Disney Dining Plan vs. Paying Out of Pocket
Walt Disney World’s Dining Plan is a popular prepaid option that some people swear by. It’s especially popular with Free Dining, when it’s offered as part of a package discount. This does the math and analyzes whether the Disney Dining Plan is “worth it” both out of pocket and when offered as part of the deal.
The Disney Dining Plan (DDP) is easy to use and if you eat a certain way, or plan well, you can save money at Walt Disney World restaurants with the DDP. This is especially true if you follow a value maximization strategy for your credits–we have a number of resources on our site devoted to helping people get the most savings on the Disney Dining Plan.
What isn’t so clear is whether using the Disney Dining Plan saves you money versus paying out of pocket if you don’t eat the certain way it is designed. If your party consists of light eaters, or you are spontaneous, is the Disney Dining Plan right for you?
A lot of guests visiting Walt Disney World just assume the Disney Dining Plan will always save them money, which isn’t always true. In fact, a lot of times it will cost more money than paying out of pocket, and that’s the case even when the Disney Dining Plan is offered for “free.”
Rather than approaching this in the abstract, we decided to do a little “case study,” taking all of our receipts from our most recent 4-day trip to Walt Disney World, adding up our totals, and comparing our out of pocket costs to what we would have spent if we used the Disney Dining Plan. We’ll then examine free dining to explain why that doesn’t always save you money.
Which option “wins”? Let’s break things down…
Disney Dining Plan Case Study
On our recent 4-day Walt Disney World trip, we visited a number of restaurants, both table service and counter service, and had a lot of snacks. Most of our plans for dining were made at the last minute shortly before the trip or on a whim the day of, which meant that we didn’t do the math in advance to determine whether the Disney Dining Plan would have been right for us.
Had we booked the Disney Dining Plan in advance, our plans would have changed to better suit the Plan and “save” more money. That said, we ate exactly where and ordered exactly what we wanted while paying out of pocket on this trip.
We arrived mid-afternoon our first day and left mid-afternoon our last day. Here’s where we ate and how much we spent:
Day 1:
Flower & Garden Festival Kiosk – $13.11
Garden Grill – $73.62
Day 2:
Everything Pop Food Court – $7.01
San Angel Inn – $54.92
Flower & Garden Festival Kiosks – $6.92
Artist Point – $120.79
Day 3:
50s Prime Time Cafe – $63.20
Restaurantosaurus – $25.92
Auntie Gravity’s – $5.52
Day 4:
Landscape of Flavors – $10.80
Tusker House – $57.78
Animal Kingdom Snack – $4.25
What We Paid:
Subtotal: $443.84
Tables in Wonderland Proportional Cost: $25
Total: $468.84
What We Would’ve Paid on the Disney Dining Plan:
Disney Dining Plan Cost: $333.54
Out of Pocket Cost: $253.50
Total: $587.04
Unused Credits: 0 Table Service, 3 Counter Service, 0 Snack
Okay, time for a little explanation. How much we spent at each location speaks is the total we paid, including tip (~18%) and less Tables in Wonderland discount. All of these amounts added together form the basis of the subtotal, which is $443.84. Now, since we benefited from a Tables in Wonderland discount, and since that card costs $100 and we take about 4 Walt Disney World trips per year, I’ve attributed $25 of the card’s cost to this trip. That brings the total we spent on food for this trip to $468.84. Follow so far?
Tracking the amount spent gets a little trickier on the Disney Dining Plan. If we were on the DDP, we would have spent $333.54 on the plan alone, which would have given us each 3 credits for table service meals, counter service meals, and snacks (since our trip was 3 nights long).
As for the out of pocket portion there, the Disney Dining Plan does not cover tips, nor does it cover some other things we ordered, like alcohol and appetizers. We also paid for two table service meals out of pocket, since we only had enough credits for 3 table service meals, and we ate 5 table service meals. Here, I made sure to apply the DDP credits in the most efficient manner (so in this hypothetical, I applied a snack credit to a $4.25 cupcake rather than a $2.19 coffee, etc.).
Finally, the unused credits show what we didn’t use. We exceeded both our table service and snack credit allotments, but only had 3 counter service meals, so we would have had 3 credits remaining. Were we actually on the Disney Dining Plan, we would have used all of these credits, and not done one or two of the table service meals that we did. It’s also worth noting that for some meals we ordered appetizers and split desserts (or didn’t order dessert), which wouldn’t have been efficient on the Dining Plan, but we ordered what we wanted since we didn’t have to consider the Plan.
Is the Disney Dining Plan Worth It? Conclusion
I normally do this math (very roughly) before each trip based upon menus from places we’re dining to get an idea of whether we might want to use the Disney Dining Plan. The first thing I want to note here is how liberating it was to do things spontaneously and not do this degree of planning (of course, I ended up doing even more work after the fact for this blog post, but whatever) and just eat what and where we wanted to eat without thinking about credits or Disney Dining Plan efficiency.
To that end, I think it’s much more convenient to NOT use the Disney Dining Plan. I say this in our review of the Disney Dining Plan, and I know this flies in the face of why so many people use the Dining Plan, but I don’t possibly see how it’s more convenient to use the Dining Plan than to not use it.
Unlike what some people say, you are not “just” paying the cost of the Plan and then forgetting about dining costs and “eating whatever you want.” You’re pre-paying a portion of the cost, then paying another (significant) cost at each meal in the form of tips. Oh, and you can only eat certain things and have to plan the types of meals that work with the Disney Dining Plan, otherwise you waste credits.
When paying out of pocket, you show up where you want, order what you want, and pay for what you ordered. Done. I’m not even going to address the “budgeting” argument, as without extensive pre-planning, you can’t completely budget dining costs with the Disney Dining Plan any more than you can when paying out of pocket. So that’s a wash. Our experience with both paying out of pocket and with using the Disney Dining Plan has been that paying out of pocket is unquestionably more convenient. Any convenience of the Disney Dining Plan is illusory.
More importantly, what about actual savings? Based on my numbers, we clearly saved more money by not using the Disney Dining Plan and instead paying out of pocket and using Tables in Wonderland (we would have saved more even without the Tables in Wonderland card). However, in fairness, those numbers are a bit misleading. As mentioned above, we didn’t eat in a manner that fit the “style” of the Disney Dining Plan, and we had a table service-heavy trip.
Honestly, we could have changed our style pretty easily without negatively affecting our experience and that would have made the gap between out of pocket and the Disney Dining Plan a bit smaller. By that, I don’t mean trading Artist Point for a counter service meal (unless there’s an AMAZING counter service restaurant we’ve never heard of, that swap would have had a negative affect on our experience!), I mean not ordering appetizers and instead doing more desserts.
Something that would have negatively affected our experience, but would also have decreased BOTH totals would have been to eat 2 additional counter service meals and 2 fewer table service meals. Obviously, this would have decreased the Dining Plan total more than the out of pocket total since we had the unused counter service credits on the Dining Plan. In fact, my rough math shows that, had we done that, the totals would have been almost even.
My preference is eating whatever I want at any restaurant and dining at the two table service restaurants rather than adding 2 counter service restaurants to the plans, but the point remains. For the sake of fairness to the Disney Dining Plan, we’re showing that a change to our plans could have made a big difference in terms of costs.
We don’t want to make it appear that paying out of pocket will always be considerably cheaper than using the Disney Dining Plan, because that’s simply not true. It was true on this one trip we took, but is definitely not always true, even for us. On other occasions, we’ve saved a lot of money by using the Disney Dining Plan! In fact, this article is sort of a “counter-point” to last year’s case study showing how we saved a lot of money on the Deluxe Disney Dining Plan. (Just to show we’re not biased one way or the other…)
This also shows that there is no single answer to the out of pocket versus Disney Dining Plan question in terms of savings. The results can substantially deviate based upon your personal dining reservations, plans, and eating habits. While my numbers illustrate this point, they offer little more than illustration, and are really little more than academic here.
The real point is that both paying out of pocket and using the Disney Dining Plan can each be viable options worthy of consideration. In other words, don’t just rely on the numbers presented here–read past them and do your own math if saving money is something about which you really care.
When you do the math, don’t base your calculations on what the Disney Dining Plan provides. Base your numbers on what you’d actually like to eat on your vacation. If you don’t do much snacking at Walt Disney World, but would take home a bunch of bags of Disney candy with unused snack credits if you had to, don’t factor that candy into your calculations.
It’s not something you really want, and just because you would use snack credits on the candy (instead of letting the credits go to waste), doesn’t mean those credits are “worth” $4.19 each. Spending more money to “save” more money isn’t really saving money at all–it’s wasting money.
What About “Free” Dining?
I mentioned Free Dining above, and the same principle that the Dining Plan–even when “free”–doesn’t always save you more money. This is something I’ve harped on in the past, and it’s worth sounding like an ornery nag for the sake of hammering home, because many people still don’t seem to understand this: FREE DINING IS NOT FREE.
Walt Disney World almost always has discounts. The place is like the Kohl’s of vacation destinations. No one is paying full price at either place, making full price/rack rates almost meaningless. Since the statement that Free Dining isn’t really free seems to confuse a lot of guests, let’s go through it point by point.
Walt Disney World almost always offers discounts on vacations. If you book with one discount, you cannot book with another discount (at least guests from the US can’t). Free Dining is one discount that Disney offers. A room-only discount of 20%/25%/30%/35%/40% off is another discount Disney offers.
It thus becomes a question of opportunity cost. Do YOU save more money paying with free dining and a full priced room and tickets than you do with a room discount and paying out of pocket for food (and with potentially discounted tickets)?
If Free Dining were offered during our visit (it wasn’t), it would have been a far better offer because room-only discounts were meager. Then again, meager room-only discounts partly explain why free dining wasn’t offered. If discounts are meager they are meager across the board, and they are meager because Disney doesn’t need to use them to “persuade” more guests to visit (this is why summer break discounts are so rare). When Free Dining is offered, it’s usually offered in off-seasons when room-only discounts are also usually much more substantial.
It’s frequently true that Free Dining is the best discount. If you have a family of 4 staying in one room, no matter the resort, that’s usually the case. However, if you have a couple staying in a more expensive room, it’s often not the case. Sarah and I frequently stay at Disney’s BoardWalk Inn, which often has a 30% room-only discount or Free Dining when we stay there.
With a 30% off discount at BoardWalk Inn, we save around $125 per night with a 30% off room-only discount during our annual Epcot Food & Wine Festival trip. This is more than the average daily amount that we spend on food, which is why we book the room-only discount at BoardWalk if both discounts are offered. If there were 2 more people staying in the room with us, that would tip the scale in favor of Free Dining.
Likewise, a family of 4 staying at a non-Deluxe resort, such as Disney’s Coronado Springs, is probably going to find that they save much more with Free Dining than they do with a room-only discount. I know everyone hates math, but the point, once again, is that you have to do the math for your circumstances to know for sure. Better to suffer through a little math and save some money than just assume based on marketing buzzwords like “free,” be wrong, and end up paying more.
Our example illustrates why it’s important to do some advance planning when it comes to dining at Walt Disney World. You vets out there already know this, but if you’re a first-time visitor or are only really familiar with Disneyland, you may not realize this. Planning your dining is almost as important as booking your airfare.
A lot of Walt Disney World restaurants book up months in advance, and the difference in experience between a good and a bad restaurant is like night and day. We highly recommend reading some of our restaurant reviews and checking out menus online before before making your Advance Dining Reservations. Not only will they give you an idea of what restaurants to book, but they’ll help you do the math and figure out whether the Disney Dining Plan or paying out of pocket is right for you!
Planning a Walt Disney World trip? Learn about hotels on our Walt Disney World Hotels Reviews page. For where to eat, read our Walt Disney World Restaurant Reviews. To save money on tickets or determine which type to buy, read our Tips for Saving Money on Walt Disney World Tickets post. Our What to Pack for Disney Trips post takes a unique look at clever items to take. For what to do and when to do it, our Walt Disney World Ride Guides will help. For comprehensive advice, the best place to start is our Walt Disney World Trip Planning Guide for everything you need to know!
Your Thoughts
Do you typically use the Disney Dining Plan or do you pay out of pocket? What works best for you? I would love to hear what your thoughts are about the Disney Dining Plan, and how it works—or doesn’t work—for you. Share your thoughts in the comments!
I agree with ya Tom that the DP can be illusory. Sadly, I fell for it on my first trip last year when I took a 9-night trip with DDDP during “Free Dining”. If my math was correct, I could have saved about $100 (ended up going over budget because of alcohol with meals). It could have been more, but I wasn’t “smart” with my orders. I ate what I wanted instead of simply ordering steak or the most expensive menu item each time just to increase the “value” of the plan. That bit was nice (as well as simply trying many of WDW’s fantastic restaurants), but there were a few annoying points to this plan:
1. There are trade-offs to ADRs. Yes, you can get ADRs at Sci-Fi, but when you’re at HS and have to get out of waiting in a ride line to make an ADR and eat when you weren’t really, at that moment, hungry can really affect the meal/experience. I did all that just to “save” a few bucks?!? NOT WORTH IT! Do this multiple times during a trip and it really ruins things.
2. While I ordered what I wanted, there was ALWAYS this nagging feeling of having to at least consider ordering the most expensive things on the menu. This constantly left me reconsidering and thinking “what if” when I should be enjoying the meal I actually ordered. This wouldn’t happen if I simply did not use the DP and paid everything out of pocket.
3. With 2 or 3 table service meals every day, eventually you just get sick of eating (NEVER thought I would say that). I never missed a meal, but I noticed later in the trip that my plates were being taken away with plenty still on it. I was eating solely because I HAD to and not because I WANTED to. Where is the value in that?
In conclusion, if you are spontaneous like me, the dining plan can really put a damper on things. It was nice trying so many different places and foods, but at what “cost”? I am going to try and take a trip in September and will be dining out of pocket. I will let destiny decided things and try a “walk-up” and face rejection and try somewhere else vs scheduling my trip around meals months in advance just to say a few bucks.
Very well said.
It’s so funny because my fiance and I actually DID price everything out — using the dining plan vs. Tables in Wonderland. It wasn’t even close; the dining plan was a lot more expensive, but that’s partly because we wanted to eat at a lot of table-service restaurants. I’ve even done the calculations a few times, just to make sure, because it seems like it would be nice to just be on the dining plan and not really worry about what you’re ordering. But, when you include tax, tip, and alcohol, it really adds up. It really sucks the DDP only includes dessert and not an either/or of app/dessert. That would make it slightly more appealing.
Also: “The place is like the Kohl’s of vacation destinations.” When I found that out about Kohl’s a while ago, I was seriously sad. You feel like you’re getting such a good deal!! Such a bummer…
Hey! I minored in math in college. So some of us like it. 🙂
We’ve been during “free” dining and have enjoyed the savings. (Family of 3, staying at a value resort so dining was by far the best choice.) The downside for us is the quantity of food. We’re not light eaters when on vacation, but the DDP offers more than we would typically eat in a day and the value optimizer in me has a hard time not eating what I’ve already paid for!
MINORED IN MATH?!?! I am a bit ashamed that my readers have done such awful things! 😉
I still crack up thinking about our first trip to Disney. We stayed off property and therefore never even researched DDP. When we got there & started having servers ask about it my husband thought it was some kind of “link card” for Disney!
Now that we make multiple trips a year & have used DDP, I agree Tom that DDP would be much easier for seasoned travelers than first timers.
You have to also consider that if you book the most expensive restaurants & order the highest priced menu items to make the most of your DDP that you will also be paying much more in tips!
Absolutely right about the tips. On the flip side, I wouldn’t let paying a bit more in tips dissuade you from ordering what you want (I know you aren’t saying it should, but just throwing it out there anyway).
I love this article. I plan on saving it and sending countless people here. I can’t count how many times I’ve stated most of this to other people trying to explain why I don’t use the DDP. You can make it worth your while, but you almost have to “work” to make it worth the money. If you plan high-priced table services in the evenings and maximize your counter meals – DDP can “save” you money.
Over the last couple years we’ve taken many trips alone and with extended family. Every time we ate whatever and whenever we wanted – never once saying “I’ll get the hamburger instead of the steak because it’s cheaper” and we always paid far less than what we would have with DDP.
Additionally, if you watch for deals with credit cards and other places, you can find ways to pay for your food. Two years ago we signed up for a Disney credit card before our trip and got a $200 Disney gift card. The plan was to use that for our food purchases on the trip. We’ve never had to use the credit card or make an annual payment on it – so $200 free to put towards food.
I highly recommend spamming everyone you know with a link to this article. Even people who don’t go to WDW! 😉
The credit card tip is a good one in general, but (as I say in our reviews of the Disney Visa cards) you’re better off going for a better-performing cashback card. The rewards on the Disney Visa are paltry as compared to many other cards.
We are planning a trip to WDW in April and are still undecided on the DDP. We did buy enough Disney Gift Cards (thru a 10% off Target promotion, then ordered online for an additional 5% discount with the Red Card = 15% off thereabouts) to pay for the entire trip and dining. That said, we are still undecided because one of my teens is a picky eater and would prefer to snack thru the parks, but we all enjoy a nice sit down (expensive) dinner in the evenings…we have found the use of the DDP calculator invaluable!!
http://www.distripplanner.com/
THANKS for this! I would love to link this from my blog! The way our family eats, DDP doesn’t make sense. We are trying to watch portion size and well we don’t pay for what the plan gives OOP. I know everyone is different, but I was so happy to see some analysis! Julie
I have done the DDP plan in the past, and when it started out it was pretty hard to beat (when it included tip). But on your advice, this time I’m running the numbers on where we will be eating, and estimate what we will be eating and it’s not worth it. Skipping it and using the extra money for a few adult beverages for when I am watching the fireworks from rooftop lounge at Bay Lake . 😀
Also LOL@ your Khol’s = Disney comment.
(totally not trying to be nit-picky, but just helping you out, as I’m sure this will be a heavily referenced post…)
first paragraph, last sentence in red… switch they’re to their.
🙂
Thanks! 🙂
Dining Plan delenda est.
Rationality has no place in Disney fandom, Mr. Bricker. Your naive faith in its practitioners disappoints me.
I’m always flabbergasted at “dinning” reports on That Other Site, where the writers go to amazing lengths to have meals, and order courses, that they end up not eating. ‘Cos it’s like, free, ‘n stuff.
I’m an episodic gavone to an extent that would make Adam Richman look like a piker, but no way could I sock away the daily intake those people order. Holy Mother Church has Her hooks deeply enough in me that I find it ethically repugnant as well. Really? You ordered a damned life raft full of ooey-gloppy-toffee-travesty, and took one bite, ’cause it was free? Fifty years in purgatory, coming right up.
I know enough servers to confirm they do pretty much loathe the dining plan. Hell, as a guest, whenever I’m seated near a multi-generational party of eight or ten on the dining plan, I’m looking for a fire alarm to pull.
I’m willing to give most guests a pass on this. People reading Disney blogs, forums, etc., are in the minority. Most guests do very little planning, and go off of what Disney, AAA, or their travel agent tells them. If the DDP is pushed on them as this great thing that you can’t do without, that’s not totally on them…
Now, in a perfect world, they’d perform their due diligence and make an informed decision. To be fair, I can’t say I’ve always done my due diligence before traveling to a new location. I’ve ALWAYS found that the experience is better when I do, though.
I’d actually put all the burden on Disney for the static attendant to the dining plan. Guests shouldn’t really need to give something like a meal plan more than a cursory glance. It’s not like they’re going to Nepal, or something.
When it first came out, it truly was point-and-shoot, and the servers liked it (mainly because it built in a pretty good tip). The choices, exceptions, and conditions have gone way overboard. My aversion is that the problems with dining plan parties scale geometrically with party size. I always see it a breakfast, when family tension seems to be highest anyway. I’m going to start mainlining bloody marys at 9:00AM if I have to keep seeing some overwrought tiger-mother berating some poor SOB of a server over getting charged for snowy’s orange juice.
Disney seems to have totally lost the thread on “diminishing returns.” I mean, the few extra spondulicks they squeeze out of guests by offering 3600 choices for everything have got to be offset by needing more cast members to handle those transactions.
Hi, it’s our first time at Disney. We have 20, 17, 13, 10 & 6 year olds . Not sure if we should do the DDP? Can’t imagine eating $400 worth of food a day. Any help is welcome . Feeling clueless. Thanks!
My parents and I used the DDP in 2006 and absolutely loved it. We used in again in 2011 – with my husband and son in tow this time – and decided never again. Not only did we have counter service meals remaining when we went home, but we decided it was just too much for us. We wouldn’t normally do a table service meal every day. We wouldn’t normally get dessert with every meal. We enjoy an adult beverage with dinner. We felt we were either paying out of pocket for things we wanted (wine) or pre-paying for things we may have not wanted (dessert).
I’ve done lots of research, and for the way we typically travel, the DDP doesn’t make sense for us. The only reason I am even remotely hesitating on ruling it out completely for our trip in October, is due to the use of snack credits at the Food & Wine festival. I can’t decide if that would be worth it or not. My gut reaction is no, it still doesn’t make it worth it. But I’m still hesitating…
We haven’t done it for our last two F&WF trips, but ONLY because we were going for WDW’s 40th Anniversary and Epcot’s 30th anniversary, so we wanted flexibility in doing things with friends at the last minute, etc.
We will take a hard look at the DDP for this F&WF trip, because the cost of grazing the kiosks can add up FAST. I suspect we’ll do the lowest tier of the DDP. I really wish it still offered 2 snack credits per night!
My husband and I leave for WDW in 27 days for our honeymoon and have done so much math my head feels like it is going to explode! At first we were going to go with the QS dining plan but after figuring that to be about $800+ for our stay we decided to plug some numbers. We picked out restaurants we would want to eat at, both quick service and counter, and then had fun just looking at menus and finding what we think we would eat. We did crunched numbers and found that after factoring in where we would and realistically how much we would eat we wound up saving $200. We decided to set aside a set amount of money each day for food and to try and stay with in that for that day. A lot of the time the dining plan is just to much food and it definitely sucks up the freedom of eating where you want without feeling the guilt of having to use all your credits.
Great post as usual!!
Also just as point of reference for everyone. We averaged every quick service meal to be $10.99 and snacks to be $6.99 and a drink at $2.19. For all of that for 14 days WITH buying the refillable mugs each time we change hotels (which is four times) if we were to buy the quick service plan we would only be saving $1.56.
Are you saying that if you take a single trip with multiple hotel stays, you actually buy new refillable mugs at each hotel?
…I don’t know what Disney’s “official” rules on this are, but there’s no way I’d buy new mugs with a hotel change on the same trip.
Well “techinically” if you were to follow the rules they way I have read it you are supposed to buy a new refillable mug for each property you stay at. I know they have been putting in the RFID machines on the self serve soda fountains and those are supposed to be good just for your stay at that particular resort. I know they were testing it at a few resorts but I can’t remember off hand which ones. As long as they don’t have those we only plan on buying one mug for our trip.
Anybody else have any insight on this?
I know this was tested at one of the All Star Resorts a year or so ago, but I’ve never seen it in person.
Personally, I wouldn’t care what Disney’s technical rules are in this situation. It’s ludicrous to expect guests to buy new mugs for different hotels that are part of the same stay. So long as Disney has no enforcement mechanism for making guests abide by this rule, it is something that I’d personally ignore. Not only does it not make sense in practice (two consecutive 1-night stays at different hotels = 2 mugs, but one 14-night stay at the same hotel = 1 mug), but it’s wasteful. Don’t substitute my ethics for your own, though…
Then again, I don’t really have an issue with guests bringing back current mugs from trip to trip. If it were as big of an issue to Disney as it is to some sanctimonious folks in the fan community, Disney would take proactive measures, such as RFID readers or…unique mug designs…or even a singular design that changes more than once every other year.
I am not a fan at of the Dining Plans at all. What if you’d like to eat off property or don’t want dessert with every meal. My family NEVER orders dessert at CS locations. We always grab popcorn or ice cream or another snack in between meal times. My girlfriend and I are much more prone to order an appetizer than a dessert and we also enjoy a drink or two with dinner. With Tables in Wonderland we are at an advantage to guest’s that can’t take advantage of it. Even with TIW it bothers me how much the restaurant’s menu’s are alike (filet, a fish, pork, etc.) compared to when they had individual flare and drink menu’s. Not to mention the price driven up to make the Dining Plan appear to be a good value.
“Not to mention the price driven up to make the Dining Plan appear to be a good value.”
This REALLY bothers me. If the DDP didn’t exist, there’s no way half these restaurants could charge what they charge.
I agreed with many, many of your points. Especially about free dining not always being the cheapest option. I am a travel agent, who specializes in Disney vacations. And I routinely price out the different discounts for clients. I just had to make two points (both as someone who books these and someone who takes them). When you are traveling with small children, who want to do character meals the dining plan can work in your favor (especially the deluxe dining plan). Second, the cost of the Tables in Wonderland card cost was included but you also had to pay for the annual pass. The cost of the pass is often much more than a base ticket (and although I know you can use discounts with the card for many of my clients there is no intention of returning within a year and the 5% difference in room discounts is not enough to invest in an annual pass) and then buying the TIW card on top of that is significant. I have done the math but I am not sure the total investment in both of these would end up saving one-timers any money. Finally, because you have the ability to travel so frequently your eating habits are vastly different than people who go once and have a checklist, Chef Mickey’s, Cinderella’s Royal Table etc… I think that for many people the plan can save or at least not cost them anything. Dana
I do think that the biggest caveat to this decision is, “It depends”. We are a family of 5 and have done DDP twice and will probably do it for our trip this November. First time, just DH, DD (4 at the time) and me. Having the base DDP means that we choose to go to character meals for all of the TS credits. Doing this meant that our daughter could spend more quality time with the characters and we would have had to make ADRs anyway – no chance of walk-up service. Second trip included our boys who were 2 1/2 at the time. So, again, many characcter meals and, since they were under 3, got to eat for free which, at buffets, meant they could pretty much eat whatever they wanted. My conclusion is, if you’re a family with young kids and want to do character meals/buffets, want to plan out your meal times in advance, then the DDP is probably a good deal. I don’t look at it as a “free” deal at all – it really is pre-paid. And, of course, there are times when we have to take a dessert that we don’t want to eat. But this is not a big deterrent. Our upcoming trip is during F&W and I definitely feel like we’ll get our money’s worth with the snack credits this time (party of 5 for 5 nights = 25 “snacks” – watch out food kiosks!). Perhaps, as our kids get older and don’t need to go to all character meals, it may not make financial sense to do DDP. I appreciate the blog posting – certainly everyone’s circumstances for going to WDW are different so there’s no one right answer. But it’s good to keep in mind that Disney is very good at being profitable!
Tom, excellent review of the DDP vs. paying out of pocket. I was one of the dining plan faithful before I did the math after a trip and found that I wasn’t eating enough to cover the costs of the plan and have since switched to paying out of pocket.
I do have one thought that may be worth pointing out in case anyone ends up using the dining plan and has credits left over. I don’t know if Disney advertises it, but you can use credits from the categories above for the lower categories (ie. using a table service credit at a counter service restaurant or using a table or counter service credit for a snack. While that certainly isn’t the best use of the credits, if anyone finds themselves at the end of their trip with any credits left over, its worth using them up even if its just for snacks. The credits have been paid for, why not use them up?
In the case of your example above, the unused counter service credits could have been used to offset some of the extra snacks, but given the small cost of the snacks, the end result would still be a significant savings by paying out of pocket.
This is a great point, and definitely something worth doing in a pinch!
However, it’s not something I would plan on doing. I shudder as it is when people say how great the Disney Dining Plan is because they can use all of their snack credits to bring home Mickey Mouse Rice Krispie Treats…
We always use the dining plan. The kids get to do the character meals and we always come out at least $300 ahead, including our tips. We also love how easy it is for us.
We have been going to Disney for many, many years with our own children. We now have the opportunity to join our daughter and her family and see it through our young, 4 and 2 grandchildren’s eyes. We have never, ever gone on the DDP and wanted to see if it’s worth the hype. We normally stay at the Value Resorts and in particular over the last few years, Pop Century. Not because we are cheap but to pay such expensive prices for a hotel room that you are barely in doesn’t seem smart. A nice clean, secure place is fine with us. Most of the time it seems their room discount only offers for value have been reduced to 15%. We booked a package, upgraded from the Free Quick Service Dining Plan to Disney Dining Plan for a fee of approx. $300 for my husband and I. My daughter was a bit higher because of my 4 year old granddaughter, herself and her hubby. My grandson is 2 and allowed to eat from an adult plate. 11/11-11/19 with a pin. I don’t see how it isn’t worth it. Being a Disney Veteran, we are going to more Character breakfast and dinners and great restaurants that we normally wouldn’t go to. Breakfast alone for an adult at a character breakfast costs around $30 with dinner as high as $60. We have grown tired of the quick service, not so good food. It forces you to sit down and enjoy your family time together and enjoy some good quality food while witnessing the smiles on our grandchildren’s faces. Agenda, Breakfast and Dinner at Ohana, Be Our Guest for Dinner, Fairytale Dining Cinderella’s Castle, A Buffet with Character Dinner, Play N Dine Breakfast, Chef Mickey, Mama Melrose, Princess Storybook Dining, Chip N Dale Harvest Feast Dinner…another point is we are thinking we may actually like having to go and sit to eat dinner, breakfast where you tend to put it off because you are taken in by your surroundings. More often than not at the end of the day, many times we have ended up grabbing a bit to eat at the hotel before bed because we just didn’t want to stop and try to get through the crowds for some not so good fast food!
We used the DDP on our first trip. This was in 2006, when we had 2 kids 9 and under ($10 a day) who were happy to eat off the kids menu. Appetizers, desserts and tip was also included. Even with all that, in hindsight we decided it was not a value for us. We are lighter eaters, and since we always hit rope drop we like a nice table service lunch (sitting down in air conditioning and being served seems like so much more of a break than standing in line, then going on an empty table search). So, all the ways you can maximize your DDP savings don’t work for us. Plus, by the next year we had a “Disney Adult” who still wanted to order off the kids menu. Because he was 10. And a kid.
On the other hand, our neighbors LOVED the DDP because he is a major penny pincher. He would have never agreed to ANY table service meals, but she was able to tell him that it was all “included”. Made them both happy.
We used it for the first time in 2007 on a Cast Member discount, and also loved it. We would have paid full price for it, in fact.
Part of me wonders if Disney introduced it at a lower price point to get people “addicted” to the DDP with every intent of raising its price and cutting what it offered later, or if Disney realized people would pay much more for much less, and then decided to make the cut. I’m guessing the latter, but the former would be pretty clever.
I love this post. It makes a lot of sense. I think, however, for first time visitors, it may be easier to use the dining plan as they get to know the restaurants, values, etc. For a seasoned traveler, it makes so much more sense.
Realistically, the ONLY reason why I would do the dining plan these days is for the option of paying for food in advance. A lot of people have a very strict budget to follow and the dining plan helps them not spend out of control while in Disney. They must realize however, that the dining plan may end up costing them more in the end.
Thanks for sharing! (PS- New NetworkedBlogs follower!)
Thanks. Despite your kind words, I’m going to take issue with both of your points… 😉
1) How is it easier for first time visitors? In the real world, you pay money for food you order at a restaurant. Paying out of pocket at Walt Disney World is exactly what you do in the real world. I have overheard more servers explaining the DDP to confused guests than I can count. If anything, I think the DDP is easier for seasoned guests who understand its nuances.
2) With all of the resources available these days on the internet, I don’t see how the DDP helps people budget. If someone tells me their party size and where they’d like to eat, I can give them a dining budget range in about 15 minutes just by glancing at the menus and their price ranges. Pick a number somewhere in that range, and order accordingly.
My parents, and thousands of other Disney guests, budgeted for trips for decades before the internet and DDP came into popularity without issue. There’s no reason anyone NEEDS the DDP to budget. This might be controversial, but…it’s not that people can’t budget without the DDP, it’s that they are afraid to do so or are just flat out lazy.
But thanks for the comment! Really! 🙂
“Budget” is a word we hear and see in use less and less. Congress has forgotten what it means.
One sees the “pay in advance” reasoning repeatedly when this topic arises. Here is how I pay in advance: Save money in the bank leading
up to the trip, make a tad (small tad these days) in interest, put meals on my Amex and pay the balance when I get home. How hard is that?
I can understand his point. Before when going to disney we would always tend toward the fast food option or cheaper food. We didn’t explore much. Then for one trip we decided to take it. It would cost us more than usual but I figured it could be ” easier ” to pay everything in advance. On one side… budget wise it is not the best. BUT it did force us to check out the restaurant in disney and discover so many amazing places that we might otherwise never have been to.
Now, for my upcoming trip we are going back to budgetting ( after 2 trip on the DP ). And of course yesterday I did the math. We checked all the menu and guess what we would order. In the end we might have for around 900-1000$ worth of food in 8 days. BUT we are going to 3 signatures restaurants and also on some days we are getting a breakfast, lunch and diner. All of that for the same price as the DP ( around 55$ per days ).
I also did the math to compare with the Deluxe Dining Plan that you were talking about. 82$ worth of food… that is a LOT of food everyday and we just could’nt see ourself eating so much.
So all in all, budget wise it’s not so great. But for new visitor to Disney. I can see the advantage of paying upfront. Not having to worry once there and it “force” you to go discover table service that you might have skipped otherwise because you didn’t feel like paying once you are there.
Best Line Ever! “The place is like the Kohl’s of vacation destinations.”
Agreed. Though Bed Bath and Beyond would have worked well too. 🙂
Haha, I thought the SAME thing. That line truly illustrated your point 😉
We’re staying at BLT at the end of April and we’re giving the DDP a try. I did the math beforehand and it seemed to work out in our favor. But the thing is, most people don’t do the math and the planning, that’s what is most important. I think the best thing we can do is use our snack credits at the F&G booths as some items are $6.99 and higher.
Whenever you have Food & Wine Festival booths (or in this case, Flower & Garden) for using snack credits, you are at a great advantage.
I wholly agree with your skepticism about the Dining Plan, with one additional angle: its complexity for servers! On our last trip, my wife and I paid for our meals out of pocket, and though we only planned a few table-service meals, the relief on our servers’ faces was evident when they didn’t have to explain the Plan’s limitations, or what meals were available, or anything else like that. As you noted, we were able to order anything we wanted without worry, and that flexibility was definitely worth it.
Your photos, as always, are superb!
That is a great point, and something we REGULARLY notice when not using the Dining Plan. Not only are servers relieved, but I think we receive better service and more gratis “treats.”
Just wait until you see some of the other photos from this trip! 🙂
So they limit menus at Table Service to certain meals when using DDP? I thought you could get anything as long as it wasn’t alcoholic and worked with your plan, ie.. regular plan doesn’t include appetizer.