5 Scary Clown Stories You Can Tell

I love clowns. Some people don’t; they find them very scary. And maybe rightly so, because there are many scary clown stories! Here are five you can tell to scare your listeners. 🙂

The short scary clown stories on this page are stories you can quickly adapt and tell. Let’s bring on the clowns!

1. The clown statue

This is one of the most well-known scary clown stories. A classic!

A babysitter babysits for a wealthy couple. They ask her to watch television in their bedroom, so she can hear the children if they are scared.

After bringing the children to bed, she sits down in the parents’ bedroom to watch tv.

In the corner of the room is a strange statue of a clown. She can’t ignore the feeling that the statue is somehow watching her. She calls the parents to tell them everything is ok, except that the clown statue is freaking her out.

The father asks her to take the children and flee the house. They do not have a clown statue! When the police arrive, they arrest the man in the clown suit. He is carrying a knife.

2. The cold case clown

She opens the door. In front of her stands a clown—a proper one, with balloons and flowers.

Suddenly he takes out a gun and kills her. Her son sees him escape in a white car.

For a very long time, this case remained unsolved. Prime suspect: her husband, who had an affair and received a hefty life insurance check.

Only 27 years later, the police have arrested the woman who had an affair with her husband. Improved analysis of DNA samples has pointed her out as the one in the clown suit.

This story could very well be told as a detective story.

3. The clown doll

This must be one of the more horrific stories about clowns. It scares me.

A young girl who loves dolls and her mother go shopping in a toy store. She can choose anything she wants.

On top of a cupboard, she finds a clown doll. One of his hands is showing three fingers.

The toy store owner does not want to sell the doll, but when the mother offers 100 dollars, he does. He says to her, “Don’t leave the girl alone with the doll.”

At home, the mother leaves the doll with her daughter to sleep. The following day she finds her daughter dead and the grinning doll holding up four fingers.

❗ Want some expert tips? Here is my guide on telling scary stories.

4. The clown (original story)

A boy walks home and finds some candy in his pocket.

He remembers taking it from a clown at a birthday party. He doesn’t like this clown. Nobody knows who this clown is. Suddenly he gets afraid. One other kid has been telling scary stories about this clown.

As he arrives home, he sees the clown’s shoes and blood, a lot of blood.

He enters the shed, and there he sees the clown take apart the kid that talked about him.

At the end of this story, there is a twist that I will not give away here. I think it will work well in oral storytelling.

5. The clown costume

Students can be so irritating. Lazy. Undisciplined.

As he thinks about his awful students, a teacher sees a clown outside his window.

The next day after a challenging day with the students, he sees the clown again, now with an ax.

At some point, a group of students stands outside the teacher’s home. He sees the scary clown with the ax again. He runs outside to warn them, but it is too late.

The clown brutally axes the students.

When the police arrive, they arrest the clown and find out that the clown is the teacher.

Where do all these scary clowns come from?

You might wonder, like me, where the ‘scary clown’ comes from. After all, aren’t clowns meant to make you laugh?

This article from Smithsonian Magazine answers this question and gives a lot of background to the ‘scary clown’-phenomenon. Enjoy!

P.S. I found one more clown story! It’s in my collection of stories for Halloween storytelling!

Photo credits: Photo by saeed karimi on Unsplash