Easy wdw touring plan vs touring plans

[DisneyBrat]

I have been comparing these two tour plans and am confused to which one is best. Can anyone tell me if they have tried both and which one worked best?

 

[supersnoop]

I have been comparing these two tour plans and am confused to which one is best. Can anyone tell me if they have tried both and which one worked best?

Pick your park based on EasyWDW, lay out your day on TouringPlans.com

 

[annabug]

Pick your park based on EasyWDW, lay out your day on TouringPlans.com

I plan on doing this too.

 

[SeanTomorrow]

I take the EasyWDW recommended parks with a grain of salt. Nothing against their accuracy or anything! Just some of their assumptions don't always apply, for example:
- They avoid EMH because it draws crowds. But if you actually use the EMH and take a mid day break, it might be worth it
- They optimize for the best time to visit over the week. But you might not have a full week of flexibility.

So don't feel bad visiting on a "not recommended" day if it works for you!

 

[Supermom3]

Pick your park based on EasyWDW, lay out your day on TouringPlans.com

This is what I plan on doing, but I also like to consult Kenny the Pirate's site for an idea of how to best fit in meeting characters into my touring plan. Then I make a personalized plan on TP with breaks built in on the plan to meet characters.

 

[Letsbgoofy]

They avoid EMH because it draws crowds. But if you actually use the EMH and take a mid day break, it might be worth it

If you take a mid day break and move to another park I would agree with you. I would not go to an early EMH park, take a break, and then go back to that same park at night.

We don't pay to park hop anymore, so we avoid the EMH parks. I recommend easywdw.com to everyone that I know who travels to WDW.

FP+ is going to make it so that you really need to come up with your own touring plans (which I have done since our first trip) based on when and where your FP+ reservations are.

 

[LSUfan4444]

I prefer Easy WDW but more importantly than the one you choose to follow is that you should remain consistent with that site. The theories often clash and you will find a strategy with touring plans may be based off of what they think is a non recommended day while Easy WDW classifies it as a recommended day. How you decide to tour (say Magic Kingdom for example) a park on a particular morning might be vastly different on a recommended vs non recommended day.

 

[SeanTomorrow]

If you take a mid day break and move to another park I would agree with you. I would not go to an early EMH park, take a break, and then go back to that same park at night.

Well, it all depends on your alternatives. Here's the real example I have in mind, planning for 2 days at the MK:

MK day 1: Early morning hours, crowds 5/10 on TP. EasyWDW DOES NOT recommend

MK day 2: No early morning hours, crowds 6/10 on TP. EasyWDW DOES recommend

This is why I take their recommendations with a grain of salt. You have to test their reasoning against your alternatives, not just accept their conclusions. They're saying there are other days of the week that might work better, but it's not a 1:1 relationship that recommended = low crowds.

 

[LSUfan4444]

What days are you talking about? Using TPs crowd levels then Easy WDW's recommendations is a recipe for disaster. Shorter trips that have a park necessity certainly brings the option of attending a non-recommended park into play a bit more, but it doesn't mean the recommendation is inaccurate.

 

[minnie mum]

Well, it all depends on your alternatives. Here's the real example I have in mind, planning for 2 days at the MK:

MK day 1: Early morning hours, crowds 5/10 on TP. EasyWDW DOES NOT recommend

MK day 2: No early morning hours, crowds 6/10 on TP. EasyWDW DOES recommend

This is why I take their recommendations with a grain of salt. You have to test their reasoning against your alternatives, not just accept their conclusions. They're saying there are other days of the week that might work better, but it's not a 1:1 relationship that recommended = low crowds.

You say take them with a grain of salt. I say read Josh's daily explanation and discussion. T
He explains the reasons behind his recommendations. More goes into them than just the crowd levels.

 

[Leeba]

Are these both paid sites (or apps)? It looks like touring plans is $12.95 for a year ... is there a free version? I couldn't find anything on quick glance.

 

[LSUfan4444]

Easy WDW is free, another reason I prefer it.

 

[SeanTomorrow]

You say take them with a grain of salt. I say read Josh's daily explanation and discussion. T
He explains the reasons behind his recommendations. More goes into them than just the crowd levels.

I totally agree. My point is that the reasoning might not be relevant to you (for example, the fact that there are lower crowds on another day doesn't matter if you're not there that day). Absolutely read those daily summaries to decide for yourself.

This might be nit picking, but I do think using the terms "recommended" or "not recommended" carries a more heft than is warranted. Really not that big a deal, but I think more neutral language would acknowledge that he's NOT optimizing for your particular constraints, like what days you have available.

Oh, and the days I'm talking about are Feb 26 & 27th if you want to check my work. Maybe you'll have a better solution!

 

[StatlerNotWaldorf]

I guess I am in the minority but I am a happy subscriber to Touring Plans. I trust their recommendations and like that I can enter dates for them to track changes in projected crows levels. Then I can also attach touring plans to those days. Easily worth the money in my mind.

 

[Laketravis]

It is also going to depend on whether or not you are staying on-site and whether or not you are willing to park hop.

I tend to show up for morning EMH at the parks that EasyWDW doesn't recommend but then I leave them when the crowds start to show up and head for a park he does recommend. While his reasons for his recommendations are certainly valid, I think it's up to each user to decide how to best utilize those recommendations.

TP, on the other hand, attempts to provide much more granular details in the form of crowd level numbers that are not based on actual crowd levels but attraction wait times, and then only for a sample base of attractions based on wait times between 10am and 5pm each day. I personally think that methodology, which was devised before the advent of FP+, is no longer as accurate as it used to be because FP+ distributes capacity over a greater number of attractions over a broader base of time than TP measures.

So as long as you aren't looking for "How long will I be standing in line for Tower of Terror on August 19th at 1pm?", I think both can be used as subjective guides to make a park decision on. Then test your decision by looking at actual wait times in the parks on a day that is rated the same by either site as the day you plan on visiting.

 

[SeanTomorrow]

By the way, anyone know if those EasyWDW daily summaries are generated by algorithm? Or is he writing a little essay for every single day? That'd be very impressive, but also a little scary

 

[Laketravis]

By the way, anyone know if those EasyWDW daily summaries are generated by algorithm? Or is he writing a little essay for every single day? That'd be very impressive, but also a little scary

My understanding is that he's tapping the same Disney API that the other sites use to show real time, but that he's also streaming it to a database and that he had some help setting up the SP's that would translate that data into the tables you see on his site.

 

[SplashMo]

EasyWDW is easier to use. For folks that have not planned. EasyWDW can get you to a much better position really quickly. For folks that have more time you can combine the two...

Easy WDW recommends two Epcot days (or two half days) so you can ride SOARIN and TT. That seems a bit conservative. You should be able to Rope Drop one ride and FP+ the other (Also single rider TT). In all fairness he mentions this. However I think most folks will schedule 2 Epcot days after reading EasyWDW.

Key steps are determining when to go, how long to stay, park hoppers or not, best days for each park and then touring plans for each park. Then figure out how FP+ can help you better meet your goals.

 

[supersnoop]

Well, it all depends on your alternatives. Here's the real example I have in mind, planning for 2 days at the MK:

MK day 1: Early morning hours, crowds 5/10 on TP. EasyWDW DOES NOT recommend

MK day 2: No early morning hours, crowds 6/10 on TP. EasyWDW DOES recommend

This is why I take their recommendations with a grain of salt. You have to test their reasoning against your alternatives, not just accept their conclusions. They're saying there are other days of the week that might work better, but it's not a 1:1 relationship that recommended = low crowds.

Just because TP says one day is a 5 and the other day is a 6 doesn't mean that EasyWDW agrees with those rankings. I believe EasyWDW's daily crowd level predictions are more accurate than TP.

Also remember that EasyWDW takes the other parks into account when making recommenations. For your example, Epcot is a 2 on day 1, and a 4 on day 2. Which is better? A 2 day at Epcot followed by a 6 at Magic Kingdom, or a 5 at Magic Kingdom followed by a 4 at Epcot. 2+6=8, while 5+4=9; so you're better off, in total, with the higher crowd level at Magic Kingdom when you consider the trade-off (if you insist on using TP crowd level figures).

 

[SeanTomorrow]

I believe EasyWDW's daily crowd level predictions are more accurate than TP.

Them's fightin words!!

Just kidding -- really that would be amazing and I must be missing something big. My impression was that EasyWdW summarizes crowds as one number for all parks (not per park), and it's not tied to wait times, and they don't publish accuracy after the fact. I'd have no way to tell if they're accurate or not. Seriously, did I miss a section of the website? Maybe I'm using it wrong?

I've been impressed that TP posts a weekly review of their predictions, and that they're tied to something measurable (wait times). A lot of people have pointed out that it's not perfect. It uses sampling of just certain rides, and only for certain time periods, etc. But I don't even know how to judge another site's accuracy without, you know, having an objective measure and then looking at how they did against that.

Just to be clear, none of this means you shouldn't use EasyWDW. If you like it, go for it.