Early Entry at Disney’s Hollywood Studios Report: What Worked & Went Wrong.

During an efficient Early Entry at Hollywood Studios, you can ride multiple E-Ticket attractions in Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge, Toy Story Land, or the front of the park. This photo report offers a step-by-step recap of my morning at DHS, detailing what worked and what went wrong.

This covers a busy day at Disney’s Hollywood Studios, when the park had a 8/10 crowd level, average park-wide wait time of 48 minutes, and peaks for multiple headliners of more than 100 minutes. If you’re visiting this summer through October 2025, you almost certainly will not encounter this high of a crowd level. There’s only been one 7/10 day this month–most dates have been at or below 4/10.

Despite the higher crowd level during my visit, Disney’s Hollywood Studios did not move forward its opening time–Early Entry began at 8:30 am and the park opened at 9 am to the general public. That’s about par for the course right now, even on dates with higher attendance forecasts. (Closing was extended to 9:30 pm, which obviously has no bearing on Early Entry.)

I purposefully visited on one of the worst days of the week at Disney’s Hollywood Studios, and during the tail end of spring break season in order to stress test my tried & true plan for Early Entry at Disney’s Hollywood Studios.

It had been a while since I had any worthwhile new strategy for Disney’s Hollywood Studios, and between the higher anticipated wait times and changes made to the rope drop procedure, I figured this would yield something worth sharing.

That turned out to be correct, as my normal strategy did not work during this day at DHS.

For this Early Entry report, I was staying at Disney’s BoardWalk Inn. I had just done field testing via the Skyliner a couple of weeks earlier–or rather, I tried to. As covered in Skyliner Warning for Rope Dropping Disney’s Hollywood Studios or EPCOT, I had no such luck on two separate mornings. I’m not sure what time I would’ve needed to line up in order for “success,” or if it even would’ve been possible via the Skyliner, honestly.

The advantage of Early Entry at Disney’s Hollywood Studios from the Crescent Lake Resorts is simple: walking. Walking consistently beats buses, boats, Skyliner, driving, rideshare, etc. There are exceptions to this, and I have had a boat pass me on the walk more than once and also seen bus guests arrive simultaneous to me, but the operative word here is “consistently.”

I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve been burned by other forms of Walt Disney World transportation for Early Entry or rope drop. Most are perfectly fine ~75% of the time, which might seem like a good number…until you wake up at the crack of dawn for nothing, and arrive at the back of the pack. I’ve never been burned by my own two feet.

Walking has a 100% success rate for Early Entry at EPCOT, Hollywood Studios, and Magic Kingdom. It’s the undefeated approach, and if you’re going to race around at rope drop anyway, you might as well walk to the park. Your mileage may vary on that advice, though.

My goal was to thread the needle, not wanting to arrive before security opened nor be the first person at the turnstile–but also not be behind the crowd. The thought process behind this is that all time has value, and leaving the room at 6:45 am (as I’ve done before for Early Entry at DHS) results in a lot of unnecessary waiting around.

According, I arrived at Disney’s Hollywood Studios on this particular morning at 7:45 am, which is ~45 minutes later than some guests. (The parking lot typically opens at 7 am, with security starting around 7:15 to 7:30 am.) This worked out pretty well, as I still beat the crowd, breezed through bag check, and went to the far right tapstiles (my preference) and was only about a dozen people back.

My goal for Early Entry at DHS is still to knock out multiple headliner attractions before the “wave” of regular guests arrived for normal park opening at Disney’s Hollywood Studios. This might seem overzealous, and it arguably is. However, I’ve done Early Entry at DHS several times and found that it’s surprisingly easy to accomplish a lot that won’t be possible later in the day.

Anyway, the tapstiles opened at 7:58 am, which was an hour before park opening time–or 30 minutes before the official start of Early Entry. (Note that this opening time is unofficial and can vary from day-to-day.)

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: one down Sunset Boulevard, two more at the respective ride entrances to 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 really 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 (save for the aforementioned ones at MMRR and Star Tours, since both are otherwise outside the checkpoint perimeter).

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. It’s been a long, long time in a galaxy not-so-far away since I last did morning Extra Magic Hours at Disney’s Hollywood Studios, but this is more or less how it used to be before Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge (so before August 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 until ~9:05 am to beat the rope drop rush.

Turning to the substance of this Early Entry report, the vast majority of guests headed to Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge or Toy Story Land. As always.

Even though the “new ride smell” has worn off Mickey & Minnie’s Runaway Railway, it is still a really popular #1 destination. My strong suspicion is that it sucks up the guests not wanting to walk any farther into the park.

If you want to stick to the front of the park, I’d probably start with Rock ‘n’ Roller Coaster and Tower of Terror. But really, Slinky Dog Dash isn’t that much more of a walk than Runaway Railway.

Despite stopping for a few photos along the way, I arrived at Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance at 8:06 am. I am exceptionally good at power-walking, something I weirdly brag about often on this blog. Well, as it turns out, there’s good reason to be proud of this–it means I’m going to be doing this nonsense well into my nineties. (Now watch, I’ll get hit by a bus tomorrow.)

I wasn’t at the front of the pack for Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance, but I was near-enough the front that it was a matter of walking through most of the queue (although now more slowly), before a brief pause near the front while waiting for the ride to start operating. After that, it was mostly a matter of getting through the lengthy pre-shows and attraction itself. I was off Rise of the Resistance by 8:40 am.

Keep in mind that this was only 10 minutes into the official Early Entry time, which might seem pretty good. The problem is that it used to be the case that you could finish Rise of the Resistance before 8:30 am, getting to your second stop right around the time the perk actually started. Rise of the Resistance used to start running way before the other rides, but that’s no longer the case. This was the second or third time I had this experience, so it’s safe to say that it’s the new normal. The difference is that it’s the first time this actually mattered.

I nevertheless headed to Toy Story Land and Slinky Dog Dash, where I was greeted by a 45 minute posted wait time and guests already loaded into the regular queue.

When I’ve done Early Entry in the past, it’s often the case that Slinky Dog Dash’s line is still ‘stacked’ outside the main entrance and stretching out into Toy Story Land. This looks worse, but actually isn’t. You can see pretty much the entirety of the line, it just isn’t snaking through the queue.

Without being able to see the line, I couldn’t eyeball the accuracy of the posted wait. I just decided to gamble on it. I had ~15 minutes until regular rope drop and Lightning Lane guests started returning, so hopefully the line would move fast.

It did not.

After moving at a glacial pace, I checked the wait times in-app, and Slinky Dog Dash had shot up to 70 minutes.

This was only a few minutes after I had gotten into line, and if my wait was even half that, I’d consider this an Early Entry “fail.” I was hoping for a time of under 25 minutes to make this approach “worth it.” I decided to bail, seeing what else I could accomplish.

At this point, there was barely any time until regular rope drop, so I went with the low-hanging fruit of Toy Story Mania.

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. My actual wait time for Toy Story Mania was under 15 minutes.

Next up, I could’ve done Alien Swirling Saucers as close to a walk-on if I so desired. I did not desire. I also probably could have beat the rush to Millennium Falcon: Smugglers Run, but I also did not desire to do that. Lots of ‘personal preference’ seeping into what’s supposed to be a research run!

Instead, I doubled-back to Sunset Boulevard hoping that enough of the regular rope drop crowd had opted for Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge and Toy Story Land to keep crowds down here. Thankfully, they had.

The only problem was that Rock ‘n’ Roller Coaster was having the dreaded delayed opening, pushing all guests heading this way to Tower of Terror. That only had a 30 minute posted wait time, so I opted to do that.

My actual wait was almost exactly 30 minutes. That’s not great for this time of the morning, but the line was unquestionably exacerbated by the downtime of RnRC. I’ve done both rides at this point in the morning and have had both be pretty close to walk-ons. (Albeit not on 8/10 crowd level days).

Once done, Disney’s Hollywood Studios was pretty busy and I was hungry, so I decided to call it quits. Were I doing anything other than field testing, I would’ve kept going.

One of my favorite approaches to extend a good rope drop run is pivoting to characters. Those have long waits later, and not many guests think to do them at or around 10 am. But I don’t need another photo by myself wearing an athletic shirt while meeting Minnie Mouse in her ballgown. You’ll just have to take my word for this being a good next-stop.

Although I haven’t had a chance to test this yet, what I would probably do after characters is knock out Villains Unfairly Ever After and the Little Mermaid – A Musical Adventure before an early lunch. Both of those still have the new show smell, and it’s common to wait through multiple show cycles later in the day. Knocking those out early would reduce the likelihood of that happening.

Ultimately, the biggest lesson of this Early Entry and rope drop run at Disney’s Hollywood Studios was that trying to do both the Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge and Toy Story Land headliners is a bad idea on a busy day. Honestly, I kind of knew this going in–there have been times when this approach has been playing with fire on moderately-crowded days. I just had never been burned before.

Going forward, my next Early Entry test is simply going to be knocking out all of Toy Story Land during Early Entry and then seeing what else I can pick off around regular rope drop. That feels like the true path of least resistance, and a much more replicable and scalable strategy. I’ll probably try the Rise of the Resistance to Slinky Dog Dash approach (or perhaps do them in reverse order), once the off-season rolls around again. I’m like a moth to a flame, and really love knocking out both during Early Entry. It’s tremendously satisfying.

Regardless, Early Entry is an excellent option for an efficient morning of attractions at Disney’s Hollywood Studios. On a good day, you’ll be able to save a few hours as compared to peak midday waits by knocking out 3 or 4 of the most popular attractions within the first hour or so of the day. This is what makes DHS the best park for Early Entry at Walt Disney World.

Even if you only accomplish a couple of headliners plus characters or shows, you’re set up well for the last few hours–and you should be able to accomplish pretty much everything else then. (See our Disney’s Hollywood Studios Afternoon Arrival Strategy.) As explained there, DHS is really only bad during the middle of the day, and is much more pleasant during the morning or evening.

Finally, this DHS Early Entry report should illustrate is the importance of calling an audible if things aren’t going according to plan. 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 delays. if you want additional strategy for the other three parks, check out our Guide to Early Theme Park Entry at Walt Disney World.

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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!