Fall Off-Season Is Over at Disney World
October 2022 is now underway, and the slow September at Walt Disney World appears to be in the rearview mirror. This wait times report covers data for the last month at Magic Kingdom, EPCOT, Hollywood Studios, and Animal Kingdom, plus predictions of what to expect for the rest of this month and November 2022.
Our last crowd report was Least Busy 3 Weeks of 2022 at Walt Disney World! As covered there, the first two weeks of September 2022 were 1/10 on the crowd calendar, across the entirety of Walt Disney World. With identical averages, those two weeks are tied for #1 as the best of 2022 thus far.
Going back even further, those were the best numbers we’ve seen since the beginning of October last year. In the third week of September, the numbers increased quite a bit over those low-lows, but the wait times data still good enough for the #3 least-busy week of 2022. Not even the winter months of January or February could hold a candle to wait times during the first three weeks of September 2022.
Many readers and commenters on social media who had been in the parks, especially that third week, took issue with those assessments. I want to start by addressing that, as this has been a growing complaint, especially among longtime visitors to Walt Disney World.
As a threshold matter, what’s covered in these “crowd” reports is actually posted wait time data. These numbers are scraped from My Disney Experience constantly by Thrill-Data.com and compiled into graphs and all sorts of interesting charts on their website. That’s worth checking out if you’re a data junky, as you can create custom graphs, track wait times, etc–there are some really powerful and interesting tools. In any case, the wait time data is the wait time data. It is not wrong.
However, wait times are not conclusive of attendance or in-park congestion. There are several other variables that can impact “feels like” crowds, from festivals at EPCOT to weather to guest demographics to ride breakdowns to operational efficiency to time of day or day of the week. And that’s just a partial list! Beyond that, wait times can be manipulated by Walt Disney World. They’re often inflated, or otherwise inaccurate. (On the plus side, there’s usually consistency with this.)
All of those are significant variables right now. It’s no longer the primary tourist season, and a disproportionate number of locals or DVC members means more guests who place less emphasis on rides. It’s also Food & Wine, several attractions have been having downtime woes, staffing remains an issue, and it’s party season at Magic Kingdom. There was also a lot of inclimate weather last month, and not just Hurricane Ian.
This all impacts crowds, or the perception thereof, and how they diverge from wait times. It’s also one (of multiple) reasons why this September cannot be easily compared even to months during this spring break or summer when it comes to “feels like” crowds or congestion. It’s also incomparable to previous years that don’t have the same dynamics going on.
On top of all that, attendance has surged by millions of guests per year, and pretty much every single day of 2022 is significantly more crowded than 2012. Similarly, 2022 is much busier than 2020 and 2021. (This year still has not eclipsed 2019, which remains the busiest year in Walt Disney World history–but even that fall experienced an unprecedented crowd dynamic due to the opening of Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge.)
Numerical crowd calendar scores are relative and calculated on a rolling basis, meaning a low day on the crowd calendar now feels like a moderate day did a few years ago. In other words, a 1/10 today is not the same as a 1/10 in September 2012 or October 2015. Today’s 1/10 might be closer to a 5/10 from five years ago.
Those numerical scores are also relative to their respective parks–meaning today’s 1/10 is not even the same at Magic Kingdom and Hollywood Studios. There is no universal standard for crowd levels; it is all relative. (Are you confused yet?!)
Longtime Walt Disney World visitors might contend that this is a bad approach, as it fails to provide context for historical crowd levels. That is true. However, absent a time machine, no one can choose to visit Walt Disney World in October 2012 instead of October 2022. And, if you do have a time machine, I would hope crowd levels aren’t top of mind. You should be fixated on getting the best multi-angle 4K footage of the original Journey into Imagination!
Crowd calendars and assessments thereof are intended to serve a practical purpose rather than a historical one. From a predictive perspective, they offer insight into which weeks and months are best and worst to take a trip to Walt Disney World in terms of wait times. (Note that individual days are purposefully omitted because forecasting specific days has mostly become a fool’s errand.) Backward-looking, crowd reports rank the days, weeks, and months by wait times within a rolling 365 or 500-day timeframe.
As all of this should make clear, wait times are an imperfect measure of Walt Disney World’s raw attendance or crowds.
Imperfect as they might be, wait times are still the best measure of crowds–and the only objective one. The alternative is relying on individual guest perceptions, which are much more flawed and incomplete. It’s impossible for anyone to be everywhere at once, and hard to know whether you’re in a pocket of crowds, what efficiency issues exist, and whether guests are disproportionately doing attractions or loitering about.
With that said, on-the-ground reader reports and comments about “feels like” crowds during recent trips, and how that differed from posted wait times, are actually quite useful as supplemental color commentary. That’s particularly true when coming from those who visit regularly or during the same week every year. It helps manage others’ expectations and contextualize what things are like beyond the numbers. Of course, that’s not the same as saying the wait time data is wrong.
Anyway, enough with the rambling preface. If you find value in these reports, you probably already have a similar perspective. If you’re thinking that this sounds useless given all the caveats, perhaps this post and crowd reports/calendars are not for you. Regardless, I felt this was worth reiterating for new readers or first-timers. It’s important to understand the strengths & limitations of crowd calendars/reports, methodology, and what’s up with Walt Disney World wait times v. “feels like” crowds right now.
With that out of the way, let’s dig into the data and look at Walt Disney World wait times. As always, all graphs and stats are courtesy of Thrill-Data.com:
We’ll start with the monthly numbers for Walt Disney World as a whole.
September ended up having the lowest wait times of the year, and by a wide margin. Still not as good as August through October last year, but as a reminder, that was skewed by surging cancellations due to the Delta variant and reinstated mask rules. Again, not an apples to apples comparison.
Looking at the weekly numbers, we can see when wait times bottomed out in September, and when they began rising.
It almost certainly would be a clear upward trend but for Hurricane Ian. Not the closure–those days don’t skew the numbers–but the cancellations caused by Ian. At this point, those are probably not skewing the numbers to a meaningful degree.
Above is the daily average wait time data across Walt Disney World, which illustrates the above point.
The missing days are the closure. The few low days after that are due to cancellations and a lack of new arrivals for the days MCO was closed. In the last couple of days, wait times have bounced back and are in the 6/10 to 7/10 range. That’s much worse than early to mid-September, but a continuation of the trend before Hurricane Ian skewed things.
For park by park analysis, we’ll start with Magic Kingdom. This one is a real roller coaster, with this Monday being a 10/10, but Sunday and Tuesday both being 2/10. So, what gives?
It’s Mickey’s Not So Scary Halloween Party, which really disrupts attendance patterns at Magic Kingdom. This is something we’ve covered at length, again and again. Thus far, all days of Mickey’s Not So Scary Halloween Party at Magic Kingdom have been 1/10 or 2/10 on the crowd calendar. Every. Single. One.
At some point this month, that will change–we’ll start seeing 3/10 or 4/10 days because people will be “forced” into those days by the reservations system. However, the non-party days will also increase as compared to last month, with those 10/10 days in Magic Kingdom becoming more common.
Once again, we strongly recommend doing Magic Kingdom during the day before MNSSHP, bouncing to another park by ~4 pm. Even with 3/10 or 4/10 days, you’ll still come out ahead by avoiding Saturdays, Mondays, and other non-party days. We’ve also covered the upside to this approach in our Magic Kingdom Party Day Early Entry Report and My Day at Magic Kingdom Using Genie+ on a Party Night.
Above are the specific ride averages for Magic Kingdom.
The big surprise here is Peter Pan’s Flight passing Seven Dwarfs Mine Train. I don’t have a conclusive explanation for this, but my guess is that it’s a mix of posted wait time inflation (both have it, but PPF’s tends to be worse) and Individual Lightning Lane not selling as well for SDMT as in past months (by contrast, Peter Pan’s Flight is a top Genie+ pick). That’s purely speculative, though. That graph is also for the month of September–in looking at October thus far, Peter Pan’s Flight falls back to #4.
Next up is Animal Kingdom.
Animal Kingdom’s wait times were starting to increase pre-Ian, and that trend has resumed in the last couple of days. The park was averaging 1/10 to 3/10 weeks for most of August and September; that has spiked to an average of 6/10 thus far this week.
Here are Animal Kingdom ride averages for the month of September.
Both Pandora attractions eclipsed an hour, but that was it. Thus far in October, these numbers are all up considerably. On a positive note, Animal Kingdom now closes after sunset and the Tree of Life Awakenings have returned!
We highly recommend staying for evenings in DAK to enjoy the Tree of Life Awakenings, plus Pandora and the rest of the park after dark. Our Animal Kingdom Afternoon Arrival Strategy is once again the ideal approach for this park. Alternatively, Early Entry or rope drop are great. Genie+ is a waste of money at Animal Kingdom for at least the next month. Totally unnecessary (not that it ever was).
Over at EPCOT, it’s pretty much the same story–wait times are trending up from their August/September lows.
Even that is not the full story. More than any other park, EPCOT is notorious for a divergence between “feels like” crowds/congestion and wait times. This is especially true in World Showcase, during festivals, and on weekends and evenings. World Showcase is worse on weekends due to day drinking, while evenings are busier for people Park Hopping over to watch Harmonious. In short, people show up for things other than attractions, so that elevated attendance isn’t picked up by wait time data.
EPCOT during Food & Wine Festival weekend nights is a confluence of bad “feels like” crowd conditions. (Throw in an away UCF game and it’s a perfect storm!) In short, the low to moderate reported crowd levels probably wouldn’t align with the perception of most guests in the park. We try to avoid EPCOT on weekends during this time of year, and that’s precisely why.
Average wait times for Frozen Ever After, Remy’s Ratatouille Adventure, and Test Track were all above 50 minutes last month. However, actual waits for everything else were minimal, dragging down that overall average.
We like Extended Evening Hours at EPCOT, but we prefer morning–see EPCOT Early Entry v. Genie+. Spoiler: Early Entry wins handily. Once again, it’s pointless to purchase Genie+ at EPCOT for at least the next month or so.
I’m honestly shocked that Walt Disney World did not drop the virtual queue for Guardians of the Galaxy: Cosmic Rewind. It’s obvious–and has been for a few months–that this is no longer necessary. Removing the virtual queue would improve the guest experience, reducing friction and (perceived) stress.
It would also improve the operational efficiency of Cosmic Rewind, allow re-rides, and probably improve sales of Individual Lightning Lanes. I’m really not sure what Disney is waiting for here, but they missed a golden opportunity to get rid of this in August or September while crowds were low. If it happens now, it’ll be a bit more disruptive.
Finally, there’s Disney’s Hollywood Studios.
Same deal here. Throwing out last week, and there’s a gradual upward trend at DHS from 2/10 in early September to 6/10 this week.
Above are ride-by-ride wait times for Disney’s Hollywood Studios last month. Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance finished the month below 100 minutes, which is the last month this year that’ll happen.
Thus far in October, Slinky Dog Dash is beating out Rise of the Resistance–99 v. 97 minute wait time on average. Both of those plus 5 other attractions are all averaging wait times over an hour in October 2022. It’ll be interesting to see how long those continue to increase.
With backward-looking wait times out of the way, let’s talk look forward to the rest of this month and November 2022. The Disney Park Pass calendar is yellow between today and October 15, 2022. To put that into perspective, every single day in September was green at this same time last month–and mostly remained that way.
As previously predicted, October 2022 is going to be a different story than last month. The month is only 5 days old, but already, we’ve had dates busier than any in September. My expectation is that this trend continues, especially heading into next week.
That’s the Columbus Day/Indigenous Peoples’ Day holiday weekend, which we’ve been pointing to as a bad week for a while. As discussed in the latest update to the October 2022 Crowd Calendar, this holiday always catches people by surprise, but it is busy at Walt Disney World during that long weekend and the dates thereafter.
This holiday coincides with fall break for many school districts, making it the most popular week for vacations to Walt Disney World since July. A contributing factor could be those who rescheduled trips due to Hurricane Ian, but that will not be the primary cause. (Rescheduled trips will likely impact the rest of the year and early 2023 equally.)
For months, we’ve been predicting that this will be the worst week in October 2022.
After that, we expect a drop-off the following week, likely back into the territory of crowd levels this week. The end of the month is a wildcard due to Halloween falling on a Monday. Our expectation is that the last full week is the second-busiest of the month, but likely not on par with next week.
The week encompassing Halloween and the start of November 2022 will likely be busy. The Wine & Dine Half Marathon Weekend (November 3-6, 2022) will also elevate crowds, but that should be partially upset by that being the gap between two holiday seasons. The week after that includes both Jersey Week and Veterans’ Day, and will be busy as a result.
Ultimately, the 1/10 to 3/10 crowd level weeks are done and the fall off-season is over at Walt Disney World. It was a good run while it lasted! We hope you took advantage of our advice and visited between mid-August and late September, because crowds will only go up from here for the rest of the year.
Going forward, there will be days and a scattering of weeks that offer reprieves, but the crowds that have returned thus far in October will only get worse from here. Attendance won’t let up in any consistent manner until after winter school breaks end in the second week of January 2023. The big questions are just how bad crowds get, how quickly, and whether there are slow stretches in the next three months between all those holiday weeks at Walt Disney World.
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
Thoughts on sleepy September crowds at Walt Disney World? Predictions for the rest of October through December 2022? How bad do you expect crowds to get for the heart of Halloween and the holiday season? If you’ve visited since mid-August, what did you think of wait times? Have you done Magic Kingdom during the day of a MNSSHP night? Thoughts on our forecast, analysis, or anything else? Agree or disagree with our commentary about “feels like” crowds v. wait times? If you’ve visited in prior months during the last year, how did crowds compare between then and now? What did you think of the wait times? Any parks or times of day noticeably worse than the others? Do you agree or disagree with anything in our report? 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!
We’re Disney first timers, we’ll be at MK on Mon 10/24, HS on 10/25 hoping the crowds aren’t too bad. Feom what I’ve been reading I may purchase G+ for MK. I don’t have bands I’ll be using my phone, I’m nervous and hoping it works fine with my phone. lol
Just wanted to say a quick thank you for your advice to go to Magic Kingdom on a party day. We just got back yesterday and had an awesome trip thanks to all of your tips. One of our favorite days was spending the morning at MK the day of a party (10/7). We got so much done even with rider switch with a toddler – all 3 mountains, SDMT and pirates and were back to the hotel for a nap in the afternoon. We kept looking around like – where are all the people?! We did pay for genie + and ILLs at all parks – expensive but worth it in our eyes as we were able to achieve low wait times and get back for daily naps for our 2.5 year old. While I didn’t enjoy waking up at 7 and the pressure of booking things daily, in some ways the spontaneity with genie plus was more fun than the fast pass system. We definitely got more out of it at Magic Kingdom but saved a few hours of waiting for rides at other parks too – like I said, worth it when you are managing a 2.5 year old. Thanks again!
We were at WDW from Sept. 27-Oct. 7 (finally coming home to CA!!) As two adults with no kids, we were only interested in the big rides and some tours. So we took the opposite approach of getting to the parks early. We slept in every day except Keys to the Kingdom day. Purchased Genie+ and bought ILLs. Arrived at the parks around 1 pm and got on every ride we wanted. We did a few standby lines but the crowds decreased early evening. All the parks felt super crowded though no matter day or time.
How is this wait time data affected by attraction closures? For example, I visited Hollywood Studios on Saturday, September 24th. I was the first guest at a tapstyle for Early Entry. When let into the park about 7:40am, I went straight to Rise of the Resistance. It was closed, and guests were not allowed in line. I headed to Slinky Dog Dash. Same thing, closed, no expected opening time. I waited in line at Toy Story Mania until it opened at 8am. I checked the MDE app while in line, and Tower of Terror was also closed. Then, I rode Runaway Railway, and I walked back to Slinky Dog Dash which had reopened. I would have had a 15-20 minute wait, but it went down again while I was in line. After waiting a few minutes, and it was clear only the first few guests in line were receiving Lightning Lanes, I got out of line. Rise of the Resistance was still down.
My question: Since wait times were not posted for these headliners, would it make it appear that the park was less crowded? When in actuality, the guest experience was diminished due to attraction downtime and guests wandering around trying to figure out what to do with so many attractions down.
Those attractions wouldn’t be included in the calculation when they’re down. In theory, if Slinky Dog Dash (or whatever) is down, the wait time goes up at other attractions. However, it’s not always by a corresponding amount–some of those people just contribute to worse crowds throughout the park.
Generally speaking, you are correct–more attractions being down means more congestion, and an average park-wide wait time that doesn’t tell the whole story.
I know there is not really a way to answer this, but I wonder how much of the lower waits times in early September can be contributed to attraction downtime due to inclement weather.
I’m going to be at WDW Oct 9-15th. Am I reading this right that the recommendation is NOT to do Genie+ at Epcot or MK on Halloween Party days? I’ve got young kids so shortening the line experience is pretty important.
For that week, I think it’s probably best to do Genie+ at EPCOT if you cannot do Early Entry or Extended Evening Hours.
Wait times for Frozen Ever After and Remy’s Ratatouille Adventure will both be over 60 minutes on average next week (maybe over 80 minutes), so that’s significant savings.
Tom – you said PPF’s wait time inflation is worse than SDMT. Do you have a hard numeric reason for saying that or is that your impression from personal experience? Thanks for the interesting analysis!
I shouldn’t have stated that so definitively–that’s purely my gut based on experiences plus what I’ve observed in the last couple of months. It’s definitely anecdotal, and could be wrong.
I will say that PPF is one of those attractions that gets Lightning Lane backlogs with some degree of regularity. If you see the LL line spilling out the entrance, the posted wait is probably close to accurate.
Does anyone know actually how early the buses start running from resorts to the parks? I know what it says on Disney’s website but I’m wondering if the buses begin operating earlier than the 45min before park open that it states. Thank you for any insight.
The transportation to each park is scheduled to start from one hour before the opening of each park. The trick is that many resorts share transportation, so there might not be a bus, a boat or even a monorail at a resort until 45 minutes before the opening of that specific park.
In my experience at the end of September, the buses from the resorts want to have guests arrive an hour prior to Early Entry. Therefore, the first bus of the day for each park was arriving about 1 hour and 15 minutes prior to Early Entry. I was on the first bus (with no other guests) from Kidani Village at 6:18am for 7:30am Early Entry at Magic Kingdom on a party day. Surpringly, this bus did not stop at Jambo House, and the arrival time was not listed on the MDE app, so keep that in mind if you are looking at bus times on the app.
Any thoughts about the week before Thanksgiving (starting on November 13th thru November 19th)? I am hoping that we will miss most of the holiday crowd…. maybe.
That’s likely to be as good of a week as any during the holiday season, but again, it’s all relative. A “good” week during this November and December could easily be a 7/10 or 8/10, and that could very well translate to a 10/10 by the standards of any year prior to 2019.
So if your question is whether I’d recommend that week over others at Christmas-time, the answer is yes. If you’re asking whether crowds will be low or moderate by historical standards, the answer is no.
We’ve been at WDW since Saturday. Weekend through Tuesday was lighter crowds, especially since we took advantage of early entry each day. Tue at MK was awesome. Thanks for the strategy Tom! By Tue afternoon it started to feel like a lot more people. Yesterday at DHS was a little nuts by 10am but by then we had already hit all the biggies (minus anything Star Wars), saw Beauty, and left the park. At that point major attractions were all showing waits of 80-110 mins.
Also lots of “temporarily closed” attractions since we got here. Ugh!
Here’s hoping Fantasmic isn’t further delayed, as the upcoming crowds are really going to stress DHS and that nighttime spectacular would help load balance throughout the day. Crowds should not be that bad by 10 am. (Yet I believe you that they are–been there, experienced that way too many times in the last 2 years!)
Just to be clear, the 80-110 minutes were when we left the park after Beauty (around noon). When we got in line for R&R Coaster around 9:30a the posted wait was 45 mins. When we exited around 10:15a the wait showed 90 mins. By the time we left the park RoR and Slinky Dog were at ~110 mins.
I can only assume you weren’t actually at WDW in Sept. I’ve been travelling to WDW and other Disney parks for around 40 years and spent a large part of Sept staying at the Yacht Club. To say Sept was quiet is just plain wrong. I have never seen it busier, even in peak season. I think lines may be “slightly” shorter than peak season, but way longer than normal for Sept. But the number of people actually in the parks was staggering for the time of year.
I am also old enough to remember when that party day “2” at the MK Sunday would have been no less than a “7.” It’s just that crowds have been increasing drastically at WDW over the past forty years. Sept was the least crowded month for 2022; like most years before it, the current year appears on track to be the Busiest Year for WDW Ever.
Also, September includes Labor Day, the vacation holiday without WDW vacations. Wish my parents knew that when I was a kid!
If you think early September was only “slightly” less busy than peak season, I’d encourage you to visit again next week.
Crowds in 2019 and 2021-2022 are nothing like they were 10 or 40 years ago. Relative to this new-normal era, September as a whole did not see above-average or even average wait times.
We were there the past few days and found it very interesting… Sunday Oct 2nd we did MK including early entry & indeed the crowds were very manageable. We did absolutely everything we wanted to except Mine Train with minimal waits and without Genie+. We left MK at 5:30 & hopped over to Epcot, and were very worried about the crowds we would face there as the monorail queue was very busy. But we were pleasantly surprised by the lack of crowds at Epcot. We strolled World Showcase very comfortably, sampled a couple of F&W booths (both very good), and did a few attractions, including Frozen by getting in the queue about 20 minutes before closing. That allowed us to see almost all of the nighttime spectacular as well.
So we were completely shocked when we arrived at Epcot Monday morning (Oct3) during the early entry to crowds and wait times already! (granted we arrived at the official early entry start time – didn’t manage to get there 30 minutes before it). And the crowds grew as the day went on, of course. We still had a great day & saw & did everything we wanted to, plus a bonus Eat to the Beat concert. But the crowds were crazy compared to the evening before.
And then Tuesday (Oct4) we attended MNSSHP and entered the park right at 4pm. We had a bite to eat & went on Big Thunder which posted a 25 minute wait (only took 15 minutes), Pirates which posted a 30 minute wait (and took 43 excrutiating minutes – wait, move a few feet & wait again), and Mine Train with a 50 minute posted wait that only took 23 minutes! We fit in Haunted Mansion & Splash too, both essentially a walk on. But indeed those crowds in the hub area were insane! Most unpleasant!
Anyway, we had a great few days post DCL cruise, and we managed to miss the hurricane by being out at sea away from the path. We got exceptionally lucky with our timing of everything. My heart goes out to those folks in the path who were devastated.
I really, really hope that the September through mid-October lull returns next year. I was at Disney World early September this year and it was mostly fine, minus a really crowded, rainy night at Magic Kingdom. I’d love to have more options in terms of low crowds in case that first week doesn’t work for my schedule next year.
I wonder if Disney likes Guardians being VQ since it drives some crowds to make EPCOT their reservation for the day. It’s hard to know how to plan upcoming trips without knowing how much longer Guardians will remain a VQ…
Oh! I also wanted to note that when you look at the “average” day at Disney with Thrill-Data, it’s a 7 “wait factor.” So if you’re seeing a 6 or less, you’re actually seeing below average crowds; if you see 7, you’re looking at average; if you see 8-10, you’re seeing above average. It’s worth noting since 5 isn’t “average” in this case on a 1-10 scale.
“I wonder if Disney likes Guardians being VQ since it drives some crowds to make EPCOT their reservation for the day. It’s hard to know how to plan upcoming trips without knowing how much longer Guardians will remain a VQ…”
I wondered this too, but there was a time when Disney was ‘forcing’ crowds to EPCOT by closing Park Pass reservations for Magic Kingdom and DHS even when those parks were only moderately crowded. Not only that, but there has been VQ availability post-Park Hopping on many occasions.
There’s gotta be some reason Cosmic Rewind hasn’t dropped the VQ, but for the life of me, I can’t figure it out. Seems to me like there’s more upside for Disney than there is downside in shifting to standby.
Given that 4+ hour line to get into Creations Shop on October 1, it *might* have been the right call if they had to wrap it around the Xandar pavilion. Whichever group rented out GOTG after 9pm brought a huge line that definitely would have interfered with the still strong shopping line, but fortunately the line was stretched over to World Nature and The LAND. (Popped in Tuesday night to do the shopping, myself.)
That’s a good point, Aaron–even setting aside the one-off nature of October 1.
The question is whether there’s enough physical queue space for a proper standby line. One option would be increasing the number of ILL so less standby space is needed, but that only works to the extent people are buying ILL.
I’m curious on your thoughts for the post Thanksgiving lull. We are planning park days Sunday (Christmas party day at MK) Monday, Wednesday and Thursday the week after Thanksgiving. I am hoping for a blip in crowds before the Holidays and crowds continue to grow.
We have found that this “lull week” isn’t very different from the first two weeks in December, so while it’s not as crowded as closer to Christmas, we have found it to be crowded.
For what it’s worth, our family has been going to Disney/Universal the Tuesday after Thanksgiving through the following Sunday for some years now. We’ve always found it manageable, and had a good time. We’ve ran into pockets of crowds, and it’s not like things were all walk ons. But with a decent approach to touring the parks it’s always been fine. Good luck!
We are also planning on being in the parks the week after Thanksgiving (Nov 27-Dec 2). I am also curious how the crowd levels will be. My family tends to be at parks at rope-drop / early hour, and will probably utilize Genie+ quite a bit. The hopper seems to lose its value when so many parks close early (no Fantasmic, etc) or have nighttime parties (though we did splurge for Mickey’s Christmas party one night).
We were there Aug 14th to Sept 5th. What I did notice was that during the MNSSHP the line moved constantly so no matter how long the line was you felt ok with it. On those special nights there are no lightening lanes or paid lanes which resulted in constant movement. It’s when you stop and stand around for awhile then move a few feet and stop and stand around yet again that makes it a less pleasant experience. Like in traffic I’d rather be constantly moving forward at ten miles an hour than stop and go.
I agree. One of the benefits of the covid period (if there are “benefits”) was that there were no FastPass/Lightning Lanes, so crowds moved steadily. You got a sense you were always making progress. Plus it kept your mind busy making sure you played the “6 feet apart” game with the lines on the ground.
Omg, I have a lifetime experience of readi g technical reports that are complex yet laid out in a logical manner and yet I gave up thus article less than half way through. Don’t mix results with narrative, set up your framework, deliver your result and ebste your conclusion. Terrible structure
Might want to proof read your message before being rude. Typos and all that.
We got home this Monday from a 12-day stint at WDW (including the hurricane). Early in our trip we were bypassing rides because of the posted long wait-times. We began to notice that on the rides that we did take, the actual wait times were often up to 50% of the posted times. We also noticed that when the lightning lanes were close to ’empty’ that our actual time spent in the stand-by line was often closer to 50% of the posted wait time.
We got better at judging the abbreviated stand-by wait times by paying particular attention to the volume of folks entering the lightning lanes.
Had a great time and MANY THANKS to the Disney folks that made our stay during the storm much more enjoyable!!!
Dave
“We got better at judging the abbreviated stand-by wait times by paying particular attention to the volume of folks entering the lightning lanes.”
This is really difficult to do–and can backfire on occasion–but it’s really satisfying once you develop an eye for it. The type of skill that can’t really be taught–it’s part of developing good “touring instincts.” Kudos!
We were there the week leading up to Labour Day and the inflated wait times were ridiculous. 40 min for Jungle Cruise, actual 20. 30 min for Splash actual 12. We are regulars and can fairly easily eyeball the queue and knew most times were easily 20min shorter then the posted. We loved the low crowds and were so glad that the Labour Day lull has returned.
Crowd levels during my trip (Sept 14-21) were manageable, but not anywhere near as magical as the end of September 2021. I knew in my heart it wouldn’t be that nice ever again but it was hard not to hope anyway. Regardless, I don’t think anyone in my party (non-regulars) really noticed it as being bad at any point except the Halloween Party night…and that made even ME uncomfortable. For a Tuesday in September, that was really awful…and I know it just gets worse from there as October builds. I’m looking at taking a January trip now, but only with a vague hope that it’ll be as nice as the halcyon days (not ship related) of old. I don’t think the magic is gone by any means, but it’s clear after a year with such slim numbers of 1/10 days that Disney needs to really build something new and crowd absorbing in Florida. Curious what next year holds, though…as the pandemic savings and revenge travel should be in the rear-view by then.
“I don’t think anyone in my party (non-regulars) really noticed it as being bad at any point except the Halloween Party night…and that made even ME uncomfortable.”
Just going to go out on a limb and guess you felt uncomfortable in the Hub–or somewhere between Casey’s Corner and Cinderella Castle?
I don’t know how Walt Disney World still allows this to happen. It’s been a known problem since (at least) October 2019. This isn’t internet hyperbole–at some point, someone is going to get hurt.
“Curious what next year holds, though…as the pandemic savings and revenge travel should be in the rear-view by then.”
I thought we already would’ve been at that point by now, honestly.
Maybe this holiday season will be the last hurrah. I’m not hoping for a recession or economic slowdown for obvious reasons, but the longer pent-up demand continues–and allows Disney to rest on its laurels to some degree–the longer lasting the impact will be.
The hub and main street were certainly packed, but what surprised me was how difficult it was to navigate EVERYWHERE. We had actually booked the party to do rides at Magic Kingdom at night when it was cooler out and for presumably lower lines, but both ended up being wrong assumptions. The temperature was cooler, but the humidity was MUCH higher making the experience unpleasant, and it was difficult to navigate through all of Adventureland, Liberty Square, and Fantasyland because of how many people there were. None of the rides had short waits, either…not until the very end of the night. The last hour was pretty blissful, but it didn’t make up for the rest so it’s unlikely that we’ll return. I preferred the After Hours Boo Bash to this, as we accomplished a lot more and enjoyed taking a relaxed pace and getting some nice costume photos.
Really, everything you’ve said about MNSSHP has been correct though – go for the unique entertainment and plan on pretty much only getting that done (and being smashed by people while you’re doing it).
–
I hear more and more from comments about people having a less-than-stellar experience due to crowds (in general, not just at the parties) and not wanting to return, so I’m really as surprised as you how long its been ongoing. There’s got to be a crash at some point…