Plans coming up soon, sorted by date so the soonest is always on top. Puppet theater, kids' plays, seasonal festivals, hands-on exhibitions and outings, all picked with families in mind. The list refreshes on its own as new events come in and old ones end, so check back before the weekend.
Rosmarie the cow finds fault with everything on the farm: the pig wallowing in mud, the dog gulping its food, the hen cackling over a tiny egg. When the farmer sends her away, new animals turn up and he learns the problem is not so easy to solve. Two actors tell it with rhythmic language, music and humor, asking what it takes for everyone to belong.
Bär hat es schwer is a puppet show by Figurentheater Pantaleon at the Ramersdorf branch of the Munich city library. Autumn is nearly over, and the bear comes out of the woods full from eating and tired, ready for his soft winter bed.
But something in the bed pokes and pinches, he can't sleep, and he gets grumpy. The show is in German, so it suits kids who follow German.
Grandma is away, so Kasperl and Seppl send Gretel packing and cook their favorite dishes themselves. Their eyes are bigger than their stomachs at the shop, and the kitchen goes from one slapstick disaster to the next until they are glad to take help after all. A classic hand-puppet show in German, with a happy ending.
Max wakes up one morning and finds he has turned into an ant. Small and alone, he needs help to get home, and he finds it among bumblebees, water striders, honeybees and other fascinating creatures.
Altenbach and Honsel tell the story as a poetic trip into the insect world, with groovy music and cool dance moves. It suits kids who enjoy a story told with music and movement.
KiKolino, a mischievous goblin who eats musical notes with cinnamon sugar and whipped cream, turns 13 and receives birthday mail from Beethoven, Brahms, Mozart, Schumann, and Richard Strauss. Postwoman Maria guides the audience through the horn's history while interactive activities invite children to shape the story. Features Maria Teiwes on horn (Munich Philharmonic) and Anne Schätz on piano as KiKolino.
A night watchman leads kids along Munich's old city wall on his evening rounds, telling them how the city lived in the Middle Ages. Kids help him watch for shady characters and lock the city gates, or just listen if they prefer. The stories get a little spooky but are chosen for children, and it's less gory than the adult tour. Stay after for a photo with him.
Two actors play with opposites: up and down, in front and behind, together and alone. They chase, hide and seem to vanish on a stage full of surprises, with fast moments and quiet ones. Director Simone Oswald, a pioneer of theater for the very youngest, developed the show with Munich nursery children.
A St. Martin's lantern walk from a farm at Munich's eastern edge. The loop runs about 2 km along field paths from Reitsberger Hof to the old village of Baldham-Dorf and back, with stops that tell the story of St. Martin sharing his cloak.
Stands at the farm and in Baldham-Dorf serve hot apple juice, sausages, pretzels and roast goose, so it doubles as an early dinner.
A touring kids' musical where five costumed dinosaurs, led by T-Rex Leo, set off for a fire volcano and need the audience's help to get there. Kids shout warnings, solve riddles, sing and dance along.
It's staged as a full theater production with LED walls, spotlights, fog and amplified music. That suits kindergarten and early primary kids well, less so a child who startles at loud noise or big costumes.
A hands-on coding workshop at the Westend public library, part of its ENTER! digital learning series. Kids work with LEGO SPIKE, a kit that combines building, engineering and programming, and code what they build.
It is a playful first look at how computers "think", with lots of trying things out and tinkering. It suits curious kids who are happy following spoken instructions in German.
Lichterkinder are the kids' music group behind "Der Körperteil Blues" and "Guck mal diese Biene da", songs many Munich kids already know from daycare and lantern walks. A seven-piece live band plays them with dance moves and bright costumes, joined by the mascots Liki and Lumi. The audience is the star: everyone sings and dances along, and the hall becomes the stage.
A puppet show from Zagreb's Teatar Gavran, written by Miro Gavran. A little rabbit raised in the city heads back to the forest to find his mom, meets the forest animals along the way, and finds litter piling up there too. He sets out to clean it up.
Performed in Croatian with no subtitles, it best suits Croatian-speaking families.
Magic Maxl is a magician so young he still goes to school, and not Hogwarts: an ordinary school where magic is strictly forbidden. He does it anyway, and kids see what he does with bad essays and how he solves a math problem.
It is comedy magic built around school life. The show is all in German, so it suits kids who follow spoken German, and primary-school kids most.
Storyteller Claudia Schleich brings fairy tales to life inside a snug yurt, told aloud by a crackling fire. Kids sit close and listen to the story as it unfolds.
It suits kids who can follow a short spoken story, and families after a calm Sunday afternoon. The yurt is at Alte Utting, the old excursion ship moored on dry land in Munich.
Tomcat Matze and his friends take a homemade submarine down into a jazz concert made for singing along. Kids meet a jumpy jellyfish, a wild shaggy whale and dancing octopuses, led by two moderators and a live band of sax, guitar, double bass and drums. Jazz standards and playful originals by Alex Naumann.
Astrid Lindgren's Pippi moves into Villa Villekulla with her monkey, Mr. Nilsson, and her horse, and turns life upside down for Tommy and Annika, the well-behaved kids next door. Police officers, robbers and worried neighbors all try to rein her in, and she outwits every one.
Daniela Kranz, who staged Ronja Räubertochter at the Residenztheater, directs this big-stage version with songs and choreography.
A paper and object theater version of the Grimm tale The Fisherman and His Wife. Pulcinella, who loves dancing, singing, eating and sleeping, catches a shimmering magic fish that grants any wish. He asks for a huge plate of pasta. His wife Zeza wants a house, then a palace, then more.
Every figure and picture is made from recycled paper, and a narrator carries the story like a song.
A family session in Robotic Worlds, the robot exhibition at Die Neue Sammlung, Munich's design museum. Kids and parents watch odd machines roll past on a conveyor belt, some shaped like dogs, sea creatures or cartoon characters, and talk about what each one can do and why it was built.
Then it turns hands-on: each kid draws a robot of their own, and gets to program a few real ones.
Flint was the Stone Age toolmaker's favorite material, and this workshop teaches the basics of shaping it. Kids work with real flint to make carving knives and arrowheads, guided by Dr. Robert Graf. It is part of the museum's program for the Stonehenge exhibition.
A merchant lost in the forest steals a rose from a castle garden, and his daughter Bella takes his punishment with the Beast. This is Johannes Galli's own join-in play, not the Disney musical. Kids call out ideas that go into the story, and at many points they can join in on stage. It suits kids who like to take part and can follow German.
Artist Karin Traxler opens her print lab ahead of Christmas. You and your kid design postcards with winter motifs, print them yourselves and take the finished cards home.
It suits a kid who likes making things with their hands, and a family that would rather send its own cards than buy them.
Once a year the Olympia-Schwimmhalle turns into one big try-it day for water sports. Kids can swim like mermaids, paddle a kayak, try diving, jump from the diving boards or balance on a slackline strung over the water.
It suits families with a mix of ages: there is water play for the smallest, while confident swimmers can sample sports a normal pool visit never offers.
Kasperl is a girl this time: brave, curious and supportive. At her side are Seppel with his glitter unicorn, an unusual witch grandma, a glittering wizard and a crocodile who would rather join the party than bite.
The stories are interactive, and kids are in the middle of them, teaching Kasperl their languages, festivals and favorite words and helping shape where each tale goes.
Münchner Theater für Kinder stages its version of the old fable. Mr. and Mrs. Hedgehog have built a small house, then the boastful hare Flitz turns up, claims it is his and demands a golden carrot as rent.
A cuckoo announces a weightlifting contest, and finally the two race each other with the house as the prize. The play is in German, so it suits kids who follow spoken German.
Clown Pepe opens his magic suitcase and turns it into a traveling circus, with mime, acrobatics, magic and plenty of clumsy clowning. In the story, circus characters come to life: tightrope walkers balance and horses gallop through the ring.
Kids are invited to join in and help shape the story. Much of it is told through mime and acrobatics, so kids who don't speak German can still follow along.
Part of Germany's nationwide reading day. Sabine Bohlmann, Charlotte Habersack and Jörg Hilbert each read from their best-known children's books on the theater stage, including Ritter Rost and Frau Honig. A reading barber, Danny Beuerbach, joins in the afternoon, and the day ends with the authors talking about how they write and where ideas come from.
Marcus Pfister, the author of "The Rainbow Fish," reads from his picture book classic for Germany's nationwide reading day (Vorlesetag). Florian Moch, director and puppeteer at the Augsburger Puppenkiste, joins him, along with the original Rainbow Fish puppets used in the new puppet film.
Afterward Pfister signs books. It suits preschoolers and early readers who can follow a story read in German.
Klang Spiel Platz is a walk-in sound installation at the Schauburg, the city-run children's theater. Strings, wind and percussion instruments share the room with wood, metal, plastic and everyday objects, and kids get to bow, strike and blow all of it. Musicians and music teachers from the theater lead the family workshop and help kids find their own sounds. It suits curious kids who want to touch everything.
In a kitchen live the Tuchlinge, a gang of cloth creatures who drum, giggle and romp around their home. Then a letter from the mayor says they must take in someone called Koriander. Surely he stinks and will wreck everything. He doesn't stink, but he does make a mess.
Stefanie Hattenkofer performs with puppets she made from dish towels, gloves and kitchenware, in a gentle story about meeting someone new.
A hands-on chocolate workshop at Museum Mensch und Natur, in Schloss Nymphenburg. Kids find out where cocoa comes from, who harvests it and how a cocoa bean turns into a bar of chocolate.
It suits curious kids who like making things, with a grown-up alongside.
A magician vanishes just before his own show. A stranger in a hoodie and his companion LUMO ask the kids to help find him, through illusions, magic tricks and audience volunteers. The kids drive the story, and it pays off at the end.
Kasperl, the red-capped Bavarian hand puppet, teams up with Mucki, an Easter bunny who has lost his job. Together they cause chaos with slapstick, soap bubbles and plenty of Kasperl magic. Kids are invited to shout along and help the heroes, while the adults laugh at the same old jokes. The Kasperl speaks Bavarian, but the story is easy to follow.
René Frotscher is an award-winning comedy magician, and his family show mixes sleight of hand with clowning, mime, slapstick and a lot of wordplay. Coins appear out of thin air, scarves and cards vanish, and kids from the audience help out with the tricks. He keeps adding new tricks to the program, so families who have seen him before still get fresh material.
Candle Art is an Advent workshop for kids and teens at Sammlung Goetz. Each child designs and decorates their own Advent candle in the studio.
It suits kids who like making things with their hands and want something homemade for the Advent season.
A Bavarian family musical from the Lustspielhaus, with songs by Margit Sarholz and Werner Meier of Sternschnuppe. A cow puts on a dirndl and high heels, breaks out of her pasture and sets off for the city to see a movie, dodging a sneaky butcher pig and catching a ride on a scooter.
A small cast swaps through dozens of roles, backed by a live four-piece band.
In a green three-story house, the Sound Merchant runs a shop where boxes, bottles, little sacks and drawers ring, creak, whistle, hum and squeak. Today's special offer: murmurs, giggles, clapping and amazement.
Two puppeteers from the Bremen puppet theater Mensch, Puppe! play this lively show, loosely based on Kathrin Rohmann's story. It suits kids who like to listen closely and enjoy a busy, noisy stage.
Hexe Trixi is a witch whose spells keep going wrong, and she can barely manage a trick without help from the audience. Magician Kornelia Weiland plays her, and kids get called up as apprentices to help the magic work.
It is a hands-on, giggly show built around joining in, so it suits kids who like to shout out and volunteer. Shy kids can watch from their seats.
Theater Kartonka tells the Christmas story with cardboard shadow puppets, poetry and live music, all set inside the Star of Bethlehem, where candles and lights are lit. Sveta Beny narrates and works the figures, with Lina Hesse on music.
It suits young kids who can sit through a calm, quiet show and who follow Russian, the language it is performed in. An audience talk follows the show.
A kids' version of Mozart's The Magic Flute, told through Papageno, the cheerful bird catcher. Prince Tamino sends him to find Princess Pamina, and a small flute helps him past every danger on the way. Singers share the stage with puppets from münchner puzzletheater while the chamber orchestra concierto münchen plays the music live. A good first opera, with the famous tunes and a story kids can follow.
Bummelkasten is a Berlin one-man band who builds songs almost entirely with his mouth: a cappella vocals, beatbox and live loop-station layers, often performed from an armchair. The songs star odd characters, like Princess Susi, who grills pony sausage and drives a monster truck to the bakery, and Max, the toilet-paper thief who rides escalators. The lyrics are sharp and funny enough that parents laugh along too.
The award-winning percussion duo Double Drums performs a family concert featuring world percussion instruments, saws, power drills, and cardboard boxes transformed into musical instruments. The musicians interact with the audience through rhythmic storytelling: stampeding wildebeest, ocean waves, and desert storms rendered as "ear cinema." The program includes humor, audience participation, and explanations of diverse percussion traditions.
Margit Sarholz and Werner Meier, the duo behind the Sternschnuppe children's songs, lead a pre-Christmas sing-along. Expect songs about sledding and snow, gentle stories, clapping games, and a visit from Schneemo Willi and the Nikolaus. Parents and kids both join in.
Students from the Munich Music Seminar and their guests perform Christmas melodies and classical pieces from various eras. The program includes a gift-giving ceremony as part of this musical St. Nicholas celebration.
The children's edition of the Münchner Advent, run by Munich's folk music association. This year's theme is dreaming: the Christmas story told from a new angle through songs, stories and old Advent customs.
Kids sing along rather than just watch, and pick up traditions many families no longer keep at home. It suits kids who like to join in; a child who wants a show to sit back and watch may fidget.
Santa Claus, known here as Nikolaus, visits the zoo with his angels. Every child gets a moment to tell him their Christmas wishes, and a sweet surprise to take home. It all happens in front of the elephant house, with festive decorations around.
Polarwelten is an indoor exhibition about the Arctic and Antarctic. Kids meet polar bears, penguins and whales through pictures and interactive stations.
The main draw is a 360° room with a show of about 25 minutes, where glaciers, icebergs, underwater scenes and northern lights surround you. It suits curious kids who like animals.
A hands-on exhibition about where food comes from and what it does inside us. Kids milk a cow, turn milk into butter, grind grain into flour and play supermarket with a recipe in hand. A giant nose and an oversized tongue explain smell and taste, and a digestion station follows a bite through the body.
Janosch's picture book, staged. Little Bear fishes a crate out of the river that smells of bananas and says "Panama", so he and Little Tiger set off to find it.
On the way they meet a busy mouse, a cow, a sly fox, a hare and a hedgehog, and work out that home may be the place they were looking for. Five actors play the whole cast.
A 750-square-meter open-air ice rink on Karlsplatz, the square locals call Stachus, at the edge of Munich's old town. Kids skate under Christmas lights to music, with themed evenings through the week.
Skates and helmets rent on site, so nobody needs their own gear. Between laps, the Schmankerl-Hütte and Glühwein-Alm huts serve hot food and drinks. It works for first-timers and confident skaters alike.
LUMAGICA turns the Showpalast grounds in Fröttmaning into a 1.5 km loop of glowing sculptures and light installations. This year's theme follows Phileas Fogg and Passepartout from Around the World in 80 Days, through light worlds for Asia, the Americas and Europe.
Kids can set off some of the installations themselves, pose at photo spots and catch a light and laser show along the way.
LUMAGICA is an outdoor light park, a walking loop of about 1.5 km through light installations after dark. This season's theme is Around the World in 80 Days.
It suits kids who are happy to walk a while on a cold winter evening. Younger kids who tire quickly may need a carrier or a ride on your shoulders for part of the loop.
A stage version of Otfried Preußler's second Hotzenplotz book. The robber has broken out of jail, eaten Grandmother's sausages and sauerkraut, and kidnapped her. Kasperl and Seppel set out to rescue her, get caught themselves, and need help from the fortune teller Mrs. Schlotterbeck and her crocodile-dog Wasti. Played by a cast of seven. Kids who already know the books will follow it most easily.
A stage version of the Grimm tale Die Sterntaler, with music and choreography. Hanne, on her own since her parents' accident, helps out at a Christmas market. When a gold coin falls from the sky, she sets out to return it, riding a barrel organ tune up to the post room for wish lists and the star workshop. Suits kids who can follow a long story in German.
A marionette play about Tabaluga, the little green dragon. A snowstorm from Arktos, the ice king, buries him and wipes his memory, and a ladybug helps him piece his past back together: bees, a dolphin, pigs, and a forbidden red button that sets off a volcano. To save both worlds, dragon and ice king team up with a giant snow cannon. Performed in German with recorded voices and songs.
A stage version of Otfried Preußler's classic about a young witch who wants to do good, though her spells still go wrong and it rains clothespins or white mice. With her hungry raven Abraxas she helps the chestnut seller and rescues Korbinian the ox, while the witch Rumpumpel spies on her before the big test on the Blocksberg. Performed in German by a professional cast in full costume.
A stage version of Sven Nordqvist's Pettersson and Findus Christmas story, played in German by a full cast in hen, cat and fox costumes. Findus crashes his sled into Pettersson while hunting for a tree, and the old man's sprained foot is only the start: a lost wish list, a homemade tree that looks like a wilted cactus, and Snorre the fox stealing the best laying hen.
Sarah Mettenleiter, a Munich pianist and singer who has played with the Jazzrausch Bigband, tells the story of her younger self, who meets the Nix, a dachshund-like creature that appears in moments of pure boredom. Soon little Sarah is wrongly suspected in a jewel theft and needs the Nix and her classmates to clear her name. A five-piece jazz band plays the score while illustrations tell the story alongside.
A Christmas market inside the Kaiserhof, the grand courtyard of Munich's Residenz palace, just off Odeonsplatz. More than 50 stalls sell handmade crafts, old Bavarian nativity scenes, mulled wine and homemade eggnog.
For kids, the draw is the Märchenwald, a fairy-tale forest where scenes come to life at the push of a button. It suits preschool and early primary kids most.
A Christmas market set inside the English Garden, with wooden huts around the lit-up Chinese Tower pagoda. Kids ride a historic 1913 carousel and a small kids' train, take a horse-drawn carriage loop through the park, and try Bavarian ice stock, a curling-style game, on two lanes. Brass players perform from the tower. It suits families who want a calmer market than the crowded Old Town ones.
Munich's oldest Christmas market fills Marienplatz and nearby streets with stalls of ornaments, gingerbread hearts and roasted almonds, under a giant tree outside the New Town Hall. Kids can hear brass bands and choirs on the town hall balcony, browse a huge nativity-figure market by St. Peter's, and catch the Krampus run if they like a scare. About three million people visit each season, so expect crowds.
An Advent market set up as a medieval Munich market scene, with detailed stalls, crafts and market food. Much of it ties back to the city's own history, such as the monk on its first city seal who later turned into the Münchner Kindl.
It suits kids who like knights, castles and old stories, and grown-ups after a more atmospheric Christmas market than the usual.
Balduin Ubinga, a panicked theater director, has been told a rich American wants a jazz concert with scat singing, and nobody knows what scat is. Kids help him find out, alongside a live band of trumpet, piano, drums and double bass.
The show runs from sad blues to wild boogie-woogie, with a little history of African American music along the way, and plenty of clapping, dancing and singing along.
Tollwood is Munich's alternative Christmas market, set up in big tents and open-air lanes on the Theresienwiese. Around 200 stalls sell crafts, clothing and gifts, much of it fair trade, and more than 50 stands cook certified organic food from many countries.
Walk-acts roam the grounds, a performance stage runs shows, and there is a kids' program. It suits families who want shows and food alongside the shopping.
One night Herr Sumsemann, a maybug, taps on Peterchen and Anneliese's window, and the three fly past the Night Fairy and the Star Meadow to the moon to win back his lost sixth leg. Composer Alexander Krampe set Gerdt von Bassewitz's classic German story to music, played by the Bergson Artists on piano, violin, viola and cello, with Maximilian Maier singing and narrating. It suits kids happy to sit and listen.
A cookie angel is supposed to bake for every child St. Nicholas will visit, but the angel is tired, the job is huge, and St. Nicholas could walk in any minute. So the kids in the audience pitch in.
Then Krampus bursts into the heavenly bakery, and a fight breaks out over who bakes better cookies. A small, interactive show in German with music, made for preschoolers and early grade-schoolers.
A stage version of the Grimm tale. Hard-working Maria toils for lazy, money-hungry Frau Schnöselbach and her daughter Marie, who never pay her. When Maria drops her sewing into a well and climbs in after it, she lands in the world of Frau Holle, the woman who makes it snow. A clear story about hard work and fairness, told by a cast of six with bright, colorful sets.
A shortened family version of Mozart's The Magic Flute, keeping the famous music but not the full-length run. Three singers, a narrator and a one-person keyboard "orchestra" tell the story of Prince Tamino, Papageno the bird-catcher and the Queen of the Night, pitched at grown-ups as much as kids. It's performed in German, and works best for kids who already enjoy music and a good story.
A marionette Christmas fairy tale by Siegfried Böhmke. Teddy, himself a Christmas present, helps out in Santa's workshop in the sky and takes a toy airplane for a test flight. He crash-lands in a snowy forest, where new friends help him get it flying again.
A string quartet and a narrator bring Wagner's Ring of the Nibelung down to kid size. The Praetorius Quartett plays themes from the opera cycle while Katja Jung tells the story of the dwarfs, giants, humans and gods fighting over a magic gold ring.
It takes place in the Parkettgarderobe, a foyer inside Munich's opera house, not the main hall. A first taste of classical music and opera storytelling.
Plans coming up soon, sorted by date so the soonest is always on top. Puppet theater, kids' plays, seasonal festivals, hands-on exhibitions and outings, all picked with families in mind. The list refreshes on its own as new events come in and old ones end, so check back before the weekend.
Rosmarie the cow finds fault with everything on the farm: the pig wallowing in mud, the dog gulping its food, the hen cackling over a tiny egg. When the farmer sends her away, new animals turn up and he learns the problem is not so easy to solve. Two actors tell it with rhythmic language, music and humor, asking what it takes for everyone to belong.
Bär hat es schwer is a puppet show by Figurentheater Pantaleon at the Ramersdorf branch of the Munich city library. Autumn is nearly over, and the bear comes out of the woods full from eating and tired, ready for his soft winter bed.
But something in the bed pokes and pinches, he can't sleep, and he gets grumpy. The show is in German, so it suits kids who follow German.
Grandma is away, so Kasperl and Seppl send Gretel packing and cook their favorite dishes themselves. Their eyes are bigger than their stomachs at the shop, and the kitchen goes from one slapstick disaster to the next until they are glad to take help after all. A classic hand-puppet show in German, with a happy ending.
Max wakes up one morning and finds he has turned into an ant. Small and alone, he needs help to get home, and he finds it among bumblebees, water striders, honeybees and other fascinating creatures.
Altenbach and Honsel tell the story as a poetic trip into the insect world, with groovy music and cool dance moves. It suits kids who enjoy a story told with music and movement.
KiKolino, a mischievous goblin who eats musical notes with cinnamon sugar and whipped cream, turns 13 and receives birthday mail from Beethoven, Brahms, Mozart, Schumann, and Richard Strauss. Postwoman Maria guides the audience through the horn's history while interactive activities invite children to shape the story. Features Maria Teiwes on horn (Munich Philharmonic) and Anne Schätz on piano as KiKolino.
A night watchman leads kids along Munich's old city wall on his evening rounds, telling them how the city lived in the Middle Ages. Kids help him watch for shady characters and lock the city gates, or just listen if they prefer. The stories get a little spooky but are chosen for children, and it's less gory than the adult tour. Stay after for a photo with him.
Two actors play with opposites: up and down, in front and behind, together and alone. They chase, hide and seem to vanish on a stage full of surprises, with fast moments and quiet ones. Director Simone Oswald, a pioneer of theater for the very youngest, developed the show with Munich nursery children.
A St. Martin's lantern walk from a farm at Munich's eastern edge. The loop runs about 2 km along field paths from Reitsberger Hof to the old village of Baldham-Dorf and back, with stops that tell the story of St. Martin sharing his cloak.
Stands at the farm and in Baldham-Dorf serve hot apple juice, sausages, pretzels and roast goose, so it doubles as an early dinner.
A touring kids' musical where five costumed dinosaurs, led by T-Rex Leo, set off for a fire volcano and need the audience's help to get there. Kids shout warnings, solve riddles, sing and dance along.
It's staged as a full theater production with LED walls, spotlights, fog and amplified music. That suits kindergarten and early primary kids well, less so a child who startles at loud noise or big costumes.
A hands-on coding workshop at the Westend public library, part of its ENTER! digital learning series. Kids work with LEGO SPIKE, a kit that combines building, engineering and programming, and code what they build.
It is a playful first look at how computers "think", with lots of trying things out and tinkering. It suits curious kids who are happy following spoken instructions in German.
Lichterkinder are the kids' music group behind "Der Körperteil Blues" and "Guck mal diese Biene da", songs many Munich kids already know from daycare and lantern walks. A seven-piece live band plays them with dance moves and bright costumes, joined by the mascots Liki and Lumi. The audience is the star: everyone sings and dances along, and the hall becomes the stage.
A puppet show from Zagreb's Teatar Gavran, written by Miro Gavran. A little rabbit raised in the city heads back to the forest to find his mom, meets the forest animals along the way, and finds litter piling up there too. He sets out to clean it up.
Performed in Croatian with no subtitles, it best suits Croatian-speaking families.
Magic Maxl is a magician so young he still goes to school, and not Hogwarts: an ordinary school where magic is strictly forbidden. He does it anyway, and kids see what he does with bad essays and how he solves a math problem.
It is comedy magic built around school life. The show is all in German, so it suits kids who follow spoken German, and primary-school kids most.
Storyteller Claudia Schleich brings fairy tales to life inside a snug yurt, told aloud by a crackling fire. Kids sit close and listen to the story as it unfolds.
It suits kids who can follow a short spoken story, and families after a calm Sunday afternoon. The yurt is at Alte Utting, the old excursion ship moored on dry land in Munich.
Tomcat Matze and his friends take a homemade submarine down into a jazz concert made for singing along. Kids meet a jumpy jellyfish, a wild shaggy whale and dancing octopuses, led by two moderators and a live band of sax, guitar, double bass and drums. Jazz standards and playful originals by Alex Naumann.
Astrid Lindgren's Pippi moves into Villa Villekulla with her monkey, Mr. Nilsson, and her horse, and turns life upside down for Tommy and Annika, the well-behaved kids next door. Police officers, robbers and worried neighbors all try to rein her in, and she outwits every one.
Daniela Kranz, who staged Ronja Räubertochter at the Residenztheater, directs this big-stage version with songs and choreography.
A paper and object theater version of the Grimm tale The Fisherman and His Wife. Pulcinella, who loves dancing, singing, eating and sleeping, catches a shimmering magic fish that grants any wish. He asks for a huge plate of pasta. His wife Zeza wants a house, then a palace, then more.
Every figure and picture is made from recycled paper, and a narrator carries the story like a song.
A family session in Robotic Worlds, the robot exhibition at Die Neue Sammlung, Munich's design museum. Kids and parents watch odd machines roll past on a conveyor belt, some shaped like dogs, sea creatures or cartoon characters, and talk about what each one can do and why it was built.
Then it turns hands-on: each kid draws a robot of their own, and gets to program a few real ones.
Flint was the Stone Age toolmaker's favorite material, and this workshop teaches the basics of shaping it. Kids work with real flint to make carving knives and arrowheads, guided by Dr. Robert Graf. It is part of the museum's program for the Stonehenge exhibition.
A merchant lost in the forest steals a rose from a castle garden, and his daughter Bella takes his punishment with the Beast. This is Johannes Galli's own join-in play, not the Disney musical. Kids call out ideas that go into the story, and at many points they can join in on stage. It suits kids who like to take part and can follow German.
Artist Karin Traxler opens her print lab ahead of Christmas. You and your kid design postcards with winter motifs, print them yourselves and take the finished cards home.
It suits a kid who likes making things with their hands, and a family that would rather send its own cards than buy them.
Once a year the Olympia-Schwimmhalle turns into one big try-it day for water sports. Kids can swim like mermaids, paddle a kayak, try diving, jump from the diving boards or balance on a slackline strung over the water.
It suits families with a mix of ages: there is water play for the smallest, while confident swimmers can sample sports a normal pool visit never offers.
Kasperl is a girl this time: brave, curious and supportive. At her side are Seppel with his glitter unicorn, an unusual witch grandma, a glittering wizard and a crocodile who would rather join the party than bite.
The stories are interactive, and kids are in the middle of them, teaching Kasperl their languages, festivals and favorite words and helping shape where each tale goes.
Münchner Theater für Kinder stages its version of the old fable. Mr. and Mrs. Hedgehog have built a small house, then the boastful hare Flitz turns up, claims it is his and demands a golden carrot as rent.
A cuckoo announces a weightlifting contest, and finally the two race each other with the house as the prize. The play is in German, so it suits kids who follow spoken German.
Clown Pepe opens his magic suitcase and turns it into a traveling circus, with mime, acrobatics, magic and plenty of clumsy clowning. In the story, circus characters come to life: tightrope walkers balance and horses gallop through the ring.
Kids are invited to join in and help shape the story. Much of it is told through mime and acrobatics, so kids who don't speak German can still follow along.
Part of Germany's nationwide reading day. Sabine Bohlmann, Charlotte Habersack and Jörg Hilbert each read from their best-known children's books on the theater stage, including Ritter Rost and Frau Honig. A reading barber, Danny Beuerbach, joins in the afternoon, and the day ends with the authors talking about how they write and where ideas come from.
Marcus Pfister, the author of "The Rainbow Fish," reads from his picture book classic for Germany's nationwide reading day (Vorlesetag). Florian Moch, director and puppeteer at the Augsburger Puppenkiste, joins him, along with the original Rainbow Fish puppets used in the new puppet film.
Afterward Pfister signs books. It suits preschoolers and early readers who can follow a story read in German.
Klang Spiel Platz is a walk-in sound installation at the Schauburg, the city-run children's theater. Strings, wind and percussion instruments share the room with wood, metal, plastic and everyday objects, and kids get to bow, strike and blow all of it. Musicians and music teachers from the theater lead the family workshop and help kids find their own sounds. It suits curious kids who want to touch everything.
In a kitchen live the Tuchlinge, a gang of cloth creatures who drum, giggle and romp around their home. Then a letter from the mayor says they must take in someone called Koriander. Surely he stinks and will wreck everything. He doesn't stink, but he does make a mess.
Stefanie Hattenkofer performs with puppets she made from dish towels, gloves and kitchenware, in a gentle story about meeting someone new.
A hands-on chocolate workshop at Museum Mensch und Natur, in Schloss Nymphenburg. Kids find out where cocoa comes from, who harvests it and how a cocoa bean turns into a bar of chocolate.
It suits curious kids who like making things, with a grown-up alongside.
A magician vanishes just before his own show. A stranger in a hoodie and his companion LUMO ask the kids to help find him, through illusions, magic tricks and audience volunteers. The kids drive the story, and it pays off at the end.
Kasperl, the red-capped Bavarian hand puppet, teams up with Mucki, an Easter bunny who has lost his job. Together they cause chaos with slapstick, soap bubbles and plenty of Kasperl magic. Kids are invited to shout along and help the heroes, while the adults laugh at the same old jokes. The Kasperl speaks Bavarian, but the story is easy to follow.
René Frotscher is an award-winning comedy magician, and his family show mixes sleight of hand with clowning, mime, slapstick and a lot of wordplay. Coins appear out of thin air, scarves and cards vanish, and kids from the audience help out with the tricks. He keeps adding new tricks to the program, so families who have seen him before still get fresh material.
Candle Art is an Advent workshop for kids and teens at Sammlung Goetz. Each child designs and decorates their own Advent candle in the studio.
It suits kids who like making things with their hands and want something homemade for the Advent season.
A Bavarian family musical from the Lustspielhaus, with songs by Margit Sarholz and Werner Meier of Sternschnuppe. A cow puts on a dirndl and high heels, breaks out of her pasture and sets off for the city to see a movie, dodging a sneaky butcher pig and catching a ride on a scooter.
A small cast swaps through dozens of roles, backed by a live four-piece band.
In a green three-story house, the Sound Merchant runs a shop where boxes, bottles, little sacks and drawers ring, creak, whistle, hum and squeak. Today's special offer: murmurs, giggles, clapping and amazement.
Two puppeteers from the Bremen puppet theater Mensch, Puppe! play this lively show, loosely based on Kathrin Rohmann's story. It suits kids who like to listen closely and enjoy a busy, noisy stage.
Hexe Trixi is a witch whose spells keep going wrong, and she can barely manage a trick without help from the audience. Magician Kornelia Weiland plays her, and kids get called up as apprentices to help the magic work.
It is a hands-on, giggly show built around joining in, so it suits kids who like to shout out and volunteer. Shy kids can watch from their seats.
Theater Kartonka tells the Christmas story with cardboard shadow puppets, poetry and live music, all set inside the Star of Bethlehem, where candles and lights are lit. Sveta Beny narrates and works the figures, with Lina Hesse on music.
It suits young kids who can sit through a calm, quiet show and who follow Russian, the language it is performed in. An audience talk follows the show.
A kids' version of Mozart's The Magic Flute, told through Papageno, the cheerful bird catcher. Prince Tamino sends him to find Princess Pamina, and a small flute helps him past every danger on the way. Singers share the stage with puppets from münchner puzzletheater while the chamber orchestra concierto münchen plays the music live. A good first opera, with the famous tunes and a story kids can follow.
Bummelkasten is a Berlin one-man band who builds songs almost entirely with his mouth: a cappella vocals, beatbox and live loop-station layers, often performed from an armchair. The songs star odd characters, like Princess Susi, who grills pony sausage and drives a monster truck to the bakery, and Max, the toilet-paper thief who rides escalators. The lyrics are sharp and funny enough that parents laugh along too.
The award-winning percussion duo Double Drums performs a family concert featuring world percussion instruments, saws, power drills, and cardboard boxes transformed into musical instruments. The musicians interact with the audience through rhythmic storytelling: stampeding wildebeest, ocean waves, and desert storms rendered as "ear cinema." The program includes humor, audience participation, and explanations of diverse percussion traditions.
Margit Sarholz and Werner Meier, the duo behind the Sternschnuppe children's songs, lead a pre-Christmas sing-along. Expect songs about sledding and snow, gentle stories, clapping games, and a visit from Schneemo Willi and the Nikolaus. Parents and kids both join in.
Students from the Munich Music Seminar and their guests perform Christmas melodies and classical pieces from various eras. The program includes a gift-giving ceremony as part of this musical St. Nicholas celebration.
The children's edition of the Münchner Advent, run by Munich's folk music association. This year's theme is dreaming: the Christmas story told from a new angle through songs, stories and old Advent customs.
Kids sing along rather than just watch, and pick up traditions many families no longer keep at home. It suits kids who like to join in; a child who wants a show to sit back and watch may fidget.
Santa Claus, known here as Nikolaus, visits the zoo with his angels. Every child gets a moment to tell him their Christmas wishes, and a sweet surprise to take home. It all happens in front of the elephant house, with festive decorations around.
Polarwelten is an indoor exhibition about the Arctic and Antarctic. Kids meet polar bears, penguins and whales through pictures and interactive stations.
The main draw is a 360° room with a show of about 25 minutes, where glaciers, icebergs, underwater scenes and northern lights surround you. It suits curious kids who like animals.
A hands-on exhibition about where food comes from and what it does inside us. Kids milk a cow, turn milk into butter, grind grain into flour and play supermarket with a recipe in hand. A giant nose and an oversized tongue explain smell and taste, and a digestion station follows a bite through the body.
Janosch's picture book, staged. Little Bear fishes a crate out of the river that smells of bananas and says "Panama", so he and Little Tiger set off to find it.
On the way they meet a busy mouse, a cow, a sly fox, a hare and a hedgehog, and work out that home may be the place they were looking for. Five actors play the whole cast.
A 750-square-meter open-air ice rink on Karlsplatz, the square locals call Stachus, at the edge of Munich's old town. Kids skate under Christmas lights to music, with themed evenings through the week.
Skates and helmets rent on site, so nobody needs their own gear. Between laps, the Schmankerl-Hütte and Glühwein-Alm huts serve hot food and drinks. It works for first-timers and confident skaters alike.
LUMAGICA turns the Showpalast grounds in Fröttmaning into a 1.5 km loop of glowing sculptures and light installations. This year's theme follows Phileas Fogg and Passepartout from Around the World in 80 Days, through light worlds for Asia, the Americas and Europe.
Kids can set off some of the installations themselves, pose at photo spots and catch a light and laser show along the way.
LUMAGICA is an outdoor light park, a walking loop of about 1.5 km through light installations after dark. This season's theme is Around the World in 80 Days.
It suits kids who are happy to walk a while on a cold winter evening. Younger kids who tire quickly may need a carrier or a ride on your shoulders for part of the loop.
A stage version of Otfried Preußler's second Hotzenplotz book. The robber has broken out of jail, eaten Grandmother's sausages and sauerkraut, and kidnapped her. Kasperl and Seppel set out to rescue her, get caught themselves, and need help from the fortune teller Mrs. Schlotterbeck and her crocodile-dog Wasti. Played by a cast of seven. Kids who already know the books will follow it most easily.
A stage version of the Grimm tale Die Sterntaler, with music and choreography. Hanne, on her own since her parents' accident, helps out at a Christmas market. When a gold coin falls from the sky, she sets out to return it, riding a barrel organ tune up to the post room for wish lists and the star workshop. Suits kids who can follow a long story in German.
A marionette play about Tabaluga, the little green dragon. A snowstorm from Arktos, the ice king, buries him and wipes his memory, and a ladybug helps him piece his past back together: bees, a dolphin, pigs, and a forbidden red button that sets off a volcano. To save both worlds, dragon and ice king team up with a giant snow cannon. Performed in German with recorded voices and songs.
A stage version of Otfried Preußler's classic about a young witch who wants to do good, though her spells still go wrong and it rains clothespins or white mice. With her hungry raven Abraxas she helps the chestnut seller and rescues Korbinian the ox, while the witch Rumpumpel spies on her before the big test on the Blocksberg. Performed in German by a professional cast in full costume.
A stage version of Sven Nordqvist's Pettersson and Findus Christmas story, played in German by a full cast in hen, cat and fox costumes. Findus crashes his sled into Pettersson while hunting for a tree, and the old man's sprained foot is only the start: a lost wish list, a homemade tree that looks like a wilted cactus, and Snorre the fox stealing the best laying hen.
Sarah Mettenleiter, a Munich pianist and singer who has played with the Jazzrausch Bigband, tells the story of her younger self, who meets the Nix, a dachshund-like creature that appears in moments of pure boredom. Soon little Sarah is wrongly suspected in a jewel theft and needs the Nix and her classmates to clear her name. A five-piece jazz band plays the score while illustrations tell the story alongside.
A Christmas market inside the Kaiserhof, the grand courtyard of Munich's Residenz palace, just off Odeonsplatz. More than 50 stalls sell handmade crafts, old Bavarian nativity scenes, mulled wine and homemade eggnog.
For kids, the draw is the Märchenwald, a fairy-tale forest where scenes come to life at the push of a button. It suits preschool and early primary kids most.
A Christmas market set inside the English Garden, with wooden huts around the lit-up Chinese Tower pagoda. Kids ride a historic 1913 carousel and a small kids' train, take a horse-drawn carriage loop through the park, and try Bavarian ice stock, a curling-style game, on two lanes. Brass players perform from the tower. It suits families who want a calmer market than the crowded Old Town ones.
Munich's oldest Christmas market fills Marienplatz and nearby streets with stalls of ornaments, gingerbread hearts and roasted almonds, under a giant tree outside the New Town Hall. Kids can hear brass bands and choirs on the town hall balcony, browse a huge nativity-figure market by St. Peter's, and catch the Krampus run if they like a scare. About three million people visit each season, so expect crowds.
An Advent market set up as a medieval Munich market scene, with detailed stalls, crafts and market food. Much of it ties back to the city's own history, such as the monk on its first city seal who later turned into the Münchner Kindl.
It suits kids who like knights, castles and old stories, and grown-ups after a more atmospheric Christmas market than the usual.
Balduin Ubinga, a panicked theater director, has been told a rich American wants a jazz concert with scat singing, and nobody knows what scat is. Kids help him find out, alongside a live band of trumpet, piano, drums and double bass.
The show runs from sad blues to wild boogie-woogie, with a little history of African American music along the way, and plenty of clapping, dancing and singing along.
Tollwood is Munich's alternative Christmas market, set up in big tents and open-air lanes on the Theresienwiese. Around 200 stalls sell crafts, clothing and gifts, much of it fair trade, and more than 50 stands cook certified organic food from many countries.
Walk-acts roam the grounds, a performance stage runs shows, and there is a kids' program. It suits families who want shows and food alongside the shopping.
One night Herr Sumsemann, a maybug, taps on Peterchen and Anneliese's window, and the three fly past the Night Fairy and the Star Meadow to the moon to win back his lost sixth leg. Composer Alexander Krampe set Gerdt von Bassewitz's classic German story to music, played by the Bergson Artists on piano, violin, viola and cello, with Maximilian Maier singing and narrating. It suits kids happy to sit and listen.
A cookie angel is supposed to bake for every child St. Nicholas will visit, but the angel is tired, the job is huge, and St. Nicholas could walk in any minute. So the kids in the audience pitch in.
Then Krampus bursts into the heavenly bakery, and a fight breaks out over who bakes better cookies. A small, interactive show in German with music, made for preschoolers and early grade-schoolers.
A stage version of the Grimm tale. Hard-working Maria toils for lazy, money-hungry Frau Schnöselbach and her daughter Marie, who never pay her. When Maria drops her sewing into a well and climbs in after it, she lands in the world of Frau Holle, the woman who makes it snow. A clear story about hard work and fairness, told by a cast of six with bright, colorful sets.
A shortened family version of Mozart's The Magic Flute, keeping the famous music but not the full-length run. Three singers, a narrator and a one-person keyboard "orchestra" tell the story of Prince Tamino, Papageno the bird-catcher and the Queen of the Night, pitched at grown-ups as much as kids. It's performed in German, and works best for kids who already enjoy music and a good story.
A marionette Christmas fairy tale by Siegfried Böhmke. Teddy, himself a Christmas present, helps out in Santa's workshop in the sky and takes a toy airplane for a test flight. He crash-lands in a snowy forest, where new friends help him get it flying again.
A string quartet and a narrator bring Wagner's Ring of the Nibelung down to kid size. The Praetorius Quartett plays themes from the opera cycle while Katja Jung tells the story of the dwarfs, giants, humans and gods fighting over a magic gold ring.
It takes place in the Parkettgarderobe, a foyer inside Munich's opera house, not the main hall. A first taste of classical music and opera storytelling.
