Help planning please - October 2023

[Sadeesmom]

I always seem to miss something obvious when looking at timeframes (a school holiday or race/event or SOMETHING) that makes it a little more crazy or abnormal at WDW. Other than Halloween decorations/parties, what would be helpful to know for October 19-29, 2023? We are only going to pick a part of that, but undecided on which days to select. Originally, it was November, but want to avoid Jersey Week which is the only week available for this group of travelers.

Thanks experts!

 

[Sherlee]

Those dates are MEA (Fall Break) in Minnesota and the entire state goes to Florida. However, I don't think Minnesota is populous enough to affect WDW as a whole, unless you are trying to get a flight out of here for that week. Throughout the years, we have encountered other state fall breaks, Utah comes to mind.
Historically, though, that week has hosted the large Gartner IT convention. Again, I don't think this affects park attendance too much as they are in meetings, etc. It is held at the Swan & Dolphin and fills up those hotels and much of Yacht, Beach, and Boardwalk. They usually do a park buyout one night for their big party, either at WDW or Universal.

 

[TheSouthernBelle]

October has progressively gotten to be a lot more busy over the last 5-7 years. I think between the halloween parties, columbus day crowds and states with fall breaks, it's a mixed bag. I think sticking to earlier in the month is always a little lighter than closer to halloween and of course, if possible, avoiding weekend crowds. Crowds are very finicky from park to park, it can feel like there's nobody at MK and on the same day DHS feels shoulder to shoulder.

My general rule of thumb is we avoid MK on Mondays and Saturdays-DHS is always a slammer so unless there's a reason to be there like EEH, we usually use DHS as our wildcard and go when we want to, Epcot is a usually busiest on the weekends so we usually make this our weekday/non holiday park and AK is always the least busy so this can be a Saturday/weekend park without any real issues or fit into the schedule as needed. I do watch the touring plans crowd calendar not so much because it's really that accurate, they're never that great, but it does help with keeping up with events, park hours, fireworks, etc.