Category — a. When to Go to Walt Disney World

DISNEY WORLD 2013 PRICES RELEASED

As of this morning, almost all of 2013 is now priced and bookable on Walt Disney World’s web site.

Bookable dates go out 500 days, so later November and all of December 2013 is still not bookable.  By my math, any arrival date in the year will be available by August 18, 2012.

If you neglect your real job and do a lot of test reservations, you can also infer the 2013 price seasons.

Having done so, it seems the projections on this site were dead on with a few exceptions:

• The regular season at the deluxes does not run from the week after Easter through mid-July.  Instead, it ends May 30, and a new deluxe summer season–with slightly lower prices–runs from then til mid-July
• The fall season at the values and moderates starts a couple of weeks earlier than I had thought it would–on September 14th.
• December 2013 now has a third price season–“Peak”–from 12/13/2013 through 12/19/2013, making this week much more expensive than I’d thought it would be.

This site’s 2013 price seasons page is still labeled as “projected,” because while the “x% higher than the lowest of the year” stuff, is pretty close, there’s still a lot of detailed slogging to do…which will take a while…Also there seems to be some weirdness still in the Disney World 2013 prices (e.g. Caribbean Beach being $190 some nights, and $191 the next).

DISNEY WORLD 2013 PRICES TO COME OUT NEXT WEEK

Multiple sources, including crack commenters Brandon and Terri, have noted that Disney World will begin online booking for 2013 visits next week, on July 11.

This means that the full 2013 Disney World resort hotel price schedule will be out by then as well. (2013 Disney World ticket prices were announced in June, and will be good until Disney raises them, likely in the summer of 2013.)

THE 2013 VALUE SEASON AT DISNEY WORLD TO BEGIN JANUARY 6TH?

We won’t know for sure until Disney release the prices itself, but it looks like the value season for 2013 won’t begin until January 6.

You can currently book into January 2013 if your arrival date is in 2012, and the 2013 prices Disney shows when you try to book, as I write this, are sky high January 1st, drop like a rock the 2nd, then go up again for the 3rd, 4th and 5th, and then on January 6 drop to what looks like value season levels for the rest of the month, other than the Marathon and holiday weekends.

This may change next week–the 2nd looks especially odd–but is consistent with the thought that the week beginning 12/29/2012 will be much busier than I had earlier forecast.

WHERE ARE THE JANUARY 2013 ITINERARIES?

Usually by now I would have published suggested itineraries and To-Do Lists for January 2013, and published an overview of the month (like this one for December 2012).

However, Disney’s calendar for January 2013 is incomplete–it’s still missing Extra Magic Hours.  These affect the itineraries, so I won’t publish material for January until they are up. Josh at easyWDW.com suggested last week that the delay is because Disney World is sorting out how to schedule and price for the crowds the week of the 29th, and perhaps also for the Marathon.

If Josh is right–and he usually is–then the January schedules should be sorted out by the 11th as well, and I’ll get the updates out as soon as I can after the Extra Magic Hours are posted.

WALT DISNEY WORLD CROWDS THE WEEKS OF 12/15  AND 12/29/2102

I now have data from ~180 of the around ~200 school districts whose vacation calendars I track (more calendars than you’d think don’t come out until June or later), which is enough to say that

• Crowds will be lower at the end of the week beginning 12/15/2012 than I thought they would, and
• Crowds will be worse from January 2 2013 to January 6 2013 than I thought they would.

Specifically, many fewer districts than I had projected are taking off from 12/18 through 1/1, and are instead taking 12/22 though 1/6 off.  As a result, in 2012 crowds will be lower December 18, 19 and 20 than I’d been projecting, and they’ll be higher January 2 through January 6th 2013. [Read more →]

OVERVIEW: WALT DISNEY WORLD ADMISSION TICKET PRICES 2012 TO SUMMER 2013

(This page is sponsored by Undercover Tourist.)

Three types of Walt Disney World prices are important to think about:

• Walt Disney World theme park admission ticket prices—the tickets that grant you admission to the parks
• Walt Disney World resort hotel prices, and
• Park and hotel food prices

This page focuses on Walt Disney World theme park admission ticket prices from summer 2012 until the summer of 2013, when, based on past practices,  they will go up.

MORE DETAILS ON WALT DISNEY WORLD ADMISSION TICKET PRICES 2012 AND 2013: HOW THE TICKETS WORK

There are multiple types of Walt Disney World theme park tickets, but the one most relevant to most first time visitors is the Magic Your Way ticket, with the Park Hopper option.

You buy one theme park ticket for each person who will be three years old or older at the time of your visit (kids younger than three enter the parks for free.) The tickets have two pricing levels: one for kids who will be younger than ten at the time of your visit (but 3 or older) and the other for people ten or older.

When you buy your tickets, you also say how many “days” you want—from one to ten. Each “day” you buy permits unlimited visits to one theme park on one day. If you also add the Park Hopper option, you can make unlimited visits to any of the theme parks in one day–one theme park, two, three, or all four theme parks.

• For example, if you buy a three day ticket without the park hopper option, you could make two visits to the Magic Kingdom on day one, three visits to Epcot on day two, and two visits to the Animal Kingdom on day 3
• If you have a three day ticket with the park hopper option, you could for example make two visits to the Magic Kingdom and one to Disney’s Hollywood Studios on day one, one visit to Epcot and two to Disney’s Animal Kingdom on day two, and one to Epcot and two to the Magic Kingdom on day three
• What you can’t do without a park hopper ticket is visit more than one theme park one the same day. For example, you can’t, on November 25th, use one day of your three-day ticket to visit the Magic Kingdom, and another day of this same ticket to visit Epcot that same day. More than one theme park in a day requires a park hopper

You do not have to use your days all in a row boom boom boom—e.g. Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday. Once you use your first day, you have 14 days to use all the days on your ticket. So on a three-day ticket you could visit the theme parks Monday, Thursday, and Sunday.

• You can also add days at the same price that you would have paid had you bought all those days at once, but have to do so no later than the day you use the last day of your original ticket (and within 14 days of the first day)
• So if you buy a three-day ticket, and realize a few days later that you need more days, you can add two days and they will cost only the difference between what you paid originally for a three day ticket, and what you would have had to have paid for a five day ticket, so long as you add these days no later than the day you use your third day
• You can also add stuff like the Park Hopper during the same day window at the same price as you would have paid when you first bought your ticket

However, you can’t “subtract” days if you overbuy.

HOW WALT DISNEY WORLD PRICES ITS THEME PARK ADMISSION TICKETS

1. While Disney typically increases ticket prices at least once a year—typically in the summer—it does not change theme park admission prices based on the seasons of the year, the way that it increases and decreases prices at its resort hotels. You pay the same amount for admission on the busiest and the least busy days of the year.

(This material, by the way, is updated as of Disney World’s June 2012 price increase, and applies to tickets bought in 2012 through Disney’s next price increase, likely in the summer 0f 2013.)

2. Disney sells tickets by the day—one through ten days. The way it prices these days, the first three days are very expensive, while days after the third are comparatively almost free. See the image for exact Disney World prices.

For example, a three day ticket costs (including tax) an adult $258, or an average of $86 a day. A ten day ticket would cost the same adult $339. The added 7 days cost in total around $81—or less than $12 per day.

3. A park hopper costs (after tax) about $37 for a one day ticket, and $61 for all other ticket lengths, regardless of whether you add it to a two-day, ten-day or anything in between. So a three day adult ticket with the park hopper added costs $319, and a ten day ticket with a park hopper costs $400.

I have also uploaded an excel spreadsheet with the same data in it as the image, so that you can multiply by the number of members of your own family.

TIPS AND TRICKS FOR WALT DISNEY WORLD THEME PARK TICKETS

There are other ticket types than the ones discussed above—less relevant for first time visitors. For details on all of them, see this page on MouseSavers.com.

While it’s hard to find discounts on tickets, it is sometimes possible. Check sponsor Undercover Tourist, MouseSavers.com, Triple A if you are a member, and if you have military ties, this page and also MilitaryDisneyTips.com.

Since you can add on to your tickets–days, park hoppers, etc.–, but can’t subtract, it doesn’t really pay to overbuy. Start with the minimum you think you need and add on later if needed.  Remember to add no later than the day you use your current last day!

All of this site’s To-Do Lists tell you exactly what ticket type you need for their associated itineraries.

FREE TICKETS ON YOUR BIRTHDAY?

Disney world no longer offers free tickets on your birthday.

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OVERVIEW: DECEMBER 2012 AT DISNEY WORLD

This page reviews Walt Disney World in December 2012: crowds, prices, deals and discounts, weather, special events, and operating hours; and ends with week by week summaries.

Early December, with lower crowds, lower prices, and wonderful Christmas decorations and events, has the three best weeks of the year to visit.

Later December with Christmas and New Year’s weeks has the highest crowds and prices of the year. Park closings to additional guests are common in this period, as are 8a openings and daily morning Extra Magic Hours.

December also has a special party, Mickey’s Very Merry Christmas Party, a special evening event–with its own ticket–that has become a family tradition for many.

[Read more →]

DISNEY WORLD CROWDS, LIES, STATISTICS, AND JUDO

Every now and then I get a comment or an email saying something like (this is an exact quote, but for reasons that will become apparent I’m not going to link to it):

• “Our last visit was Sept. 2011 . . . The crowds were not low in the parks. MK closed most nights at 5 pm for MNNSHP. Only EPCOT was open late and DTD. They were mobbed . . . impossible to find a place to eat if you didn’t make your reservations 180 days out. MK very crowded during the day. The shortest wait we saw for Toy Story Mania or Soarin’ was 90 min. and fast passes gone by 11:00 am. . This same week has a crowd level of #1!”

Or to put it another way…I said it was not going to be crowded, but it was!

Now there’s a number of errors of fact or interpretation in this comment (MK closes at 7, not at 5, for Mickey’s Not-So-Scary Halloween Party; the restaurants are always packed during free dining; FASTPASSES are almost always gone for Toy Story, and often for Soarin, by late morning at every time of the year).

But there’s two bigger points.

One is that if you don’t know what high crowds are, it’s hard to know you are experiencing a low crowd.  

And the second is that even in the lowest-crowd weeks of the year, sometimes the days you choose for specific parks matter a lot.

LOW DISNEY WORLD CROWDS COMPARED TO WHAT?

Low crowd periods, as used in this site and its crowd calendars, are low compared to other times of the year with higher–often spectacularly higher–crowds.

That does not necessarily mean that the parks will feel uncrowded compared to your expectations, as that depends on your expectations, because low does not equal empty.

Even on the quietest of days, if you arrive at 11a and stay through the afternoon parade, you may run into mobs of people, long lines, and fully-distributed FASTPASSES.

But all of these will be much better than they would be during a more crowded period.

The least crowded day I ever had at the Magic Kingdom was a cold and rainy January day during a long stretch of cold and rainy days.  It was already one of the lowest attendance periods of the year; everybody knew the forecast; everybody was tired of the cold and the rain; tons of people stayed home; and I had 20 rides in by 1p.

The busiest day at the Magic Kingdom I’ve ever personally seen was a late Wednesday afternoon the week after Easter 6 or 7 years ago.  Because I was tent-camping at Fort Wilderness, I drove; and for unrelated reasons had  arrived a couple of days earlier than I had planned.

I took 45 minutes to get a burger at Pecos Bill’s, and even the Carousel of Progress was mobbed…

So “Low Crowds” does not necessarily mean lower than you think they will be, or a low as you wish they were; it means lower than the other choices you have.

VARIATIONS IN DISNEY WORLD CROWDS BY DAY OF THE WEEK AND OTHER “LOCAL” FACTORS

You can also, by art or by error, design your trip so that you hit the parks on their most crowded days.

Because both shorter and longer trips typically include weekends, weekends (and Mondays) are typically the times that see the most people in the Disney World parks. Operating hours are often extended over weekends (except at Epcot), but not in proportion to demand, so crowds can be high even during low times of the year.

Days when a park has Extra Magic Hours will be more crowded later that day than they would be without these special hours. This is because these hours disproportionately attract Disney resort hotel guests, many of whom don’t have hoppers and thus have that as their park all day.

During weeks with highly varied show schedules and/or operating hours, the Magic Kingdom and Hollywood Studios can show real variation in crowding across the week.  This may be what happened to the commenter I quoted at the top of the page.

During many non-holiday weeks from September through President’s Day, there will be weeks when the Magic Kingdom closes some nights at 7, 8 or 9p, and others at 11p  Some of these nights will have no evening parades or fireworks, and others will.

This is particularly an issue many weeks September through much of December, when because of Mickey’s Not-So-Scary Halloween Party and Mickey’s Very Merry Christmas Party the Magic Kingdom can be closed at 7p, with no fireworks or evening parade available to the general public, multiple times a week.

As a result, people are both “repelled” by the 7p closings and lack of evening shows, and “attracted” to the days when the park is both open late and showing fireworks and parades…and those days can be mobbed.

The better way to handle these periods is to see the Magic Kingdom on days when it closes at 7p, and see the evening events on a different day, without having spent the earlier part of that day at MK.

THE JUDO OF DISNEY WORLD CROWDS

This last point is an example of how to think about crowds at Disney World.

Think about why you are drawn to Walt Disney World in general during a particular week, or to a specific park on a particular day, and whether your reasons are the same as those of the typical family with children.

If the reasons you have are also those of the typical family with children, then you will likely run into disproportionate crowds.

So as much as you can, do the opposite of the typical family–that’s the judo.

• Go when almost all kids are in school.
• Avoid parks on days when they have Extra Magic Hours.
• Avoid the daylight part–or at minimum, the afternoon part–of days when parks have less-common evening entertainment available to everyone with regular tickets
• Go during lousy weather

The point you have to be specially careful about is “go when almost all other kids are in school.”  I’ve learned a couple of things over the years of running this site:

1. School breaks across the country are more varied than most parents think–especially spring break
2. There’s a number of parents who think “We’ll go to Disney World during Thanksgiving/ Christmas/ Easter, because everybody else will be home with their families, and it’ll be great.”  Oh no it won’t…
3. You  need a plan that includes showing up before the parks open, riding the most popular rides first, and using FASTPASSES.  See this post on the TouringPlans.com blog for how much this matters.

MORE ON WHEN TO GO TO WALT DISNEY WORLD

• For when to go to Walt Disney World, see this
• For the best and worst times to visit, see this
  • For 2015 weeks to visit, ranked in order, see this
  • For the 2015 Week Picker, see this
  • For 2016 weeks to visit, ranked in order, see this
• For forecasting crowds at Walt Disney World, see this
  • For the 2015 Crowd Calendar, click here
  • For the 2016 Crowd Calendar, click here
• For seasonal pricing at Walt Disney World, see this
  • For 2015 price seasons, see this
  • For projected 2016 price seasons, see this
• For weather at Walt Disney World, see this

Want a second opinion?  Then check out my book lol.

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