WonderCon 2026

If you need an indication that the US economy has entered a "soft recession", take a look at WonderCon. The Anaheim, CA based comic convention had a noticeable dip in attendance in 2026, presumably due to tightened budgets and strained incomes. The federal government might say there is no recession, but We the People say otherwise.

Don't just take my word for it, listen to the words of these random people on the internet.

While these posts aren't hard evidence, it is telling when people are talking about it both online and IRL. Me and others talked about it while we were there. I've attended WonderCon since 2022 and I definitely noticed that attendance was down this year. There were less cosplayers and less people wandering around the vendor halls. There was lots of empty space and even empty booths in the vendor hall. Certain cosplayers that I've consistently recorded video with over the years at WonderCon were absent this year. I struggled to meet my own quota of cosplayers, coming short ten people. In past years, I had no problem reaching my arbitrary quotas.

Does this mean WonderCon is dying or bad or boycotted? No, not at all. It's more or less the same con I've always attended. Same venue. Same vendor hall and panels, more or less. But with rising inflation and flat wages come hard choices. Do I attend WonderCon or go see grandma this year? WonderCon or Anime Expo? WonderCon or… you get it. Budgets are tight and WonderCon is a "nice thing to have" and not a necessity.

Some people say that WonderCon hasn't been the same since 2019, before the pandemic. That was before my time so I can't comment on that besides saying that I feel that way about other conventions. Colossalcon Prime hasn't recovered to a pre-pandemic condition six years later. Some conventions have grown significantly since the pandemic, so it's not an across the board scenario. It could just be the natural success and failure of cons due to other reasons, such as mismanagement and changing interest in fans.

WonderCon is the smaller and less prestigious convention under the San Diego Comic Con umbrella. It follows the same model of most comic cons - have a big vendor hall and invite comic-related guests. It's not the most exciting type of convention from my perspective, but to each their own. It still draws a healthy number of attendees, estimated to be over 20,000. Maybe the model is growing a bit stale and when faced with a budget crunch, people are choosing other options for their entertainment.

Another possible reason for the lower attendance numbers which I haven't touched on is competition. There are so many cons out there and on the weekend of March 27th, there were multiple conventions competing for attendees. There was C2E2, a large comic convention in Chicago, PAX East, a gaming convention in Boston, and Planet Comicon Kansas City which also featured multiple cosplay guests who I would typically see at WonderCon. While it's not unusual to have multiple conventions on any given weekend, it was unusual to have so many larger events on that particular weekend. WonderCon is typically held on the last weekend in March, so it was C2E2 and PAX East as the outliers who were trying to steal the attention.

One complaint I've heard is that WonderCon just didn't have very many guests this year. I don't get too excited about celebrities, but they're certainly a big draw for comic conventions. Planet Comicon was pulling in big name celebrity guests like William Shatner, Elijah Wood, Sean Astin, and Jason Isaacs. C2E2 had Geena Davis, Christopher Eccleston, and Elizabeth Olsen along with some other big names who cancelled. WonderCon had… Felicia Day? Seriously, that's the only name I recognize on a short list of guests. Yikes, I can understand why fans were disappointed. Given that Anaheim is so close to Hollywood, it's almost embarrassing they gathered so few guests. When a comic con in Kansas has five times more guests than you, you have only yourself to blame.

Regardless of the reason for the drop in attendance, WonderCon suffered a loss and it was felt by all who were there. It really knocks this convention down a notch in terms of prestige. Show runners are almost never forthcoming about attendance numbers - it's an industry secret or something - but we noticed it.

For those of us who did show up, we did our best to enjoy it. I recorded with a lovely group of people and made a very nice video available to watch now. Thanks to everyone who shot with me!