Category — a. When to Go to Walt Disney World

OVERVIEW: APRIL 2013 AT DISNEY WORLD

This page reviews April 2013 Walt Disney World crowds, prices, deals and discounts, weather, operating hours, adds a few other notes, and ends with week by week summaries.

[Read more →]

AN ALTERNATE VIEW OF THE BEST WEEKS OF 2013 AT WALT DISNEY WORLD FOR YOUR FAMILY

This site has a couple of easy ways and a hard way to figure out the best times to visit Walt Disney World in 2013.

The 2013 Weeks to Visit rankings are the easy way for first time visitors to pick a time, and the 2013 Week Picker takes a few more clicks but is great for returning visitors—and for first timers who weigh the key issues of crowds, prices, etc., differently than I do.

The harder way is to drill down yourself into weather, prices, crowds, ride closures, and the hurricane season, and use the conclusions you draw from this material to pick your time to visit Walt Disney World in 2013.

Or you could just go in later October… [Read more →]

THE BEST WEEK OF 2013, TAILORED TO YOUR FAMILY’S PREFERENCES

Last week, the 2013 edition of one of this site’s most popular offerings came out–the 2013 Walt Disney World Week Picker.

The Week Picker is an alternative to this site’s 2013 Weeks to Visit Walt Disney World, Ranked in Order.

It’s particularly suited for returning visitors and for first-time visitors who weigh crowds, prices, ride closures, the hurricane season, or other weather factors differently than do the week rankings (which are built for the average family of first time visitors who may never return). [Read more →]

PICKING THE BEST WEEK OF 2013 AT DISNEY WORLD FOR YOUR FAMILY

The 2013 Walt Disney World Week Picker is designed to show you the best weeks for your 2013 visit to Walt Disney World based on what’s important to you.

(It’s an alternative to this site’s 2013 Weeks to Visit Walt Disney World, Ranked in Order, which is designed to yield answers for the “typical family” of first time visitors who may never return.)

The Week Picker provides guidance on the best weeks of 2013 for you to visit Walt Disney World based on your family’s exact preferences, and is particularly useful for returning visitors!

(For the 2014 Week Picker, click here.)

[Read more →]

DISNEY WORLD AND TROPICAL STORM ISAAC

We’ve entered the peak of the hurricane season, and Tropical Storm Isaac is currently expected to turn into a (mild) hurricane over the next day or so, but is no longer expected to much threaten Central Florida or Orlando. [Read more →]

DISNEY WORLD CROWDS AND FREE DINING

Pretty much every time Disney World announces a free dining deal (like this one), I get a  bunch of comments like this:

“Dave–with free dining now announced for my week, should I move my dates to avoid the crowds it draws?”–Perplexed

My short answer is always something like “No, don’t change.  It’s mathematically impossible for free dining to much change park crowds.”

For the longer answer–and why the short answer is true–keep reading!

FREE DINING CAN PACK THE DISNEY WORLD HOTELS AND RESTAURANTS, BUT NOT THE PARKS

Here’s the basics:

• The vast majority of people in the parks are NOT staying in a Walt Disney World hotel
• Free dining only affects the number of people staying in Disney World hotels
• Some people who take advantage of free dining arrival dates would have been in Walt Disney World hotels then anyway, so don’t incrementally add to park crowds
• Some people are simply pulled into Disney World hotels from off-site hotels by free dining, so have no incremental impact on park crowds
• Some people would not have gone during one of the eligible arrival dates at all except for free dining

Only this last group has an incremental impact on park crowds, and it is so small that it can’t affect park crowding much.

Here’s why:  including all the Art of Animation rooms, there’s about 27,200 Walt Disney World hotel rooms (excluding the Campsites at Fort Wilderness, which are never eligible for free dining).

The last bucket–people who would not have come but for free dining–is going to book at most 20% of these rooms, or about 5500 rooms.

At 3 people per room, that’s about 16,000 incremental people.

Divided across 4 theme parks, two water parks, off-days, Universal and SeaWorld, etc., the incremental effect on any given park is de minimis.

For example, on a slow day (and basically free dining is only offered during the slow periods–that’s why they offer it…), the Magic Kingdom will have 20,000-25,000 people in it; adding another 5,000 or even 10,000 people will have only a trivial impact on park crowding, as this will still put the crowd level well below the point where the park lines start going crazy.

Free dining does make the park crowds higher than they would be on the same exact dates without free dining, but not enough to change the nature of the parks or their lines.

It does crowd the hotels–that’s the point–and crowd the restaurants–that’s the tool.

But in general, you should view the presence of free dining during your week as an indicator that it’s a pretty low crowd week to attend!