My Awful Early Entry Experience at Disney’s Hollywood Studios on 10/10 Crowds Day
During an excellent Early Entry at Disney’s Hollywood Studios, you can knock out multiple E-Ticket rides in Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge, Toy Story Land, or beyond. This was pretty much the exact opposite of that, and this photo report recaps my rough morning, explaining what went wrong and how I should’ve pivoted to make things much better.
This covers a peak season day at Disney’s Hollywood Studios, when the park had a 10/10 crowd level, average park-wide wait time of 60 minutes, and multiple headliners had wait times of 2+ hours. If you’re visiting this summer through early October 2026, you likely will not encounter this high of a crowd level. There have only been a handful of days at DHS this busy in the last year; this was the worst day I’ve done at DHS in two-plus years.
Much to my chagrin, park hours were not extended on this day or on the two 9/10 days before or one 9/10 day after. Had I waited another two days, when crowds were “only” 7/10 and 8/10, I would’ve benefited from an extra hour (30 minutes in the morning and 30 minutes in the evening), which might seem insignificant, but would’ve helped a lot.
I might be just a little bitter about that, but I’m calling attention to it more to point out that Walt Disney World extended on the objectively “wrong” dates. (I’d argue that any time internal forecasts point to 6/10 or above crowds, moving forward opening by 30 minutes is appropriate; 8/10 or above crowds should call for a full hour.) This happens with reasonable frequency, and should underscore why we’ll almost always take the earlier opening and not worry about comparative crowd implications.
Regardless, I knew what I was getting myself into visiting DHS on a busy day during the tail end of spring break season. My goal was to stress test our plans for Early Entry at Hollywood Studios. Like Disney, I didn’t expect the park to be this busy or bad.
For this Early Entry report, I was staying at Disney’s Pop Century Resort. That was my first mistake. As much as I love this resort–and I really do–I’m done staying Pop Century or Art of Animation during peak season dates. Fortunately, I had already learned my lesson with that earlier in the trip, and managed to get to DHS before Early Entry started.
At a young age, my military-man father instilled into me a great punctuality philosophy: “If you’re early, you’re on time; if you’re on time, you’re late.”
Clearly, the United States armed forces don’t have the same stringent standards as Walt Disney World touring commandos. Because even though I arrived 20 minutes before the start of Early Entry, I was very much late by WDW standards.
I nevertheless hit the ground running, breezing through bag check and shifting to the far right tapstiles (a highly recommended ‘hack’), but I was still firmly behind the first wave of guests into Disney’s Hollywood Studios.
That’s fine. Being willing to call an audible is a key component of Early Entry, and this gave me a chance to make lemonade out of lemons as opposed to locking into a single strategy before the day began.
If you haven’t done Early Entry in a while, one thing to note is that now all guests are allowed through the tapstiles at the same time.
Previously, there were separate lines for regular rope drop and Early Entry, with off-site guests held at the main entrance until official park opening time. With the new procedure, everyone can enter the park about an hour before regular rope drop. Off-site guests then have access to a large swath of the park, including the entirety of Hollywood Boulevard.
Once inside the park, there are five designated checkpoints for resort guests participating in Early Entry: at the entrances to Tower of Terror, Mickey & Minnie’s Runaway Railway and Star Tours, one on Grand Avenue for Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge, and the final checkpoint along the main entrance corridor to Toy Story Land.
Unless you’re bouncing around the park, resort guests will likely only have to validate eligibility once via MagicBand, Key to the World card, MagicMobile, etc. Meaning that there’s no checkpoint between Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge and Toy Story Land, for example, nor are there at the entrances to individual attractions within those two lands.
On balance, this switch to in-park checkpoints is a positive change. It gives off-site guests the chance to enter Disney’s Hollywood Studios, grab a coffee, enjoy the atmosphere, pre-queue for regular rope drop, or simply sit in the shade. I never stood in the mass of humanity waiting in the sun for regular rope drop outside the entrance, but it looked pretty miserable.
Since more guests are coming from off-site than are staying on-site, this is an improvement for the guest experience as a whole. It’s also a reversion to the old normal. This is more or less how Extra Magic Hours used to be before Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge in 2019. Everything changed once that land opened and mornings at DHS turned into pure anarchy.
The above analysis considers the guest experience as a whole. This new-old approach is a slight negative for on-site guests taking advantage of Early Entry. It introduces a bit more chaos to the entry experience, both at the tapstiles themselves and at the checkpoints for the various lands.
It also means that you have a few fewer precious minutes to beat the regular rope drop crowd to your next destination before the end of Early Entry. Instead of a slow trickle of guests entering the park via the tapstiles, those guests are already pre-loaded near Galaxy’s Edge, Toy Story Land, and Sunset Boulevard, and descend upon those attractions all at once right at 9:00 am.
You used to have a little longer to beat the rope drop rush, effectively extending Early Entry by another 5-10 minutes before the rope drop rush really arrived. This may seem insignificant, but it had major implications on this particular day. We’ll circle back to that towards the end.
As always, the vast majority of guests are headed to Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge or Toy Story Land both for Early Entry and for regular rope drop.
Even though the “new ride smell” has worn off Mickey & Minnie’s Runaway Railway, it’s still a popular first pick. My strong suspicion is that it sucks up the guests not wanting to walk any deeper into the park, despite Slinky Dog Dash not being that much more of a walk.
If you want to stick to the front of the park, I’d recommend starting with Rock ‘n’ Roller Coaster and Tower of Terror. This will be doubly true once Rock ‘n’ Roller Coaster Starring the Muppets debuts later this month. Our expectation is that this will draw significant crowds during Early Entry at first, but it’ll be short-lived. Despite its average daily wait times, RnRC has never really moved the needle on Early Entry, which is why it’s been such a great option.
We wouldn’t be surprised if the normal dynamic returns by June 2026, at least in the morning. We also expect Rock ‘n’ Roller Coaster Starring the Muppets to see elevated average wait times for the entire summer and beyond, which will make this an even more attractive Early Entry option. We’ll be back with comprehensive testing in early June to see whether our suspicions are confirmed or not.
I could tell just by the concentration of crowds around the front entrance that I was already too late for Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance or Slinky Dog Dash. I have enough experience with Early Entry to know that, even before either posted wait times, the best case scenario was probably a 45 minute wait, if not worse.
My pivot at this point was making a lap of Toy Story Land and Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge for the sake of research, and then potentially knocking out a secondary attraction or two before heading to Tower of Terror.
By the time I made it over to Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance at 8:27 am (still 2 minutes before the start of Early Entry), it had a 65 minute wait. The extended outdoor overflow queue was already in use.
Those familiar with Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance might be quick to conclude that this is longer than a 65 minute wait. And I would be inclined to agree. During the middle of the day, this is probably a 2+ hour wait.
The difference during Early Entry is that there’s no Lightning Lane to pull from; it’s all standby. Assuming the ride is firing on all cylinders (bold assumption), the line would move quickly.
The problem is that this is easily more than a 30 minute wait. Once regular rope drop rolls around, so too do Lightning Lane arrivals. Anyone getting into that posted 65 minute wait at ~8:30 am isn’t beating those arrivals to the merge point. The first half (or so) of their walk through the queue is going to move fluidly, before the second half slows to a crawl.
This is the type of thing you would think Walt Disney World would be able to build into their models for predicting wait times. In my experience, it is not. Posted wait times are surprisingly imprecise and reactive. The guests towards the front of the line might find their wait is shorter than what was posted when they got in line, whereas those towards the back are more likely to find their wait is longer than posted.
From here, I made a quick detour over to Millennium Falcon: Smugglers Run.
It had a posted 10 minute wait, and a surprising number of people in the courtyard (it’s usually empty at this hour). This is almost certainly the on-time-is-actually-late-arriving crowd that balked at the 65 minute wait time or overflow queue for Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance. A very logical pivot!
From there, I headed to Toy Story Land and Slinky Dog Dash, where I was greeted by the dreaded delayed opening as of ~8:32 am. Thankfully, the coaster was already cycling–just without guests, so it would be opening at some point sooner rather than later.
Guests were loaded into the queue, and the overflow line was all the way back to the entrance of the land. Not only that, but it was already snaking around (slinking around?) back by the Woody marquee. I can’t recall ever having seen this, and I can only assume it was to give breathing room to the Early Entry checkpoint and regular rope drop crowd.
Slinky Dog Dash was not posting a wait time (due to the delayed opening) at the start of Early Entry, so the above sentiment about over/under-estimates on the posted wait time obviously doesn’t apply. But the same idea does when it comes to the importance of beating Lightning Lane guests to the merge point. And that’s obviously less likely to happen with a delayed opening.
As of around 8:35 am, both Toy Story Mania and Alien Swirling Saucers had 5 minute posted waits.
Based on average wait times, this would still have been a good option–rivaling Mickey & Minnie’s Runaway Railway, which had drawn a rather large crowd of guests doing that as stop #1 for Early Entry (its overflow queue was also in use). I debated doing TSM to confirm that it was a walk-on, but was pretty positive that was the case just based on the shockingly low flow of guests into that line.
I get the sunk cost of arriving extra early for Slinky Dog Dash and not wanting to abandon that even with a delayed opening (the objectively correct decision given it was cycling). But the guests rolling up at 8:35 am and getting into the slinking queue near the entrance have no such excuse.
That’s an objectively awful decision, and one of the reasons I enjoy doing reports like this. I’d rather teach planners to fish as opposed to having a list of hard and fast rules for rope drop.
Point being, someone arriving at 8:30 am could’ve knocked out both Toy Story Mania and Alien Swirling Saucers during Early Entry if they so desired. From there, they could have beat the rush to Millennium Falcon: Smugglers Run if they so desired.
Since this was a research run, I kept going, but that should nevertheless illustrate that this morning was salvageable. It didn’t have to be awful.
Thinking I had time before regular rope drop, I made another loop of Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge and Toy Story Land for more photos:
I’ve either lost a step in my old age or grown complacent. Or both.
I made it to Sunset Boulevard at 8:58 am, and was approaching the intersection separating Rock ‘n’ Roller Coaster and Tower of Terror right as the welcome message played. As soon as that happened, Cast Members started waving Early Entry guests away from the entrance and into an overflow line. I missed the cutoff by, at most, 10 seconds. The last guests directed to the attraction entrance had literally just passed me while I stopped to take the above photo.
That last photo cost me 35 minutes. Or it would have, if I actually got in line for Tower of Terror instead of bailing. Unlike Disney not moving park opening forward on such a busy day, I wasn’t the least bit disappointed about this. If getting on Tower of Terror was a high priority, I wouldn’t have dilly-dallied taking photos.
There’s also the fact that the cut-off needs to happen, and someone is always going to be the first person to miss the cut. I was the last person to board a bus twice this trip, which was a far bigger win for me personally, and felt like the universe finding its balance or whatever.
In the end, this was an objectively awful Early Entry for me, and rope drop would’ve been rough for everyone. That’s simply the nature of the beast with busy days at DHS, especially 10/10 crowd level ones.
However, there is also the unassailable argument that I could’ve simply made better choices. (Sentiment I’ve also heard a lot in life from my military man father!) As noted above, I could’ve pretty easily knocked out Toy Story Mania, Alien Swirling Saucers, and Millennium Falcon: Smugglers Run during Early Entry.
That would’ve likely spilled into regular rope drop, but they all would’ve been walk-ons (or close to it). I also could’ve done Red Carpet Dreams (the meet & greet) shortly after rope drop when it had a posted 10 minute wait and literally no one in its general vicinity.
Not only could I have done just fine with all of those attractions despite my early-but-actually-late arrival to Disney’s Hollywood Studios, but I don’t think there’s any arrival time that would’ve made Slinky Dog Dash or Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance pencil out on this particular day. The former had a delayed opening and to be at the front of the pack for the latter, you would’ve had to arrive absurdly early, and even then, that’s all you would’ve accomplished during Early Entry.
For reference, here were the average wait times on this particular day at DHS:
- Slinky Dog Dash: 118 minutes
- Star Wars Rise of the Resistance: 103 minutes
- Millennium Falcon Smugglers Run: 100 minutes
- Tower of Terror: 87 minutes
- Toy Story Mania: 71 minutes
- Mickey & Minnie’s Runaway Railway: 70 minutes
- Alien Swirling Saucers: 49 minutes
- Red Carpet Dreams: 41 minutes
Had I done the above, I would’ve knocked out 4 attractions, which would go on to average waits totaling 261 minutes, in less than the first hour of the day.
Ultimately, the biggest lesson of this Early Entry and rope drop run is that ignoring the headliners and focusing on the low-hanging fruit is a winning strategy for busy mornings at Disney’s Hollywood Studios when you’re behind the first wave of crowds.
This isn’t really anything new. We’ve previously offered this advice and dubbed it the “Moneyball Magic Kingdom Morning.” (From that, I learned that an alarming number of you are unfamiliar with sabermetrics.)
I would take this a step further and argue that my early-yet-late arrival time plus a low-hanging fruit strategy would be subjectively superior to getting to the park an hour before the gates opened, waiting around for a while, and then only knocking out only one headliner. But I’ll spare you my “all vacation time has value” diatribe.
This is definitely not always the optimal strategy. Prior to this, I’ve had several highly successful rope drop runs at DHS that included knocking out Slinky Dog Dash multiple times, running the table on Toy Story Land and/or Galaxy’s Edge, and basically finishing the park’s headliners before 10 am. But those were much less busy days.
The bottom line is that Disney’s Hollywood Studios has a top-heavy ride roster and is a park where wait times routinely peak by 11 am. Taking a ‘quantity over quality’ approach, when necessary, can work out to your advantage. It opens the door to do stage shows and other “filler” during the busiest hours of the day, waiting out the clock on headliners until wait times start dropping in the late afternoon and evening.
You can also pair this approach with Lightning Lanes. Disney’s Hollywood Studios is the #1 park at Walt Disney World for Lightning Lane Multi-Pass, and can make sense to buy whenever crowds are moderate or above. If you’re able to score Slinky Dog Dash via LLMP, that sets the table for a great day and makes it easier to start elsewhere, while ending the evening at Rise of the Resistance.
Finally, this Early Entry report should illustrate the importance of calling an audible if things aren’t going according to plan at Disney’s Hollywood Studios. If you arrive later or to larger crowds than expected, it makes no sense to follow the pack to Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance or Slinky Dog Dash.
Zig when they zag, with a Moneyball approach to knocking out several rides that’ll be busy later, but aren’t high priority for most guests first thing in the morning. If one thing is certain about Disney’s Hollywood Studios, it’s that nothing is certain. That park has seen a lot of operational and strategy changes in the last few years, and on top of that, several of its headliners are prone to downtime and delayed openings.
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YOUR THOUGHTS
Thoughts on Early Entry at Disney’s Hollywood Studios? Have you experienced this jumpstart to the day at DHS? If so, what time did you arrive and what time did attractions start operating? What’s your preferred approach to Early Entry: Toy Story Land, Star Wars Galaxy’s Edge, or something else? Agree or disagree with our advice or approach? Any questions we can help you answer? Hearing your feedback–even when you disagree with us–is both interesting to us and helpful to other readers, so please share your thoughts below in the comments!
Lesson here…avoid 10/10 days like the plague, even with Early Entry.