Early Park Admission at Epic Universe Strategy Guide: Beating Crowds in Super Nintendo World!

On-site Universal Orlando resort and select other guests have access to Early Park Admission at Epic Universe. This strategy guide covers everything you need to know about EPA: eligibility, ride rosters, how the perk works, and tips for best using the extra morning time in Super Nintendo World to beat the Mario Kart and Donkey Kong Country crowds. (Updated June 1, 2025.)

Early Park Admission (EPA) is essentially Universal Orlando’s twist on Early Entry or Extra Magic Hours at Walt Disney World. Going forward, EPA will be offered at Epic Universe every single day through at least December 31, 2025. It is also being offered at Islands of Adventure and Volcano Bay, but not Universal Studios Florida.

Early Park Admission is officially advertised as being “up to 1 hour prior to park opening.” (It’s sometimes 30 minutes during the off-season.) Unofficially, we’ve already experienced it starting slightly earlier than an hour in advance, and expect this to continue to be the trend going forward at Epic Universe.

Most eligible guests during Early Park Admission are coming from Universal Orlando Resort’s on-site hotels, for whom the perk is included with their stay as a guest perk. Here’s the full list:

At the other gates, the pool of eligible Early Park Admission guests was even larger due to Annual Passholders and a wide variety of other ticket holders also being granted the perk. Thus far at Epic Universe, EPA is limited to on-site hotel guests. If you’re not an on-site hotel guest, this is not relevant to you. Instead, consult our Epic Universe Morning Strategy: Rope Drop Rides to Do & Avoid to Save Time!

While preparing this guide for Early Park Admission at Epic Universe, it came to my attention that I’ve never covered strategy for the same at Universal Studios Florida or Islands of Adventure. Which is odd, because I specifically did a bunch of field testing of various plans. Guess I just rode a roller coasters repeatedly for fun.

Let’s start there given that Islands of Adventure is currently offering EPA during Summer 2025. Here’s a list of Early Park Admission Available Attractions at Islands of Adventure:

  • Harry Potter and the Forbidden Journey
  • Flight of the Hippogriff
  • Jurassic World VelociCoaster
  • Ollivanders
  • Hagrid’s Magical Creatures Motorbike Adventure

If you’re looking for EPA at IoA strategy, my advice is simple enough: do Hagrid’s Magical Creatures Motorbike Adventure one or more times, then head over to Jurassic World VelociCoaster and do that one or more times, and then head to Harry Potter and the Forbidden Journey and the rest of the Wizarding World of Harry Potter.

Honestly, my optimal approach to Early Park Admission at Islands of Adventure is just doing the two roller coasters on loop. The total time commitment for either one isn’t that significant from the time you enter the queue until the time you exit, so it’s easier to do these coasters repeatedly than it is to bounce around or do attractions with more elaborate and time-consuming pre-shows.

The last time I did Early Park Entry at Islands of Adventure, I looped VelociCoaster over and over again. I love this approach because it’s quick, convenient, and satisfying–and it means only hassling with a locker once. Your mileage may vary on this, though, as not everyone can do a relatively intense roller coaster a half-dozen times to start the morning.

Anyway, moving along to Early Park Admission at Universal Epic Universe…

I’ve only ever done Early Park Admission from Universal Helios Grand Hotel, which is the in-park resort overlooking Epic Universe with its own private entrance into the park. The process for this hotel is going to differ from the main entrance, but from what I observed and heard from friends staying at Terra Luna, it’s fairly similar.

The one big difference is that Helios Grand Hotel only has one bag scanner and two turnstiles, which makes for a long and slow-moving line to enter Epic Universe before and during Early Park Admission. My group typically arrived an hour before EPA started, and we were still ~50 people back from the front, at minimum.

On my checkout morning, I observed this process play out from my park view room, and the first guests actually appeared outside in the walkway around 90 minutes before Early Park Admission started. They then were held there for around an hour before being released into Epic Universe.

Approximately 90% of guests headed towards Super Nintendo World once released from the Helios holding point. It’s a fairly long walk to that portal and the pathways are wide, so being first in line for Early Park Admission is almost meaningless. Parties that showed up ~30 minutes after those first guests could have theoretically beaten them to Donkey Kong Country.

That’s not the only pre-queueing. Even though the portal to Super Nintendo World should be open at that time, the rides likely are not yet operational. So guests are allowed to line up for the attractions, but usually are not riding right away. With that said, the rides did end up operating roughly 10-15 minutes before the start of Early Park Admission, assuming they aren’t subject to the dreaded “delayed” opening.

All of these times are imprecise and subject to change. These earlier start times are essentially “release valves” on crowds to prevent congestion and backups. That’s why the Helios Grand Hotel security and turnstiles open early–otherwise, resort guests wouldn’t all be inside the park by the time EPA starts–and that’s why the attractions pre-queue. But we’re getting ahead of ourselves. Let’s backtrack a bit and cover what’s open during EPA.

Available Attractions During Early Park Admission at Universal Epic Universe:

  • Mario Kart: Bowser’s Challenge
  • Yoshi’s Adventure
  • Donkey Kong Mine-Cart Madness
  • Stardust Racers
  • Constellation Carousel
  • Monsters Unchained: The Frankenstein Experiment
  • Curse of the Werewolf

As you can probably gather, this means the lands open during EPA are Celestial Park, Super Nintendo World, and Dark Universe. The last entry on that list is a new one, presumably due to worse crowds during EPA than at regular rope drop (since most Epic Universe guests are staying on-site).

The Wizarding World of Harry Potter – Ministry of Magic and How to Train Your Dragon – Isle of Berk both open at regular rope drop.

Despite higher demand, we highly recommend taking advantage of Early Park Admission in Super Nintendo World, as opposed to Dark Universe or Celestial Park. This portal is the most popular in the entire park, with 2 of the 3 highest average wait times in Epic Universe.

The “secret hack” to beating the crowd for Early Park Admission in Super Nintendo World is entering through the ground-level bypass doors to the left of the Nintendo Super Star Store in Celestial Park (pictured above). 

This way, you avoid going up the escalator (or stairs) in the main portal and back down the stairs again. This may seem insignificant, but it’ll save you a couple of minutes, easily, and every second counts when it comes to EPA–especially at a low-capacity attraction like Mine Cart Madness.

The best strategy for Early Park Admission at Epic Universe is simple: Do Donkey Kong Mine-Cart Madness first.

There’s some strategy that’s still “iffy” for Epic Universe, but not this. Starting in Donkey Kong Country is, without a doubt, the #1 best time-saving approach to Early Park Admission at Epic Universe. The optimal second step is more debatable, but Mine-Cart Madness should be your top morning priority.

Mine-Cart Madness has really low hourly capacity, and is going to end up being one of the longest lines in Epic Universe. The average year-to-date wait time for Mine-Cart Madness at Universal Studios Japan is 151 minutes. Not the peak wait–the average wait. We’ve heard of it exceeding 300 minutes on occasion.

Granted, USJ is the busiest theme park we’ve ever visited, but we’d expect something similar at Epic Universe. Maybe Mine-Cart Madness will “only” average 120 minute wait times in Florida. Regardless of the actual numbers, it will be one of the top wait times in all of Epic Universe, and a higher number than anything else on the above list.

That’s not the only reason to do Mine-Cart Madness in Donkey Kong Country first.

In addition to having low-capacity and (very likely) 2-hour waits later in the day, Mine-Cart Madness is also a relatively short attraction with no pre-show. It does have a long queue, so that alone might take you 5-10 minutes to walk, but the ride itself is fairly brief. Meaning that it takes less time, from start to finish, than Mario Kart: Bowser’s Challenge (the other top contender for Early Park Admission).

It’s always a good idea to knock out shorter duration attractions first, and then turn your attention to the longer ones. It’s possible that you’ll still have time to hit Mario Kart before Early Park Admission is over if you start at Mine-Cart Madness and are near the front of the line.

It’s also possible that Mario Kart: Bowser’s Challenge will already have a prohibitively long line due to the aforementioned pre-queueing and crowds. This makes it a more questionable #2 attraction during Early Park Admission at Epic Universe.

Ideally, you’d like to see the posted wait time be roughly how much time is left on the clock during EPA. Meaning that if it’s 8:20 a.m. by the time you’re off Mine-Cart Madness, you’d want the posted wait for Mario Kart to be 40 minutes or less. That’s probably not going to happen most days.

Even during limited capacity days, Mario Kart was already hitting hour-long waits by the time we were done with Mine-Cart Madness. There are thus two approaches at this point–either do Yoshi’s Adventure, which should have a wait time of under 40 minutes (you’re in for a rough day if it doesn’t) or just bite the bullet and do Mario Kart regardless of the posted wait time.

The argument to be made for doing Mario Kart regardless is that the wait time is only going to get worse at and after official park opening, and this will be another one of the most popular rides in Epic Universe. So you might as well minimize walking and finish off Super Nintendo World first. Knocking out two of the park’s most popular rides as a 1-2 punch puts you in a great position for the rest of the day.

The argument in favor of Yoshi’s Adventure is that it enables you to rope drop one of the other portals before off-site guests are allowed into the park. Meaning you could head over to Isle of Berk, Battle at the Ministry, etc. This way, you’re beating the crowd to two different attractions/lands in the same day.

Which approach is better is truly a judgment call. I come down on the side of just doing Mario Kart. You’re already there and it has a higher average wait than anything in Isle of Berk. In addition to the above, Mario Kart seems to be a love-it or hate-it attraction. So it might be good to “get it out of the way” early to focus on things you love. Or if you love it, you might want to replay it again via Single Rider or even standby. (For the record, I’m firmly in the “love it” camp on Mario Kart.)

I’d then round out my morning with Yoshi’s Adventure, which should still have a below average wait time unless one of the top 2 attractions in Super Nintendo World has a dreaded “delayed” opening. Following that, you can either move on or play the Super Nintendo World Key Challenge mini-games. Those are also low capacity and could have ridiculous waits later in the day as a result.

An alternative approach to Early Park Admission is simply looping Stardust Racers and seeing how many times you can ride that awesome roller coaster before the crowds arrive. Stardust Racers has pretty healthy throughput, so you should be in good shape to do this again and again with minimal waits. Even so, I’d recommend starting on the green side, as that tends to have the longer line.

A similar strategy could be recommended with Curse of the Werewolf in Dark Universe, which also has higher average wait times but isn’t quite as intense. (As much as we love it, there’s no point in doing Monsters Unchained during EPA–it’s a people-eater.) I do not recommend a strategy of prioritizing the roller coasters unless you have a few days at Epic Universe and want to try something different on a subsequent morning.

Finally, it’s worth noting that Early Park Admission may not be all that useful at Epic Universe. During our days at the park, the highest wait times of the day were all posted towards the end of EPA and right around regular rope drop. The problem is that the 11 on-site hotels have over 10,000 rooms and those aren’t even the only guests eligible for EPA. Then there’s the reality that utilization of EPA is high, as Epic Universe is brand-new and guests feel a greater sense of urgency to take full advantage and beat the crowds.

On top of that, only around one-quarter of the park is open, consolidating that demand into a low number of attractions. So it may not be worth arriving ~90 minutes in advance for Early Park Admission. Personally, I think it is for the sake of knocking out Mine-Cart Madness and/or Mario Kart: Bowser’s Challenge. And it’s just awesome to be inside Super Nintendo World as the morning light illuminates the vibrant landscape of the Mushroom Kingdom and Donkey Kong Country.

Need trip planning tips and comprehensive advice for your visit to Central Florida? Make sure to read our Universal Orlando Planning Guide for everything about Islands of Adventure and Universal Studios Florida. Also check out our Walt Disney World Vacation Planning Guide for everything about those parks, resorts, restaurants, and so much more. For regular updates, news & rumors, a heads up when discounts are released, and much more, sign up for our FREE email newsletter!

Your Thoughts

What’s your plan for Early Park Admission at Epic Universe? Agree that Donkey Kong Country and Mine-Cart Madness are the #1 starting point? Or do you have an alternative plan of attack for beating the crowds? Which of these rides are your highest priority Epic Universe or Orlando attractions? Do you agree or disagree with any of our strategy? 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!

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40 Comments

  1. Going by what’s now showing on the Universal Orlando website, I see that Donkey Kong Mine-Cart Madness has been removed from early park admission. So before you base your plan of attack on getting to that one first, you should make sure to find out whether they’ve restored it to EPA before your trip.

  2. Any idea when they’re going to start selling park tickets for January 2026? It’s difficult to plan a Christmas break vacation without being able to buy tickets.

  3. In reference to that photo of the Nintendo Super Star Store, are the ground-level bypass doors in frame? It looks like one big building without any doors nearby that I can see. Are the bypass doors near where that person in the hat is walking?

    1. We were there yesterday. I wish somebody had clarified this for me. I was looking for the “secret” entrance during/before EPA and couldn’t find it. It WILL make a big difference during EPA. My two teen boys and I got separated on the escalator, and that probably cascaded for the day. But we did luck out for MoM (see my other post below).

      What is not clear from Universal’s online map of Epic is that everything that is not physically within a land—is celestial Park. So when Tom says that the entrance is in Celestial Park, realize that the “secret” entrance is PAST the Donkey Kong escalator. Don’t queue up there, keep going. If you look closely at the picture, you can see on the far right side that Pizza Moon is there in the picture. That may help you orient and find the entrance on the map. And yes, it is where the lady with the hat is. That should help! Good luck!

  4. Quick question, Tom. We’ll have Epic Express Passes on 6/9 and are eligible for EPA. We are planning on going to Donkey Kong first. Would you recommend going to the HP line after finishing Donkey Kong to beat the rope drop crowds? Th reasoning is that we would get both done earlier and still have our Express Passes to fall back on later for the other rides.

    1. Unless you want to meet Toothless, that’s probably the best strategy in light of Express Pass.

      My one piece of advice is to be willing to cut your losses on BatM. If you’re far back, it immediately posts a multi-hour wait or has a delayed opening–just do it later. Some mornings, rope dropping BatM has been a great approach. Other days, it’s been awful. Very little middle ground.

    2. Got it, thanks for the input. I’ll post an update to let everyone know how it goes with the Express Pass. Based on a recent post, the day we are going is one of the days with a *slightly* lower cap

      Best to you, Sarah, and Megatron

    3. So…here’s our update from yesterday’s visit. I had gone to guest services at IoA the day prior to see if I could get a refund of the difference of the Epic single day general admission prices and the Epic single day prices for AP holders.

      Alas! No, there were no AP single day tickets remaining. But! The Team Member suggested that I hold off using the Express Passes that I had bought for Epic. He didn’t seem to think I would need them. If we didn’t/couldn’t use them, he said I should be able to get a refund of that expense.

      We went to Epic for EPA. See my response about how that went (above). We should have been able to ride Donkey Kong really quickly, but my teens got separated from me on the escalator. In any case—to avoid the escalator chaos—enter past the escalator to cut in front of the crazy throng of people.

      We were off DK and in line for Bowser’s by 9:40. I’m not a Nintendo or game person at all, just ask my boys, but Bowser’s was fantastic! So the arrival to Bowser’s was not ideal, but not terrible. So we had decided not to go to BatM right after DK and see if we really needed to use the Express Passes (spoiler—Express Passes probably would not have improved our day). We did step into the Yoshi line for about 10 minutes after that, then decided that an hour+ wait for Yoshi was not going to be time well spent. So we headed to France.

      We lucked out because when we were having lunch in France, BatM was down. When we finished, I noticed it was operating again. We entered the line with a 90 minute posted wait. It was spot-on. It increased to 150 minutes pretty quickly. All I have to say is WOW!! Totally worth the wait. The queue is incredible. Universal hit it out of the park with Battle at the Ministry.

      Then…the dreaded weather delays. We checked out Berk, ate some steak and rice bowls (great, and a fair amount of food) and a PB and J macaroni and cheese cone (good to try, but I won’t be dreaming about them). I saw the boats at Fyre Drill start moving a little, so my teens and I hopped into line. But the water canons weren’t working. Then all the Express Pass guests started loading into the line. So a short line became 45 minutes.

      Then everything was on weather delay the rest of the day. We did ride Frankenstein since it was indoors. So—5 rides plus Cirque Arcanus (from a Harry Potter fan—worth seeing) the whole day. And trying a whole lot of new foods. Besides Fyre Drill (not worth our time as a family with older teens), Express Pass wouldn’t have changed anything about our day. So the Team Member was 100% right. And we got a $900 refund.

      I didn’t mind paying for our day tickets. We enjoyed the park, especially the new Harry Potter area/France and Battle at the Ministry!

      And yes, the cold Butterbeer in France is better/different than the cold Butterbeer in Hogsmead and Diagon Alley. But I’m still a hot Butterbeer fan, even on a warm day.

      I wish we could have done Stardust, the dual ride in Berk, and the werewolf coaster. And the show in Berk since it comes so highly recommended by Tom.

      My overall recommendation would be to prioritize what you really want to see and do, and do those things first. Review Tom’s ride and event descriptions and rankings, and decide what is most important for you and your family. And beware of weather delays, often in the afternoons in the summer. Those might shut down most of the rides for a long period of time, perhaps the rest of the day. Good luck!

      I also heard that attendance was around 17,000. I have no idea if this was accurate, but the park was not overwhelmingly full.

      Thanks for all you do, Tom. Best to you, Sarah, and Megatron.

  5. The Universal website now shows the following open for early entry:
    “Available Attractions:
    Mario Kart™: Bowser’s Challenge
    Yoshi’s Adventure™
    Mine-Cart Madness
    Stardust Racers
    Constellation Carousel
    Monsters Unchained: The Frankenstein Experiment
    Curse of the Werewolf”

    You’ll have to update the strategy to account for the Dark Universe rides and the carousel.

    1. Saw that yesterday and had this on my list of posts to update over the weekend. Thanks!

  6. Completed our preview yesterday and lapping Stardust to start our EPA was by far best approach, unless you are way upfront in line and can beat most folks to DK Country. Mine cart basically opened with a posted 240 min wait, it was crazy. Mario Kart was delayed so everyone in SNW (which is by far the majority of EPA people), seemed to queue for DK. Eventually DK times dropped later in the day, still the longest line we waited in but no where near EPA wait times. We got 2 Stardust rides in before EPA ended and then basically had a second rope drop for Monsters Unchained.

    1. Thanks for sharing this!

      I had a couple of friends who went over the weekend and said that Mine Cart Madness wasn’t even operating–and didn’t for a couple of hours–at the start of the day, which might explain that 240 minute wait. It’s almost impossible for that to be due to EPA (there aren’t *that* many people doing it first).

  7. I haven’t seen an article yet from you on strategy if you don’t have early entry, so I’ve been stalking Thrill Data to come up with my own. (Hint- it will NOT involve going to Nintendo World first thing!)
    Have you noticed that every day, they have rotated 1 ride or attraction that does not open until later in the day? Saturday it was Hiccup’s Wing Gliders, Sunday it was Meet Toothless, Monday it was Monsters Unchained, Tuesday it was Stardust Racers, today it was Fyre Drill. Just wondering to myself if this is just coincidence, or if they are testing something with this.

  8. So I was just at Epic yesterday and did exactly this strategy with some mixed results – not due to failings of your approach,Tom, but ride downtime. Rushed to Mine Cart and it went down immediately. After 20 or so minutes, came back up but without any audio. Super annoying, but that’s the risk with the preview. The team members did offer us a re-ride, which was really nice.

    We did the rest of Nintendo rides then moved on as we were right at 11am. Got the Harry Potter VL at 11 (didn’t see a 1045 drop but maybe just too slow?) and a 3pm return, which was fortunate as the ride was down most of the rest of the day from 430pm or so onwards.

    Frankenstein didn’t open until late afternoon, meaning crazy lines until close. We did it and loved the ride – so bummed we didn’t have time to do it more.

    However, overall I was blown away by the immersive elements of each area and the quality of the rides and atmosphere. Without express pass my son and I did something approaching 40 rides. Yes, 20 were werewolf (he loves it!) but that also includes stardust multiples (so fun at night!) and lots of Nintendo rides.

    Highly recommend the preview tickets at hotels – the capacity restrictions seem to make the experience wonderful right now. I fear what the park looks like when full…

    1. Is it difficult to purchase the tickets at the Universal hotels due to availability? I haven’t been able to purchase preview tickets and I’m afraid they will be sold out by the time check into my hotel.

  9. Tom we were at US Hollywood last year and Mario Kart more the once. Our #1 priority is Donkey Kong, would say just in whatever line is shortest for ride #2 and then move on to another Portal? Mario Kart is not a priority now.

  10. Hi Tom, I was curious if you’ve purchased express passes for Epic Universe, and if so, is it worth it to try and get them? We’ll be there May 30 or 31st.

  11. Hi Tom!
    Universal app show EPA to be available at IOA throughout May including after Epic Universe opens. So is the change going to happen in June?

  12. I’m visiting in July with my 8,10, 12 yr old grandkids. Did you have any experience with the “Power Bands” ? must have? skip? I’m not a gamer, although the oldest grandkid does some and I think the other two have a switch, but their parents don’t allow much screen stuff.

    So I’m a little lost as to how that stuff plays out

  13. Not the same Pete as below, but per the advice above to make Yoshi’s Adventure the 2nd priority in an efficient Early Park Admission strategy, I remember the words of a wise blogger who wrote this about a previous incarnation of this ride at another Universal park: “Yoshi’s Adventure certainly doesn’t qualify as ‘ugly,’ but it definitely is ‘bad.’”

    So is this Epic Universe iteration of Yoshi an improvement, or have you warmed to the ride, or are you just assuming folks will want to knock it out from a “completionist” point of view, and they might as well do it during Early Park Admission vs. wasting a lot of time in line later in the day?

    1. I’ve warmed to it a bit. Having a kid now has also colored my perspective, as the entire time I was riding, I was thinking how much she might enjoy this.

      Also, waiting ~5 minutes versus over an hour definitely helps.

  14. Hi Tim. A recent follower but enjoying your content!

    We’re visiting next week at hoping for preview tix from Terra Luna. What have you heard about ticket availability for guests?

    Secondly, we’re travelling with two toddlers so cannot ride at the same time, is anything such as rider switch or single rider operating during previews?

    1. When I asked at the desk, they indicated there was plenty of ticket availability for all dates and it shouldn’t be a problem. They stopped short of saying tickets were “guaranteed,” though.

      Rider switch is available and single rider lines are (mostly) open during the previews. Just make sure you get spots in the Ministry of Magic VL for everyone who wants to ride!

  15. I’m planning a trip for December 31-January 2. Multipark tickets are available for those dates, but express passes are not available on the website for January 2026. Does anybody have any idea when those may become available? Thank you!

  16. Thanks for this info. Did you get a sense that EPA guests arriving from the front main gates of the park were at an advantage or disadvantage getting to the queue for Super Nintendo World vs. those coming from the Helios entrance?

    1. I felt very little difference when doing my own testing, and observed the same when watching via my hotel window. But it’s going to end up varying slightly by day since the holding points are on opposite sides of the park and one could be released ~30 seconds earlier or whatever.

      What I can’t speak to is how arrival times come into play. Meaning that guests getting to the main entrance much later might be in a better position to arrival later without issue because there are more turnstiles/security stations there than the Helios entrance.

  17. Thanks for the great information, Tom! Do you think the Epic Universe crowd will thin later in the day as early birds burn out, or do you expect the crowd level to remain steady throughout the day’s operating hours? I’m specifically asking about late July for planning purposes, which may be too early in the ‘shiny new thing’ game to speculate, but also interested about crowd strategy in the long term.

    1. At some point, that will happen. It really depends on overall crowd levels and attraction breakdowns on any given day, so not something that’s easily predictable at this point. I’d probably just plan on doing EPA.

  18. very helpful. If you start in Super Nintendo World at either Donkey Kong or Mario Kart could you get to Stardust Racers before the end of EPA?

    1. Probably, but I don’t really see the point of that. Stardust Racers has really good capacity, and it’ll keep getting better as dispatch intervals improve. That ride will undoubtedly be popular, but it shouldn’t be a problem.

  19. We are planning 1 day at Epic Universe in mid June while there for a 1 week Disney trip, and we are staying at Disney. We would love to hear your strategy for Epic when staying off site and not eligible for early admission. We are seasoned Disney people, and rope drop during EMH regularly, so trying to navigate a new park is a little daunting, especially without early admission, but we’re going to try! We will take all of the tips you can offer!! Thanks for all of your great reporting…love your blog!!

    1. Regular rope drop strategy and a 1-day itinerary are both coming soon! Trying to do this somewhat in a logical order of the day.

    1. Oops! Not sure how that got deleted from my list of hotels, but it’s eligible.

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