benefits of park hopper vs. cost

[DisDayz]

I would recommend you let your plans and what you want to do make the decision for you. For instance, are you on the dining plan and, if so, where are you wanting to dine. Do your restaurant choices match up with your park days? Or are you more like us, wanting to spend 1 or 2 mornings at Epcot but wanting to dine there in the evening 4 or 5 times. If that is the case, hoppers are a must.

 

[LBIJim]

Just out of curiosity, say you have a 10 day non-hopper ticket. On day 10, you want to do a greatest hits tour of all four parks. Would Disney charge the full hopper price or give you the one day hopper discount, since you wouldn't be able to extend your ticket any further?

Jim

 

[Corsetopia]

We've bought park hoppers for every trip to WDW thinking that it's an absolute 'must' to get our money's worth out of the parks. I'm sort of starting to question it though. Our next trip is going to be 8 days, I feel like that's plenty of time to see every park without the added expense of park hopper.

Again, I'm on the fence with this one as well, argh!

Wouldn't it be fun if they did a promotion every now and then that included park hopper add-on for free or discounted? That way families could 'test out the waters' and see if it's beneficial or not.

 

[TwinPrincessMermaids]

Just out of curiosity, say you have a 10 day non-hopper ticket. On day 10, you want to do a greatest hits tour of all four parks. Would Disney charge the full hopper price or give you the one day hopper discount, since you wouldn't be able to extend your ticket any further?

Jim

The upgrade to the park hopper is THAT fee, no matter WHEN you add it. It's not pro rated for the days. Best to add it AS soon as you know you want it, otherwise its money not very well spent, ie., on day 10 of 10... Even if they could give you a single Hopper day (I dont think they can), its still a better deal to add on earlier. The single hopper day is like $35 isn't it? You might have to buy a single hopper day ticket and it justwouldnt be worth while...

 

[DavidNYC]

Key hopper things for me: Restaurants, closing shows (Wishes, Illuminations, Fantasmic), and special events (Osborne Lights, Food Festival, etc).

If it was just a matter of rides, I could do without the hopper, but the flexibility for these things makes it worth it for me. At Food Festival, it's imperative! I can only get about 1/3 way through before getting stuffed so I need at least 3 evenings in Epcot to make it around to try everything I want!

 

[ZoZo]

I nearly always get hoppers, usually for a specific reason. For several of our trips, it was during the Food and Wine Festival. We almost always started our day at MK, AK, or DHS, then hopped to Epcot in the mid-to-late afternoon to end our days @ F&W. So hoppers were a must for this type of touring.

But one trip, I was traveling solo and "automatically" bought a hopper (I had always had one in the past, and assumed I'd need one for my solo trip). Surprisingly, I only hopped once or twice on an eight-day trip -- and realized that the reason I had hopped so much in the past was because my traveling companions loved the wine festival, and (since I don't drink!) I wasn't nearly as interested in going to Epcot on the solo trip!

So it all depends on what you want to accomplish, and how much you're likely to hop. Now, I always think about hoppers on a "per use" or "cost per hop" basis. The hopper option costs around $60, whether you use it once or seven times. With only one hop, is it worth it to pay $60? Probably not. But if you hop every day for seven days, it ends up being $8 per hop - much more reasonable of a cost.

And remember, you can always buy your tickets without the hopper option, and add it later. If you're unsure, that's what I recommend to people. One year, I bought the "Water Parks Fun and More" option, and didn't use it once because it was too cold to swim. What a waste of money!

 

[Robo]

Now, I always think about hoppers on a "per use" or "cost per hop" basis. The hopper option costs around $60, whether you use it once or seven times. With only one hop, is it worth it to pay $60? Probably not. But if you hop every day for seven days, it ends up being $8 per hop - much more reasonable of a cost.

Taking that a step farther, if your multi-day tickets already have the "Water Parks Fun and More" option,
then adding the Hopper only costs $26 per.
That is a pretty fair bargain, regardless if you only hop 2-3 times.

 

[nat8199]

We are hopefully staying at YC, so a hopper is definitely worth it for us. We plan on taking the monorail to Epcot for dinner on our 3 MK days. Otherwise, we would have to eat in MK, which wouldn't make DH happy.

 

[sbecker517]

I'm in minority... Not getting it. We are even staying at BC, but there is only one day we would possibly hop and it doesn't make sense.... I love Epcot and the food, but have three young kids that want to eat at TRex, etc... So, on MK days we. R doing dinner at DTD at beaches and cream in our resort... We get there early and go till we can't go anymore... Not 'rests' during the day here...

 

[lurkernj]

I guess it would depend on the trip. We've (4 of us) had them once on a ten day trip and used them twice. Ten days is plenty of time to do one park per day and if we were tired/bored, we could just go to DTD or pool. I like the slower pace of not rushing somewhere else to squeeze in some more stuff.

However, if it was the food/wine fest as mentioned by pp, or staying at an Epcot resort (both of which DH and I will be doing in Sept), I will want the hopper.

I can say, even though everyone says "you can buy it if you need it while you are there", I don't think I would(unless it was just one or two of us). If I didn't purchase if beforehand, I wouldn't be able to bring myself to fork up that much at one time, I'd be thinking about the souveniers or nice dinners I could be buying with that money.

 

[JCornell]

It also depends on where you are staying, I would imagine. We were just at Beach Club for 9 nights - having DHS and Epcot so close, it would have been crazy to not have park hoppers. We would go to one park in the morning and/or afternoon, and all but, I think, one or two days, we would take a break in our room, then head out to Epcot in the evening to wander the World Showcase.

This is also our thinking on hoppers. Normally if we leave a park with the intention of returning later, we rarely do. The exception would be if we were at a BW resort since Epcot (and specifically World Showcase with food and drink options) is a short walk and even DHS is a leisurely boat ride away. We might consider it for a monorail resort too, but that would probably be it.

 

[jensen]

My thought right now is to not get park hopper and then, once we get there add it if I feel that not having it is really limiting us.

This is what we do every trip... and we always end up buying it at some point. But, it's really simple to upgrade your tickets, so IMO there's not much reason to spend the money unless you are sure you are going to use it.

Same goes for the Water Park upgrade... we used it once.

 

[abmitch01]

we've never park hopped and have been content. We don't want to waste the time traveling to another park. I'd see if you like not hopping and then addict later if you feel like you need to hop. That FP feature stinks.

 

[NYDisGuy]

I get it because I stay at the Boardwalk and we sometimes like to get breakfast in France or have a after dinner drink in the world showcase. Or we have the option to take a boat to DHS after we did AK in the morning. It gives alot more flexibility with the new fastpass system too

 

[Worfiedoodles]

Hoppers are an essential part of our park strategy. We have a 16 yr old who might want to be in a different park than we are. It's also really common for us to do rope drop, come back for an afternoon rest, and then hit a new park in the evening. Kiddo can do the Studios, we can do MK, and everyone can have dinner together in Epcot. This allows us to have time together and separately, which makes for a much more enjoyable vacation.

Maria