How to Make Halloween Stickers on iPhone (Costumes, Pets, and a Spooky Pack)
The best Halloween stickers are not pumpkins. They are your friend in last year's terrible costume, the cat in a witch hat it tolerated for four seconds, and the group costume nobody agreed on until the night before. On an iPhone you can make those in two ways: cut a real photo out into a sticker with the tools built into Photos, or have an emoji maker redraw it as a cartoon and build a whole matching pack around it. This guide covers both, what to put in a Halloween pack, the prompts that give a set one spooky look, and how to have it ready in WhatsApp and iMessage before October 31.
The short version
- A real photo as a sticker: open a costume photo, touch and hold the person until they lift off the background, tap Add Sticker, and pick an effect such as Comic or Puffy.
- A cartoon of the costume: Pixmoji's Image to Emoji redraws the costume photo as an emoji-style sticker, on any iPhone with iOS 15 or later.
- Everything else in the pack comes from a sentence in Text to Emoji: "black cat in a witch hat, spooky cute cartoon sticker". Use the same style words on every prompt.
- Eight to twelve stickers is a good pack. Add them to one pack, tap Install Pack for WhatsApp, and send the first one on the morning of the 31st.
What goes in a Halloween pack
A pack of generic ghosts gets used once. A pack about your people gets used every October for years.
- The costumes. Each friend in their costume, this year's and the legendary ones from past years. These are the stickers people will actually send.
- The pets. The dog as a pumpkin, the cat as a bat. If the pet refused the costume, the prompt can do it for them.
- The reactions. A ghost saying nope, a skeleton waiting, a pumpkin with a shocked face. Reaction stickers are what keeps a pack alive after the party.
- The inside joke. The costume someone threatened to wear, the house that gives out toothbrushes, the horror film one friend is too scared to finish.
- Two classics in the same look, a jack-o'-lantern and a candy bowl, so the pack works for any Halloween message.
The built-in way: photo cutouts
Since iOS 17 you can turn any photo into a sticker without an app.
- Open a costume photo in Photos.
- Touch and hold the person or pet until a glowing outline appears and the subject lifts off the background.
- Tap Add Sticker. The sticker goes into the sticker drawer next to your emoji keyboard.
- Tap Add Effect to choose Original, White Outline, Comic, Puffy, or Shiny. Comic is the most Halloween of the five.
If the photo is a Live Photo, the sticker moves: a friend throwing a cape or a dog shaking off a hat makes a short animated sticker. This is the fastest way to get a real costume into iMessage. Where it stops: the result is always a real photo, it cannot add anything that was not in the picture, and a set of cutouts from different photos rarely looks like a pack. Details on the drawer are in adding custom emojis and stickers to iMessage.
On an iPhone with Apple Intelligence, Genmoji can also generate a single emoji from a description, such as "ghost holding a coffee". It makes one at a time, in Apple's own look, and has no pack to install in WhatsApp. How it compares is in Genmoji vs custom emoji apps.
Making the pack in Pixmoji
Step 1: the costumes. Open Pixmoji, choose Image to Emoji, and pick a costume photo where the face and the costume are both clearly visible, in good light, ideally against a plain background. Pixmoji redraws it as an emoji-style sticker with the background removed. Masks that cover the whole face work fine; it is the costume's shape and colors that make the result recognizable. Run it on two or three different photos per person and keep the best.
Step 2: the scenes and reactions. Switch to Text to Emoji and describe each sticker in one sentence. Pixmoji has no style menu; the style lives in the words you type, which is exactly what makes a pack consistent. Pick one style phrase and put it on every prompt:
- "corgi dressed as a pumpkin, spooky cute cartoon sticker"
- "black cat in a witch hat on a broom, spooky cute cartoon sticker"
- "small ghost shaking its head no, spooky cute cartoon sticker"
- "skeleton checking a watch, waiting, spooky cute cartoon sticker"
- "jack-o'-lantern with a shocked face, spooky cute cartoon sticker"
Swap "spooky cute cartoon" for "pixel art", "claymation", or "vintage horror poster" if that suits the chat better, but keep the same phrase across the whole pack. More phrases that hold a look together are in the best AI emoji styles.
A note on words. Generated images are unreliable with text. "BOO" in big letters usually works; a sentence or a name often comes out misspelled. Keep text to one short word, check it, and put the rest in the message.
Step 3: the pack. Every result has copy, save, and share buttons, plus Add to Pack. Add each keeper to a pack called something like "Halloween 2026". Eight to twelve is right. If you need more classics to fill it, the Explore tab has ready-made packs you can install alongside your own.
Getting it into the chat
- WhatsApp. Open the pack and tap Install Pack. It appears in the sticker tab of the WhatsApp keyboard. Send one sticker to the group; anyone who taps it can add the whole pack. The full route is in how to make WhatsApp stickers on iPhone.
- iMessage. Saved stickers sit in the sticker drawer. Drag one onto a message to stick it on the bubble.
- Instagram. Share to Instagram Stories from the result screen, and the costume sticker doubles as the party post.
Timing. Make the pack a few days before, not on the night. Send the first sticker on the morning of October 31, and the costume stickers after the party, when there are new photos to turn into stickers. Then keep the pack: next October it is already installed.
One consideration. A sticker pack can be installed by anyone who receives a sticker from it. Ask before putting someone's face in a pack for a big group, and keep children's photos in private chats.
Quick answers
How do I make a Halloween sticker from a photo on iPhone?
Open the photo in Photos, touch and hold the person until they lift off the background, tap Add Sticker, and choose an effect. For a cartoon version, use Pixmoji's Image to Emoji on the same photo.
Can I make animated Halloween stickers on iPhone?
Yes, from a Live Photo. Add Sticker on a Live Photo subject creates a short moving sticker for iMessage.
How do I make a matching Halloween sticker pack?
Use one style phrase on every prompt in Text to Emoji, such as "spooky cute cartoon sticker", add every keeper to one pack, and install it in WhatsApp with Install Pack.
Can I use Halloween stickers in WhatsApp on iPhone?
Photo cutouts from Photos stay in iMessage. For WhatsApp you need a pack: make the stickers in Pixmoji, add them to a pack, and tap Install Pack.
How many stickers should a Halloween pack have?
Eight to twelve: the costumes, the pets, three or four reactions, an inside joke, and two classics in the same look.
Make the costume last longer than the party
A costume is worn once. A sticker of it gets sent every October. Download Pixmoji, free to download, and turn this year's costumes into the pack your group chat keeps.