{Almost} Everything that You Need to Plan a Walt Disney World Vacation

You’ve booked your trip to Walt Disney World! …now what?

If you haven’t booked your trip yet, what are you waiting for?!

My Disney Experience

You can start your planning before you hit the parks online! Disney has introduced MyDisneyExperience for all guests to get a jumpstart on their planning. Once you register/log in here, you will be able to link all your resort reservations, dining, and family and friends traveling with you. We will also be able to customize your Magic Bands! These bands will contain your admission to the parks, allow you to charge purchases to your hotel room account, purchase and book Genie+ Lightning Lanes, manage dining reservations, etc. You can also download the free MyDisneyExperience app on your smartphone from the app store. This will allow you to access your magical itinerary on the go!

Once you’re in your MyDisneyExperience account, you can link your reservation by going to the “MyDisneyExperience” tab and selecting “My Reservations & Tickets” and then “Link Resort Reservation”. At that point, you’ll enter your confirmation number and last name to link the reservation.

Planning Your Days

Next, you need to figure out what you want to do. Have a family meeting, check out the Disney website, talk to your travel agent, and come up with a general idea of what would work best for your family. That will look different for each family, so the plan that works for a family with small children will probably not be the same one that works for a family with teenagers.

Reminder: it only requires a $200 deposit to book your resort reservation, and then you can make as many payments as you’d like over time up to final payment at 30 days before travel

Park Reservations

Date-based tickets that are purchased individually or as part of a Disney Vacation Package no longer require Park Reservations. The Disney Park Pass system is now only for guests with certain types of tickets:

• Annual Passholders
• Disney Military Salute Tickets
• Florida Resident Discover Disney Tickets
• Student, Sport, and Convention Tickets

Dining Reservations

60 Days Before Check In

The first date that will open for you is 60 days before your check in date. At this point, you can book advance dining reservations {ADRs} including firework dessert parties, Bibbidi Bobbidi Boutique in Magic Kingdom or Disney Springs, backstage tours, spa services, etc.

Availability will be different depending on when you go, but it’s always best to be ready to call Disney Dining or jump on the Disney website right at 6:00am EST to get your ADRs. Or if you use a travel agent, have your reservation wishlist to them prior to 60 days out and they’ll do this for you! Yes, there are times of the year where you can grab reservations for great restaurants right before you go, but I promise that you don’t want to take the chance of not getting in if you can avoid it. If you are interested in Character Dining, check out Disney Character Dining 101 to see the options available.

All restaurants will require you to give credit card information to book the reservation, but some restaurants will require you to pay for your meal in full at the time of booking. Some of the restaurants that require full payment include Cinderella’s Royal Table, Hoop-Dee-Doo Musical Revue, and firework dessert parties.

Lightning Lane Service

formerly known as Fastpass+/Genie+

Lightning Lane Multi Pass starts at $15 per person per day that gives you access to Lightning Lanes (aka shorter lines). It is not available for every ride, and you can only ride each ride one time using the Lightning Lane. Lightning Lane Single Pass rides in each park are purchased individually that isn’t included in the Multi Pass purchase, and the price per ride depends on the day. You can buy up to 2 Lightning Lane Single Pass rides per day, and if you have a Park Hopper, those 2 rides can be in different parks – ex: Rise of the Resistance + Flight of Passage. You can also buy just the Single Pass experiences without buying Multi Pass, so if you want to ride Flight of Passage but aren’t concerned about doing Lightning Lane for anything else that day, you can just get Flight of Passage and not purchase Multi Pass.

Guests staying at a Walt Disney World Resort can purchase and select their Lightning Lane experiences beginning 7 days before arrival while all other guests can purchase and select their Lightning Lane experiences beginning 3 days before arrival. All purchases and bookings for Lightning Lane must be done through the MyDisneyExperience app, and booking is not available on the website.

Once you redeem a selection on the day of your park visit, you can choose another Multi Pass experience from either group. If you have tickets with the Park Hopper option, you could even choose a multi pass experience in a different theme park. Ex: for our Animal Kingdom day, we booked Kilimanjaro Safaris, Festival of the Lion King, and Expedition Everest at the 7 day booking window. Once we got to the park and rode Expedition Everest, I booked our next Lightning Lane for Magic Kingdom around 2pm because we were going there after lunch. I was able to book 3 Lighting Lanes for the first few hours that we were in Magic Kingdom, and then booked more Lightning Lanes as we used them.

Pro Tip: As soon as you scan in for your Lightning Lane, immediately jump on your app and book your next one while you’re waiting in line. Some rides require you to scan in twice (like Space Mountain, Tower of Terror, or Rock ‘n’ Roller Coaster) and may not let you book a new experience after only one scan, but go ahead and try to book once you scan in the first time because the second scanner is not always active on these rides.

Lightning Lane Single Pass Experiences

Multi Pass Lightning Lane Experiences

Virtual Queue

On the day of your visit, you can join the Virtual Queue at daily distribution times (7:00am EST + 1:00pm EST if there are spots available after the 7:00am drop). Select one member of your party to access the virtual queue to check for an available boarding group for everyone in your party. If multiple people in your party try to join the virtual queue simultaneously, that may inhibit your ability to join a group. Virtual Queue gives you access to the Standby Line, not the Lightning Lane Line. If you would like to be in the Lightning Lane for this experience, you need to select the ride as on option on Multi Pass (Tiana’s Bayou Adventure) or purchase the Single Pass (Guardians of the Galaxy: Cosmic Rewind). If your ticket requires a Park Reservation, the Park Reservation must match the park for your Virtual Queue

Pro Tip: Create your Boarding Group by 6:58am and begin hitting the Refresh button as quickly as you can at 6:59am until 7:00am for the best luck at securing a Virtual Queue spot!

Enjoying Your Vacation!

I know, this seems like a lot {and it is}, but it will be worth it once you get to Walt Disney World! When you see people wandering around confused and complaining about not having reservations and FP+ for lines that are hours long during busy season, you’ll be thankful that you planned it out months in advance. I’m not saying that you can’t have a great vacation with zero planning because we do it all of the time, but I am saying that it will be a generally calmer and more relaxing vacation if you do plan ahead.

If you have questions about what might work best for your family, feel free to contact us here or through one of our social media pages, or contact our friends from Embrace the Journey Travel!

Happy planning!