Hollywood Studios Reopening Report: A Tale of Two Visits
Our final park to visit post-reopening of Walt Disney World is Hollywood Studios, following our days in Magic Kingdom, Animal Kingdom, and Epcot. In this post, we’ll cover our first two visits to DHS, the frustrations and pleasant surprises we encountered, health safety rule & mask compliance, plus our experiences with the Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance boarding pass dash, Toy Story Land, and more.
Even before the parks resumed operations, we knew Disney’s Hollywood Studios was going to be the most frustrating park. In our We Were Wrong About Disney Park Pass, we discussed some of the capacity woes of the park. New Virtual Queue for Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance covered the updated and improved boarding pass process, but concluding that it was easy to foresee rope drop at Disney’s Hollywood Studios being one of the biggest reopening problem points.
The unfortunate reality is that Disney’s Hollywood Studios does a poor job of absorbing crowds. The park’s layout, crowd-flow, reliance on stage shows, top-heavy attraction line-up, and even little things like the park’s approach to shopping & dining are all not conducive to present circumstances and reduced capacity operations. If you were designing a park to operate during this period of “temporary abnormal,” Disney’s Hollywood Studios would be a lesson in many things to avoid…
To be abundantly clear, we knew all of that going into our visit. As did Walt Disney World leadership, which is undoubtedly why Disney Park Pass availability is so limited for DHS. It’s less about this being the most popular park and much more that the park’s capacity has been significantly reduced–to a lower level than any other park at Walt Disney World.
We’re offering this preface not to “roast” Disney’s Hollywood Studios or offer some sort of scathing indictment of the current operations. To the contrary, we had a pretty good idea of what we’d be getting ourselves into well in advance with Disney’s Hollywood Studios, as would anyone who has visited since last December or read anything about the park since Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance opened.
Originally, we didn’t even plan on rope dropping Disney’s Hollywood Studios because we expected the worst and wanted to mitigate our risk.
However, we felt that might be doing a disservice to those using these reports for planning purposes or to see whether they’d be comfortable visiting. (The above and below photos are deceiving, but this line was actually pretty well physically-distanced when viewed closer.)
Instead, we opted to arrive 20 minutes before rope drop, but grab a bench in the shade beyond the Skyliner station to watch the crowd situation play out.
This line was longest about 10 minutes before park opening–above is how it looked a few minutes before 10 am. The guests towards the end of this line probably didn’t enter prior to opening. If you’re going to arrive for rope drop, your best bet is arriving closer to 9:30 am.
It’s amazing how quickly this all dissipated. By 10:08 am when we entered, every line (health screening, bag check, and turnstiles) was totally gone. Literally no one in front of us.
(For what it’s worth, we tried to enter the Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance virtual queue from outside the park and it did not work. No surprise there, but we double-checked anyway.)
Here’s a view from above about 90 minutes after park opening. Note that there’s not a single person walking towards the park in this shot.
At this point, there were already more people leaving the park than entering. This was the pre-closure norm at Disney’s Hollywood Studios, and it remains true that DHS crowds peak within 30 minutes of rope drop. That phenomenon is not happening at any other Walt Disney World park.
Inside Disney’s Hollywood Studios, the longest line you’ll encounter early-on is for Mickey & Minnie’s Runaway Railway. (See “line starts here” sign on left side of photo above.)
Again, physical distancing generally looked fine to us, but this is nonetheless a very long outdoor line that’s going to be in the sun for a while.
About an hour later, the same area looks like this.
While the line for Mickey & Minnie’s Runaway Railway has been cut on some mornings due to it getting too long, that was not the case here–it just naturally subsided due to the posted wait time being two hours.
Here’s a look at wait times as of 10:19 am. Slinky Dog Dash had just gone down, but was a 90 minute wait prior to that.
As before, you should either be in line for a headliner before official park opening time or save them for later in the day. Don’t jump into line for one of the top Disney’s Hollywood Studios attractions between 10:00 am and 10:30 am unless you want what will literally be the longest line of the day.
We enter Toy Story Land shortly after passing by the Mickey & Minnie’s Runaway Railway line.
Not much of a crowd coming or going here at this point.
Slinky Dog Dash after reopening, with a physically-distanced queue.
Aside from the line being long, this was pretty well done. It’s essentially a “party per umbrella” system, with this stretching back towards Toy Story Land’s entrance.
While these wait times are peaking–because the vast majority of guests in the park are standing in line somewhere–Disney’s Hollywood Studios feels like a ghost town.
We sat in Echo Lake for 10 minutes and didn’t see another person during that entire time.
Even the Grand Avenue entrance to Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge is pretty quiet shortly after park opening.
Paradoxically, the busiest time of day at Disney’s Hollywood Studios is the best time to wander around and get empty park photos because most guests are locked into lines for their first rides of the day.
Even Muppets Courtyard is totally devoid of guests!
…Okay, bad example.
A little bit later, and we’re starting to see more guests on Sunset Boulevard.
These are mostly people leaving the area, presumably finishing up rides on Tower of Terror and Rock ‘n’ Roller Coaster.
As we leave Disney’s Hollywood Studios for the morning, here’s a look back at Hollywood Boulevard.
All in all, a pretty good morning for DHS…so long as you’re not looking to do anything aside from walking around. In terms of the park’s public spaces, we didn’t encounter anything troubling.
We returned (twice) at around 3:45 pm to test out how a late arrival and evening visit would work. On only one of these visits were we able to score a spot in the virtual queue for Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance.
Thus far, the staggered distribution of boarding passes has been a bit flawed and glitchy. The process for entering the virtual queue could definitely could use tweaking and improvement, but we found the actual ride experience to be markedly better. (All of that is a full post unto itself, so stay tuned.)
It should come as absolutely no surprise, but wait times were significantly shorter around 4 pm.
Above is a look at posted times, which are the highest we’d see during our afternoon and evening visits.
By 5:30 pm, everything except Mickey & Minnie’s Runaway Railway has a posted 10 minute wait.
In actuality, everything we did aside from Slinky Dog Dash was a walk-on.
Slinky Dog Dash was an 8-minute wait one time and around 5 minutes another.
We would’ve felt comfortable waiting longer in this line. The spacing is great, they’ve installed barriers throughout, and it’s all open-air. This is going to be one of our go-to evening attractions this summer and fall.
From our Slinky in the Sky, we can see that the walkways are pretty clear.
Of course, we were sure to scream inside our hearts.
After doing Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance, the rest of Galaxy’s Edge was pretty empty.
I never expected to see this land as quiet as it was last summer at Disneyland right after it debuted. Surely that was a total fluke that would never repeat itself, especially once the incredibly popular Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance opened, right?!?
The late arrival approach is obviously the way to go, so long as you’re not dead-set on doing Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance.
If that attraction is a must-do, you should arrive before 10 am as that increases your odds of scoring a spot in the virtual queue. We’ll offer a more comprehensive DHS strategy post at some point in the near-ish future, but feel free to ask any questions you might have.
Even with a good number of tables out of commission, BaseLine Tap House remains a great under the radar option for a low-key late afternoon meal. How this spot remains a “secret” despite its prominent location on the main walkway to Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge is beyond me. (But we are totally fine with that!)
Thanks to their outdoor seating, along with Docking Bay 7, this is now our go-to restaurant at DHS. Hollywood Brown Derby Lounge is not serving its food menu, unfortunately.
As with the other parks, Disney’s Hollywood Studios has a few different motorcades that drive up Hollywood Boulevard.
These are pretty good, with the Mickey and Minnie one being an especially great fit for the area now. Once things start getting back to normal, Walt Disney World should really condense these cavalcades into one, creating a new Stars & Motorcars Parade.
My “favorite” of these motorcades is the Disney Junior one, which we’ve now seen about a half-dozen times. It features a vampire and a doctor, who I assume appear together in a buddy comedy getting into all sorts of morbid hijinks. (That premise sounds a bit dark for kids, but I’d watch it.)
The Disney Junior motorcade also has an ear-worm of a song consisting of ~15 words. I know maybe half of these words, yet insist on humming/singing it anyway. Sarah is thrilled by this. (Of course I don’t have any photos of this motorcade–I was too busy rocking out to that sweet jam.)
Entertainment in Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge is also great.
I really hope one of the long-term consequences of the modified operations is more spontaneous character appearances and fewer static meet & greets. I wouldn’t mind a future where the only posed interactions are via character meals.
Wait times for Mickey & Minnie’s Runaway Railway dropped to around 30 minutes in the last hour that Disney’s Hollywood Studios was operating each night. Far and away the longest line at that point of the day at DHS.
There’s no reason to expect this to change. With how scarce Park Passes remain for Disney’s Hollywood Studios, this is going to be disproportionately tourists every day of the week. As this is the big new thing (that has a standby line), it’s going to be a must-do for many/most guests.
Mask compliance was exceptional at Disney’s Hollywood Studios during both of our visits–even at the end of the night when you’d think fatigue would be setting in for more guests. What we observed was around 98% compliance.
This is especially great news given that Disney’s Hollywood Studios is going to be the toughest park when it comes to physical distancing and time spent in lines.
Ultimately, Disney’s Hollywood Studios remains Walt Disney World’s most paradoxical park. We had two unexpectedly pleasant days in the park, but we also went from ~10 am to 11:30 am one morning (doing zero attractions) plus ~3:45 pm to 8 pm two evenings. We haven’t even experienced the lunch rush or early afternoon when walkways might be more crowded. It should go without saying, but this is not how the average guest is going to approach DHS.
While Disney’s Hollywood Studios was an unexpectedly pleasant surprise for us, we also were braced for the worst with it, and did everything we could to avoid lines and minimize exposure to points of friction. The fact remains that this is the most frustrating park to visit at Walt Disney World, and that’s exacerbated by the reduced stage show lineup. More than any other park, you’ll need to visit Disney’s Hollywood Studios with a strategy, or better yet, willingness to skip Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance. If you’re potentially okay with that, it’s the perfect option for an afternoon arrival after enjoying a morning at the pool or somewhere else.
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
Have you visited Disney’s Hollywood Studios since the park reopened? What was your experience? When did you arrive? How long did you stay? If you’ve yet to visit, will you be attempting to join the modified virtual queue for Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance? Do you plan on arriving at rope drop, or will you utilize a late arrival strategy? Do you agree or disagree with our 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!
Tom, How do you you guys feel about riding Smuggler’s Run? It’s tempting with the low wait times, but it seems like such a confined space to be in during this pandemic. We’ve ridden it, so we may skip it when we go in September.
They’re doing one party per cockpit, so it doesn’t bother me at all. (As long as that policy is in place.)
We did DHS Friday at open arriving before 930, but barely made it in by 10.
After looking around at everyone being stationary staring at their phones at 958 I cracked up at how silly it looked. Even hitting the queue button exactly at 10 for Rise we got group 40. Got called at 240 pm.
Only Smuggler’s Run and MMRR had a long wait. MMRR is not going to be popular long past it being new IMO. Updating the cartoons would help.
Thanks for the attractions numerical ratings for each park on this blog I found with google! I used it to plan and prioritize each day at the park for me and my boys and it worked great.
I want to rope drop MMRR but afraid that I won’t be able to grab a boarding pass if I’m inside the ride at that time. Will that happen?
I’ve never lost service inside that building, but I’ve also never tried to obtain a boarding pass in there. It’s an understandable concern.
We rope dropped MMRR and it hit 10:00 while we were on the ride. We were still able to get our boarding pass for ROR from on the ride without a problem.
We were at DHS on Friday and routinely noticed posted wait times were significantly longer than it actually took. Tower said 30 minutes almost all day and the 4 times we rode it was a walk on all the way to the boarding area. Thought the distancing was handled well, and felt like both cast and guests took mask wearing and distancing serious
What restaurants are open at HS? We had Sept. reservations for SciFi-DineIn that were cancelled and since the reservations opened again we have not been able to find a spot. Are they even open?
We also tried to re-book our SciFi reservations. But no luck! They are open though.
They are open. We have reservation for there in Aug.
We we’re at HS yesterday and today. I thought social distancing was exceptional. Both mornings we got there about 9:20 and immediately got in line for MMRRR. We waited 20-30 minutes, today even finishing before official park opening. We had no trouble getting a boarding group at RotR. Group 5 then group 8. However, both days had significant down time. The first day we we’re through to the first order officers and it went down for about an hour. Today, I was down early. Our 40 min return time turned into 2 hours and then it broke down for about 30 minutes while we were in the queue. Almost all the other rides were walk on. The longest we waited was maybe 10 minutes. Mask use, social distancing and hand sanitizer use were almost universally followed.
When trying to join a boarding group at RotR, should everyone in your party have their own My Disney Experience account linked to one another in order to increase your odds, and if so, what about a minor? Can they have their own account if they have their own phone?
Maybe this is a dumb question as we are relatively new to the Disney world. But do you foresee the addition of magic hours for resort guests? In my limited experience, it seems that would make the HS lines potentially shorter at rope drop.
I don’t foresee them being added any time soon. Even prior to the shutdown they weren’t super helpful for the rope drop crowds at Hollywood Studios since they were in the evenings and everyone was arriving at opening to try and get on Rise of the Resistance.
I don’t think there are any dumb questions right now. Disney’s never had to have a virus policy on any of this before! (For the record, I personally suspect they will not do EMH at least in the short-term but I’m no expert).
Am I really the only one that absolutely loves character meet and greets and strongly dislikes the way they’re having characters in the parks now? It would be one thing if they were walking around and there was the chance you could bump into them and give them a hug and take a walk with them or something, now that would be amazing, but the way it is now you can’t even get near them; all you can do is wave. I’ve read at least a good handful of blogs that apparently enjoy that and that’s just so depressing and worrisome for me. No meet and greets is in itself a dealbreaker for me and is why I haven’t gone to Disney since they re-opened despite being a local passholder. If they don’t bring them back I don’t see myself going back which would really crush me. Literally nearly all of my best memories were meeting the characters. If all I could do was wave at them from a distance and can’t get near them that would just be beyond lame and depressing. Just my thoughts though.
I think not even getting near them is the point? And avoiding cross contamination from guest hug to guest hug to guest hug…
Spotting a tucked away easter egg is a lot more exciting than walking up to a shelf full at the grocery store. I think the other charm many are finding is the unexpected delight in a sighting, with a dose of pixie dust fueled imagination that you encountered them by chance as they went about their everyday lives. Adds to the illusion of visiting them in their “home” digs.
For me when I say I want more spontaneous character interactions, I’m envisioning the characters being out and about but not out of reach. Like you can go over and interact with them but it isn’t a preplanned be here at this time, stand in line for half an hour, pose for picture, move on so next group can do the same; that’s never appealed to me. I understand not letting guests approach currently but I’m not advocating for that to be the norm.
Ditto what Jared said.
I’m basically advocating for the Disneyland approach being adopted at Walt Disney World. More spontaneous encounters, fewer scheduled meet & greets with lines.
I totally agree. I wouldn’t bring my 5yo if there’s no character meet and greets.
I liked the meet and greets last December because I boughta memory maker and enjoyed maximizing that. Now, I like looking at the photos and how my kid interacted with characters and it’s nice to see our family in the photos but I myself do not really like interacting with characters. I feel weird the whole time and don’t know what to say. (maybe with the exception of Mickey and maaaaybeee Olaf because who can resist Olaf). I just want the photo op. So for me this new cavalcade, character-at-a-distance thing is great for my anti social nature….lol…….
Reports from others are that the posted wait times (especially now) are pretty elevated compared to actual wait times (even in the morning at DHS).
I haven’t been a hundred times or anything, but I’ve always thought that most of the times I’ve been the wait times were always exaggerated…Of course, I’m the type of person that works on, as spending an entire day waiting in line for anything is not the least bit appealing to me.
We entered the line for Runaway Railroad with a 70 minute wait time. The wait was actually only 35 minutes.
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It could be my end, but for what it’s worth none of your photos show up on my mobile phone. They all appear on the computer, however.
They aren’t showing up on mine either but they do show up for the new closures report that I read prior to this one. I’ll check back later because I’d love to see the pictures. Great information! We skipped Hollywood Studios but will probably go for the evening on our next trip.
Same here no photos coming up for me
No photos show up on my phone either anymore. This has happened for a while, but they use to show up in the past.
Same, photos no longer showing up on my phone either, tried more than one browser and still no luck.
Thanks for the heads up on this, everyone.
This occurred once before and it was due to some sort of script error (on my end), but I can’t remember what. I’ll try to figure it out. Sorry about the issue!
I love these pop up cavalcades. I especially look forward to seeing Buzz Lightyear’s Camaro and Mickey/Minnie, of course.
I miss the old Star Wars Weekend characters with the Fab 5 in their Star Wars costumes. I would love to see their return in a character meal at Hollywood & Vine. One of my more unique character memories is from a Star Wars weekend. A stormtrooper was shaky going down the stairs off the stage. I thought he was being silly until he reached the ground and had a protein spill in the shrubbery. Poor guy!
If you could, do you think it’s be worth breaking it into two short days?
Say your arrival day or something like that, just head over in the evening, do some attractions and try and runaway railway towards the end of the night?
Later in the trip rope drop for rise, take it easy or do the low wait stuff while you wait, then bounce for a pool day or something?
Thanks.
We did two days just so we could ride RotR twice. Otherwise, it’s easy to do in less than one day.
I’m struggling so much conceptually with how to approach Hollywood Studios and really looking forward to your thoughts on strategy. We’ve never ridden rise of the resistance and my twins are star wars nuts so I know we have to be there at 10am to try for VQ, but not keen on waiting in any long indoor queues. Would it maybe be smart for us to schedule things like droid depot and oga’s for the first hour so that we can avoid the long lines you saw? Or better to knock out “b list” stuff like star tours and lightning mcqueen in the first hour and avoid star wars land altogether until later in the day? I’d personally be happy to wander/explore but my kids would get bored quick if we don’t have any activities to do…
Great update! Also that last photo…stunning!!! Please please publish a book of your photos Tom!
My husband I went for our 30th Anniversary without our teenage kids . Yesterday at HS we
Arrived at 10 am with the skyline . We would agree the lines went fast . Except for Mini & Mickey train ride . HS had more of a Disney feel then Magic Kingdom and Epcot .
We Went back to our hotel around 2 and noticed how low the crowds were. We arrived back at 6 for dinner at the Brown Durby and we walked right in no crowds and looked like we had the park to ourselves.
Disappointed that their wasn’t
Not a lot of Disney music playing in the parks like years before . Seen a few Characters.
I over heard one child ask dad where are all the people that live here at (Magic Kingdom).
If I had to rethink about bringing my children. I would definitely wait . They would of been disappointed. We also noticed no trams from the parking lots running.
Animal Kingdom the best part was the Avatar ride . Which is usually 2-3 hr wait was only 10 min . Wait . The walk to the entrance to the ride to linger then the wait time .
The cast member even asked if we wanted to go again since they had no line . That never happens.
Over all it was a quiet relaxing Grownup Disney experience .
Thanks for another responsible park report. Things look very hopeful.
Looking forward to your upcoming advice on doing the Star Wars plans.
Any word on one or both of the water parks opening?
My understanding is the chlorine makes them a safe place as long as you keep your mask dry. We’ve been using face shields and they can get wet no problem.
Have you seen any face shields or only masks?
Water parks are not currently open unfortunately.
Looking forward to hearing your Rise of the Resistance strategies to get in queue. We will be there on the 31st of this month and have not yet been on this ride (which is top priority). Thank you for all of the tips and info!
Hi tom
I agree it would be really great if they kept the pop up characters when (if) all the parks return to normal, I’m not planning to visit till possibly 2021 so hopefully life will be nearly bk to normal. Thanks for all your updates
“I wouldn’t mind a future where the only posed interactions are via character meals.”
I am of three minds of this. First, I personally despise meet and greets and how much time they suck out of my itinerary, so if they just disappeared I’d be okay (I think autographs from characters are completely idiotic, but guess whose kid has an autograph book?). Second, some of the best moments I’ve had at the parks with my kid were at a static meet and greet (namely, Edna Mode, Merida, and Ralph and Venalope). Third, at some level character meals only would make WDW even less egalitarian than it is now. Of course, spontaneous character interactions could improve that, if you had the right amount of pixie dust to actually run into the characters.
“Third, at some level character meals only would make WDW even less egalitarian than it is now.”
This point is definitely fair, and worth considering.
Nevertheless, I think that the reallocation of characters to spontaneous interactions would be a net positive and result in many more ‘magical moments.’ If our observations over the years are any indication, these are much more likely to be organic and meaningful, whereas static meet & greets can often have more of a formulaic and repetitive quality to them–even for kids. (Obviously this is a generalization, and is not always true.)
“Nevertheless, I think that the reallocation of characters to spontaneous interactions would be a net positive and result in many more ‘magical moments.’“
Totally agree with Tom, as these can be magical and memorable even if you aren’t directly involved. One of my strongest character memories is seeing a little girl dressed as Tiana light up as the actual Tiana rounded the corner into Liberty Square and the two go over to one another. Didn’t know the girl at all and it still warmed my heart. My second strongest character memory is an unannounced appearance by Mary Poppins in the gardens in front of Cinderella Castle; an eagle eyed fan in our group spotted her when she appeared and it was one of the best character interactions we’ve ever had. I also loved how in Galaxy’s Edge Rey, Chewbacca, Kyle Ren etc were around but they weren’t standing there signing autographs; it made the whole land feel alive.
I don’t think the scheduled meet and greets should totally disappear (I know how important meeting certain key characters are to families) but limit them to the heavy hitters. If it isn’t one of the Fab Four or a small contingent of Princesses let them be more spontaneous.
“I wouldn’t mind a future where the only posed interactions are via character meals.”
Our character interactions during character meals from a recent trip were our dullest interactions! Chatting with Snow White in Germany at Epcot was much more playful & fun for my 4 year old daughter than during the delicious & lovely dinner at artist point but blah meet n greets. Bumping in to characters sounds the most magical of all! Overall I found the interactions to be rushed & less personal at meals versus in the parks. Also better lighting for pictures in parks versus restaurants. I love following your blog, Tom!
We were fortunate enough to go the end of January, just my husband and I for a mom and dad getaway long weekend and did the boarding pass craziness–credit must be given to my husband for snagging us boarding group 10!! Which means by 8:15 we were done riding (amazing!!) and eating breakfast. Chewbacca was wandering around and had the most incredible interaction with the family at the table behind us, it’s been months and I still think that’s how characters should do it, it was fun, surprising, and organic!
Great Update! I miss Disney World so much!! Thanks for bringing Disney World to us Tom!