How far in advance does Disney publish operating hours?

[mala55]

We are going to Disney April 2018. I'm working on out itinerary so I can book my ADRs next month. Disney hasn't put out their operating schedule yet. Very frustrating as I'm trying to plan around park hours, fireworks, shows, etc.

Does anyone know when I can expect to see the schedule?

Thank you!

 

[Klayfish]

Do you mean a schedule or the final schedule? I'm sure a schedule will be out soon (surprised it's not now), but the final one likely will be in March 2018.

 

[Parker Clan]

Disney has a history of updating their hours about a month before... So I feel like nothing is ever final

 

[tobikaye]

When I booking for January, it was literally, 180 days that they released each days hours. So on our 180 day, only the park hours for our check in day were showing. We did not worry too much, since last year I think we only kept 2 of our ADRs that we actually made at 180 days and changed all of the others, sometimes the day before or day of.

 

[mala55]

I did mean the most likely hours, not final. I realize changes can happen up to day of arrival, but I would imagine they don't change that much. For instance if I plan to make a reservation for The Tommorrowland Dessert Party and a dinner at BOG, I would want to make the BOG ADR a couple of hours before the dessert party. I would need to know what time the park is open until and if it's a fireworks night.

I usually stick with all my ADRs made at 180 days out.

Thanks

 

[DekrRini]

This is what I do. When planning my ADRs, I look at the current park hours closest to when I'm going. I make the assumption that the hours will be fairly similar. I do keep in mind that winter hours are shorter than summer ones. I try to remain flexible so if the EMH change, I'll change my ADRs. Any of the hard ones like BOG or CRT, I know I'll have to schedule my park hours to the ADR. It's not perfect, but it works for me.

 

[Robo]

Never mind.

 

[Haley R]

We are going to Disney April 2018. I'm working on out itinerary so I can book my ADRs next month. Disney hasn't put out their operating schedule yet. Very frustrating as I'm trying to plan around park hours, fireworks, shows, etc.

Does anyone know when I can expect to see the schedule?

Thank you!

This might not help with booking ADR, but we choose our park days based on the EMH schedule. I used Undercover Tourist's crowd calendar because they had EMH on it before Disney. I'm pretty sure the EMH follow a pattern most of the time.

 

[Queen of the WDW Scene]

Its a rolling window so the initial park hours come out 180 days in advance one day at a time.
Finalized hours tend to come out only 2-3 weeks in advance.

 

[mala55]

Thank you! You are all the best! Nice to wake up and find all these helpful responses.

 

[Kindermouse]

be careful if you are looking to book a PPO BOG or CRT. the changed park hours just a couple weeks prior to October and several people whose ADR's were PPO are now during the first hour of park operation which many consider to be prime park time that shouldn't be wasted on dining. People went to the mattresses at 180 for those ADR's and then gave them up when park hours changed.

When I loaded a calendar once it showed that fireworks had also changed times and now conflicted with my dinner ADR...thankfully it was a glitch and the wrong month was loaded but I about lost my mind when I thought that my oh so carefully planned dinner ADR at BOG now conflicted with the only night I would be in MK when the fireworks were showing.

Head these experiences and plan around the calendar knowing that you may need flexibility. Most of us are happy that we are getting extended hours but a few people also feel like they got burned by the 180 ADR process.

 

[kniquy]

HERE ya go.

Will some of these change?
Yup.

These are really only guesses as to what time the times will be based on past hours. It seems that Disney is only releasing exactly 180 days out. Yes, very frustrating when trying to make dining reservations, which leads me to make more reservations than what i need and then when the schedule is released -- cancel what i don't. But they can change again. It happened to me this past April wishes was scheduled for 10pm, so made a Wave 8pm reservation -- so i had plenty of time to get to the top of the world lounge. I just happened to check the time of wishing during dinner and noticed it had changed to 9pm. It put a damper on our dinner because we had to rush though to get to the lounge.

 

[Robo]

Never mind.

 

[Haley R]

HERE ya go.

Will some of these change?
Yup.

I don't know if I would go off of this. I looked at it just to see what my trip in March looked like and the times for Animal Kingdom don't match what's on Disney's website. I know that it could change either way. Disney says AK is open until 8pm and that website says 7 all week. I think 8 would be more likely.

 

[Robo]

You know, one day, I'll get the hang of this posting stuff.