Crowds Spike, EMH Changes, and Hours Extended at DHS for Star Wars Rise of Resistance
I’m starting to feel like Bill Murray (except not as cool) in Groundhog Day, as each week brings news that Walt Disney World is changing things up and extending the park hours at Hollywood Studios (and sometimes elsewhere) due to Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance. This time, they’ve added hours for January 2020, with Februrary 2020 having shifted Extra Magic Hours.
This shouldn’t come as a huge surprise. Crowds have spiked and demand is actually growing for Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance rather than subsiding (more on this in our commentary section below). As this blockbuster attraction continues to garner rave reviews from critics and guests alike, the ride’s popularity is unlikely to wane any time in the coming days, weeks, or months.
For its part, Walt Disney World has been pretty diligent about extending park hours at Disney’s Hollywood Studios, but is taking an incremental approach, only adding hours when it becomes clear demand is there. Hence this Groundhog Day situation. They don’t want a repeat of last fall’s Extra, Extra Magic Hours fiasco, but I think at this point it’s patently obvious that’s not going to happen…
Before delving into this update, we’ll offer the boilerplate reminder that most questions you have are likely answered by our Ride Guide & FAQ for Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance. We continue to update that as circumstances dictate, so please read that before asking a question in the comments below.
Irrespective of the operating hours, that ride guide and answers to frequently asked questions will ensure you a place in the virtual queue…so long as you’re willing to get up bright and early while on vacation and trudge over to Disney’s Hollywood Studios!
To recap on recent park hours extensions at Disney’s Hollywood Studios, we had the belated Christmas gift of 6 am openings all of last week, with those ending at the start of January 2020.
Earlier openings continued into the new year, thanks to extended park hours for January 1-11, 2020. As a result, these dates have 7 am openings. Although it now seems “late” by comparison, park opening hours were moved to 8 am through February 1, 2020.
The latest change has moved forward the opening of Disney’s Hollywood Studios to 7 am for more dates: January 17-20, 2020 and January 24-26, 2020. The first set of extended dates coincides with the long MLK Weekend holiday, while the second set of dates is Pro Bowl Weekend, which is being held in Orlando, Florida.
Additionally, park closing has been extended from 9 pm until 10 pm through this weekend (January 4, 2020). It’s possible if not probable that park closing time will be extended for subsequent dates due to WDW Marathon Weekend and the other events/holidays listed above. (For how these and other events will impact crowds, see our January 2020 at Walt Disney World Crowd Calendar & Info post.)
Next up, we have more changes to Extra Magic Hours. Previously, Walt Disney World shifted December and January 2020 Extra Magic Hours from mornings to evenings. Now, the same thing is happening with February 2020 dates: Extra Magic Hours will now be at night on February 2, 9, 16, and 23.
It probably got lost in the holiday shuffle, but we recently published a post with Strategy for Evening Extra Magic Hours at Hollywood Studios (Post-Star Wars Rise of Resistance). Obviously I’m biased, but I think this is good advice that will hold true in the future. It’s worth a quick read/skim.
Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance Crowds Commentary
In our previous update (“More 2020 DHS Hours Extended for Star Wars Rise of Resistance“), we offered some commentary on the latest developments of…let’s call it the Rise (of the Resistance) & Shine Pre-Dawn Cattle Call. Many of you found that interesting and shared your own experiences (thank you!!!), so we thought we’d do the same here.
Suffice to say, Disney’s Hollywood Studios has been bonkers for the last few days. We anticipated a slight reprieve after New Year’s Eve and that did not happen. I can’t offer a definitive explanation for this, but here’s my leading theory: it’s locals. Well, locals and the holiday hangover crowd.
In the past, we’ve stressed how the boarding pass and virtual queue system for Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance primarily favors tourists, at least on weekdays. This is because most locals have 9-5 jobs, and coming after work to queue up is not an option.
That’s not the case right now. Plenty of people are still off of work and, more importantly, both Orange County and Osceola County School Districts are on winter break until January 7, 2020. Many of these same locals have been on break for the last several weeks, but many (most?) of them are Annual Passholders who would’ve been blocked out…or simply busy hosting family for the holidays.
If this is accurate (and I really can’t think of a better explanation), expect things to only get worse this weekend. Most Walt Disney World Annual Passholders were blocked out until January 3, 2020. We weren’t in Disney’s Hollywood Studios this morning, but reports on social media made it sound pretty bad. With tomorrow being a weekend and dates that are unblocked and the final few days before school is back in session, you can count on Saturday and Sunday being particularly packed.
The other trend we’ve noticed lately is guests becoming more savvy when it comes to other attractions at Disney’s Hollywood Studios. For a while, wait times throughout the park didn’t spike right away–and that’s still true, in large part.
However, gone are the mornings of doing Toy Story Land’s headliners repeatedly with no wait. You should still be able to experience the trio with minimal wait if you’re efficient about getting back there, but you won’t be able to loop Slinky Dog Dash. This shouldn’t be a huge surprise; this always happens as guest flow gets into a groove with new attractions.
For those of you heading to Walt Disney World in the very near future trying to choose the best date to do the Rise (of the Resistance) & Shine Pre-Dawn Cattle Call, our pick would be January 7 or 8, 2020. On these dates, local schools will be back in session and most of the New Year’s crowd will have gone home. Dates closer to the weekend will start seeing elevated crowds (again) because of the Walt Disney World Marathon, so those mid-week days should be the sweet spot.
Of course, this is barring downtime on Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance, assuming our theory is correct, and [insert additional caveats you can think of here]. As with forecasting Walt Disney World crowds, this early morning stuff with Rise of the Resistance is more art than it is science. Pack your patience, be prepared to roll with the punches, and you should be fine. It’s a great attraction that is well worth jumping through a few hoops to experience!
If you’re planning on visiting the new land, you’ll also want to read our Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge Guide. This covers a range of topics from basics about the land and its location, to strategically choosing a hotel for your stay, recommended strategy for the land, and how to beat the crowds. It’s a good primer for this huge addition. As for planning the rest of your trip, we have a thorough Walt Disney World Planning Guide.
YOUR THOUGHTS
Think local schools are to blame for the early January 2020 spike in crowds for rope drop at DHS? If you’ve arrived early for Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance, what was your experience like? If you have an upcoming January or February 2020 trip, do you plan on arriving to Disney’s Hollywood Studios super early? Do you agree or disagree with our advice and assessment? 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!
Hi Tom. We went into DHS on 12/22 and 12/31. Both days we drove to the park as skyliner was not running early enough to get us to the park. We arrived 1/2 hour prior to opening and went through security and then the cattle call. Both days they opened a few minutes prior to posted open, we sat down and started refreshing the app for a boarding pass. We were fortunate enough to be sitting near three cast members with Wilkie talkies the first day. They were relaying messages back to Rise and receiving messages from the ride cast members. They told us it would be 7 am exactly that the boarding passes would be released. We heard them message the go ahead command for releasing and we got a boarding pass number 53 that day. So happy we got one but interested to know what the algorithm is for setting these up because we were on the app quickly, refreshing continually and got # 53. Others around us got 13 and still others higher then us within split seconds. We are a party of 4 so interested to know if they hold each for a specific number of people, then issue the next pass etc. I’m not sure. On the 31st we were in the park just before 6 am and did the same, sit down, keep refreshing the app and at 6 am got boarding group 49. Awesome ride. We are not late sleepers on WDW vacations so we could roll with this entrance but it was crazy. Happy we got lower boarding passes and got to ride both days. The lines were insanely long for Slinky on the 31st but surprisingly we did Midway Mania in a 20 minute wait that morning and 10 minutes on the aliens.
I was at Hollywood Studios this morning, 1/3. We arrived at 5:20, scanned in and were down waiting at Toy Story land around 6:30. At 7:00 I clicked on the boarding pass, chose my group members and hopped on a boarding pass. Everyone was doing the same thing at the same time. We got a boarding group of 92. The people in front of us were in 36, we hit the button less than 30 seconds apart. Our boarding group was finally called tonight after 8:00. Unfortunately we had to fly home this afternoon so we never got to ride. We walked on to Slinky Dog with less than a 10 min wait but by the time we stepped off that ride Toy Story Mania was over an hour and SDD was at 140 min. The line ran through toy story land, down along past the Little Mermaid Show and into the courtyard with the archway. It was insane and it was only 7:20am. We headed over to Rockin Rollercoaster to hop on the singles lane which also was already over an hour’s wait. Star Wars area was so packed (8:10ish now – we decided not to wait in the barely moving singles line) that it was difficult to move. Lines were so long they were wrapped and coiled all over the place making it nearly impossible to navigate or to explore the land at all. We left the park by 8:40, it was too packed to move and most rides were well over 120-180 minutes by then. We had great experiences earlier this week (12/28 and 12/29) although the lines were still long the park itself wasn’t too crazy. There was at least enough space to walk between attractions at a decent pace. Today rivaled Magic Kingdom on NYE – so many people we could barely move. Will be trying to get on ROR ASAP!
I’m an Uber driver, picking up people at DHS. Today, the 3rd, I had 3 riders who came to the park just to ride ROR. Two where attending a conference or convention and came early to ride. One of which was from Canada. While the third flew in from Houston with his family to ride ROR. It’s only 3 riders, but I wonder how many others are like these three.
Here’s my experience from today, 1/3. We got to the park around 6:15. They opened the park at about 6:30, and we tapped in right at 6:59. A very nerve wracking experience, but not too bad! At 7, I opened MDE to try for a boarding group – my app wouldn’t load any information, so I grabbed my mom’s in a frenzy. 7:01, and we got group 115. Given how quickly groups have moved the past couple of days, I wasn’t worried at all. It wasn’t ideal, of course, but it was a regular boarding group as opposed to backup. I figured it wouldn’t be too bad and that we’d get on the ride late afternoon or perhaps early evening.
Unfortunately, that isn’t what happened at all. I don’t know how many times the ride went down today, but I talked to one person who said she attempted to ride several times and was evacuated each time. At first, it didn’t seem too bad. Given that we’re annual pass holders, as well as locals, we took the opportunity to do other things in Orlando to pass the time and largely avoided the parks save for our very spread out last minute FPs (TSMM at 9:55, Star Tours at 5:05.) While I love Slinky Dog Dash, I’m not sure I love it enough to wait in a line that hovered around 150-180 minutes all day. But like I said, we’re APs and local. We can afford to call it a day and skip out on things while others cannot because their time is limited.
Around 6, we spoke to a cast member and asked if it would be likely that we would ride today – if it wasn’t likely, we were just going to go home. She said that if the ride stayed up, they would do their very best to accommodate us. We decided to hang around, but at 7:45, we got the dreaded “We are unable to accommodate your boarding group” message. As we were a regular boarding group, Disney did give us a fast past for tomorrow as well as two DHS tickets which are good for two years. I believe group 101 was the first group to receive the message, based on just asking around and from what I’ve seen on twitter. We’re driving the two hours home today, and will be back tomorrow to hopefully ride! At this point, I almost want to ride it purely out of spite – we were at opening weekend and were evacuated twice, so riding this thing really does feel like it’s been a long time coming at this point!
To anyone going out tomorrow and Sunday: don’t take what others are saying lightly. The crowds are some of the worst I’ve experienced as a passholder and are largely comprised of locals. Be prepared to wait A LOT for the most basic attractions, and even those will likely go down at points throughout the day.
Planning on going to HWS on Jan 21 (which has a 8am opening time) as of now. Planning to be at HWS by 6am via Lyft. Do you think that is a good plan to get a boarding pass?
We rode it twice this week. On 12/29 we were a few minutes late getting in because we brought a bag. It was also pouring which was slowing things down. We were able to get boarding group 119. We road SDD then Mania a couple of times and Saucers for the kids. We left to go back to the hotel room for a break and naps and came back mid day when the rain let up and we had FP. Group 119 was called by 3 and it was a quick journey through the queue. We did drive in ourselves and it was really light traffic.
1/1 we also drove in. We were very early this time and it only helped a little bit. Opening was one hour later and the crowds had a different feeling. It was a majority adult crowd and the no bag line actually took more time than the bag check line. It was a much more knowledgeable crowd. It took a couple of minutes of refreshing for us to get BG 74. The rides had much longer lines all morning. Our BG was called at 12:15.
It could have been the rain that allowed us to ride more our first morning or it was a shift in the local/knowledgeable crowds. Most likely a combination of both.
We were at DHS on 12/20 for a 7am opening, 12/24 7am, 12/26 for 6am. Staying at POP we ordered a Lyft/Uber for 5:30 for the 7am and 4:45 for the 6am. We went without bags, and were thru security waiting for turnstiles within 20 min of getting in the car. They opened turnstiles around 30 min before park opening. We used all phones trying to get boarding and had some turn off park wifi. Were able to get a boarding group before they let people walk to attractions. Our BG numbers were random–9, 15, and low 30’s. All 3 days we walked right to Smugglers Run first. Busiest day was 12/26 and we were OK but lots of people were talking about not being able to get BG. At turnstiles that morning, cast members were sort of frantically getting people in and I’m not sure the finger pads were working–in front of me, every single mickey and finger print were turning green at the exactly the same time, so I don’t know what was happening. We were fine, but wondering if some weren’t registered as being in parks?
Was at HS on Jan 2nd. Traveled from Contemporary Resort, pre-booked a Lyft three night before for 6am, cancelled when it was still 20+ mins away and a bus arrived at 6:10am. Much better.
Was thru the gates by 6:45am, thousands in front of us. Managed to get boarding group 115 at 7:03, was on backup groups by 7:06. Good flow until mid-afternoon, then broke down for a couple of hours (froze at group 88). Our group came up around 5:00pm.
Smugglers’ line time is not accurate yet. Got in line early afternoon showing 140min, actual time about an hour longer. Definite growing pains throughout Galaxy’s Edge.
All of that said, Smugglers’ was fantastic, and Rise was as amazing as everyone said!
Here’s our report for 1/3. We arrived at HS at 5:51, went through the checkpoint at 6:20. Started trying to join a boarding group at 7:00. Technical difficulties of course so refreshing and frantically power walking to a blue umbrella. Final result: boarding group 158. It’s 3:00 in the afternoon and we are heading back to our resort for a nap. I don’t expect ours to be called until 9:00. You were exactly right about the crowds jumping into Toy Story land. The end of the Slinky Dog line was by the Little Mermaid. It was insane. We decided to bail and made it to Epcot on the gondola for rope drop. Went straight to Soarin and it had already ballooned to 75 minutes in the amount of time it took us to walk from the gondola station. I think a lot of people (us too!) are still on holiday break. I’m coming back early February for mid-week overnighter. Hoping for lighter crowds then.
My brother and I went to Hollywood Studios on 12/29 explicitly to ride ROTR. We were staying at Port Orleans resort and got up at 4:30. The first thing we found was that Lyft availability was non-existent after 4:50; there simply weren’t any vehicles available. Fortunately, a bus showed up at 5:15 and we were able to get to DHS by 5:40, but it could easily have been a disaster. I’m not sure what lessons one should draw from this, since we were trying to get to the studios on one of the busiest days of the year, but I’d be careful about assuming vehicle availability at this point; too many people are competing for a limited resource.
Once the park opened at six we experienced problems with getting a boarding pass. As is common with Disney IT it failed under load and we continued to get errors for the first couple of minutes. It was also raining, so I was starting to freak out a little. Fortunately, we eventually managed to get boarding group 102.
We were cold and wet, so after riding Tower of Terror and using a FastPass for Toy Story we headed back to our hotel room and went back to sleep. That Sunday was actually a pretty good day for ROTR, and boarding group 102 was called at 1:30 pm. Despite the frustrations of procuring a pass we both agreed that the ride itself is fantastic.
To me, you are not describing a enjoyable day at WDW , but rather a Nightmare, and a great waste of money and time! And people continue to flock to Disneys gates for ???
This seems like a miserable expensive experience from what I’m reading. Tom or anybody on the ground, are you upset about paying big bucks for tickets and experiencing ridiculous waits?
disney’s notoriously bad IT would freak me out trying to get a boarding group. it’s so awful. and the number of people who defend disney unapologetically make me laugh. disney’s inconsistent IT is the only constant.
Cast members report that if you don’t use Disney WiFi and don’t open the app until 7 (don’t keep refreshing) you will get a much lower BG
Hello Tom,
What is the expected/unofficial opening time for DHS on monday Jan 13th?
Thanks in advance for your advice
Andres
Hi Tom! I’ve been reading your thoughts, experience and advice regarding Start Wars Rise if the Resistance and am very anxious about whether we’ll manage to get into the a boarding group. We’re taking our first trip with new grand (13 months), we’re flying and not taking a car seat. Four adults, staying at AKL. Considering what I’m reading from you, unless we Uber, I don’t think we stand a chance and we can’t Uber without a car seat. Thinking our only option is to split up having each couple go on separate mornings. Thoughts?
Bringing a car seat is highly recommend! It’s free to check for the flight and worth just grabbing it at bag claim. Then they will just put it in the luggage compartment in the bus. You might not even have to grab it at bag claim. They give you luggage tags for the Magic’al express and load them on the bus for you. All you gotta do is go get into the magical express line:) the first year we went. We stayed and waited for our bags, freaked out then thankfully some nice person told us they send the bags straight to the bus:) have an amazing time! We are skipping g our annual trip this year and I’m so sad!
What day do you plan to go to Hollywood Studios? If it’s not in the next week or one of the weekend days Tom mentioned in the article, then you should be fine
This was the best way before their most recent change. Now, since boarding passes don’t open up until the official park open time, you should be able to get there on time and get a boarding pass, even if for something later in the day. If you’re staying at a skyliner resort, you should be able to get on that when they open it up in the morning and get over there, otherwise, buses run pretty early as well.
Also, the Disney Minnie Van’s by Lyft say they have child seats onboard as well. I’d imagine they’d be able to include a 13 month old, but always worth double checking before the trip.
Tom, thanks so much for all the info on Rise, it is really helpful. We have one day to experience Rise on Friday 01-17 and plan to be at HS by 6-6:15. My husband and I are always both logged in to our My Disney Experience App. When we enter HS, should we both have our app open to get a Rise boarding pass or should just one of us try? We didn’t know if you and Sarah had tried using both of your mobile devices to get boarding passes or just one. Also, and if you’ve already answered this, my apologies for asking again, but when we arrive early at HS, will we go through security upon arrival or will we have to wait to go through security closer to opening? We’re trying to decide bag or no bag. Thanks so much Tom (and Sarah)!
Why was the extra extra magic hours a fiasco? I thought it was pretty great.
It was great for guests who were willing to wake up early. It was a fiasco for Disney because they spent lots of money to open the parks so early to accommodate the expected surge of SWGE guests. There was no surge of SWGE guests, but Disney was stuck opening DHS at 6am every day anyway.
10-4 thanks.
Well, in a few months maybe they will start doing one of those paid late night tickets for Hollywood studios.
Left the Swan at 4:30 intending to walk but a boat was just about to leave so hopped on (I had heard they didn’t run that early!). Arrived at ticket booth area a bit before 5. They let us in at 6:15, I believe. We were held at the entry to GE until 7. My husband and I both had the app open and bounced between More Info and My Status screens in prep. We were both able to get in easily (Sprint, no wifi) but my husband was slightly faster and got group 14! Mine was about one screen behind and told me I’d already joined a group at that point, so it didn’t cause problems to both try. We went straight to Smuggler’s Run and waited maybe 20 min but much of it was just walking through the queue. Our group was called just at around 7:30. We got breakfast first and then headed to RotR. The wait was about 20 min before the experience began. We absolutely loved it. Highly worth waking up early in our opinion (12 year old and 2 parents). We did it this way to be sure to ride Millennium Falcon – not necessary if not trying to ride it or Slinky, obviously.
Keeping tabs on this and wondering how the new Mickey and Minnies Run-Away Railway opening will happen. We will be at Disney March 1-5 and have earmarked one early morning to get boarding pass for Rise of the Resistance and early morning March 5 for Mickey ride (or both rides if possible).
I’ll be at WDW from Sunday, Jan 12 thru Tue, Jan 14th. I’ve made FP+ choices for the afternoons each day so that if I can’t get into a ROTR boarding group one day, I can try again the next. I’m going to first try on Sunday with the hopes many people will be running or spectating the Disney Marathon. I was hopeful DHS would be opening at 7AM so I could LYFT there before the first runners arrived (it’s Mile 23). But it’s not opening until 8:00. So, Tom…do you suggest I bring a book and still LYFT to arrive at 6-6:30, or should I try the Skyliner and not deal with road traffic at all?
Oh, and I just saw Becky’s plan to take a bus to the Boardwalk and walk from there. What do you think of that?
We were at HS yesterday, inside the oak just after 7 am. The app did not recognize that my husband was in the park for about 5 minutes, then we got stand by boarding group for Rise 169. Wait times were 2 hours for slinky and over 3 hours for millennium. We had no trouble with food, but the last boarding group called was 167, so no joy with Rise, despite our best efforts. Crowds were terrible and everyone we talked to was from out of town. Hopefully things will be calmer in June when we were back.
I’m coming for marathon weekend, doing the Dopey Challenge. I was lucky enough to get on Rise opening day last month, so if I miss it this time I will survive. My plan is to run the 5k starting at 5:30am, finish the race in about half an hour, hop on a bus to the boardwalk, and walk to HS from there to hopefully arrive around 6:30am. I’m hoping that will give me enough time to get a spot in the virtual queue but if not, so be it. I don’t have a lot of other options with all the morning races 😉
Hey Becky! We have a similar plan (i’m doing the Dopey, my friend’s 10 year old is doing the 5k with me) but may Lyft over to HS just in case. It’s going to be a crazy day
tom, CONGRATS on your Sam Eagle Regal Eagle Salute to all dishes but mostly BBQ prediction coming true!!! i’m pumped!
I was a Hollywood Studios today Jan 3. I got into park at 7:04 and got boarding group 161. By 7:10 there was a 210 minute wait for Slinky Dog Dash. Needless to say crowds were terrible. No fun at all.
We left at 8:00 am. I will try again Wednesday.
OMG. That is horrific. Disney should give refunds. No ride should have more than a 20 min wait at 7:10 am. A 210 min wait at that hour? That is ridiculous.
Exact same experience. Was much worse than Christmas Day. Took a good 20 minutes to get through paying for parking around 6:20, probably 30 min for bag check and to scan meaning BG 162 around 7:07am. Arriving at parking had us in the park for 7am easily on Christmas Day. Fortunate to get called at 8pm. Left the park around 1:30pm because it was NUTS. 2 hours plus on most attractions. Even after 8pm lines stayed long, but better than afternoon. I recommend getting to the parking lot by 6am for sure if the crowds stay like this for ROTR.