The Comprehensive Guide to Walt Disney World Dining
By Dave Shute
OVERVIEW
The image rates the Walt Disney World table service restaurants based on both appeal to kids and appeal to adults.
Click the image to open it; when open, click again to enlarge.
This information allows you to pick your dining choices based on kid appeal, adult appeal, or both!
MORE ON WALT DISNEY WORLD DINING
- How to Eat
- The Disney Dining Plan
- What if You Can’t do the Dining Plan?
- Where to Eat
- Dining Alternatives
- The Comprehensive Guide to Walt Disney World Dining
- Character Meals and Dinner Shows Ranked in Order
- Table Service Meals at the Parks Ranked in Order
- Table Service Meals at the Resorts Ranked in Order
101 comments
Found this site today. Have been going to WDW with the kids for over 15 years now and still found this site helpful! Great, I repeat Great site. I wished I found it sooner. Best wishes to you!
hi i consider myself a disney veteran but i have never seen your website before and inatantly became a fan! i am traveling with my husband, 16yr old and 9 yr old daughters. i told my kiss durinf our last visit 2 yrs ago we are going to do our 2012 visit big since its the last time my youngest will be a disney child. we are going the first week if free dining plan at the end of august for 7 days. with the followiing dining reservations 8/25 5pm akershus, 8/26 9am crystal palace, 8/27 1pm tusker, 8/28 1pm teppen edo and 8/30 spirit of aloha, and 8/31 7pm 1900 park fair. i have myw base but reallybwant to include a water park but unsure i will have time to do disney quest. our last day i definitely want to spend at mk.
Hi Nicole, and thanks! I’m not quite sure, though, if you are asking a question?
do you have any thoughts on an itinerary for me? should i switch days in parks due to projected crowd schedule? should i get the water parks option o just pay for one day admission. do you know of any offsite promos for water park tickets? we want to see as much as possible since i dont plan on visiting again for 5 years
Hi Nicole–it looks like you were writing your second comment just as I was sending my response to the first, so now I get your question!
It looks like from your dining reservations that you are targeting parks on their EMH days. Unless you buy park hoppers and then hop away late am or early pm, this is generally a mistake, as parks are more crowded when they host EMH–especially AM EMH–than on days they don’t.
So I’d shift your dates around so you avoid EMH, especially am EMH.
Also I note you have a 9a meal targeted. My advice is to eat breakfast before 8 or after 10.30. The most valuable time in the parks in terms of crowds is the first hour or 90 minutes after open, and a 9a breakfast eliminates the availabilty of that time to you…
Finally, I’d not worry about waterparks etc now. If you go to just one, it’s cheaper to pay at the gate than add it to your ticket.
Hope this helps and have a great trip!
I’m taking my fam to disney for the first time in November, and have found this site invaluable, and recommended it to so many friends. Now I have a bit of a problem, though. We are going the day after thanksgiving and have the Royal table booked our first evening for my 3yo daughter who is all about princesses! Start things off with a bang, right?
Well, Delta just changed our flight so we are arriving 2 hrs later than previously scheduled. I checked, and there are no further reservations for this during our stay. We are now scheduled to arrive at the airport at 12:50, and they recommend we show up to Cinderella’s castle by 4:10. We are staying at Port Orleans Riverside, and traveling with 2 young kids.
Is this cutting it too close? So we will need to depart the plane, get to the hotel, and get over to MK in about 3 hrs. We are usually pretty good at getting from place to place with the kids in general, but I just don’t know what to expect. And I really don’t want to cancel, because we’ve already hyped it up to my daughter. Let me know what you think – please HELP!
Hey Ryan first, thanks for the kind words and the recommendations!!
Second, on your question, it all depends on a. whether or not you are checking bags (likely) and b. how you are planning to get to POR from MCO–if you are using Magical Express it may be hard. If you cab from MCO to POR, check in and drop your bags (with the bell if your room isn’t ready) and then cab to MK, you will be fine! Let me know your airport transport plans and how flexible they are…
Dave,
Alright, thanks for the help. We will check a couple of suitcases so will need time to wrangle those. And I was planning to use the Magical Express, but maybe that could be adjusted if there just isn’t time. Let me know what you think – I was hoping to avoid cabs so we wouldn’t have to bother with car seats. Can cabs provide car seats? I’m sure my wife would know, but I am a clueless dad. And could we use a cab for just one of the segments if really needed, and if so which one. This flight reschedule is really giving me more grays!
Ryan two things:
One is I’m wrong on cab 2–from the hotel to MK. I forgot that cabs drop you off in the wrong spot, and waiting 20 mins for a bus is still net a better (that is, faster) plan. So cab from the airport, but bus after you’ve dropped your bags in your room or at the bell stand.
I should know the answer on the cabs/kid car seats question, but I don’t, so I’ll find out and add another comment!
Going to WDW in Feb 2013 fo 10 days, looking to a disney resort book meal plan and park tickets for 8 of 10 days and then just the same resort for 2 days at the end, would any unused meal plan meals be still useable on the last 2 days?
Hi Dave! No, they won’t. Any unused credits expire at midnight of the day you check out of the hotel stay for which you bought the dining plan, so you can’t use them your last two days.
Thanks for the quick response. Slight slant on the question, we will not be checking out, but staying at the same resort and hopefully the same room, will that make a difference.
Hi Dave, no it doesn’t. On a reservation you have to buy the dining plan for every night of your stay, for every person over 3 in the room. The credits then expire at MN of check out day, regardless of what you do next…even if you stay in the same exact room on a second reservation…
I was wondering which would be better for a princess character dinner. Cinderella’s Royal Table or Akershus? I would really like to do one for the kids. Just want to get the most out of the trip.
Jennifer that’s a great question, and the answer depends at least partly on the ages of your kids. If they are say 6 or younger, then you probably don’t want to spend a ticket on Epcot (unless you have hopper tickets), and that would rule Akershus out.
Akerhshus is less expensive, has a less exciting session, and has better food for parents, equally good for kids. Cindy is more expensive, more dramatic, and at MK, which as noted is better for the younger set than Epcot…
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Hello Dave, when your 180 day till vacation comes, you can start to book your adrs. Can you book the whole week or must you come back everyday to make your adr for each 180 day ?
Mike, if you are staying in a Disney owned and operated hotel, you can book up to the next ten days once you arrival date 180 hits. If you are not staying in such, then it’s pure 180, so you’d come back every day…
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Thank you Dave, one last one maybe, how do you get from Hollywood Studios to Epcot ? thank you
Mike, there’s a walking path, and also a boat, that connect the two. I usually walk, and both take about the same time–15 to 20 minutes.
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Thank you Dave, your site is the best.
Thanks, Mike!
Hi Dave, I have some dining questions. We are staying for 6 nights in October. I’m struggling with how to divide up our table-service credits. We have a 5 year old “princess” and doing the Royal Table is a must, so that takes 2 of the credits. For the remaining 4, I wanted to do Chef Mickey’s, Akershus and then I read a fantastic review on HoopDeDoo Review and want to do that as well…..which will also take 2 credits. So, we’re using 6 table service credits for 4 meals. Is that smart? Any other suggestions? I was planning to use table service mainly for dinner, so if I go with the picks above, I’ll need to either pay cash or use quick-service for the other 2 dinner meals during our stay. Can’t wait to hear your thoughts!
Shana the way to do this is to use the credits to absorb the meals that would otherwise cost you the most cash per credit. It isn’t always true that a 2 credit meal would cost you twice as much in cash as a would one credit meal. If you do the math, you may end up deciding to use the credits for the one-credit meals first…
Dave—Love your sight!! Have only been to Disney once and am going this time with my husband who has never been. We are not taking the kids this trip. Unfortunately AAA didn’t tell me I picked one of the worst weeks which is arrival 5/26 (sun) @ 10:50 am departing 5/31 (fri) @ 9:10pm. So I am so confused and need help badly! We are staying on Disney Grounds at the Sports value resort and we have purchased the Park Hopper pass and Disney Dining Plan. I reviewed the magic hours but need help creating an itenary and where to eat. Only think I know I want to do based on reviews is the Hoop De Doo Revue (spelling?) What night would be best to do that as I hear it is time consuming with the travel etc.? Any help on a plan of action would be great, without the kids we have much more flexibility I just want to make sure he sees everything since he’s never been. Thanks in Advance 🙂
Hi Leann and thanks!!
The hopper creates a lot of flexibility if you two are willing to get up early. For example, you can go to parks on their morning extra magic hour days–planning to arrive at the turnstiles 30 minutes or so before the park opens, stay at that park through lunch, head back to Sports for a break, then hit a different, less crowded park in the late afternoon/evening.
If you do this, then I’d suggest AK the morning of the 27th (7a open for EMH), with Epcot in the evening; Epcot the morning of the 28th (8a open for EMH), with MK in the afternoon/evening, HS the 29th all day (9a open, no EMH), MK the morning of the 30th (8a open for EMH) with Hoop in the evening, and Friday reserved for returning to your favorite, or the one where you have missed some stuff–likely MK.
Note that currently scheduled 9a openings may be moved to 8a, with EMH then beginning at 7a…
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Wow those early magic hours if they move up will definitely make for a long day! Thank you so much, this helps alot. Are there any specific places to eat with the dining plan that you would recommend that would be more likely to have availabilities at this time.. I’m assuming we will be dining in the parks you suggested for the evening hours so what time should I be looking at to eat? I know Hoop takes 2 of our meals.
Leann, it’s so close that a lot of the favorite dining places will be booked up. All you can do is try. Use this to prioritize: https://yourfirstvisit.net/planning-your-first-family-trip/where-to-eat/dining-alternatives/the-comprehensive-guide-to-walt-disney-world-dining/
Sorry to keep asking questions but maybe they updated the magic hours because I am finding different information than you have which is no big deal but I’m just wondering, I see you’ve addressed to go to all the AM magic hours, what about the PM hours, should I just follow the parks based on who has the magic hours and go there for ex. 5/27 AK 7a–8a then go to HS @ noc for magic hours 10p-12a?
Oh Leann, I’m sorry, I did mess up. Epcot has pm EMH, not am on Tuesday, and HS does have am EMH on Weds. PM extra magic hours draw crowds but add little, whereas am extra magic hours–if you get up–can let you see 6 or 7 things in the rifts two hours that would take 4 or 5 hours later in the day…
Ok, thank you that was my main question regarding the pm magic hours. We will focus on getting up early instead of staying out late 🙂 Appreciate your help.
What a wonderful website we’ve used it as our guide for planning our Nov 30th 2013 vacation to WDW! Since I just booked my restaurants online 180 days in advance wanted to share some things I was not prepare for so that you can elaborate in this section.
1) Be our Guest Dinner is not mentioned, maybe on purpose, but I think this has become one of the hardest reservations to get and so should be included on your list..
2) We were told by Disney on the phone that we could not link our dining plan when reserving online and we would need to call at 7am for the restaurants that require prepay – Cindy’s royal table and Hoop Dee Do for us at least. That was FALSE information. We could use our Disney Dining Plan and not a credit card!
3) The website is VERY GLITCHY. It only opened 1 instead of 10 days out at 6am which I did not realize at 1st and so I keep trying to reserve days post that time for harder restaurants and only after a while did I realize I could reserve the 1st day. The other days opened up and I quickly reserved as many as I could, the only 1 sold out on our preferred day was be our guest, but since we’re doing 2 days at magic kingdom we were able to swap days and get a reserve. The ability to reserve will magically stop working for 10-15minute periods perhaps trying to get you to give up! I found it very confusing and frustrating, but got all my reservations made by 6;30AM.
4) Disney gave us WRONG information about reserving the BBB, we were told we could only reserve 180 days from the day of the actual appointment and not 10 days in advance of 180. We called at 7am to check on the 10 days 180 morning and found we could make a reserve. We were happy we were so distrusting…
Ok that’s it. Hope it helps everyone else who has these questions!
Jill thanks so much for your kind words, thoughts and comments! And yes, I do view BOG–with its limited kids menu–as optional…
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Hi Dave
Great site for us first timers.
We are planning on going to WDW the first or second week of December 2013. Please advise which would be best. We are from South Africa and this is our first time….super excited!!! My question to you is this: my kids are 18 and 14 (son and a daughter). I am not sure if booking any of the Disney Dining plans would be worth it considering their age. Do you have any tips to make this once in a lifetime trip a fabulous one?
Hi Jemima–those are both great weeks, but I like the first better–see this: https://yourfirstvisit.net/2011/09/19/2013-weeks-to-visit-walt-disney-world-ranked-in-order/
The dining plan likely won’t save you much, if any money–it’s more of a convenience…
And as for making the trip fabulous…well start at the home page and work through the topics there! https://yourfirstvisit.net/ See especially this, which was designed from the start for those dates: https://yourfirstvisit.net/planning-your-first-family-trip/basic-itinerary/basic-itinerary-daily-links/
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Dave, is it true that the first Starbucks has opened on Main St USA? Exactly where? Any comments about it?
Cheers
Heya Tom, nice to see you again. Yes the old Main Street Bakery is now Starbucks. Josh has a detailed–and hilarious–post on this here: http://www.easywdw.com/uncategorized/main-street-bakery-reopens/
The Candlelight Processional starts booking 7/9/13 at 6:00am at disneyworld.com and 7:00am over the phone (407-939-3463). I don’t see the narrators posted anywhere, so here they are:
TBD: 11/30-12/3
Ashley Judd 12/4-12/5
Whoopi Goldberg 12/6-12/7
TBD 12/8-12/10
Dennis Haysbert 12/11-12/13
James Denton 12/14-12/16
Edward James Olmos 12/17-12/19
Trace Atkins 12/20-12/22
TBD 12/23-12/25
Blair Underwood 12/26-12/28
TBD 12/29
Amy Grant 12/30
The experience is credit guaranteed when you book.
More tips:
Le Cellier will NOT be participating in the Candlelight Processional this year.
The California Grill is still not booking for the fall yet. We do not know when they will reopen or the date we will start taking reservations. When we know the date we will start booking it will be posted on the Disney blog: disneyparks.disney.go.com/blog
Be Our Guest is getting fully booked past the 180 day mark because of Disney resort guests. The perk you get for being a Disney resort guest is that you can can start booking only at the 180 day mark, but you get to book 10 additional days after that 180th day. So if you call in to book BOG on the 180th day, please realize that many other people have been booking before you and the restaurant is most likely already full by the 180th day mark. Lunch at BOG is quick service, walk-up only, no reservations. So you can always try and walk up with no reservation.
T-Rex and both Rainforest Cafe locations are NOT Disney owned restaurants. Most have trouble booking for T-Rex because they don’t give many tables for Disney Dining to book. If you’re unable to secure a reservation at these locations you can always call the locations directly to make a reservation.
T-Rex: 407-828-8739
Rainforest Cafe at Downtown Disney: 407-827-8500
Rainforest Cafe at Animal Kingdom: 407-938-9100
Disney Dining is not permitted to make SAME DAY reservations at any othe the above locations. You MUST call them directly for a same day reservations.
Disneyworld.com has been having major issues since the migration to the “My Disney Experience” site. If you are booking past the 180 day mark (because you’re a resort guest) or you have more than 3 reservations to book, I highly recommend you call us to book your reservations at 407-939-3463. Be aware that when you book with us over the phone we can’t manually e-mail you and you won’t receive an e-mail at the time of booking (you will get a reminder e-mailed to you by the Disney server right before the reservation). However, you will be able to see the reservations we make for you in your My Disney Experience under the My Reservations section. *Note: You will only be able to see reservations there that can be made online, you won’t see children’s activities there or anything else there that you can’t also book online.
Be careful when booking prepaid experiences like Cinderella’s Royal Table or the 3 dinner shows online if you’re on the Disney Dining Plan. Many times disneyworld.com will not recognize your dining plan and will attempt to charge your credit card for the experience when it should be taking your card only because of the cancellation policy. It’s strongly recommended you call us at 407-939-3463 to book the above experiences. But at the very least if you try and book it yourself online PLEASE ensure you take note if disneyworld.com is trying to charge your card when you really wanted to use your dining plan instead. If that happens please don’t book it and pay for it, just stop booking and call us to book it for you instead. We will take your credit card as a guarantee because of the 1 day full cancellation policy, but we will ensure your card doesn’t get charged.
DisneyDiningAgent, as always this is INCREDIBLY helpful! On behalf of the readers of this site, thanks so much!!!
I published about your Candlelight material yesterday, and will post more on some of these other big topics as well so that they get the attention they deserve! See this for the candlelight post: https://yourfirstvisit.net/2013/07/08/candelight-processional-2013-narrators-booking-opens-july-9/
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