Genie+ Collapsing in Crowds at Disney World
As previously covered, it’s the busiest week of the year at Walt Disney World (so far). While we expected heavy crowds, the high attendance has come as a slight surprise even to us. Nevertheless, we’ve been in the parks a lot this week, working on strategy and touring tips.
Most of this has focused on Genie+ and Lightning Lanes. The first article resulting from our experiences is Speed Strategy for Genie+ Selections, advanced-level advice that would normally be “next level” and optional for getting more bang for your buck with the paid FastPass replacement. This week, it’s pretty much mandatory.
We’ve been enjoying low crowds at Walt Disney World over the last several months, so part of the goal in spending even more time in the parks during a busy week was to “stress test” our strategies. In particular, I wanted to put Genie+ through its paces with the goal of showing just how much time you could save on busy days. That largely has not happened. Instead, it has been one frustration after another.
There are several problems with Genie+ right now, but let’s start at the beginning–what we and other guests are encountering right at 7 am. As noted in the ‘speed strategy’ post, Slinky Dog Dash is booking up for the entire day before 7:01 am.
The same is also happening for the Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance Individual Lightning Lanes. While we don’t purchase ILLs, we’ve heard from several readers sharing the problems they’ve had. Basically, it has been impossible to book both Slinky Dog Dash and purchase access to the Galaxy’s Edge headliner. Even on busy days, I never thought this would be an issue–clearly, I was wrong.
However, it’s not just Slinky Dog Dash and Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance that are going fast. Headliners in every park are going quickly during these sold out days during Thanksgiving week.
Here are some screenshots from this morning showing return times within the first 5 minutes that Lightning Lane reservations were available:
At this rate, many popular attractions will be gone not long after park opening. The last several days, there have been virtually no (worthwhile) options by afternoon, meaning that even savvy users of Genie+ are likely only getting 3-4 “good” selections per day. Novices or those visiting parks other than Magic Kingdom could be doing worse.
Keep in mind that Genie+ is still new, and many guests don’t even learn about it until arriving at the park. In previous weeks, we saw many people purchasing it while in the standby line for an attraction, realizing they could save time. Anyone who did that today wouldn’t have a shot at anything on the above list.
In fairness, some attractions do have drop times throughout the day when their Lightning Lane allotments are refilled. It can be better to wait for an earlier time to appear rather than pouncing on a later one–unfortunately, there’s no “modify” feature, making canceling and rebooking fraught with risk of getting shut out completely, or stuck with an even later time.
To assist with this, I’ve been tracking when these refills occur and for which attractions. I put a decent amount of effort into this, and had a post planned, but this week has thrown a monkey wrench into that. Drop times have become more random, and some attractions don’t seem to be receiving refills at all. It’s understandable that Disney would switch things up and make this less predictable so it’s not as easy to ‘hack.’ Totally get that.
Speaking of hacks, remember our Tips for “Stacking” Genie+ Ride Reservations? That explained how to leverage the 120 minute rule in tandem with “last actions.” The normal 120 minute rule still works, as it’s an intentional feature of Genie+ that is there by design.
However, now stacking can only be done in the intuitive, one-at-a-time sense. It’s no longer possible to leverage the last actions in such a way that you can turn a single selection into multiple branches, and grow those exponentially. Again, the normal 120 minute rule still works and regular stacking is possible, just not the advanced hacks. This makes complete sense and we can’t fault Disney for closing what was possibly an unintentional loophole. Definitely a bummer for those who like to hack, but that’s how it goes.
On a related note, if you read the comments to our speed strategy post, you might’ve seen me tease an upcoming post with even more next-level, advanced hacking technique. There was a way to turn an expired Lightning Lane selection into 3 new ones, but that’s also gone.
I’ve been working on testing and researching that for a few weeks, and know I’m not the only one (I received multiple emails about it). I almost posted my strategy guide on Monday, but decided to compile a list of attractions with two tapstiles first. While I’m disappointed that I researched and wrote so much for nothing, I’m also relieved. I would’ve been “blamed” if I shared that on Monday and the loophole closed on Tuesday. (Travel hackers in general are very protective of ‘secret’ strategies and don’t believe they should be shared widely since that often leads to their demise. That’s an unrealistic expectation, but I digress.)
Disneyland fans might be surprised by all of these issues. I don’t recall there ever being any such problems with MaxPass, which is the basis for Genie+ and Lightning Lanes. One of the reasons those loopholes are closing and Genie+ is unraveling under the weight of crowds even without them is because of the eligible attraction roster and capacity.
That’s the biggest difference between MaxPass and Genie+. It bears reiterating that Disneyland has many more attractions than even Magic Kingdom, and despite its reputation, DCA is a solid second gate. The two are also about a football field apart, meaning that Park Hopping is commonplace.
Combined, Disneyland’s two parks have close to the ride roster of 4 parks at Walt Disney World. On top of that, Disney has removed two popular attractions per park for Individual Lightning Lanes and there are no nighttime spectacular or parade viewing areas as possible selections, meaning Walt Disney World’s already thin roster for Genie+ was made even thinner.
Another thing we question is what the Lightning Lane-to-standby ratio is right now. There has been a lot of speculation about this, and the ‘phases’ for determining capacity allocation. Up until now, much of that has been theoretical–and it might still be, depending upon actual distribution levels.
As a reminder, the ballpark FastPass-to-standby ratio was 80:20. This meant that for every 10 parties boarding an attraction, 8 were pulled from the FastPass queue and 2 were pulled from standby. That’s why standby lines moved at a snail’s pace with FastPass, and constantly without it. That 80:20 ratio also meant that a lot of guests were taking advantage of FastPass, which should be no surprise given that it was free.
Anecdotally, I’ve yet to experience anything even remotely like this 80:20 ratio with Genie+ and Lightning Lanes. Everything seems to skew much more strongly in favor of standby. I’ve noted that the attraction with the highest capacity allocation appears to be–to me, at least–Toy Story Mania, which tracks with it having more Lightning Lane availability than most other attractions.
At Slinky Dog Dash, the attraction that has consistently booked up the fastest, I’d be shocked if even 50% of capacity is being allocated to the Lightning Lane. This appears to be a matter of distribution and not policy; Cast Members can only pull Genie+ guests to the extent that they are there. Based upon my firsthand experiences and observations, there’s seldom more than a slow trickle of guests into the Lightning Lane. That frees up more capacity to be allocated to the standby line.
One notable exception to this is when an attraction returns from a breakdown. Then, the priority is to process the backlog of guests with Lightning Lane ride reservations, which often amounts to a far greater allocation of guests coming from the Lightning Lane. This is nothing new to the Genie+ system; FastPass did the same thing.
The part that’s new is Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance being less reliable and more popular than a normal attraction, meaning that it’s possible to get really unlucky with the posted v. actual standby wait if your timing is off. (Conversely, you can get really lucky–it’s far and away the least accurate posted wait time, in both directions, at Walt Disney World.)
The thing about anecdotal observations is that they’re inherently limited and may not reflect broader trends or experiences. When it comes to Walt Disney World, I tend to not take them too seriously–even when they’re my own–because someone an hour later or earlier might encounter something dramatically different. That’s true here, too. The problem is that there’s no good data about Lightning Lane v. standby allocations as the system is still new and this week has been its first true stress test.
One thing I will note is that most of my Genie+ testing this week has been at Hollywood Studios and Epcot. Today was going to be Magic Kingdom day before I abandoned that plans out of futility and frustration. I’ve heard stories of things being different there, with slower standby queues for Peter Pan’s Flight and other rides. Since our experiences are limited and there’s no good data, we’d love to hear from other people who have been in the parks this week–you should have ample time to comment while standing in those long lines! 😉
Whether the current allocation is a problem or not is in the eye of the beholder. If you’re purchasing Genie+, you want as much capacity reserved for Lightning Lanes as possible. Otherwise, the service you paid for is less useful and you’re inclined to have buyer’s remorse, not purchase again, or even request a refund.
If you’re not using the pay-to-play line skipping service, you’re probably pleased to see Walt Disney World not reserve 80% of capacity for paid FastPass. Well, that might be a stretch–I doubt anyone is “pleased” with lines right now. Due to it being the busiest week of the year, standby wait times are also really high. The point is that a normal FastPass 80:20 allocation would make those posted waits so much worse.
It should go without saying, but allocation is subject to change–that all of the complaints thus far can be “fixed” pretty easily. Walt Disney World will almost certainly adjust that upwards to favor Genie+ and Lightning Lanes, because why wouldn’t they? More Lightning Lane capacity means higher satisfaction from guests paying more–and more sales of the paid FastPass service. There’s every reason to believe the allocation scales will tilt towards Genie+ more over time, and every reason not to believe the reverse will be true.
However, it’s not just return times, availability, and capacity that are causing complaints. The Genie system itself has been rife with glitches, errors, and problems…
Some of this is nothing new, and should come as no surprise to anyone who has experience with Disney IT. My Disney Experience is not exactly the gold standard; it’s been buggy for years. Upon launch, we used the free Genie itinerary builder and found it comically bad and totally worthless.
This week, the problems have gotten even worse and more frequent. We’re talking about the My Disney Experience app crashing, Genie system being slow or unresponsive, and sending a seemingly endless number of access codes via email. This last one is especially frustrating, as it always seems to happen at the most inopportune time, right as you’re trying to make a new Genie+ selection.
We’ve had this problem with codes since the beginning, and it’s further exacerbated by the propensity for Disney emails to be flagged as spam (in a way it makes sense–they’re spamming us with these codes). In some cases, we’ve received over a dozen of these codes in a day. One reader reported receiving 56 in one day. That’s the kind of claim you might assume is hyperbole unless you’ve actually used the system yourself. In which case, you believe it without any hesitation.
I’m likely missing some of the tech problems, but only because I’ve probably blocked them out for the sake of my own sanity or haven’t experienced them (yet). All of this is to say nothing about Genie’s absolutely abysmal UI and organization. This is nothing new, but almost nothing makes sense about the way it’s laid out or functions. It very much feels like Genie launched months–or perhaps years–before it was ready. That was more forgivable when it was working reasonably well to help save time. Now Genie+ is just a headache.
Ultimately, it’s very difficult for me to recommend Genie+ right now for any of the parks, even Magic Kingdom or Hollywood Studios. We expected that to go in the other direction, with recommendations for Epcot and Animal Kingdom only ‘kicking in’ once at a certain crowd level.
That threshold has been reached, but Genie+ has become so frustrating that the case could be made that you’re better off without it. While you will certainly wait longer in standby lines, most of them have been at least reasonably efficient, and don’t mean starting your day out with headaches at 7 am and spending the day glued to your phone dealing with bugs and other problems.
Personally, if visiting for “holistic enjoyment” and not just wait time minimization, I’d opt for a normal rope drop, midday break, late night strategy–pretending Genie+ doesn’t even exist. Again, this comes with the caveat that it’s the busiest week of the year at Walt Disney World. During times like these, there’s no ‘magic bullet’ approach that’ll totally beat the crowds (even some of the Genie+ woes are forgivable in light of attendance and strain on the system), but that should minimize headaches to the greatest extent possible during one of the worst weeks to visit.
From the beginning, we’ve sought to bring you the good, bad, and ugly with Genie, rather than sticking with preconceived notions or the popular sentiment. We were cautiously optimistic when it was mostly outrage, and now we’re in the other camp. We reserve the right to continue changing our minds as circumstances evolve–you know, how opinions should work. My guess is that Genie+ will continue to be tweaked throughout the holiday season, perhaps even this week. Walt Disney World has got to realize that this is unsatisfactory. For those who have used Genie+ this week, consider yourself an honorary Detroit Lions fan, because now you know how it feels! We’ll be in the parks this weekend and next week doing more Genie+ testing, if you want to be notified when we post more updates on Genie, crowds, news, and more–subscribe to our FREE email newsletter for instant alerts!
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YOUR THOUGHTS
If you’re at Walt Disney World for Thanksgiving week, what has been your experience with Genie+ or standby lines? Any success or failures making morning Lightning Lane selections? Have you had success in getting Slinky Dog Dash and/or Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance? What about headliners in other parks? Notice the closure of the stacking strategy or other hacks? Other problems or thoughts to share? Do you agree or disagree with my assessment? 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’ve flown over from the UK (we didn’t even think about it being thanksgiving when we booked!) And this week has been awful for Genie+ , we last visited in 2019 and FastPass was so much better. In MK we only managed to use it on 3 rides (Buzz, PotC and Monsters Inc) I’ve just been writing about it on my blog when your post popped up in my news section! Fortunately we are gere for another 10 days yet so hoping next week is quieter
The Disney app wouldn’t even work for most of visit a couple weeks ago. It’s really aggravating because even at busier times of the year we used to be able to go to WDW with our dining reservations and 3 free fast passes a day (planned ahead of time) and have a great time. It was so crowded at Epcot, MK, and Hollywood Studios it was just miserable. Certainly not worth the admission price for a day of total frustration…much less the extra $ for genie+, etc. Disney desperately needs a change in leadership!
Went to Disneyland on Sunday and Monday (11/21 and 11/22), and we’re done with Disney for a while: simply too many people in the park.
We pay enough just to walk jnto the park; we don’t want to mess around with bug-ridden apps at 7am just to get on a 10-minute ride sometime that afternoon. And food service is unacceptable: must place orders hours ahead of time for a tiny meat skewer, or wait 30+ minutes in line for a pretzel.
All the problems stem from over-population: they simply need to limit the total number of people in a park on any given day, or open more parks. If we don’t have a ticket to get in the park in the first place, we won’t have a need to stress and complain about all the other issues…
Thank you everyone!
We were able to get a 2 day pass Yeah!!!
Now hopefully we get to Bells cottage!
I emailed guest relations but it said 10 days to respond!
I’m going to call again.
The first person was very help helpful. I think it depends on who you get!
I’m so excited for June to wake up so I can tell her!!! Woohoo!
We were at DW for 4 days this/Txgiving week. We used Genie+ 3 times. First day was amazing. We utilized the 120 min stacking technique and had 2 rotating LL passes all day. It was worth the extra $75+ for our family of 5. The next 2 days were a disaster because Disney CHANGED the stacking option overnight between Nov. 20-21 without my knowledge, which means I missed out on earlier LLs because I was waiting 120 minutes to get a 2nd one, so by 11:00 there was basically nothing left. I spent hours in the Guest Relations lines trying to explain how this unexpected changed screwed up all my planning and wasted my money. Of course the people running the iPads had no idea how to help me. I just don’t know what to think anymore. I love Disney but I hate the money grabs and apparent greed and crappy experiences. It’s ready stressful enough.
One of the many reasons why WDW is my least favorite Disney resort, is they make it so much work. Ughhhh
We’ve been using DAP this week and it has generally worked much better than I expected. Sometimes not all rides are listed, but this seems to be because of ride closures (Rise of the Resistance closes often). I agree the Lightning Lane usage is sparse compared to stand by. Just one example is Space Mountain where stand by is out the door, but in the Lightning Lane we get to the second tap without a wait at all. I’m struggling to come up with an example where there was a wait in the Lightning Lane that was due to capacity.
Our only issue occurred last night when Pooh went down and we couldn’t use our scheduled DAP. A CM at the ride said the DAP should convert to a multi-experience pass 15 minutes beyond our return since the ride was closed. This didn’t happen and I had to skip dinner with the family to talk to a Customer Experience rep who confirmed what’s supposed to happen isn’t happening. He then asked what we wanted a DAP for rather than giving a multi-pass. All of our late our night plans crumbled with that. Disappointing, but seemed to be just unlucky timing.
30 yr Disney veteran who would normally be arriving at Ft Wilderness on Sun. 11-28, at Dollywood today. Says it all. . .
We aren’t making our annual Disney trip this year. Genie+ is one of the reasons. We have always tolerated the Spring Break crowds and walked away looking fondly on our trip. Trips to Disney are expensive enough. I can understand raising ticket prices a little as the cost of doing business does increase. There is enough profits when a family of four stays on property for a week and (when available) use the dining plan. No one rarely walks away without souvenirs. Nickle and Diming visitors isn’t right. A business plan like this will alienate a family that just can’t afford to spend an additional $100 a day per person to make sure they have the experience they want. They may be the best game in town but they aren’t the only. Disney will lose from this, the question will be how long it takes for them to realize it.
June’s Mom: I have an idea for something fun for June but it’s not at Disney World, it’s at Busch Gardens, Tampa. If you write me at [email protected] I will expain.
I am here this week with a party of 9. We have used a mix of Genie+ some days, Individual LL, and rope drop/park close strategies. Genie + worked much better Saturday-Monday, especially with rope dropping one park, break, and then stacking all day for the late afternoon/early evening combined with park close. I did use the advanced hacking strategy so I’m sure that helped too. On those days, it felt like it was worth it to pay. We were in all 4 parks over those 3 days. If you had a full day at either Epcot or Animal Kingdom then I wouldn’t purchase Genie+ but probably just some of the Ind. LL. It was great at Magic Kingdom and Studios. By Tuesday it was clearly more crowded and Wednesday was wall to wall. We had Genie + and did ok Tuesday for a late morning/hop using advanced stacking which still was working for me. Wednesday is when I first noticed the closed loophole and was only able to get 3 rides on Genie+, which meant I didn’t purchase for Thursday. We rode 3 rides at park open, break for swimming and Thanksgiving meal, and went back to Studios for park close. This is what I recommend on extremely busy days, not worth the purchase because they sell out and too busy during the day. I’m off site which means we couldn’t get Rise at all and many others only for evening times, but we rode Rise twice on separate days at park close. On normal crowded days it seemed worth it for Genie+ combined with a good plan and strategy, on extremely crowded days everything was gone too early for it to make it worth it. Hope this helps someone!
Thanks everyone for your kind words and birthday wishes. It really is heartbreaking trying to explain that even though we’re here we can’t go to Disney World.
I did write to Disability Guest Relations with no reply. I’m sure their flooded with request.
We’re going to see Santa tomorrow so that’s exciting for her.
I’ve asked everyone at I could think of.
Hopefully something works even if for an hour!!!
p.s. HAPPY BIRTHDAY JUNE!
June’s Mom: don’t tell June and it probably will not work but what about trying to find a higher up person and explaining what would make June VERY happy and her needs. Perhaps an exception could be made and somehow they could squeeze you in? If you do not try you will never know. My friend M was always doing things like that at parks, incredibly politely, and her daughter got on Double Dare TV! All she did was ask really nicely after hearing “no” first. I hope June gets to see Belle and her cottage. If not, is there a picture book she could treasure that has pics of Belle and the cottage? Belle is my favorite too. If you ask the closest store manager to the cottage perhaps they know of a good picture book or a special Belle keepsake June would like.
It’s really disappointing that I’m here for two weeks my husband & our daughter who will turn 19 Dec. 2nd.
Our daughter Has Down’s syndrome and does not understand why we can’t get tickets…
She keeps talking about going to Bells cottage and other attractions and they’re are no tickets to be had during our whole stay.
We’re so disappointed.
But understand the Covid safety guidelines just wish my daughter understood.
My solution is to simply not visit Disney parks. They’re not the only game in town. Go there once to say you’ve been (hit whatever is most important to you and forget the rest), then move on. There’s plenty of fun to be had at Universal, SeaWorld, Busch Gardens, Cedar Fair parks, or even Six Flags – with far, far less hassle and expense. I’m good with Disney once every 10-20 years. The other places will get my money the rest of the time (which is a lot).
The entire problem with Disney and Disney Genie+ is that it sets an unattainable expect to begin with. Anyone that states they are “the most happiest place” sets the bar pretty high. Any person on the busy day of the year sounds just a little ridiculous complaining about how busy it is – almost as ridiculous as the individual standing outside a retailer 2 hours before they open for a door buster that there are 50 of. You are going to be left feeling disappointed.
The Genie+ system is flawed. First, it leads people to believe that they can make two ride reservations as long as they are two hours apart and two additional lightening lane purchases at 7 am. To begin with if everyone logs into a system at 7 am it will fail. The system just can not handle the surge and collapses time and time again. This is not new.
Second, Disney themselves have not put a cap on how many people can purchase Disney+ per a day. Which is the main source of the problem. It took Universal years to find the sweet spot under normal operating conditions with a cap on how many pass they can sell at a much more hefty price tag.
Third, is the horrible feed back, feeding an already misguided corporate agenda under current leadership.
As Disney states people, people were not happy with waking up once to make their three ride reservations a day for their entire trip ahead of time and begin disappointed at their selections (for those staying on property). Disney misguided resolution – let’s make everyone wake up every day early on their vacation and then keep them glued to their phones all day to try reserve rides as they come available, if at all. Then when they are upset, let’s not give them 60 days to cool down and form a plan of attack, let’s send them to the park and hope they conduct themselves as well adjust adults. As we have heard that’s not going so well. Additionally, I don’t even know when or how they expect someone to plan their dinning reservations with everything up in the air.
The old system was great. Each family could plan their meals and rides in comfortable time frame. Making your own happy experience if just for a few hours or sprinkled through out the day. Once again, any place calming to be the most happiest place on earth set the standard pretty high and that’s okay by me. Just do not going defending the cost of a flaw system stating other parks with working systems have been charging for the experience for years. Disney should be setting the bar, not following the crowd.
I will be going to Disney World soon. Believe it or not, it is not by choice and I hope I do not experience this. There is just too much, nonsense in change at this point. It is as if CEOs have never heard of the 10% rule. The moment they stated they were reducing food portions to cut food waste was a red flag for me. Anyone in food service with a shred of knowledge could tell you they were not correcting the problem – just magnifying it. Hopefully, they correct the problem before Mickey loses his shorts. The poor guy never even had a shirt.
What Disney needs at this point is another park to open up somewhere in the united states’. Maybe in Texas or Arizona. Preferably Arizona beacuse we have great weather all year and lots of open land to house something of Disneys size. There is too many people going to just these two parrks. and to have so many difficulties problems. I don’t see it getting any better.
It is so sad to read all these comments. For all of us who love the Disney Parks to be so disappointed in recent experiences and management continues to do nothing clearly shows how out of touch they are with the long term success of the entire Parks & Resorts Business model – especially in WDW.
Looking back, the experience has been gradually eroding for years, but it sure has taken a dive off a steep cliff in this past year.
Josh D’Amaro wears much of this in my opinion and probably a good chunk of the senior management needs to go before things will start to improve, it can’t just be Bob Paycheck alone that’s the issue, although the buck does stop with him!
They never should have laid off all the cast members the way they did at the start of the pandemic. If memory serves, they had quickly secured a 12 BILLION dollar line of credit to see them through, I know it would have been expensive, but they should have found as many projects and other work for those cast members as they could and not sent them to the food banks.
Imagine a Disney ad that said “We are so committed to our cast members who create magic for our guests, that we are not laying them off – please support us by visiting a park when you can!”
They would have created a mountain of goodwill and wouldn’t be in this mess with staff shortages AND untrained, rude cast members.
I fear this is just the beginning of the unraveling… hate to say it, but I hope it happens hard & fast so we can get on with the healing & correcting of this disaster!
Please tell me this trend is not sustainable for much longer!
P.S. Tom: You and Sarah do a phenomenal job with this site – THANK YOU SO MUCH for all the beautiful pictures and humorous write ups… it really helps as we patiently stay away from our happy place.
I was in Disney in Oct. Will NEVER return! Lost $30 trying to L.L. on top of $120 / day (x 2) ! Way to much Bullshit to fight with apps and websites to enjoy a park for a day.