Epic Universe’s Worst 2 Weeks Ever.
Epic Universe’s opening year has been a wild ride. Universal Orlando’s new park has ping-ponged between low and sky-high crowd levels, with astronomical wait times that are worse than New Year’s Eve at Walt Disney World. This takes a look at data for the last couple of weeks, which have been especially rough for Epic Universe.
For starters, this comes during the popular fall break period at Universal Orlando. It thus shouldn’t come as a huge surprise that Epic Universe is busy, as we already reported that Walt Disney World’s Worst Crowds Since Easter Are Here.
Attendance trends are comparable at both Universal Orlando and Walt Disney World, with Epic Universe being the colossal caveat to that most of the time, at least when it comes to crowd dynamics with Floridians and Annual Passholders. But those are not the issue right now, as Fall Break crowds are fueled by non-local tourists.
It’s been almost exactly four months since we shared our preliminary 2025 Epic Universe Crowd Calendar, which offered a forward-looking forecast and a recap of then-current crowds. On the big-picture predictions front, that holds up shockingly well.
Obviously, there’s a lot of additional wait times data since then to share (courtesy of thrill-data). By and large, crowds have only worsened since then. Epic Universe has had several record-setting days and weeks since, first breaking the 80 minute wait time barrier on July 16, when average wait times were 85 minutes and the crowd level was 10/10. That was followed by back-to-back 80 minute days August 6-7.
As always, keep in mind that these are averages. Wait times tend to be even higher midday, but lower first thing in the morning or evening. Some attractions are averaging waits that are over 2 hours, but that’s offset by a few people-eaters or less popular attractions that are below 30 minutes. All told, Epic Universe has 5 rides plus one meet & greet averaging wait times over an hour this month. Three of those are in triple-digit territory.
The days with averages over 70 or 80 minutes are notable because no other Universal or Disney theme park has had an 80+ minute day since at least 2019 and there have been very few 70+ minute days. Meanwhile at Epic Universe, there have been many days at or above 70 minutes–breaking that barrier was a pretty common occurrence that happened multiple times per week before schools went back into session.
Late June was the start of a stretch when weekly averages were 64-68 minutes for 6 consecutive weeks; with all but one week in the 64-66 minute range. For a park that is so inconsistent on a day-to-day basis, that was remarkably consistent on a weekly one.
The ended in mid-August, when weekly averages dropped to “only” 51-59 minutes between then and mid-September. From the second half of that month through early October, weekly averages once again were 61-62 minutes. All the while, daily averages were all over the place, ranging from lows of 29-32 minutes (including the day of My Excellent Epic Universe Experience) to highs above 70 minutes. Not only are the highs higher at Epic Universe, but the range is also wider than any other theme park at Universal or Disney.
Fast-forward to October 2025, and the last two weeks that just ended on Sunday have been the worst ever at Epic Universe. (Thus far, this week is not quite as busy, which is as expected since the height of Fall Break is now behind us.)
Now obviously, this park isn’t even 6 months old, so “worst ever” may seem like hyperbole. Until you look at the numbers. The weekly averages were 72 and 73 minutes, respectively, over the course of the last two weeks.
This covers a daily range of 58 minutes to 86 minutes (twice), the latter of which is another new record for Epic Universe. The park has broken the 80 minute barrier three times thus far this month: October 7, 12, and 14.
It’s worth noting that no other Universal Orlando or Walt Disney World park is hitting average daily wait times at anywhere near those levels.
Islands of Adventure was the busier of the two legacy gates at Universal Orlando over the last two weeks. Its average weekly wait times were 37 and 36 minutes. The busiest park at Walt Disney World was Hollywood Studios, which had weekly averages of 42 and 43 minutes.
It’s not like either of these parks were dead, either! Those were their busiest weeks since Easter! Before Fall Break started, the weekly averages at DHS had been under 30 minutes since late August. Islands of Adventure had 18-21 minute weekly off-season averages until spiking for Fall Break.
To further put these numbers into perspective, it’s also worth noting that Walt Disney World’s two busiest days since 2019 have been 71 and 70 minute waits–both came during the weeks of New Year’s (early 2020 and late 2023–pictured above are screenshots of the worst wait times, not averages, from one of those days).
As we’ve stated countless times before, the high wait times at Epic Universe are mostly a capacity and efficiency story, and not one of overwhelming demand. The park is hitting these crowd levels (which are actually wait time levels) with relatively low attendance. There’s potential for these wait times to get much worse if Epic Universe doesn’t find its footing on ride throughput.
Although you’ll find ‘hot spots’ of heavy crowds and congestion in Super Nintendo World, Celestial Park and other areas of Epic Universe don’t feel or look busy, even on these 70+ minute days. So that’s one positive. Another is that Epic Universe shouldn’t have to contend with storm season for much longer, and efficiency should continue to improve.
Regardless, our expectation is that the worst crowds of 2025 at Epic Universe are still to come. Fall Break has been the busiest 2 week stretch ever…so far. There’s at least one more 2-week stretch that will almost assuredly be worse, with several more single weeks that raise red flags.
You might recall that almost a year before Epic Universe even opened, we wrote about the potential for a “crowdpocalypse” scenario, with October through December being much busier than the first few months due to guests avoiding the opening season under the (erroneous) assumption that it would be busier. They’d “wait out” the initial rush and early hiccups…only to all descend on the park during a busier timeframe.
Given the crazy crowds (or at least, crazy wait times) at Epic Universe over the summer, this might sound like a take that aged poorly. However, it’s precisely what we’ve seen play out repeatedly with major new theme park openings.
It occurred with both Walt Disney World and Disneyland with Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge, as well as Fantasy Springs at Tokyo DisneySea. In all three cases, crowds materialized starting around October after slower summers.
Walt Disney World and Disneyland went from being dead to slammed, and that didn’t change until the parks closed in March 2020 due to COVID. In the case of all three, seasonality comes into play. Those lands debuted during the summer or early fall off-season, and Disney (incorrectly) bet that the lure of the lands would be enough to overcome normal attendance patterns. They were not.
Hard as it might be to believe given the wait times the park has been posting, but it remains my belief that it’s going to be a similar dynamic with Epic Universe. Summer is no longer peak season for Florida theme parks, and hasn’t been for a while. While there was the initial new park fanfare, there were also plenty of people postponing visits for that very same reason.
All of this is to say that Epic Universe could see a similar tailwind from October through December 2025.
That’s a popular time for tourists traveling to Central Florida, and Epic Universe will undoubtedly capture visitors making their annual pilgrimages to Walt Disney World. Erroneously expecting lower crowds, plus better weather (hopefully) and more seasonal offerings, many of those guests have likely been waiting to visit Epic Universe until their normal fall and holiday season trips.
I’d take this a step further and predict that Epic Universe attendance will be higher from January 2026 through Easter 2026, too. Ticket policies change in 2026, with restrictions for regular tickets being removed. This will allow guests with multi-day tickets to spend a disproportionate amount of time at Epic Universe, and we’d expect exactly that to happen.
(This ticket policy changes are a mixed bag. They are welcome and guest-friendly changes that probably need to happen at this point. At the same time, they’ve been helpful guardrails at preventing even worse wait time woes at Epic Universe.)
In other words, there will be guests who waited out the initial rush visiting. Others will have waited for better weather after learning about Epic Universe’s lack of shade and issues handling heat and Florida weather.
Winter is becoming an increasingly popular of time for tourists, especially frequent visitors to Orlando, and we could see the first few months of the year being “surprisingly” busy at Epic Universe as a result. That’s doubly true given the relaxed ticketing rules, which could result in more Park Hopping to Epic Universe, or even a similar pool of guests spending more time at Epic Universe. (It wouldn’t surprise me if Epic Universe gets busier at the expense of USF and IoA.)
Another thing that’s worth noting is that there have already been several dates when single-day tickets have sold out for Epic Universe for the next 3 months. However, most of these–with the exception of Christmas week through New Year’s Eve–keep coming back in stock. It’s our strong suspicion that this is the result of Universal reallocating tickets among admission types (from multi-day, which doesn’t sell as well, to single-day).
The biggest wildcard about crowds for the holiday season is word of mouth about Epic Universe.
There have been a lot of complaints about the days with significant downtime due to downpours and ride breakdowns. Even diehard Universal fan communities have soured somewhat on Epic Universe, and now recommend waiting out the crowds. It’s impossible to tell how much this is “breaking containment” and reaching audiences beyond theme park fans, though.
The general public might only be seeing the rave reviews of the excellent Epic Universe ride roster and making plans to visit “after the opening rush” of the upcoming holiday season or early 2026.
The bottom line is that I highly doubt Fall Break will end up being the two busiest weeks “ever” at Epic Universe once 2025 is over. Honestly, I wouldn’t be surprised if neither of these weeks end up being top 5.
I also wouldn’t be surprised if Epic Universe smashes through that current 86 minute record daily average wait time, breaking the 100 minute barrier between Christmas and New Year’s Eve. In other words, right now might seem bad…but it can and will get worse!
The good news is that it will also get better! Fall Break has been bad, as have several other weeks since opening. But there have also been pockets of lower crowd dates since opening, including several good-to-great days in the last couple of months. Even though we fully expect October, November, and December to rank as the #3, #2, and #1 busiest months of the year at Epic Universe, there will be quieter days amidst the sea of red.
If planning a late 2025 or 2026 trip, I’d target all of the same dates on our Best & Worst Weeks to Visit Walt Disney World in 2025, 2026 & 2027. That’s a mix of quantitative and qualitative, and I’d argue that the latter matters more at Epic Universe than Walt Disney World. Regardless, good luck–you’re going to need it.
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.
YOUR THOUGHTS
Have you visited Epic Universe in the last two weeks? What did you think of wait times and crowds? Experience any operational meltdowns due to breakdowns or weather? Is it possible or probable that Epic Universe has even worse wait times from now through December 2025, or throughout 2026? Will you visit Epic Universe this year, or will you wait for crowds to settle down (in theory) in 2026? Agree or disagree with our assessment? Any questions? We love hearing from readers, so please share any other thoughts or questions you have in the comments below!
FYI- I’m coming to Orlando for a conference in December and they’re offering “conference discount” tickets for both WDW and Universal. There are “evening only” tickets available for WDW and a decent discount, but Universal is offering only full day tickets (including single day standalone Epic Universe). This is first time this particular conference is publicly offering these type of tickets on the conference website.
Interesting! Is there much of a discount for the Epic Universe tickets? (My guess is no, as it seems like they’re hitting soft capacity limits even at full price, which is why AP discounts on EU tickets are fairly minor.)
Reply to Tom:
WDW after 4pm tix: $71-77 depending on park
Universal Studios & IoA after 2pm tix: $100 (1 day)
Universal Epic Universe 1 day tix: $164 (no afternoon / evening option)
There are also 1 park / 1 day + Epic Universe tix available, but those don’t seem that discounted at $300.
I could definitely see me convincing co-workers to do the WDW after 4pm tix for either Epcot or Hollywood on a late night open scheduled day, especially if we can get reservations at one of the space themed restaurants (we’re a space company).
I’m also coming for a conference at Universal Royal Pacific in November. Pricing for tickets is similar from what I recall, except that single day Epic tickets aren’t discounted as much (or at all). I tried to take another look at pricing to confirm, but the Universal conference ticketing site keeps timing out (which happened repeatedly every time I’ve tried over the last 2-3 weeks). When I did compare before it ended up being cheaper to just buy the two day multi tickets with one day at Epic directly from Universal than to buy discounted single day IOA and Epic tickets through the conference.
Does anyone know when individual tickets for January 2026 will go on sale? I thought they’d be available by now, especially since it’s the week after Christmas. It’s difficult to schedule a Christmas vacation without individual ticket availability. I don’t understand their strategy for not selling individual tickets for that week yet. Thanks for any thoughts.
We did Epic Universe on the Saturday of Labor Day weekend. I knew it would be busy, so i did the Express Pass and it was 100% worth it (and had early park admission). The lines were all long, but between EPA and Express Pass, we did everything in one day and even did some rides multiple times. I’d recommend saving up the extra money and buying the Express Pass until ride times come way down – its not cheap, but made the day smooth and easy to hit all the rides.
The most ridiculous wait for an unimpressive ride was Mine Cart Madness, which was 210 minutes and even 25 minutes for Express Pass – it was a very underwhelming ride that honestly was lame according to both of my kids.
We were there for two days, 10/2 & 10/3, with Express for one of those days. While I think it is a pretty amazing park (and will only get better with time and expansions), I have to admit I came away largely agreeing with Tom’s advice to wait a bit. As he has said, there simply are too few attractions and particularly too few indoor attractions, making every day a wildcard based on two factors: crowds and (especially) weather. Even though crowds were manageable while we were there, it rained a good part of 10/2 and most of 10/3, closing many attractions entirely (DK, we were told, will not run if there is any rain in the vicinity), leaving others open but miserable to ride (Hiccups, I’m looking at you) and making lines for indoor attractions long (even with Express). And the other thing I have not seen discussed about Epic in bad weather is that ANY rain makes almost all of the “street-mosphere” disappear. Apart from the covered Toothless meet-and-greet in Berk (which, oddly, still closed “for weather”), all of the character walk-arounds — the students in Wizarding Paris, the monster-hunters and Igor in DU, Mario and Luigi in SuperNintendo — are gone if there is even a drizzle, and those interactions are a huge part of what makes Epic work.
I think the biggest gamechanger for enjoying Epic will be Universal selling multi-day park-hopper tickets including Epic (i.e., not multi-day tickets limiting you to one Epic day). On the day we did not have Express and it rained all afternoon, we ended up buying tickets for Universal Studios and hopped over there to take advantage of all of its indoor rides while the storms cleared. Financially, it didn’t make sense (though it was cheaper than adding Express to Epic) but given we didn’t know when we’ll make it back to Orlando, it seemed better than sitting in our hotel room all afternoon, Once multi-park flexibility kicks in and we can all spread our visits across Epic, Studios and IoA, it will be a much more enjoyable park!
“This ticket policy changes are a mixed bag.”
I completely agree with trying to make policies clearer and simplifying things for guests as much as possible … but not when the end result is likely to make things worse for all Epic visitors.
Heads up, it looks like some Universal hotel prices for November fell after going up significantly after Epic opened. I thought I saw Cabana Bay go up past $200 a night and now it’s down to almost $100 per in the sweet week between Veterans/Jersey and Thanksgiving weeks. Makes sense if Epic is already drawing tourists who would otherwise go to the existing parks.
We are going Dec 14-17… have one day at epic but feel like we need two. I just can’t decide. On one hand we might need two to get everything done since we don’t have express, but on the other we could go to the legacy parks stress free :/ it’s $800 to add a day at epic and we are already spending almost $2k on 3 day tickets. So I’m not sure. We did Nintendoland in Osaka so I guess we can skip that if we have to.
Is it possible to visit Epic on a Sunday? Even with crowds increased across the board, this past month of data is *still* showing that it is the best day to visit Epic if it’s not a holiday weekend. It will definitely be busier than past weekends, but going on that Sunday looks like the best way to enjoy the park on a single day.
Thanks for the great review, as always. When do you think they will open up Epic Universe for annual pass holders? Until then, do you think weekends will still continue to have lower wait times than weekdays through the end of the year and into 2026?
“When do you think they will open up Epic Universe for annual pass holders?”
I hope they don’t sell APs until 2027, but I doubt they’ll be able to resist the revenue for that long.
I’m planning on doing day of week advice for Epic in the next couple of weeks, but want to wait just a little longer until fall break passes, since these long weekends have skewed recent data. (Long weekends aside, yes, weekends are still the way to go.)
Visited Epic for the first time on 9/26 and have to say MEH. It just doesn’t feel finished. There’s no real theming in Monsters other than creepy looking building facades. Wait time for Ministry was 165 minutes so no thanks. Nintendo was a mistake I won’t make again and I was lucky to escape with my sanity. Berk, on the other hand, shows what the other portals could be. Gorgeous visually with several good/great rides, a great show and roving characters to carry the theme. Not to mention really good food! They need to apply this level of detail to the other areas. Until and unless they do, I don’t see any reason to return for more than a few hours to visit the dragons & ride the carousel.
We went Sunday. Overall I liked the park but it has some issues. It was extremely hot, which was weird since we had been at the other two parks and they were fine even though the temperature was just a little higher. There was a distinct lack of pastries and ice cream. The pastry shop in the Harry Potter land was fake. Talk about a no brainer! The lines were long. All of them. But the hours were long too, so we rode everything we wanted to ride. All lands need small people eating attractions but even Disney doesn’t build those these days.
Tip: Ministry of Magic says it doesn’t open until 10 but for us it opened at 9:00. Since it wasn’t an early park attraction they never looked at our hotel keys. So even if you aren’t staying at an on site hotel you should go in really early for that one. We got there before 8:00
“Tip: Ministry of Magic says it doesn’t open until 10 but for us it opened at 9:00. Since it wasn’t an early park attraction they never looked at our hotel keys. So even if you aren’t staying at an on site hotel you should go in really early for that one. We got there before 8:00”
I’ve written this elsewhere, but it seems like the current approach with Battle at the Ministry is “it opens when it opens” (and to everyone at the same time). It’s absolutely worth checking out as soon as you enter (which potentially is *before* 9 am) if you’re staying off-site, as the opportunity cost to seeing whether it’s open is pretty low.
But also a warning: They close Battle of Ministry early. We were there on 10/19 and they closed the doors at 7 p.m. with a wait of 90 min. (posted: 120). We’ve been among the last 10 persons who were let in, leaving the ride on 8:30 p.m. with the park closing at 10 p.m. This is one of several policies at Epic right now that I view as not very guest friendly.
We had some horrible experiences that day, some of the worst in a theme park ever. But also some of the best. Kind of emotional rollercoaster as of right now.
I was just in Orlando last week with the main goal of helping elderly relatives, but with a secondary goal of sneaking out to a park or two. We wanted to go to EPIC Universe, but the crowds looked off the scale bad so we passed, which is the only advantage of waiting until the day before to buy tickets.
I feel bad for people who booked well in advance and then were stuck waiting in crazy long lines. We really enjoyed EPIC Universe during the previews, but the park doesn’t adequately absorb crowds that are larger than that. Its odd that the restaurants seem to have the capacity to handle triple the crowds of the preview days, but the rides cannot. Did Universal not calculate the actual ride throughput?
“…which is the only advantage of waiting until the day before to buy tickets.”
To the contrary, I don’t see any real advantage of buying tickets in advance unless you’re absolutely sure you will go no matter what.
Single-day tickets selling out is the clearest-cut sign of heavy crowds, and I wouldn’t want to be there one of those days. It’d be bittersweet, obviously, but I’d be relieved at not wasting the money were that to happen to me.