Do Disney Park Reservations Guarantee Reentry This New Year’s Eve?

[JJZMgailey]

If you are in Disneyland or Walt Disney World, now is an exciting time to be visiting the parks. Though hectic and a little crowded, there is electricity in the air that keeps spirits high right through until the first week of January. However, there is one aspect of visiting Disney at this time that can often be overlooked and has caught out even the most seasoned travelers at times. If you are visiting the parks on December 31st, here is one topic that is proving to be a little controversial, and the lack of a straightforward answer is quite concerning.

Disney Genie+ is sold out for Friday, December 29th both Disney’s Hollywood Studios and Disney’s Animal Kingdom theme park for the second consecutive day.

You might be planning to start your day early to get the most out of the morning, then take a break in your resort before returning for the late-night countdown into 2024. Well, there may be a problem with this. Even with a park reservation, you might not be guaranteed re-entry after you leave, which makes this problematic if it comes to reentry time and the park is already at capacity.

Read the rest of the article HERE!

 

[HyperspaceMountainPilot]

If you are in Disneyland or Walt Disney World, now is an exciting time to be visiting the parks. Though hectic and a little crowded, there is electricity in the air that keeps spirits high right through until the first week of January. However, there is one aspect of visiting Disney at this time that can often be overlooked and has caught out even the most seasoned travelers at times. If you are visiting the parks on December 31st, here is one topic that is proving to be a little controversial, and the lack of a straightforward answer is quite concerning.

Disney Genie+ is sold out for Friday, December 29th both Disney’s Hollywood Studios and Disney’s Animal Kingdom theme park for the second consecutive day.

You might be planning to start your day early to get the most out of the morning, then take a break in your resort before returning for the late-night countdown into 2024. Well, there may be a problem with this. Even with a park reservation, you might not be guaranteed re-entry after you leave, which makes this problematic if it comes to reentry time and the park is already at capacity.

Read the rest of the article HERE!

This is what somebody at Disney told us last year for NYE (we had park reservations for Epcot, staying at BCV)—we struggled through a long, crowded day for no real reason as the park didn’t sell out at any point (as far as I’m aware).

We are hoping to hop to EPCOT tomorrow around 5 from MK…I guess there’s a non-zero chance we could get locked out of both parks. Just another way Disney adds extra stress to our vacations.

 

[NYCgrrl]

Been to WDW a few times over the December holidays. We really didn’t like the crowds ( if there is a queue to enter Swiss Family Robinson treehouse there are too many people) and spent a few park near capacity days and nights at either DS or one of the water parks. Much calmer yet still fun.

 

[scrappinginontario]

Today and tomorrow are good days to watch as both days are already full for park reservations. They should give us an idea of what might happen Sunday which is not yet full for park reservations.

As of now it’s 4:30 and there have been no reports of guests not being allowed to enter a park they have a park reservation for nor has hopping been stopped.

Bottom line is each family must choose what is their best option, just sharing current trends.

 

[HyperspaceMountainPilot]

Today and tomorrow are good days to watch as both days are already full for park reservations. They should give us an idea of what might happen Sunday which is not yet full for park reservations.

As of now it’s 4:30 and there have been no reports of guests not being allowed to enter a park they have a park reservation for nor has hopping been stopped.

Bottom line is each family must choose what is their best option, just sharing current trends.

We just passed the MK on the monorail and didn’t hear anything suggesting the park was full (I assume they would announce it?)—it’s 50 degrees and projected to drizzle or rain soon, so that may be helping keep crowds down.

 

[soniam]

We just passed the MK on the monorail and didn’t hear anything suggesting the park was full (I assume they would announce it?)—it’s 50 degrees and projected to drizzle or rain soon, so that may be helping keep crowds down.

The bus stop last night about 5pm at Boardwalk for MK was massive. It took at least 2, if not more, buses to clear/lower it.

 

[DisneyDebbie]

FYI- today (12/30) at 9am, The Genie+ multiple park option is not available to purchase. It will be interesting to see how things go today

 

[HyperspaceMountainPilot]

FYI- today (12/30) at 9am, The Genie+ multiple park option is not available to purchase. It will be interesting to see how things go today

Many of the FP attractions for Epcot were totally sold out by 10:30AM. We are at MK now and it’s extremely crowded. Hoping that more people will want to hop to MK than Epcot tonight.

 

[soniam]

Many of the FP attractions for Epcot were totally sold out by 10:30AM. We are at MK now and it’s extremely crowded. Hoping that more people will want to hop to MK than Epcot tonight.

It seems less crowded than when we did this day in 2016.

 

[soniam]

I found this from 7 days ago. It seems that somewhere Plan Disney is being contradictory. Not shocked.

https://plandisney.disney.go.com/qu...-mk-need-leave-bitwe-smaller-children-559252/

 

[soniam]

Re-entered MK a little before 7pm with a park res without issues. Lots, but not a ton, of people were leaving after the 6:30 NYE fireworks. Everyone was being let in when we left just after 2pm. Not very many people were coming in.

 

[HyperspaceMountainPilot]

We also had no trouble getting into Epcot at approximately 5:20PM (the turnstiles were nearly empty), I was nervous because even the B and C tier rides had Genie+ sell out. By the time we made it over to the country pavilions at 7 it didn’t feel very crowded and the lines for F&B were reasonable.

We caught the midnight fireworks at MK from our hotel room which has a spectacular view — they looked much more impressive than the fireworks I saw last year on 12/30 (admittedly from the people mover)— good luck to everyone trying to get in tomorrow!

 

[jrsharp21]

Good to know. I had asked this question several times and each time got the answer that as long as we had a reservation we would be fine to re-enter the park that day. At least now we know we may need a back up plan in case we can’t get back into MK around 6pm tonight. I bought the G+ hopper option just in case.

 

[ENJDisneyFan]

I guess I’m confused by this post. Why would you not be allowed to re-enter a park you have a reservation to? Isn’t that the point of a reservation? I don’t believe it has ever happened before and I haven’t seen anything to suggest otherwise. What am I missing?

 

[Grasshopper2016]

It hasn’t happened before and still seems highly unlikely to happen today because Disney would face an onslaught of bad PR and guest dissatisfaction if it did. Many people, as you say, assume that the right to unlimited reentry is inherent in the very notion of a park reservation.

That said, there have been inconsistent answers to this question posted by Disney on PlanDisney. Most say reentry is fine, but some warn that you could be turned away if the park hits capacity. And many Disney fan sites have been warning about this.

Confused by the conflicting signals, I emailed Disney to ask about this a couple of weeks ago. Here’s their response:

“You are welcome to exit our Theme Parks and return later in the same day to the same Theme Park at no additional charge. Admission to the Theme Parks is closely monitored and may need to be restricted or cut off when full capacity is reached. For this reason, we do not guarantee re-admittance to Guests who have exited the Park.”

 

[JJZMgailey]

Confused by the conflicting signals, I emailed Disney to ask about this a couple of weeks ago. Here’s their response:

“You are welcome to exit our Theme Parks and return later in the same day to the same Theme Park at no additional charge. Admission to the Theme Parks is closely monitored and may need to be restricted or cut off when full capacity is reached. For this reason, we do not guarantee re-admittance to Guests who have exited the Park.”

The bolded sentence above is one of the reasons we put the article up on wdwinfo.com – we won't know for sure what will happen unless park capacity is reached, but we want people to be prepared just in case.

 

[HyperspaceMountainPilot]

Anybody waiting to hop right now? Wondering how the lines are looking because MK and EPCOT sold out far in advance.

 

[SL6827]

It hasn’t happened before and still seems highly unlikely to happen today because Disney would face an onslaught of bad PR and guest dissatisfaction if it did. Many people, as you say, assume that the right to unlimited reentry is inherent in the very notion of a park reservation.

That said, there have been inconsistent answers to this question posted by Disney on PlanDisney. Most say reentry is fine, but some warn that you could be turned away if the park hits capacity. And many Disney fan sites have been warning about this.

Confused by the conflicting signals, I emailed Disney to ask about this a couple of weeks ago. Here’s their response:

“You are welcome to exit our Theme Parks and return later in the same day to the same Theme Park at no additional charge. Admission to the Theme Parks is closely monitored and may need to be restricted or cut off when full capacity is reached. For this reason, we do not guarantee re-admittance to Guests who have exited the Park.”

That's not right. If you have a reservation, you should be golden. Makes no sense.

 

[HyperspaceMountainPilot]

Update: just made it into EPCOT at 5:51. Super long line to get through security but no sign of being full.

 

[gottalovepluto]

Many of the FP attractions for Epcot were totally sold out by 10:30AM. We are at MK now and it’s extremely crowded. Hoping that more people will want to hop to MK than Epcot tonight.

As long as you aren’t counting Remy, FEA or TT in that it is an interesting data point. (Those often sell out in the morning on a normal day.)