Star Wars Rise of Resistance: Disneyland Virtual Queue & Crowd Predictions
Like its counterpart, Disneyland’s Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance will use the virtual queue and boarding system, instead of FastPass/MaxPass and standby lines. Here, we’ll offer info, tips, screenshots, strategy, and everything you need to know. Plus, crowd predictions and how California will handle Annual Passholders and the local audience from Los Angeles and Orange Counties.
In the event that you’re a Disneyland diehard and only read our California content, we have a regularly-updated and very long Ride Guide & FAQ for Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance. That includes answers to 40+ questions and will probably end up being around 75% accurate for Disneyland, as well. (For opening weekend, at least.)
Of course, the threshold question is whether Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance is “worth it” in terms of the time and effort you’ll have to expend in getting up early, braving rush hour traffic on the 5, getting parked, through security, etc. in order to get a boarding pass. For that, you might want to check out our Spoiler-Free Review of Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance. Suffice to say, there’s a reason guests are willingly getting up at the crack of dawn and jumping through hoops to experience the WDW version…
To use the virtual boarding pass for Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance, download or update the Disneyland app before arriving. Once you launch the Disneyland app, you’ll see a dedicated module, Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance — Access by Boarding Group, available from the main page.
The virtual queue will not be available until published park opening hours, meaning that if Disneyland opens the turnstiles early and allows guests onto Main Street (or even deeper into Disneyland) the virtual queue will still not be available until official park opening time.
We anticipate that Disneyland will open well before 8 am on January 17, 2020 (probably more like 5 or 6 am), but the virtual queue will not go live until 8 am. That means either Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance will be standby only until then, or it won’t operate at all until 8 am. (Or option 3: the virtual queue will start earlier.)
From there, this will show you the status of the land (it’s always open now) and provides options to check “My Status” or “Join Boarding Group.”
If you haven’t already joined one, “Join Boarding Group” is the button you want. From here, you select party members and click confirm. You can only add people if they’ve already entered Disneyland.
After that, when you click on “My Status,” you’ll see this screen. Those green bars do progress, but it’s still pretty much meaningless until you’re actually called.
We highly recommend enabling push notifications on your mobile device for the Disneyland app so you will be notified when it is time to enter the queue for Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance.
If you don’t enable notifications, you’ll need to incessantly refresh or check the “My Status” screen in the My Disney Experience app or digital signage in the park to see when you’re up.
Once your virtual queue boarding group is called, you’ll have up to two hours to enter the physical line for Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance. To enter, you simply walk up to the Rise of the Resistance entrance, which is just inside the Galaxy’s Edge near the Hungry Bear Restaurant end of the land. There, you’ll find a sea of Cast Members with iPads will scan your park ticket.
Disneyland Virtual Queue Conjecture
In its post announcing the virtual queue for Disneyland, the Disney Parks Blog is careful to state that a “virtual queue for Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance may be implemented to help deliver the best possible guest experience” (emphasis added). Disneyland also points out that this only may be implemented “as needed.”
While those two sets of wiggle words downplay the use of the virtual queue for Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance, our expectation is that it’s used for at least opening weekend, holidays, peak season, and potentially other weekends thereafter. In fact, our expectation is that it’ll be used exclusively at Disneyland, just as it’s used at WDW.
The big wildcards here are the reliability of Disneyland’s Rise of the Resistance, how Californians react to the virtual queue, and how much overflow queue there is for the attraction at Disneyland. Let’s discuss these each in turn…
First, ride reliability. Imagineers have stated publicly that both versions of Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance were at roughly the same point in their testing back in December. Yet, Walt Disney World’s opened over a month earlier. That means Disneyland’s has had another month-plus of test and adjust. We’re hopeful that means it’s ready to roll…or at least operating smoother.
We don’t know what, if any, issues Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance has had recently at Disneyland. We know what caused the multi-month delay last year (it’s nothing that would have caused lingering operational problems once remedied) but we haven’t heard anything since. Either way, this is a complex attraction with a lot of moving parts, and some downtime early on is to be expected. Let’s just hope it’s not as much downtime as WDW’s version has experienced.
Second, there’s how Los Angeles and Orange County locals and California Annual Passholders react to the virtual queue. Whatever the guest reaction to it has been in Florida, you can expect a more negative response at Disneyland. This is primarily because the first-come, first-served system disadvantages the local audience that primarily arrives later in the day.
We won’t really see this right away. Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance debuts at Disneyland on the Friday of a holiday weekend. It’s safe to assume that plenty of Disneyland diehards will take off work and turn up at the crack of dawn on Friday. The next three days are weekend and the MLK Day holiday, so it’s probable that locals will arrive early all of those days.
However, the weekdays that follow are a different story. Locals are accustomed to being able to show up after work and do whatever; they often don’t mind waiting in line hours for new attractions. Not being able to line up or obtain a FastPass like normal could lead to a backlash or surplus of complaints by locals.
January and February are California’s chilly off-season, which means far fewer tourists state-wide than other times of the year. However, there will still be enough vacationers visiting Disneyland who show up at rope drop and the hours that follow to fill up the virtual queue for the day well before locals start arriving.
Finally, the amount of physical queue space may necessitate some form of virtual queue, be it this boarding pass system or the quick rollout of FastPass/MaxPass. As we’ve noted, there’s not a ton of physical queue space in the WDW version of Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance. This is fine when FastPass+ is in use there, as the standby to FastPass ratio can be adjusted to manipulate wait times and discourage guests from queueing up.
It’s entirely possible that the physical queue is longer at Disneyland–we’re not sure. This side of Galaxy’s Edge definitely has more “breathing room” in California, so it’d make sense for more of an extended queue. It would also be a savvy move, as Disneyland locals have no problem spending hours in line. Their balking point for new attractions is higher than the average Walt Disney World guest, in large part because their park time is not as scarce.
The other difference here is that Disneyland could switch to FastPass/MaxPass overnight since these same guest demographics (along with vacation planning timeframes) don’t require more advance notice. Nevertheless, our expectation is that the virtual queue will be used at Disneyland for at least a few weeks.
Disneyland Crowd Predictions for Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance
We’ve already at least partially addressed our attendance expectations in our 2020 Disneyland Crowd Calendars: When to Visit & Avoid post…and we also started to touch upon it in the section above. Given the lack of Annual Passholder blockouts, new SoCal Resident ticket deal, and NAMM convention, it’s safe to say opening holiday weekend will be bonkers. That’s hardly a bold prediction.
With that said, we’ve been reluctant to predict huge crowds for the weeks and months that follow the opening of Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance at Disneyland. We made that mistake last year with the debut of Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge, and summer crowds ended up being below average for the months that followed.
There were a number of reasons that happened, and why history should not repeat itself with Rise of the Resistance’s debut. There’s less hype, fear of overcrowding, and Disneyland hasn’t been proactively sending a message that the park, parking, traffic, etc. will be chaotic.
On top of that, the substance here is really, really good. Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance is going to have tremendous word of mouth, which plays a huge role with the local fanbase that can “mobilize” much more quickly than the tourist-heavy demographic Florida draws.
Nevertheless, there are also reasons to believe that the sustained impact on crowds may not be tremendous right away. The next 30 days are historically the slowest stretch of the year, with only the Presidents’ Day holiday breaking up the prolonged period of sleepy off-season dates.
That coupled with the possibility (probability?) that locals arriving after work will have no way of experiencing Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance could cause weekdays for the next month or so to remain only moderately crowded. That is, if the virtual queue/boarding pass system stays in use and locals get the message that there’s no standby line for their post-work visits.
On the other hand, weekends and holidays should see a continuation of the chaos that begins opening weekend. Between those Southern California resident ticket deals and the ongoing lack of Annual Passholder blockouts, locals will likely arrive at Disneyland in droves on the weekends.
Of course, this is all speculation right now, and much of it depends upon variables that could chance after opening weekend. If you’re a tourist with upcoming travel dates to California, you (hopefully) will be fine one way or the other. If you’re a local with limited opportunities to visit Disneyland, we’d recommend taking a wait and see approach, holding off until the dust settles and more concrete strategy is available. We’ll have follow-up Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance strategy and ride report(s) once we have the chance to experience opening weekend (and thereafter) at Disneyland.
If you’re planning on visiting the new land, you’ll also want to read our Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge Guide. This covers a range of topics from basics about the land and its location, to strategically choosing a hotel for your stay, recommended strategy for the land, and how to beat the crowds. It’s a good primer for this huge addition. As for planning the rest of your trip, we have a thorough Disneyland Vacation Planning Guide.
YOUR THOUGHTS
Are you planning on visiting Disneyland’s Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge now that Rise of the Resistance is open? Do you agree or disagree with our preliminary predictions for crowds or how the virtual queue will work at Disneyland? Are you a fan of this system, or would you just prefer FastPass/MaxPass and a really long standby line? Any questions? 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!
An unexpected bonus to this digital queue system: watching the two parks race each other. Right now it’s 2:30 PM PST / 5:30 PM EST, Hollywood Studios is on group 58 while Disneyland is on 61. Woo, go west coast! (I prefer the Orlando parks, but I’ll be going to Anaheim next month so I’m more invested in their success right now. 😉 )
I have the same question about being in DCA for Magic Morning at 8am (we’re there the 27th – 30) and the ability to get a boarding group when DL opens at 9 from inside DCA. Like how you can book fastpasses for either park from either park. Will you or someone in your party attempt this to find out and take one for the team if it’s a no? Thank you, you’re awesome!
I am pretty sure the Disneyland boarding group procedure will work the same as it is setup in Disneyworld. When we got a boarding group for the Disneyworld ROTR we had to be scanned and inside the HS theme park, nowhere else. It is not the same as the FastPass system, where you can get those from your home computer or an app on your phone if you’re at the Magic Kingdom or elsewhere. You, as well as everyone in your party who wants to get a boarding group, have to physically be in the HS theme park to get one.
Thank you for the well written and informative article. I was going to take my two teen boys to Disneyland to experience this ride on Wednesday, February 5th because that is a historically low turnout day. I may reconsider to Wednesday the 26th based on what you said. Thoughts anyone?
Since (according to the Disneyland website and the way it’s been operating at DHS) the virtual queue cannot be joined until 8 am, is there any advantage to arriving super early on the 17th? I would think as long as you got to the gate at least 1 1/2 hours early, you should be able to scan in to the park before 8 so you can join the queue. Is there a flaw in my thinking?
I am an AP’er in Southern California and was fortunate to preview ROTR this past weekend. The ride is set up with a long cue to enter the ride (similar to Flight of Passage) and it looks like a FP line can be set up but is not used (Iike the Millenium Falcon ride). We were not allowed to do stand-by for the ROTR though it looks like cue was designed to accommodate it.
I was able to pass through security before 6:30 am at the DLH entrance and get in line at the DL park gates for 7 am early opening. If you are staying at Disney hotels or good neighbor hotels, you can wait in the lines marked “Early Entry/Magic Mornings” and are required to show your hotel room key when your park ticket is scanned. I would recommend giving yourself at least 20 minutes at security (the entrance at DLH serves Paradise Pier Hotel, Downtown Disney, parking garages and other hotels as well).
I would not underestimate So Cal AP’ers (we have lots of die hard Disney fans!) and many will arrive early to get in the Virtual cue. (They used to camp overnight for events before Disney banned that!) Saturday may be easier to get ROTR since more Ap’ers are blocked out. Sunday is usually a mad house because most passes are valid though I just checked and So Cal level passes are blocked til Monday. I do expect the parks to be VERY busy even with Ap’ers blocked out.
I hope this helps some peeps with their planning and good luck!
PS there are 2 In N Outs about 2-4 miles away, you can always Uber or Lyft! Enjoy!
Thanks for the insights, Tom! I’m looking forward to all the tips you can provide as the weekend progresses!! I don’t get to the west coast parks very often, and I’m hoping to make the most of my park time next week, 1/23-1/25.
“We know what caused the multi-month delay last year (it’s nothing that would have caused lingering operational problems once remedied)”
what is the reason?
Unfortunately, there’s only so much I can divulge. I will say that it was an issue caused by a subcontractor that necessitated significant work to be redone on the attraction. I don’t have any inside info regarding construction on the DHS version, but I do know that different subcontractors were used (which should be obvious given that they’re on different coasts) and the same problem did not occur in Florida. That’s why the WDW version opened first despite being several months behind the DLR version at one point.
Other sites have reported that the trackless ride system was discovered to be faulty after installation, which then required significant time and effort to remove, rework, and reinstall. Because construction of Florida’s version was a few months behind, ride system work was stopped until CA’s problems were figured out. As such, Florida didn’t require any rework (it was just installed correctly the first time), and its constuction “caught up” as a result.
Apparently the subcontractor installed at least some of the floor tiles upside down (they look nearly identical on each side) which caused the trackless ride system not to work properly.
Anyone know roughly what time of the day to expect boarding if you’re in boarding group 50 or so
Should we anticipate that Disneyland letting guests in extra early will become a “regular” thing until the ROTR crowds die down, or is the early park opening expected to be a one-and-done on Jan 17th only?
As with DHS, Disneyland Resort isn’t going to let large crowds form outside the security perimeter or the turnstiles. So it really comes down to what demand dictates.
Since Disneyland Resort guests are generally much more laid back than their Florida counterparts, I’m guessing it won’t happen much (if at all) after opening weekend.
“I’m guessing it won’t happen much (if at all) after opening weekend.”
oh tom, don’t tempt me more. i’m dying to go back to DL before my youngest turns 3 this coming fall, haven’t been sure how to swing it. if there’s a higher likelihood of riding ROTR on the west coast without the chaos in dhs, that makes it all the more desirable… but we’re saving vacation days and $ for our disney transatlantic cruise late this year too.
I have been anxiously awaiting your take on the opening of Rise of the Resistance in Disneyland. We are out of state pass holders who decided to head down and experience the opening . We will be in the parks Jan. 15th – Jan. 18th.
We are staying at the Disneyland Hotel and want to get in line at the gates that morning as soon as possible. I have called customer service multiple times and the answers are all over the place, but average answer is, we won’t be able to go through security until 6:30 that morning. I’m a planner, so I really just want to have an idea of what time we should get in line. We want to give ourselves the best chance of obtaining a boarding pass. We are a group of 2 adults and 2 children. Ideally, I had held out hope that maybe hotel guests would get an automatic boarding pass, but sadly that hasn’t happened. We also are wondering if, since it’s early magic hours starting at 7:00am for DCA, could we go over there and then at 8:00, use our app to get a boarding group. Two cast members told me yes, that will work, one told me it will not, and we have to be in Disneyland park to get the pass. Help …. too many uncertainties.
Lisa, my wife and I did the ROTR attraction at Disneyworld 6 days after it opened last month. If the Disneyland version is set up the same way you will not be able to get a boarding group until everyone in your party is inside the park. It doesn’t matter how early you get inside the park because Disney turns on the boarding group feature in the app the second the park officially opens. Depending on the size of the crowds gathering outside the park, they usually start letting people in an hour or more before the scheduled park opening for that day. Just be sure you’re inside the park when it officially opens. Boarding groups at the Florida site have been filling up within the first 4-5 minutes.
Thanks but we will for sure be all together and going in the park at the same time. We just cannot get a clear answer as to whether we can join a boarding group at 8:00, when Disneyland opens, if we are in DCA. We won’t risk it if it’s a for sure “no”. Keep getting conflicting answers from Cast Members. We also can’t decide what time to line up at the gates. I was told we can’t go through security until 6:30 but it seems like that should be much earlier.
You’re not going to get a clear answer on any of these questions because Cast Members simply do not know. What they’re telling you is what they’ve heard, or their own speculation based upon past precedent.
Unless more official info is released (and I’m skeptical that anything will be), you’re just going to have to go with your best judgment. I’d recommend arriving by 6 am–potentially even earlier if you don’t mind being outside in the cold–but that’s just me.)
Security generally opens about 1 1/2 hours prior to official park opening so 6:30 am is wrong if we are talking about the 17th and 18th when there are Magic Morning Hours scheduled at DCA (on the 17th) and DL (on the 18th). With the parks opening at 7 am, expect security to be open by 5:30 am at the latest. On the 17th, they will probably open security even earlier. Perhaps as early as 4 am if a crowd is building up but 4:30 to 5 am is more likely.
I’m not sure if you’ll be able to join a boarding group if you are physically inside DCA at 8 am. It’s a possibility but I wouldn’t risk it.
We’ll be there. We have a room a Disneyland hotel. Should be fun next Friday and Saturday!
What time do you think you guys will get in line for security? I’m hoping the entrance coming from the hotel may be shorter. Or are those lines the same as the parking garages? Being out of state we have never parked at Disneyland ☺ï¸, so I’m unsure.
Will you be flying in to witness the madness?
The chance to stand in long lines and deal with huge crowds for something we’ve already experienced several times? OF COURSE!
(Hey, I’ll take any excuse I can for some In-N-Out Burger!)
Omg, Tom! Why hadn’t I thought of this sooner? Is there an In-n-Out Burger within walking distance to Disneyland? I’m starting to regret my plan to not rent a car.
I thought your love for SoCal would overcome your disdain for crowds!