AMC

2026-Summer Movies for Kids on the Cheap!

Abby H.Leave a comment

One of the kid’s favorite summer activities is to hit up the local theater for a showing of one of their favorite movies.

Big buckets of popcorn, snuck in candy (shhhh), and a drink, and they are ready for 2 hours of fun in the Air Conditioning.

 

Some of the “Usual suspects” have not updated their summer movie programs for 2026. As soon as we get more info, I’ll update.

Landmark Theatres has Family Friendly Films starting June 12, 2026. There are no locations in San Diego County, but there are some in Southern California.

Regal Summer Movie Express usually offers tickets for $2 on Tuesdays and Wednesdays, featuring summer movies the whole family will enjoy.

Summer Movie Clubhouse at Cinemark starts June 1, 2026. Bring the kids and enjoy exciting family-friendly big-screen entertainment for just $1.75 (plus taxes) per ticket for each movie.

Lots of smaller theatre chains have also joined this bandwagon! Marcus Theatres, MegaPlex, Epic Theatres are just a few. These theatres do not have locations in California.

Theatre chains that have not published their schedules yet, but in the past have had family/kids movies in the summer:

AMC Theatres has previously had a Summer Movie Camp with tickets starting at $3.oo/each at the box office.

Reading Cinemas usually has the Reel Kids program, with ticket prices reduced to $2/ticket!

UltraStar Cinemas doesn’t have anything posted yet, but they do offer discounts on tickets and popcorn on Thursdays year-round.

Talk Back: What summer movies are you looking forward to seeing?

Summer Movie Programs for Kids!

Abby H.

In the past, I’ve only posted about Regal Cinemas Summer movies but after some digging, I’ve come to discover that most movie theatre companies offer an inexpensive summer movie program for kids!

Looking at each theatres offerings, it appears that there isn’t tons of variety. Most theatres are showing kids movies that were popular in the last 5 years or so.

UltraStar Cinemas: A different film shown every week at 9:30 AM. Tickets on sale NOW at the theater box offices. $1 per movie. Mission Valley at Hazard Center Summer Program, every Monday-Thursday: June 17-August 8.

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Regal 2019 Summer Movie Express series– Movie ticket deals are just $1 on Tuesdays and Wednesdays featuring summer movies the whole family will enjoy like Shrek, Despicable Me, Kung Fu Panda and many more. Regal has the widest variety of movies.

Screen Shot 2019-06-20 at 8.46.09 AM.png Reading Cinema has summer movies as well! Tickets are just $1 each, and movies start at 10am M-TH.

 

Screen Shot 2019-06-20 at 8.57.05 AM.pngAMC offers a summer movie program, however, there are only three locations in California: Bonsall, Irvine, and Apple Valley (Victorville area). Their Summer Movie Camp is being offered at their AMC Classic theatres ONLY.  The complete list of participating theatres can be found here.

The nice part about the AMC program is that the programs includes a ticket to the Kid-Friendly movie plus a KidsPack every Wednesday for just $4 (+tax).

 

To keep the frugal morning going, check out a free kids lunch location near the theatre.  For more info on San Diego locations, check out this post. If you live outside San Diego County, Text FOOD  (Or COMIDA for a list in Spanish) to 877-877, or call 211 and you can find a list of free summer lunch locations near you.