted Art is full of inspiration!

More Halloween Science Ideas

Try our Halloween party science ideas, including fake blood, pumpkin lava lamps and spider decorations.

My new book Gross Science, is jam packed full of gruesome, sticky and slimy science experiments for kids! Make jelly scabs, chocolate poo, slimy slugs, a blood model and lots more experiments sure to creep out your friends and family!

Gross Science book for kids. Image shows fake poo made from chocolate, jelly scabs and red blood cell cupcakes!

I’ve also got an exciting collection of Halloween STEM Challenges you might like. Including spider drawing robots, blowing up pumpkin balloons and more!