Digital tickets vs Physical for Universal Orlando?

[Plague]

Today I received an email from Attraction Tickets (as did many others I expect) about this:
"From 30th September, Walt Disney World, Universal Orlando and SeaWorld Parks are replacing physical tickets that are sent in the post with digital tickets."
It may not be 'news' but I'd not heard it before.

I think all my Disney stuff for October will all be digital anyway as that's booked direct with DisneyUK, but I also have Universal tickets booked with AT (hence the email).

This means with my Universal tickets I actually have a choice to pick physical until 10 Sept. If I don't do anything I'll be locked to digital after that.

In the email they also say "Digital tickets are gate-ready." which presumably means I wouldn't have to 'convert' them at a booth before going into the parks.

So my initial thoughts are to go digital, despite that slight comfort feeling of having an actual printed thing in my hand. (I assume that like boarding passes I can print the thing out as backup anyway.)
With Disney I'll have 'backup' of things with both phone and Magic Band, but I guess Universal doesn't have a MB equivalent (or does it?).

What are people's feeling about pros and cons for this at Universal?

 

[disneyholic family]

we were just at universal last week with digital tickets.
the only difficult thing was i'd purchased 9 tickets, so we had to scroll through to find each persons ticket to show to the entrance team member.
We took screen shots of each one and most of the gate attendants let us get away with the screenshots.
Each digital ticket is assigned to a particular name since you have to do the finger print thing (like disney) when you enter the park.

Bottom line, i actually thought the digital tickets were very convenient.

 

[Plague]

the only difficult thing was i'd purchased 9 tickets, so we had to scroll through to find each persons ticket to show to the entrance team member.

That won't be a problem ... It's just me

 

[disneyholic family]

That won't be a problem ... It's just me

You might want to take a screenshot anyway, just in case you lose internet connection.
they were fine using the screenshot.
it's very fast.
they have one of those gun readers, then you do the fingerprint thing.
have you been to universal before?
this was only our second time
first time was back in 2011 when we stayed one night.
This time was 2 nights and we've already decided we'll do at least 4 nights there next time.
That's how much fun we all had (a group of 9 ranging in age from 4 to 67).

However, you really do need the express pass to enjoy it i think.
I didn't look at the standby times, but express pass was so easy - no muss, no fuss.
You just show them your pass and walk into the line.
None of the nonsense of having your head in the phone trying to get a genie fastpass time.

there are only two rides you can't use express pass on, both in islands of adventure.
we had early entrance so we raced for one of them but when we got there, the line was already 120 minutes.
Nope, not waiting 120 minutes. We'll try for it next time.
So then we walked over to the other one, which only had a 10 minute wait.
only my son rode it, the rest of us just did the queue, which was fun (that's where they have a blue animatronic (from jurassic world)

but all the other rides in both parks can be accessed using express pass.

 

[MichelinMan]

Personally, I preferred having the physical tickets. I witnessed loads of problems from people in front of me with their phones trying to scroll through tickets.

As for Express Pass, yes it was a godsend, but don't be tricked into thinking rides will be walk-ons. We still waited for around 30 minutes for the Hogwarts Express. Whilst Express is much better than Genie+, we found the Genie+ lines were much shorter (you just don't get to use so many in a day).

 

[disneyholic family]

Personally, I preferred having the physical tickets. I witnessed loads of problems from people in front of me with their phones trying to scroll through tickets.

As for Express Pass, yes it was a godsend, but don't be tricked into thinking rides will be walk-ons. We still waited for around 30 minutes for the Hogwarts Express. Whilst Express is much better than Genie+, we found the Genie+ lines were much shorter (you just don't get to use so many in a day).

it depended on the ride.
the Hogwarts train is definitely slow loading, as is the minions ride.
but it was still faster than standby...

 

[Plague]

You might want to take a screenshot anyway, just in case you lose internet connection.

I screenshot and/or have local copies of everything anyway. Recent flights have been e-ticket, e-covid pass, etc, so I'm quite organised at making sure I'm independent.

have you been to universal before?
this was only our second time
first time was back in 2011 when we stayed one night.

I have, but I think not since about 2002 or 2003 when I went to Disney with my daughter and took a day out to Universal. I could have gone when I was in WDW in 2018, but as there were no new rides then I didn't bother. Did Seaworld and a couple of days in Busch Gardens instead.
This time I have 2 nights booked at Universal and 2 to near 3 days park time depending when I leave WDW on day 1 and have to go to the a/p on day 3.

However, you really do need the express pass to enjoy it i think.

Yes, I've got Express Unlimited for the middle (full) day, so I'll thrash the rides then. The other days I'll just go with the flow - I'm not that bothered about queuing these days.

I witnessed loads of problems from people in front of me with their phones trying to scroll through tickets.

Shouldn't be a problem scrolling through one

Something I saw mentioned when I was travelling to Spain in June was to make sure your phone screen is set to bright to ensure good contrast for the scanner. I imagine many people turn the screen down when travelling, to prolong battery life, so probably worth upping it before using e-tickets and passes.

 

[disneyholic family]

i didn't mention that we HATED universal when we went in 2011.....totally hated everything about it....the workers, the rides, the parks,....everything..
but we decided to try again, plus we had all that time since disney didn't bring back the 21 day ticket.....probably a mistake on their part since it gave us the opportunity to try universal again..
this time we LOVED it..
i'm not sure why we liked it so very much this time..
part of the reason is the workers are great now....much improved from our prior visit....friendly and helpful.......
so that makes it nice..
and we enjoyed that express pass so much in comparison to genie+, which is more difficult to use...

this doesn't impact your visit, but another thing universal does right - they have a fantastic child swap system....
they have air conditioned rooms inside the ride where you wait...it's fantastic....and everyone gets to go through the ride queue, not just those who are tall enough to ride...
so you can keep your whole group together....it's much more user friendly....
maybe disney can't do it because of the massive number of kids they get in the park...

 

[Plague]

part of the reason is the workers are great now....much improved from our prior visit....friendly and helpful.......
so that makes it nice..

I think Universal, and other parks, are taking lessons from Disney and seriously competing. There's big money, so it's worth the effort. I'm really interested to see how Universal suits me now - the parks and my wants are likely quite different since 20 years ago.

 

[Plague]

This time was 2 nights

By the by, which hotel did you stay at?

 

[steve_rob]

As for Express Pass, yes it was a godsend, but don't be tricked into thinking rides will be walk-ons. We still waited for around 30 minutes for the Hogwarts Express. Whilst Express is much better than Genie+, we found the Genie+ lines were much shorter (you just don't get to use so many in a day).

To be fair I think that is by design. While FastPass originally (then FP+ and therefore now Genie+) marketed itself as being "skip the standby lines" and that you wouldn't have to wait any length of time to ride, Universal to my knowledge have always avoided that sort of thing in the blurb for Express Pass.

Instead they've used much vaguer statements like, it'll should never be more than half the wait of standby and usually it's less than 15 minutes. So of course you need to go in with those slightly lower expectations compared to Genie but at the same time it means they can keep the standby queues moving that little bit faster with less demand in the EP line.

 

[disneyholic family]

By the by, which hotel did you stay at?

we stayed at the royal pacific, one of the 3 hotels that gets unlimited express pass "free" (included with the room)
given the high price of express pass, it's a really good perk...

 

[Plague]

we stayed at the royal pacific, one of the 3 hotels that gets unlimited express pass "free" (included with the room)
given the high price of express pass, it's a really good perk...

It's been a few months since I booked, but I think I did look at hotels with included xp. I was tempted but for me the extra cost didn't make sense as I wouldn't use the fancy facilities (I'm generally in the parks all day), so it was cheaper to stay at a lesser place and buy the xp I needed.

Of course I may regret it ...

 

[disneyholic family]

It's been a few months since I booked, but I think I did look at hotels with included xp. I was tempted but for me the extra cost didn't make sense as I wouldn't use the fancy facilities (I'm generally in the parks all day), so it was cheaper to stay at a lesser place and buy the xp I needed.

Of course I may regret it ...

if you're only one person, i think it's probably cheaper to stay in a cheap hotel and buy the pass...

 

[Plague]

if you're only one person, i think it's probably cheaper to stay in a cheap hotel and buy the pass...

Yes. I pay nearly as much for a room as those sharing, but they get multiple passes and I only get one.

 

[MichelinMan]

It's been a few months since I booked, but I think I did look at hotels with included xp. I was tempted but for me the extra cost didn't make sense as I wouldn't use the fancy facilities (I'm generally in the parks all day), so it was cheaper to stay at a lesser place and buy the xp I needed.

Of course I may regret it ...

I take it you are a single person? In that case, personally I would have stayed at Cabana Bay and paid for the Express Pass. But for more than one person, the economics are heavily stacked in staying at a deluxe resort. I much preferred our room at Cabana Bay than RPR, and the overall resort as well.

 

[Plague]

I take it you are a single person? In that case, personally I would have stayed at Cabana Bay and paid for the Express Pass. But for more than one person, the economics are heavily stacked in staying at a deluxe resort. I much preferred our room at Cabana Bay than RPR, and the overall resort as well.

I'm just across the road in Aventura.
I looked at CB, but the 'beach' stuff is not for me.
I looked at some the other side of I-4 too, like Endless Summer, but that would make me very shuttle dependent.