Let's just get this out of the way. No ride at WDW is worth an excruciatingly long wait. There, I said it. You can berate me in the comments. During every visit I see families choose to wait in a 3-hour queue for a 3 minute attraction and I think to myself, "Why would you do that?" There are some simple and easy strategies you can use to help you avoid unnecessarily long wait times. What tips do you have to ensure short waits? Let me know in the comments!
Tip #1: Rope Drop & First Attraction
Rope Drop is when Cast Members walk guests back to the most popular attractions once the park opens. Most WDW experts will tell you to get to the park 60-90 minutes early so you can position yourself at the very front of the crowds headed for rides such as Flight of Passage, Seven Dwarfs Mine Train, and Slinky Dog Dash. My first tip, however, is to do the opposite.
I usually do not arrive to a theme park until about 5 minutes before rope drop. I am able to do this because I do NOT go the most popular attraction at rope drop. I usually tackle the 2nd or 3rd most popular attractions, which doesn't draw the kind of crowds you see at the aforementioned rides. This also means I don't have to stand among a giant crowd of humans one hour before the park opens. Rope drop can be exceptionally stressful if you are jockeying for a good position that may or may not get you a short wait at the most popular ride in the entire park. By doing the opposite, you will avoid the crowds and have a more relaxing, enjoyable start to your day.
For Animal Kingdom, I tend to hit Expedition Everest at rope drop. I can usually get 4-5 rides on the coaster without waiting in a single line. While everyone else is waiting in line for Flight of Passage, I will already be making my way to Kilimanjaro Safaris or Dinosaur.
At EPCOT, I choose Soarin' because it draws the least crowds out of the top tier attractions. I think Test Track is a risky ride to head toward at park open because often it has technical difficulties, sometimes first thing in the morning.
At Hollywood Studios, I head towards Tower of Terror and Rock 'n' Roller Coaster while everyone else dashes to Star Wars: Galaxy's Edge and Toy Story Land.
At Magic Kingdom, I go to Frontierland where I ride Big Thunder Mountain Railroad and Splash Mountain before heading to Adventurland to ride Pirates of Caribbean or Liberty Square to ride The Haunted Mansion. Most guests will make their way toward Fantasyland to ride Seven Dwarfs Mine Train and Peter Pan's Flight or Tomorrowland to ride Space Mountain.
99% of the time, using this strategy means I do not have to arrive early and stress about the huge crowd heading toward the same attraction as me.
Tip #2: When to Ride the Most Popular Attraction
Since I'm not using rope drop to ride the most popular attraction in the park, I now have two options to ensure a short wait on that particular ride.
Use a FastPass:
FastPass allows me to skip the standby line during a 1-hour window and instead use the FastPass line, which boasts a significantly shorter wait. FastPass is free to all Disney guests, and you are allowed to book 3 FastPasses per day at one park of your choosing. After you use those 3 FastPasses, you are allowed to book one additional FastPass at a time until all of the FastPasses have been distributed for the day. I have had many days at WDW where I never stood in a single standby line thanks to this awesome (and did I mention free?) feature.
Be warned, FastPasses for the most popular attractions will be gone first. Guests staying at a Disney World Resort will have 60 days before their resort check-in day to book all of their FastPasses for their resort stay. Guests staying off-site are allowed to make their FastPass reservations 30 days before each park day. Make sure you know the date you are able to reserve your FastPasses. More details and tips for booking FastPasses will be covered in a future post.
If all FastPasses for the most popular attraction have been distributed by the time you are booking yours, fear not! Guests will cancel or change their plans, which means those FastPasses they booked will be released back out into the world. I recommend checking availability multiple times throughout the day at least 48 hours before your visit to a given park. You will see the most cancellations then.
I have gotten FastPasses for all of the most popular attractions last minute (or even day-of) by simply being persistent. This doesn't mean spending hours on my phone trying to modify my FastPasses, but rather being smart about the process. I recommend checking while you are in line at the grocery store, during the commercials of your favorite TV show, or during a work break, etc. Find those down times in your day where you typically do nothing or have to wait, and, instead of checking social media or email, use that time to change your current FastPass selections to better attractions or times!
*Note: FastPass is currently not available at WDW due to the new Park Pass Reservation System.
Ride the Attraction at Park Close:
How is this any different than waiting for the ride at rope drop? WAY different. When the park closes, the FastPass line also closes. This means that only people in the standby line are being loaded onto the ride, which makes the line moves significantly faster than it would at rope drop. At rope drop, the FastPass line is open for guests who booked a reservation first thing in the morning, and this significantly slows down the standby line.
At the end of the night, most people will be watching the fireworks or nighttime show, which also means all rides will have lower wait times than during the day. Disney will usually inflate the wait times at end of the day, so don't be discouraged if you see a high wait time for the most popular attraction. We have walked into the Flight of Passage queue with a marked wait of 2
hours, when in reality the wait was only 30 minutes. Just make sure you
are in line 1 minute before the park's official closing.
Riding the attraction at park close also means you will be one of the last guests to exit the park. Not only do you get some epic pictures of a nearly empty theme park, but you also aren't scrambling with everyone and their Aunt Karen to get to your resort's bus stop or your parked car.
Finally, the most popular rides and lands often look spectacular at night. An empty Pandora - World of Avatar and Star Wars: Galaxy's Edge at night are amazing to walk through. Seeing Cinderella's castle lit up with no one around is a special time.
Tip #3: Check Wait Times on My Disney Experience
Do not walk halfway across a theme park to see that the attraction you were headed to has an obscenely long wait. Use the map on the My Disney Experience app to see which attractions are posting the shortest wait times. It amazes me how many people do not have this app on their phone. All of the information is at the palm of your hands. Use it!
If one of the more popular rides goes down, I will use the MDE app to occasionally check when that ride is operational once more. Usually when the ride is up and running again, the wait time will be significantly lower than usual. This requires some luck because you have to be near the vicinity of the attraction to really capitalize the low wait time upon the attraction reopening. Using the app will help you find those moments.
Tip #4: Be Flexible
So many experts will have a spreadsheet that tells them everything they are doing each day down to the very minute. While I definitely recommend having a plan, leave some wiggle room to ensure a more enjoyable experience.
When you over plan, you are setting yourself up for frustration. Things happen at WDW. Rides break down. Someone in your party suddenly no longer wants to ride the coaster that goes backwards. You accidentally sleep in and miss rope drop (I mean, it is vacation so don't feel bad about this one). It will rain and all the outdoor attractions will suddenly close.
Have a plan in place, but avoid making it so rigid that it becomes impossible to make changes. Seriously, y'all. Don't do it. If there is anything I would plan, it would be how you respond to those mishaps. What will you do when it rains? What will you do when the attraction you were dying to ride is closed for most of the day? What will you do when you accidentally oversleep? Our responses to tough situations are just as important as the actual plan, because it means that nothing on our vacation can become a "make or break" moment. When something becomes "make or break," it is inevitable that people will get angry.
Hope for the best, plan for the worst, and be ready to make a change quickly to avoid unnecessary frustration. You will enjoy your WDW vacation way more because of this!
Bottom Line:
You shouldn't have to wait in super long lines at WDW. Use these strategies to ensure that you are spending more time enjoying the park and less time waiting. Rope drop can be stressful or relaxing depending on how you use that time. FastPasses are your friend. Riding an attraction at park close will almost always yield the lowest wait time and a more enjoyable experience when exiting the park. The My Disney Experience app will allow you to monitor the wait times and capitalize those moments when popular attractions have lower than normal wait times. Be sure you enter each park with a plan, but allow that plan to change so you can have the most enjoyable experience possible.
Happy riding!
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