One of the most genuinely moving things Disney does all year is back: the Candlelight Processional returns to EPCOT for the 2026 holiday season, and Disney has now confirmed the complete celebrity narrator lineup. It runs November 27 through December 30 as part of the EPCOT International Festival of the Holidays.
If you've never seen it, here's the shape of it: a celebrity narrator reads the Christmas story, backed by a 51-piece orchestra, the a cappella Voices of Liberty, and a mass choir of more than 150 cast members and community singers, on the America Gardens Theatre stage in the American Adventure pavilion. This is its 55th year at Walt Disney World and its 32nd at EPCOT. Even for the not-especially-religious, the sheer scale of the sound is worth the seat.
The 2026 narrator lineup
Narrators rotate every few days across the season. Here's the full schedule, with this year's debuts marked:
- Nov 27–28 — Auli'i Cravalho
- Nov 29–Dec 1 — Gary Sinise
- Dec 2–3 — To be announced
- Dec 4–5 — Whoopi Goldberg
- Dec 6–7 — Robin Roberts (debut)
- Dec 8–9 — Jason Kelce (debut)
- Dec 10–12 — Neil Patrick Harris
- Dec 13–14 — To be announced
- Dec 15–16 — Lauren Daigle
- Dec 17–19 — Ralph Macchio
- Dec 20–21 — Henry Winkler
- Dec 22–23 — Lacey Chabert (debut)
- Dec 24–25 — Jodi Benson
- Dec 26–27 — Simu Liu
- Dec 28–30 — Eva Longoria
A few worth circling: Jason Kelce making his debut the week before the holidays will pull a crowd, and Neil Patrick Harris always does. For the Disney-hearted, Jodi Benson — the voice of Ariel — narrating on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day is a lovely bit of casting. Two slots (Dec 2–3 and Dec 13–14) are still "to be announced."
How to get a seat
There are three performances every night — 4:45, 6:30, and 8:00 p.m. Standby seating is free with park admission but first-come, first-served, and it fills up fast, especially for the marquee narrators and the last two weeks of December. On a busy night you can burn a big chunk of your evening holding a spot.
The reliable way in is a Candlelight Processional Dining Package. You book a meal at a participating EPCOT restaurant (breakfast, lunch, or dinner, depending on the spot) and it comes bundled with a reserved seating badge for a specific showtime that day. Booking opens October 14. Honest take: if you're set on a popular narrator or you're visiting in peak late-December weeks, the dining package is worth it — it turns "line up two hours early and hope" into "eat a nice meal, then walk to a saved seat." If you're flexible and going midweek in early December for a lower-profile narrator, standby is perfectly doable.
Pick your narrator first, then decide how you'll get in: for the big names and the last two weeks of December, book the dining package the day it opens (October 14); for a quiet early-December night, standby is fine.
What we know
The lineup and dates above are confirmed by Disney directly. Still to come: the two "to be announced" narrator slots, and the dining-package restaurant list and pricing, which Disney typically posts right around when booking opens on October 14. We'll refresh this post once those land. It all runs alongside the rest of the Festival of the Holidays — the World Showcase Holiday Kitchens and the Holiday Storytellers — so a Candlelight night pairs naturally with an eating lap around the park.
Building a holiday EPCOT day around it? The app keeps the festival booths, showtimes, and your dining reservations together so you can slot a performance in without the guesswork.