Disneyland Magicbands

[skelow401]

Quick Magicband question. For WDW we have always used magicbands for our room keys, Fastpass/genie+, DAS, and as payment. I am curious to hear some opinions from you guys on how necessary the magicbands are for Land considering we are staying offsite and probably eating a good portion off site. We will have Genie+, probably purchase some lighting lanes, and DAS. Before I drop $140 on 3 of them I wanted to hear from your experience are they really that useful. I mean the bands at WDW were free for so long or even after they started charging was like $5 for a basic one. $140 is a far cry from that. Thanks!

 

[dina444444]

I wouldn’t spend the money on them right now. I have 2 MB+ but I got them when they first released at WDW, I wouldn’t have bought any at DL even if I didn’t already have these.

 

[drenha]

I'll probably be purchasing them as I'm traveling with 5 kids without phones with very different ride interests. I can book LL on my phone and the big kids can use MB to go on the rides without me having to escort them all the way to the turnstile. I probably wouldn't if I were traveling in a group in which everyone had a phone.

 

[Wesley815]

Maybe if you're really going to use LL and don't have others near your phone (after first linking each band) but otherwise there's not much use for them IMO

I normally travel with a friend or alone and don't do much else besides scan in front gate with Magic Key. Hopefully they'll add payment as well, but that's also not really needed since I can use Apple Pay on my watch. Would be nice if DL turned on Apple Watch features like WDW then there's really no need for another wrist band. I'm sure an upcharge though

 

[DLgal]

You can't even unlock room doors or use them to charge things to the room anyway. They are pretty useless at DLR at the moment. They need to roll out WAY more functionality.

 

[DizMe]

You can't even unlock room doors or use them to charge things to the room anyway. They are pretty useless at DLR at the moment. They need to roll out WAY more functionality.

Assuming they do eventually roll out more functionality, will the cost of the Disneyland-specific Magicband+ go up? I know nothing about magic bands, never having used one, but I did notice that the DL bands are less expensive than most of the bands on the shopDisney site. I would prefer to have a DL band, and I'm wondering if the cost will go up comparably once the usefulness improves. That's a point in favor of getting one now. Conversely, if I had to buy a new band to use the new features that will presumably appear at some point, I'd be doubly peeved to buy one now.

 

[DLgal]

Assuming they do eventually roll out more functionality, will the cost of the Disneyland-specific Magicband+ go up? I know nothing about magic bands, never having used one, but I did notice that the DL bands are less expensive than most of the bands on the shopDisney site. I would prefer to have a DL band, and I'm wondering if the cost will go up comparably once the usefulness improves. That's a point in favor of getting one now. Conversely, if I had to buy a new band to use the new features that will presumably appear at some point, I'd be doubly peeved to buy one now.

I mean, they raise the prices on everything all the time, so it's possible. But they wouldn't raise them JUST because they added the same features that have existed forever in WDW magic bands.

I think more likely, we will see price drops on MB+ at Disneyland. NO ONE is buying them. They are even trying to hawk them at the parking structure.

 

[Kender]

Assuming they do eventually roll out more functionality, will the cost of the Disneyland-specific Magicband+ go up? I know nothing about magic bands, never having used one, but I did notice that the DL bands are less expensive than most of the bands on the shopDisney site. I would prefer to have a DL band, and I'm wondering if the cost will go up comparably once the usefulness improves. That's a point in favor of getting one now. Conversely, if I had to buy a new band to use the new features that will presumably appear at some point, I'd be doubly peeved to buy one now.

They're all the same cost whether you buy them online or at the parks. It just depends on the MB+ band you're getting:

Basic, simple, solid color: $34.99
Design: $44.99
Limited edition/release: $54.99

 

[laugard]

They're all the same cost whether you buy them online or at the parks. It just depends on the MB+ band you're getting:

Basic, simple, solid color: $34.99
Design: $44.99
Limited edition/release: $54.99

The one benefit of buying in person is if you're a Magic Key holder as you can apply your discount.

I already wrote about it, but I don't regret buying a band and am very pleased with using it for entry, park hopping and Genie+. (I don't stay onsite, so wouldn't use it for room entry anyway.) However, I wouldn't consider the new bands a must for most at all, and certainly not for anyone needing the as-of-yet-not-included additional features.

 

[KPeterso]

I am not sure I would buy one for Disneyland only. I have one from my September WDW trip, so I linked it in the app. It makes some things easier for me --- I push my Mom in a wheelchair, so it is handy to use on my wrist versus having to fish out my phone and then get to the tickets in the app. But if it was just me without the wheelchair, the phone use would be fine too. Just depends on the situation.

 

[Blue32]

I liked using the original magic bands at WDW. But I would only consider purchasing them if they lowered the price considerably. We are not ones that are interested in the + features. We just like them for scanning at the gates, attractions, and for payment method.

 

[limace]

I bought them for our trip next week. Wasn’t excited about it-eso since I was buying for 8-but got 20% off and my mom really wanted one. I figured it would be easier since we have a large group, and two of them don’t have smart phones. We do WDW every other year typically so my kids have used them and liked them.

 

[Tksolomom]

Assuming they do eventually roll out more functionality, will the cost of the Disneyland-specific Magicband+ go up? I know nothing about magic bands, never having used one, but I did notice that the DL bands are less expensive than most of the bands on the shopDisney site. I would prefer to have a DL band, and I'm wondering if the cost will go up comparably once the usefulness improves. That's a point in favor of getting one now. Conversely, if I had to buy a new band to use the new features that will presumably appear at some point, I'd be doubly peeved to buy one now.

The Magicband+ are the same for both parks, there isn’t a specific Disneyland-specific band, it would just be the designs. You can use your WDW Magicband+ at Disneyland, just not the original Magic bands or Magicbands2.

The other thing is if you are getting ride or photo pass pictures, you can use your band instead of your phone. If you want to play the Bounty Hunter game too. If you don’t have Genie+ it is definitely not worth it in my opinion.

 

[thegootzie]

I love using it at WDW and am very excited to use it on my upcoming DL trip. I hate pulling out my phone and doing the scan swipe scan swipe process to check into a ride for LL/DAS. The ability to have everyone scan their own band and keep my phone in my pocket is totally worth it to me.

 

[DizMe]

The Magicband+ are the same for both parks, there isn’t a specific Disneyland-specific band, it would just be the designs. You can use your WDW Magicband+ at Disneyland, just not the original Magic bands or Magicbands2.

Thanks. I was mainly wondering why the price was lower for the cute DL bands. I was misled by the wording under the picture of the 5 new DL bands: "Disneyland MagicBand+ designs—including exclusive Disneyland Resort designs—will be available for purchase in select shops located at the Disneyland Resort with prices starting at $34.99." I took that to mean that the 5 bands shown were $34.99.

I saw the cute ones on ShopDisney were $10 more. I thought that if the cute themed DL band was $34.99 less the MK discount, it would be worth buying and I'd have it for future use when I could do more with it. I missed the key words: "STARTING AT" and thought all the pictured bands were that price.

 

[serendipityaey]

I love using it at WDW and am very excited to use it on my upcoming DL trip. I hate pulling out my phone and doing the scan swipe scan swipe process to check into a ride for LL/DAS. The ability to have everyone scan their own band and keep my phone in my pocket is totally worth it to me.

Same! I’m excited

 

[Kender]

The one benefit of buying in person is if you're a Magic Key holder as you can apply your discount.

I'm aware. I have a MK. I was addressing only the posted prices not potential discounts that are not applicable to everyone.

 

[Kender]

Thanks. I was mainly wondering why the price was lower for the cute DL bands. I was misled by the wording under the picture of the 5 new DL bands: "Disneyland MagicBand+ designs—including exclusive Disneyland Resort designs—will be available for purchase in select shops located at the Disneyland Resort with prices starting at $34.99." I took that to mean that the 5 bands shown were $34.99.

I saw the cute ones on ShopDisney were $10 more. I thought that if the cute themed DL band was $34.99 less the MK discount, it would be worth buying and I'd have it for future use when I could do more with it. I missed the key words: "STARTING AT" and thought all the pictured bands were that price.

Those DLR specific ones are definitely $44.99. The only one that dropped temporarily to $34.99 was the MK one (the special promo of $10 off; MK discount able to be stacked with it).

That "starting at" language can be super misleading, I'm sorry

 

[laugard]

I'm aware. I have a MK. I was addressing only the posted prices not potential discounts that are not applicable to everyone.

Right, I was just adding to the information you'd already provided, as some may not be aware. I know I only recently realized you can't use the Magic Key discount on ShopDisney. (I guess shows just how much, i.e. little I buy from there!)

 

[Kender]

Right, I was just adding to the information you'd already provided, as some may not be aware. I know I only recently realized you can't use the Magic Key discount on ShopDisney. (I guess shows just how much, i.e. little I buy anything there!)

I just figured anyone with a MK would already know about in park discounts . But maybe there is someone who didn't know discounts applied to these. I just thought Disney did plenty of ads to MKs really hyping up we get our discounts lol. Felt like every other story was about the discount and special promo on the MK version .

And yeah, although WDW APs can during special promos (no shopDisney discount love for DLR passholders on shopDisney sadly). But it is important to note that there often seems to be greater restrictions on shopDisney.

Like right now the CHEERDVCC (20% off for Disney Visa) code does not work on MB+ (or at least not on the sampling I tried of a basic, design, and limited edition/release). Neither does DRVCMEMBER (10% off for Disney Visa). But D23MAGIC (10% off purchase of $50+ for D23 Gold Members) does. Or did on my small sampling.