are extra magic hours worth it?

[ahill004]

first time staying onsite and potentially taking advantage of EMH! Since crowd calendars typically tell you the worst parks are the EmH parks is it worth attending them as Disney guests or is it super crowded? And are morning or night magic hours better?
We are looking at doing HS on a late August Friday night for the extra evening magic hours but not sure if it is worth it or if we will be stuck in long lines? Can we book fast passes for this timeframe?

Thanks in advance!

 

[Robo]

We love AM EMH.

PM EMH can vary, due to crowd-levels.

 

[jlnten17]

We took advantage of both AM and PM EMH. With young kids we felt AM hours were better for us but both were "worth it". There are several other things that affected the crowd levels in the parks, weather being the biggest imo and I have found MK is horrible on Mondays as is often posted. If you are staying near the park you intend to visit EMH are even more useful as I am a big fan of midday breaks when the park is busiest.

 

[hakepb]

Late EMH is great at HS to get in extra RNR and TOT rides. (since F! Draws away a lot of guests)
Do not waste the EMH on F!
The RNR line moves much more Quickly without FP+ (RNR is usually a 15-20 minute wait during peak times)

I think TSMM becomes more manageable the last hour of EMH, but I avoid it at the beginning.

 

[redsbe]

morning EMH are worth it, except they will increase total crowds once park opens for regular hours and you have EMH+RP visitors, hence by 10a-noon park is pretty busy especially main attractions. You can get a lot done in first hour but then advantage quickly disappeared as RD and regular crowds add to the numbers. So use morning EMH then park hop or personally we avoid morning EMH days and RD another park.
PM EMH can work if you stay to the bitter end and ride the most popular at or close to end of PM EMH (if you can stay up that late, which will also impact/delay your next morning start). We usually avoid PM EMH because it has ripple effect to the following days including later start the following day as we get up later and end up in park with crowds and not at RD.

 

[scrapquitler]

first time staying onsite and potentially taking advantage of EMH! Since crowd calendars typically tell you the worst parks are the EmH parks is it worth attending them as Disney guests or is it super crowded? And are morning or night magic hours better?
We are looking at doing HS on a late August Friday night for the extra evening magic hours but not sure if it is worth it or if we will be stuck in long lines? Can we book fast passes for this timeframe?

Thanks in advance!

We have only done the morning EMH a couple of times, and find that the crowds are pretty large.
We ALWAYS do the late night EMH at MK, and find that the crowds are much lower, and we get to do a LOT of rides in a short amount of time, and this is even more the case the later the 'late' hours are. Late hours from midnight-2am are much lower than when the late hours are 9-11pm. Nighttime EMH at MK are a MUST for us.

 

[jessrose18]

two of my planned park days are landing on am emh... which we have always avoided. MK and AK so im interested as well

 

[Hootch]

I like AM EMHs if we have park hoppers. The crowds are usually heavier at the EMH parks and the afternoon and evening can be busy. Late, late EMH is good if you don't have anything else the next morning. Extending to midnight may or may not be good.

 

[NYDisGuy]

MK and Epcot are great for EMH. I like to have a drink sometimes and it's great that the Epcot bars stay open with the rides in the front. And we are night owls so MK works great for us.

 

[ElsasFan]

We were there last week and did EMH at the Magic Kingdom and Hollywood Studios. EMH at MK was great. I waited about 25 minutes for the Minetrain, but everything else that we rode had short lines (about 10 minutes for space mtn, most others were walk-one. The times posts did not necessarily correlate with the wait time. Peter Pan showed 35 minutes, but we only waited a couple of minutes after we got through the que.

HS was another story. We arrived in time for the 6 pm Indiana Jones show. After that, no Fastpasses were available, but Star Tours was only a 10 minute wait, so we did that twice. We had dinner; the lines were crazy long and I didn't think we would find a table, but somehow we did. I felt like we were just waiting for everyone to go to Fantasmic so the lines would get shorter, but they never really did. After dinner, TSMM showed a 15 minute wait, so I guess everyone rushed over; it was actually about 40 minutes. They close the ride at 8:00 for the fireworks, so I guess that is why the line got as short as it did. After that, RNR showed a 25 minute wait, so once again the whole crowd rushed there and by the time my husband and son got in line, it was 40 minutes. My daughters and I watched the fireworks (amazing, btw) and then the app once again showed 15 minutes for TSMM. We headed that way, but cast members were holding up a rope to that section of the park, and a big crowd was forming. We didn't want to deal with the crowd, so we decided on the Great Movie Ride, which was showing a 20 minute wait (I know...but my daughter wanted to ride it). Cast members were also preventing anyone from getting close to that area. It was about 10:25 at that point. So we headed back to Star Tours to ride again because it was the only thing with a short wait. When we finished, the app still showed a long line for TSMM, so we did actually wait 20 minutes for the Great Movie Ride. After that, the app showed 45 minutes (I think?) for TSMM. We were exhausted and decided not to take a chance that the line was actually that long, so we left. Our whole time there was a beating. I will not do EMH at HS again until there are more attractions that draw a crowd.

I almost forgot, we also did EMH at Epcot. That was great; we did have to wait about 30 minutes for Test Track, but everything else was a walk-on.

Good luck with whatever you decide!

 

[loves to dive]

While we don't do it much any more because we are not really ride centric, we used to take advantage of the late night EMHs. We could use those and get everything done we wanted to do then have the whole next morning/day free to just go to the parks and take it easy. We rarely have done the morning ones but that is just because my son is not an early morning person, we don't even do rope drop.

 

[disney world dreamer]

my family thinks EMH is worth it.
we especially like AM EMH.
for HS i'd suggest AM over PM EMH but that's just me.

 

[Dan Murphy]

We like emh as it helps guide us to the lower crowd park/s. We seem to prefer lower rather than higher crowds.

 

[Accident]

first time staying onsite and potentially taking advantage of EMH! Since crowd calendars typically tell you the worst parks are the EmH parks is it worth attending them as Disney guests or is it super crowded? And are morning or night magic hours better?
We are looking at doing HS on a late August Friday night for the extra evening magic hours but not sure if it is worth it or if we will be stuck in long lines? Can we book fast passes for this timeframe?

It's a flip of the coin what crowd you'll get. With AK opened late, new star wars show at hollywood the crowds are going to change but nobody really knows what that will look like for EMH at each park yet... Disney has also played with a couple fridays recently where MK and HS both had matching EMH.. If that happens then I would say go for EMH in the evening since people will split between the parks.

your also talking a time when several states (including jersey) aren't back at school yet and it's last chance for summer vacation.

 

[supersnoop]

Extra Magic Hours are worthwhile, in my opinion, only if you are planning to park hop.

No, FP+ reservations are not available during EMH. In the evenings, everyone uses the FP+ line and scans their bands to prove they are staying onsite.

 

[cornflkgrl]

I definitely think they are worth it in the summer to stay out of the sun and heat. Night time is the only time we really enjoy the parks as a whole family so I LOVE evening EMH. But then we always get park hoppers too, so I don't know about planning certain parks for certain days. That concept is foreign to me.

 

[ahill004]

So I'm thinking MK EMH might be worth it in the evening but HS may not be so great? I'm guessing bc of the last of rides and the rides that are there that have long waits are really geared toward people who would generally be willing to stay up later...aka not young children. Thinking I need to rework my plans!

 

[JimmyV]

Morning EMHs get you the most bang for your buck. Unfortunately, I cannot convince my family to be up and at it that early when they are on vacation. Can't say that I blame them. Evening EMHs are only worth it at the MK, and then, only if they are really late. 10:00-12:00 tends to seem like a regular day. But midnight to 2:00 is a blast. Really low crowds and great weather. But it comes at a cost. We have a standing rule that on any day when we stay in a park past midnight, the next day must be either a resort/pool/Disney Springs day, or else it can be a "World Showcase only" day. Early mornings at a park the next day are forbidden!

At the other parks, the hours are simply not late enough to matter. There are still plenty of people at DHS in those hours such that you don't get the true feel of the benefit. ElsaFan laid it out pretty well above. Same with Epcot, although that is a bit better.

 

[ElsasFan]

So I'm thinking MK EMH might be worth it in the evening but HS may not be so great? I'm guessing bc of the last of rides and the rides that are there that have long waits are really geared toward people who would generally be willing to stay up later...aka not young children. Thinking I need to rework my plans!

That was our experience. MK offers so many more attractions than HS, too. And the added advantage is that they are closer together (which is nice at the end of a long day).

 

[Beamerball]

Epcot early magic hours were not worth it for us. The only rides that were open were Soarin and Test Track. There was nothing for the 4 year old to do, we thought that the aquarium building would be open but they only opened that at the normal opening time.