DISNEY WORLD ITINERARY DESIGN
This site provides 8-night itineraries here for all of the year (published about six months ahead), as well as itineraries a night or two shorter (more of these are coming…). Beginning for June 2014 travel dates, all are based on optimizing the use of FastPass+.
If these aren’t enough, here are a few thoughts on designing your own shorter itinerary.
For a blank excel version of the itinerary spreadsheet to use for your own itinerary, click here. For a blank PDF version, click here.
How to divide up and allocate your days
- Decide how many days you can be at the parks—include if you can time on your arrival and departure days, as the cost of tickets after four days is so low that partial days are worth it! Shoot for at least 6 days and 5 nights on site–e.g. four full days and two partial travel days. 7 days and 6 nights is much more humane, if you can do it
- Divide your days among the parks. You have two different issues here: the overall use of your time at the four parks, and the days you can spend at each. Because you can pre-book only three FastPass+ per park, two half days–and thus six FastPass+–are more valuable than one full day.
- For the overall use of your time, very few sources will suggest less than
- At least a day each at the Animal Kingdom and Hollywood Studios
- More than a day at Epcot
- Around two days at the Magic Kingdom.
How to sequence your days
Work through the following five rules in order. You rarely will be able to design a perfect trip unless you have extra off times that you can move around, so do the best you can. You will need to check the Disney calendar while doing this.
It’s easier to work with the individual park calendars. To view a day–for example, to figure out if and when Fantasmic or Wishes is on that day–go to the individual park’s monthly calendar and click within the date you are curious about.
1. Avoid Extra Magic Hours unless you are starting at a morning EMH park and hopping to another park where your FastPass+ are scheduled. The higher crowds in EMH parks typically overwhelm the EMH benefits
2. Make sure that one of your Magic Kingdom evenings is a day with the fireworks show “Wishes,” and ideally one that also
- Has an evening parade
- Does not close right after the fireworks
3. Otherwise, avoid Magic Kingdom on days where it has the evening shows in the middle of a stretch of days where it doesn’t.
4. Make sure that Fantasmic is playing one of your Hollywood Studios days. Fantasmic is on almost–but not quite–every night.
5. Within the constraints above, try to see Epcot first, and the Magic Kingdom last
FOOD, SHOWS, AND SUCH
See this for various meal and show options ranked in order.
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115 Comments on "Designing Your Own Walt Disney World FastPass+ Itinerary"
Hi Dave,
I was reading somewhere else that Friday and Saturday tend to be the busiest days at MK but notice your itineraries often have you at MK on those days. Do you disagree that Fridays and Saturdays tend to be busiest or is there some other factor that still makes them the best days to visit MK?
Thanks and love your site! Appreciate all your work!
Dave,
Thank you for your response. I will keep an eye out for the December calendar. We are planning our first trip to Disney with our children and your website has been a great help!
Lisa, the parks have very different crowding patterns by day, so the days in the itinerary are set to reflect this. Also note that the December calendar is not yet out–it should be out in a couple of weeks–so the itinerary may change.
Hello Dave,
We are planning on a trip from Dec. 11-19th. this year. I took a look at your basic itinerary for Dec. and I was wondering why you jump from park to park, instead of doing two days in one park back to back? We will be attending the Christmas party so I am trying to figure out which park to do the day after because it will be a late night for our two children. We have planned on two days for MK, two for Epcot, one for HS, one for AK and one day for the Christmas party.