July 2024 at Disney World: Crowd Calendar & Info
Our guide to July 2024 at Walt Disney World offers a free crowd calendar, when to visit & avoid, weather, new attraction openings & closures, and Independence Day events. Plus info & tips for summer season at Magic Kingdom, EPCOT, Animal Kingdom, and Hollywood Studios.
July is usually the height of summer vacation at Walt Disney World and the time when summer storm season intensifies. Generally speaking, July is a month for people who have no better alternatives. It’s summer vacation season, a time when school is out of session and parents with young children and teachers head to the parks in full force.
With that said, if you have a trip planned for July, the sky is not falling. For one thing, “a rainy, crowded day at Walt Disney World is better than a perfect day at home.” For another, last July was not particularly busy at Walt Disney World. To the contrary, most of the month saw below-average crowds–with a couple of notable exceptions that we’ll discuss below.
Normally, July is a literal perfect storm of weather and crowds. Walt Disney World’s primary demographic is families, and on average, they vacation about halfway through the summer break. Although school schedules in some districts have changed and Disney has raised peak season pricing on tickets & hotels, summer is still the busy season at Walt Disney World.
This has shifted around in recent years, but it’s still generally true–and we’ll cover the typical crowd dynamics over the course of the summer season in this July 2024 crowd calendar.
JULY WEATHER AT DISNEY WORLD
The humidity is at “intense back-sweat” levels whenever the sun is up. On the plus side(?), that back-sweat will usually be washed away by the daily afternoon showers, which could be a 20-minute occurrence or could last the better part of the evening. Welcome to July in Florida.
If you think we’re exaggerating, let’s start by taking a look at the weather. July is the hottest month of the year with average high temperatures above 90 degrees every single day of the month. Average lows and highs range from 74 to 91 degrees. As demonstrated by the “comfortable” band on this page for July, 27% of the time, the weather is in “hot” (85-100 degrees) territory.
If there is any silver lining in this, it’s that July has a greater percentage of “comfortable” weather than August (20% vs. 15%)…so those hours of the day when you’re in your hotel room asleep in air conditioning, it’s actually not too bad outside!
Then there’s precipitation. Unless you’re homies with Zeus, it will rain during your July trip. It’s not a matter of “if”, it’s a matter of “how often and much how?”
Especially later in the month, Florida is starting to get into the heart of hurricane and storm season, so you should be prepared for that. You’re average daily chance of some amount of precipitation in July ranges from 67% to 71%. I’m no mathematician, but that says to me it’s a small miracle if it goes 2 consecutive days without any rain.
In addition to our standard Unique Items to Pack for Disney (forget bringing the cheap 10-packs of ponchos that we normally recommend–pack this Olaf raft to get around the parks in style! 😉 ), we recommend reading our Tips for Beating Summer Heat & Humidity post for ideas on things to bring, and ways to minimize the affect of unpleasant summer weather during your vacation.
JULY SPECIAL EVENTS AT WDW
The big thing is obviously Independence Day at the beginning of the month. That first (long) weekend will be especially busy as a result, but those crowds will be rewarded with some of the best fireworks shows of the year. Magic Kingdom and Epcot both have special fireworks shows for the Fourth of July.
“Disney’s Celebrate America” fireworks display is shown at Magic Kingdom on both July 3 and July 4. We highly recommend seeing Celebrate America on July 3. If you’re unable or unwilling to brave the crowds in Magic Kingdom, a great place to view it to see the full scale of the fireworks is outside the park at the Ticket & Transportation Center.
The reason we recommend seeing Magic Kingdom’s Independence Day fireworks on July 3 is because you can only see the EPCOT Forever fireworks with the “Heartbeat of America” finale on July 4.
For more on special entertainment, read our Celebrating Independence Day at Walt Disney World post.
The beginning of July will have other special events. The EPCOT International Flower & Garden Festival dates have not yet been released for 2024. The last couple of years, it’s ended around Independence Day, but don’t be surprised if it wraps up in June 2024.
After that comes a festival-less gap, during which the park will briefly become “Diet EPCOT.” But not for long. The EPCOT International Food & Wine Festival usually begins less than a month after Flower & Garden ends. This is the biggest, longest, and most popular event of the year at Epcot. (It’s also our least favorite and the most lacking in substance, but people love it.) Again, don’t be surprised if this doesn’t start until August 2024, though. EPCOT has really overdone the festivals in the last few years, and we expect that to be dialed back a bit.
In terms of other seasonal events, the France pavilion at Epcot will offer a very minor celebration of Bastille Day on July 14. Nothing around which you should plan a trip, but it’s neat to stop by to see.
JULY REFURBISHMENTS & NEW ATTRACTIONS
For an idea of what’s going to be closed in July 2024, check the Walt Disney World Refurbishment Schedule. The good news is that there aren’t many attractions that are currently closed. The bad news is that calendar doesn’t fully cover the construction all around Walt Disney World–just ride closures.
The only major closure currently scheduled in 2024 is Splash Mountain. That’s being reimagined into Tiana’s Bayou Adventure at both Walt Disney World and Disneyland. The new attraction will bring guests into the world of “The Princess and the Frog” after the events of the movie. According to Disney, the reimagined ride will open at Magic Kingdom in Florida and Disneyland in California in late 2024.
If recent rumors are to be believed, there’s actually an outside chance it’ll open in Summer 2024. Honestly, we aren’t holding our breath. While anything is possible, Walt Disney World’s recent track record suggests Tiana’s Bayou Adventure being delayed is more likely than it opening early. But who knows!
On the plus side, Guardians of the Galaxy: Cosmic Rewind, Remy’s Ratatouille Adventure, Space 220 Restaurant, Creations Shop, Club Cool, Connections Cafe, and more all have now debuted.
When it comes to Cosmic Rewind, experiencing the recently-added ride is a bit complicated. Be sure to check out our How to Ride Guardians of the Galaxy: Cosmic Rewind & Virtual Queue Speed Strategy to improve your chances of success for joining the free virtual queue. We’re expecting the virtual queue to end any day now…but we’ve been expecting that for a matter of months. So who knows.
Another alternative for Cosmic Rewind is buying line-skipping access via the Individual Lightning Lanes. Those posts explain the free and paid options, their pros & cons, and everything else you need to know. Suffice to say, do not just show up to EPCOT expecting to join the standby line–as there isn’t one.
Then there’s TRON Lightcycle Run at Magic Kingdom, which is the newest major attraction at Walt Disney World. This works very similarly to Cosmic Rewind; see our Virtual Queue Strategy Guide for TRON Lightcycle Run for details, tips & tricks for success, and more.
There is considerable overlap between the virtual queues for the two rides, so you probably only need to read the VQ guide for TRON Lightcycle Run and can apply those same “lessons” to both. Unlike Cosmic Rewind, we don’t expect this virtual queue to be retired before Fall 2024.
Bouncing back to EPCOT, there’s a bunch of other new stuff there. This includes World Celebration, Moana’s Journey of Water, and Luminous: Symphony of Us, all of which will only be <6 months old as of May 2024. That’s still pretty new in the grand scheme of things! For an overview of what else is on the horizon, see What’s New & Next at Walt Disney World in 2024 & 2025.
JULY 2024 DISNEY WORLD CROWD CALENDAR
There’s no color-coded July 2024 crowd calendar to start this because that’s reductionist and doesn’t give you the full picture of Walt Disney World attendance trends. Moreover, WDW crowd calendars are less reliable due to how Disney manipulates attendance patterns, staffing, closures, and ride capacity. It better serves readers to offer an explanation in terms of what to expect crowd-wise this summer at Walt Disney World.
Since Disney doesn’t release official attendance numbers, crowd calendars use things like school schedules, airport traffic statistics, hotel pricing & occupancy, etc., as proxies for crowds. We use these to forecast wait times and the resulting crowd levels. In short, predicting wait times via Walt Disney World crowd calendars is an imperfect science. Hopefully that makes sense!
There are other wrinkles that make predicting summer crowds at Walt Disney World difficult. One is the tension between pent-up demand and the pre-closure trend of summers being less busy. (See “Summer Isn’t Peak Season at Walt Disney World.”)
As covered in that article, July is no longer one of the busiest months of the year at Walt Disney World–or at least, it wasn’t from 2017 through 2019. That’s not to say it was off-season at Walt Disney World in July during those years (far from it!), just that the beginning of the month is no longer massively crowded. It was still summer vacation season. Nevertheless, the parks were busier in October than in July during those years.
Typically, the first week of July–the one encompassing Independence Day–would be far and away the busiest week of the month. Crowds would gradually decrease after that, dropping slightly with each subsequent week. However, that is NOT how last year played out.
Last year, wait times rose gradually between the week before Memorial Day and the last week of June, and steadily dropped throughout the first few weeks of July. Most days up until the last week of the month had crowd levels of 3/10 to 5/10.
Independence Day weekend was the slowest 4 days of the entire month, with 1/10 crowd levels. However, that was due to blockout dates for Annual Passholders, Cast Members, and discount tickets. While we don’t expect Fourth of July 2024 to be packed, we also don’t expect it to be dead again.
The bottom line is that July crowd patterns have been hit or miss in the last few years. Last year’s Independence Day almost certainly was an anomaly, as was the peak of summer crowds happening in mid-June. It’s too early to offer precise predictions, but we’re already expecting July 2024 to be busier across the board. Moreover, it’s likely that summer crowds won’t peak until late June or early July.
Another thing that’s likely to happen again is actually a phenomenon that’s consistently occurred the last few years, which is another spike in attendance the last week of July. This is likely a “last hurrah” for tourists scrambling to take a summer vacation before their kids go back to school in August. It’s happened again and again in the last few years, with crowd levels increasing to around 7/10 or 8/10 that last week, which has been a sharp contrast to earlier in the month. Don’t be surprised if these ‘twin peaks’ occur again in late June/early July and late July 2024.
Another likely trend is lower Saturday and Sunday attendance–see the ‘Wonky Weekends at Walt Disney World’ section of our Best & Worst Days to Do All Parks at Walt Disney World for a discussion of this dynamic.
Expect all of these trends to continue into August 2024, which will likely be slower than this month. That’s par for the course, as schools start going back into session mid-month, and fewer families are inclined to take summer vacations in the couple of weeks heading back into school. The result is typically that crowds continue to taper off throughout August before bottoming out in September. Expect the same dynamic in late summer and early fall.
With all of that said, we do have words of warning to add. If you last experienced Walt Disney World in the post-reopening period, or even in 2017 or during the Great Recession, your baseline expectations and experience probably would be different than someone who visited during holiday weeks during the last year or when pent-up demand was really running hot.
Not only that, but a ‘low’ crowd levels does not mean that in absolute terms. Even on 1/10 days, the parks will not be veritable ghost towns (for the most part) allowing you to do snow angels on the ground. You will see rides with 60-90 minute posted wait times. You will encounter areas of congestion. “Uncrowded” at Walt Disney World means something different than it does at the American Dream Mall or Wyoming in The Last of Us. The most popular rides, especially during the middle of the day, will still have long lines.
For example, going from a 10/10 crowd level to a 1/10 crowd level means you might encounter a 65-75 minute average wait time for popular rides–such as Seven Dwarfs Mine Train, Peter Pan’s Flight, Slinky Dog Dash, Remy’s Ratatouille Adventure, and Avatar Flight of Passage–as opposed to 90-120 minute wait times. Since those numbers are averages, it also means higher peaks and lower lows. Below-average crowd levels does not mean every attraction is always a walk-on!
Another specific problem point is Happily Ever After. Unfortunately, congestion is the not-so-new normal for fireworks at Magic Kingdom. For the sake of illustration, let’s say that there are–on average–40,000 people in Magic Kingdom towards the end of a busy night.
On a slower day, let’s say the number is 20,000 people–half the number of a busy day. Now let’s assume that 10,000 people fit on or around Main Street USA. It’s a simple math problem. Regardless of whether it’s a slow or busy night, the number of people wanting to see Happily Ever After exceeds the capacity of the viewing areas on and around Main Street.
Finally, expect there to be day-to-day and park-to-park variance for the remainder of July 2024. This is beyond the scope of this crowd calendar, and will largely end up being driven by ride breakdowns, maintenance issues, and weather.
If it’s a really hot or rainy day, Floridians will largely avoid the parks, which can reduce crowd levels. If it’s an unseasonably dry or cooler (by Orlando in summer standards) day, Floridians will flock to the park. If several attractions experience downtime, that will cause wait times to balloon everywhere else. All of these are more random variables, but they collectively can move the needle on crowd levels considerably.
JULY PRICING & DISCOUNTS
In terms of promotions, there are likely to be room-only discounts for Annual Passholders, Florida residents, and the general public in July 2024. See All Current Discounts at Walt Disney World for the various resort deals.
Normally, Walt Disney World has something of a captive audience during the summer months as many families can only visit then due to school being out of session. Disney only offers discounts in order to fill hotel rooms and entice more guests to visit. They don’t really need any extra incentive for the summer, as that’s when people are most inclined to travel to Florida, even in the face of the weather we mentioned above.
In terms of pricing, July has higher than average rates. One-day park tickets are most expensive during this month, with most of July being “peak” season (read our Tips for Saving Money on Walt Disney World Tickets post for multi-day ticket recommendations to avoid having to deal with seasonal pricing). Hotels aren’t quite as bad, as it’s the “Summer” pricing season for them most dates; overall, hotel rates are slightly above average, outside from the dates around Independence Day.
Even with below-average crowds, you’ll still want a solid itinerary for touring the parks. July is also a safe bet when it comes to seeing the new entertainment and attractions at Walt Disney World, and the longer hours. There’s also upside in the inclement weather: it clears out the parks. If there’s heavy rain for over an hour (and you follow our tips to stick it out), you’ll be rewarded with a far less-crowded park after the rain stops.
Many guests are not prepared for heavy rain, and a heavy rain in early afternoon can mean significantly lower crowds the rest of the day. It’ll also cool down the parks a bit. From an objective perspective, July is one of the worst months of the year, but it does have upside and if you’re forced to visit during the summer due to your school or vacation schedule, you should not hesitate to do so. You’ll still have a good time!
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
Do you agree that a rainy day at Walt Disney World is better than a perfect day at home? Do you like July at Walt Disney World? If you’ve visited in July, do you have any tips to add? Do you agree or disagree with our assessment of July? 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!
July 3-11 for my birthday. I love the july for full of stars.
http://www.ustradeent.com/18483-adult-stars-stripes-t-shirt-423.html
I’m staying at All Star Movies July 2-7 for my birthday. First time in Disney! Can’t wait
Oh my! Hope to see you and Sarah there! We’ll be at AK July 28-Aug 2nd!
Do you recommend a 7 day hopper, or with this heat the new “4” day single park per day and using other days for the water parks or pools?
Thank you!
In short, Disney World offers the most in July. Yes there are negatives, but, unless your a wuss that runs from everything (rain, crowds), they are definitely outweighed by the positives, most notably, park hours. OK, it can be hot. What better way to relish Splash Mountain and Kali River Rapids, etc. Crowds? Learn when to go where, and your day has a bit more “excuse me’s” in it. No problem. Rain? Every drop evaporates within 5 minutes after the rain stops. You can almost watch it evaporate. Tired? head for a long sitting attraction like Hall Of Presidents. You get the biggest bang for your buck in July.
I’ll be there July 7-10th for a quick girlfriends getaway! Staying at the Grand, which I know a not a favorite of this site 😉 But I’m looking forward to my first time at a monorail resort!
Thanks for all you do, Tom. Your insight is invaluable and the photography stunning. We’ll be there 6/26 – 7/6. Split stay- Kidani/YC. This will be our first 7/4 visit and we are excited! Has MK ever closed due to crowd levels on 7/3?
Thanks for the fast pass update. All day Saturday the 21st kept getting the broken Olaf but Sunday the 22nd I was able to get fast passes for Soarin, Frozen, night time Kilmanjaro and Jungle Book. We will be there for 11 days including July 4th. Thanks for all the great tips. Have two Be Our Guest reservations and one for Cinderella’s Royal Table. I was also able to get July 6th Beach Bash and July 13th! Can’t wait 🙂
My husband has to be at a conference in Orlando in July, and I was debating whether or not we should make a family trip out of it. You’ve convinced me that it’s possible! I doubt we’ll spend much time in the parks, but hopefully I’ll get at least one chance to ride Frozen!
One other advantage in July is that most of the rides are open. Disney doesn’t like to schedule too many refurbishments during this peak time.
We’ll be there July 9-15. Would love to meet you guys- love your blog and all of your helpful info!
Hi Tom, my family & I are travelling from Scotland to WDW from 10- 24 Jul. We are staying at CBR & have the QS dining plan & just wanted to let you know that your blog has been a fantastic source of info!! We have many ‘laugh out loud’ moments when reading your posts & love your wonderful photos & candid reviews! Thanks ☺
Tom, my Disney experience is still showing the parks closing as earlier than I expected? MK 10pm HS 8.30 EP 9pm this is for July 10th -22nd and other than EMH nothing is open beyond 10pm unlike June which is showing much later closing times, will this change nearer the time? I understand AK will but what about the other parks and if so when do you expect the change to happen as I’m planning!
Love the site!
The park closings will be updated and extended as we get closer.
Same experience here, and I’m a veteran Disney World goer. Though I’m betting the farm that late hours will “appear” closer to July. The big question is “which days at which parks”, which is terribly frustrating when you’re trying to choose things like restaurant reservations.
Love your blog, we just started following it this year. We’re planning to be at WDW the last week of July, it was the only week they fit everyone’s schedule. I’m trying to read and plan as much as I can between now and the to get the most out of our trip and minimize the negatives of going at that time. So, I really appreciate this article and all of the tips, lists, and guides you put out – thanks!!
So Tom, when do you guys plan on visiting? We will be there the 10th-15th, and finishing off with a night at Vero Beach.
How’s this sound: from July 21, two nights Riverside, two nights Animal Kingdom Lodge, four night cruise Disney Dream then three nights at Yacht Club? I’ve decided to pretend we’re visiting India (not Indiana) so that my internal thermostat can set me to tropical in advance,..
That sounds about perfect. AKL and YC offer a lot of appeal for a trip that features time outside the parks, so I’d say good call on those resorts.
I wouldn’t recommend Riverside unless you’re staying in a newly refurbished room; just stayed there two weeks ago and our beds in Acadian House were extremely uncomfortable and not inviting for a good night’s sleep. YMMV, though. If you can swing Wilderness Lodge instead, do it!
We will be at the Yacht Club July 24-30. So when a random girl runs up and hugs you, its probably me! Gonna hug your wifey too. I’m a huge fan of the skater dress too. We love reading your blog and laugh. Hubby and I have a few years on you guys but you tour and are geeks just like us (well, him, I’m a closet nerd).
We will be there for the 4th of July as well. This will be our first time visiting during peak season so I’m incredibly nervous but I’ve got your site book marked for tips and tricks. Hopefully we can make it through it and still enjoy ourselves!
Will you guys be going in September too? Its going to be our first trip and weve got so much booked (although ive tried not to over do it) even got a keys to the kingdom tour. Your site has been an amazing reference for helping me plan. Have you ever done the keys to the kingdom tour or Dine with an Imagineer?
Yes, we will be there in September, as well. Haven’t done Keys to the Kingdom or Lunch with an Imagineer. Hope you enjoy both (and report back on them)!
Hi. My granson is 13 years old he’s going chimo he got cancer his dream is to always to Disney. How can discount tickets for the family for this summer.thank u
For starters, this might help: http://www.givekidstheworld.org/pre/contact/wgo-list.php
Failing that, here are our recommended places for buying discounted tickets for Walt Disney World: https://www.disneytouristblog.com/discount-disney-tickets/
You may also want to look into referring your grandson to the Make-A-Wish Foundation (wish.org). They have sponsored thousands of trips to the Disney parks for kids with life-threatening medical conditions.
Only March and August left to go on these very helpful month reports! Waiting with bated breath for the March one since that’s when we’re likely going, but given that it’s farther away than August I imagine it will be the last one up? Whenever it arrives, I’m looking forward to it!
Both March and August will be done before the end of this month. These posts have been popular, so I want to give them added context by ranking the months (based on my opinion). I can’t do that until I have each of the monthly overviews done.
We’ll be there early July to fight the crowds. No better way to celebrate America than with fireworks and “intense back-sweat”.
A shirt thoroughly soaked in back-sweat is distinctly patriotic.