Kicking off Thanksgiving Day for the 99th time, the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade will wind its way through the streets of Manhattan with its blend of floats, bands, Santa Claus and the larger-than-life character balloons.
Designed and built in-house by artists and engineers with Macy's Studio, each year's balloon lineup captures a mix of classic and new characters in pop culture and entertainment. Balloons vary in size but can exceed the length of a couple of school buses.
The 2025 parade will feature five new characters among an array of 34 balloons. Classic video game icons PAC-MAN and Mario join Buzz Lightyear from Pixar's "Toy Story" franchise, Derpy Tiger from Netflix's "KPop Demon Hunters," and the onion carriage with eight characters from DreamWorks' "Shrek" movies.
In past parades, balloons have included Mickey Mouse, Uncle Sam, Underdog, Dora the Explorer, Kermit the Frog and many others. The decisions on what characters get the giant-balloon treatment are made with a mix of internal conversations and partnerships with studios and agencies that own the characters.
From initial character design to its final flight test on Balloon Day, production of a character balloon can take anywhere from six to eight months and involve as many as 30 people. Floats featured in the parade follow roughly the same production time.
