How bad is Disney World crowd wise during Christmas?

[Disneyland1084]

Ouch!

I see your problem. Looks like a choice between summer heat and Christmas crowds.

The good news is, if you are there two weeks, you will have lots of time to not worry too much if it is too crowded or too hot for you some days. Which depends upon when you go - Christmas or summer.

On days that you know will be crazy busy, make other plans. Christmas Day you could go to the park early and stay only as long as the crowd is bearable. Maybe plan to stay until about 11:00am? Have all your fast passes booked for late morning. Then go to a nice character lunch at cinderellas castle or the crystal palace. After the meal head back to the resort and spend some time with previously planed Christmas tradition activities. We would do our gift exchanges and stockings then. Next go for a game of golf or some other pre arranged, booked activity that has limited capacity. Finish with dinner at a nice pre booked restaurant (example:Sanaa - take a taxi). At the end of day, watch fireworks from your resort, if possible, or just go 'home' to your resort and relax. It is Christmas Day and you are in the happiest place on earth! Just go with the attitude that you WILL enjoy it, and you will.

My choice would obviously be to go at Christmas and deal with the crowds. But my family has members that would not deal with the heat of summer at all well. So I start with making sure that we all will be comfortable and make my plans from there. If your family will be OK or even just better with dealing with heat then summer could work better for you. Again, use strategies that others have suggested to get out of the heat each day. Stay in a resort with a great pool and take advantage of it as often as possible.

Only you know what will work best for you and yours.

Let us know what you decide!

Good luck!

What wonderful suggestions.Thank you. I know when we do go Magic Kingdom will be our main park, but we will be going to many others too. Universal Studios, Epcot, Waterparks(are those even open in the winter?) etc.. At this point I have no idea what we'll decide. We have at least two years to think about it.

 

[outahere]

What wonderful suggestions.Thank you. I know when we do go Magic Kingdom will be our main park, but we will be going to many others too. Universal Studios, Epcot, Waterparks(are those even open in the winter?) etc.. At this point I have no idea what we'll decide. We have at least two years to think about it.

At least one of the Disney waterparks in open during the winter. They usually close one for a refurb for a couple of months.

 

[thisismyusername]

If you'd really like to get to the waterparks and have the full Disney experience, just keep in mind that Christmas is hit or miss with weather--it may be warm enough for use to one, but I wouldn't count on it as some of your days may only be in the 60s (or even cooler). I've been to Disney 3x in December, and the weather has never been so hot that I felt compelled to go swimming, and many of our days were spent in jeans and light jackets. I really can't imagine walking around a water park, wet, while waiting in line for a slide, in temps lower than 80, and it's usually not that warm then. I know some people can and do use the waterparks in cooler weather, but I don't think I'd find much enjoyment shivering throughout my experience.