How important is rope drop?

[MouseMum]

In doing my touring plans, I have us arriving at the parks in enough time to be up near the front of the rope drop crowds. However, toward the end of my trip (end of August) predicted crowd levels drop substantially. So couldn't we be arriving later on these days? As an example we'll be at MK on a CL 2 day. Even if we still do arrive for rope drop, could we still arrive later than the 8:15 I'll be arriving at when we do an earlier MK day which has a CL prediction of 9? If we can all sleep in a half hour later, then I'd definitely like to take advantage of the lower crowds by showing up later.

 

[ChasingLeslie]

Remember that crowd calendars are a prediction, and not a guarantee. The CCs said 8s for the beginning of my trip, and then they dropped to 7. In reality, the first three days were super light and last four were much higher crowds.

Consider the calendars, but don't pin all of your vacation dreams on it.

 

[chapie1968]

The answer is different all the time. Too many factors.

We have been to WDW on the average of once a year since around 1983 and I have never done the rope drop and I think I might remember one trip we missed a ride that we wanted to do.

If you have never been there before, I would say rope drop is a pretty good thing to do as you can knock out a lot of the longer queue rides early before the crowds build. Then again, if you are there for a long period of time(7,8,9,10 days) you will have plenty of time to do most of it. Also if you go when crowd levels are low, you probably won't even need rope drop.

As I said, many factors play into it.

We are going on August 27th and I am getting up early BY MYSELF to go to Magic Kingdom rope drop, not for the lines but to see the opening show that I have never had a chance to witness.

 

[dkrauss]

In my opinion there is only 1 park that's worth doing for RD..........that would be the MK, and only because the Welcome Show is so cool ..........oh yeah and 7DMT can be had for under 40 minutes.........is that good?

RD at the other parks is all about doing the BIG attractions/rides in those parks............and we only do that when we haven't got a particularly popular FP..........like the new Frozen ride........but everyone has that same plan. In Epcot since the 3rd theatre opened for Soar'in the lines have been better..........our only reason for arriving early would be Test Track. In AK you've got KS and EE............now you can do multiple rides on EE if you get to the park at RD but if you get in by 9am you can probably get 2 rides. At HS the only reason to do RD (IMHO) is to get your youngling on the list for Jedi Training TSMM has a new track that has reduced the lines there in a big way. ToT and RnR can be gotten early too............but you have to want to do both for it to make sense (again in my opinion).

OP, your plan is fine in my mind............. Have a wonderful trip!

Doug

 

[thepicklebee]

I think that if your goal is to hit every major attraction in a park with minimal wait time, then rope drop is a must.

If you want to leisurely enjoy a day at the parks and have fastpasses for your must do's - then I don't think it's a big deal.

I have gone to the world both commando touring with a specific touring plan and strategy, and the laid back approach. I much prefer the laid back style - and the current fast pass system works great for this. I have my top three things guaranteed for me and can take the rest of the day as it comes.

That said, I've also been to Disney a lot, and am no longer compelled to hit everything. I don't get a lot of time off every year so I don't like feeling like I need a vacation from my vacation when I get home.

 

[Geoff_M]

RD is really key for a couple of different things:
1) If you want to try and ride a headline attraction without a FP with little or no wait.
2) In the case of MK, we've found that there's about a 60 minute "sweet spot" after RD where you can get a whole lot accomplished during that time that it would take hours to repeat later in the day. I've found that we can "blitz" the entirety of Fantasyland in 45 minutes if we're at RD.

Now, I will say that the advent of FP+ has taken some of the pressure to be there at RD off for us in general. During a 7-day visit last August I think we only did RD once (at MK, for reason #2 above), and I do think that if you're there at a unusually low time of year that early window of opportunity will be wider such that getting there 30 minutes later would still work well for you. However, I will say that I'm not one to think that 30 minutes of sleep will make the difference between "tired" and "refreshed," but your results may vary.

 

[rwdavis2]

Keep in mind if the crowds really do drop and WDW expects fewer guest they may very well cut capacity on an attraction. For example, shutting down one side of Space Mountain. This then causes wait times to go back up.

 

[loves to dive]

As other's have pointed out, it all depends on what your style is and what you want to get accomplished. Also, as others have pointed out, the crowd calendars are just an educated guess at best so I would take them with a grain of salt. The only time we've ever done rope drop is if we just so happen to be up and ready, when I make FPs I never make them earlier than 10 am. We go often and easy, seat of the pants type vacation is our style. If we miss a ride, oh well, we missed that ride, move on.

 

[Klayfish]

Yep, don't rely on the calendars, they're just educated guesses. We used to be big believers in RD, but have sort of changed our stance.

Without a doubt, if it's a holiday and/or you MUST get on a top tier ride without waiting and without a FP+, then doing RD helps. Otherwise, we've found it not necessary if you use FP+ to your advantage. For example, in 2015 we had a 16 day trip. I didn't count, but I bet we did 9 or 10 RDs. This summer, we had a 17 day trip. We did zero RDs, except for a water park. Truthfully, we didn't really miss on anything that made us say "Gee, wish we had been here for RD". There were several days where we arrived close to RD, say 10-15 minutes after. That does help. But IMO, you don't need to be standing in that massive herd of a stampede. I'm sure the time will come when we do it again, but it's no longer a "must" for us.

 

[SaintsManiac]

For my family rope drop is good for every park but Epcot.

AK because you can basically walk on everything and it's not too hot yet. (went in December and it was HOT by lunch)

HS was kind of an accident for us but it meant walk on RnR and gave us time to stroll around and take our time.

MK because we like to head to Adventureland or Frontierland while everyone runs to 7DMT

 

[redsbe]

Also length of trip plus interest in riding a popular attraction multiple times (especially on same day) can also make RD much more important then longer stays of 7 days or more with multiple visits to same park. For example a trip under 5 days with perhaps only 1-2 days in MK and wanting to ride 7DMR, PP, or a Mountain, RD can help make that aim much easier with fewer lines.

 

[aprincessatlast]

Personally I would not stress too much over it. Rope drop is good but would not kill myself to be at the front of the pack. We did get the most accomplished the first 2-3 and last 2 hours of everyday. That of course is because we left the parks for a good chunk of the middle part of the day. We did most of everything and only missed the smaller things like Universe of Energy at Epcot and Monsters Inc at MK, that we chose not to do. We rode the headliners 3-4 times a piece, which was good for us for a week stay. We never made it exactly at rope drop but I would say about 15-30 minutes after, which was enough time to not feel like we were running with the bulls but still be ahead of the masses. FWIW enjoy the Poly, we just got back and it was amazing!

 

[YawningDodo]

I'm not going to go into the logistical advantages or disadvantages, since I think it's been covered pretty well and it's down in no small part to personal preference. I'd just say that I really like to hit rope drop for each park once because I really enjoy being there for the opening - it just makes the start of the day feel really special. Magic Kingdom's opening show has already been mentioned, but I also loved the rope drop show at Animal Kingdom this last fall, and I was really glad we got there in time to see it.

 

[dlavender]

MK because we like to head to Adventureland or Frontierland while everyone runs to 7DMT

Using this strategy last year we rode BTMRR 3x's, Splash, PoTC, JC, and HM in the first hour and 15 minutes! Really freed up our day and helped me to feel so accomplished early in the day. Made the rest of the day a breeze since we already got to do so much.

 

[TigerlilyAJ]

When we have managed RD, which was only about 50% of the time we tried, in our two DLR trips, I was never disappointed. No one wants to get up and out the door early on vacation, so the crowds are low once you get inside the park. It was everything people promised.
However, "no one" includes my family, so it was kind of miserable before we actually got into the parks on our second trip, which was in a High Season, August, so RD meant 8am and EMH meant 7am. Our first trip was in a Low, from Halloween through the first two weeks of November, and everything opened an hour later, and that hour made everything so much easier. We made RD more on that trip, because getting kids up, fed, and dressed at 7am, rather than 6am, is a HUGE difference for our crew. I would blow it off if you have too many Hard to Rise people in your party, because the stress was not what I wanted on my vacation.
That's part of my WDW fears. Because of travel times, our December trip seems to be shaping up like our DLR August trip in that we'll have to get up at 6am (before the sun rises in December Orlando!) to get transport at 7am to make any PPO breakfasts or other 8am events (like possibly changing opening hours as Christmas nears). I changed our ADR+park touring plans so that we won't have to get up early the day after our MVMCP.
So, go for it when you can, but drop it if you stay out late for fireworks or a party.

 

[redsbe]

We never RD EMH, in fact plan our days around EMH so as to hit a park for RD at regular 9am opening, as I can agree getting up before 7am to make 8am EMH RD is no fun for anyone! And in contrast to our other vacations we never seemed to have a problem getting anyone including young, old and teenagers out of bed at WDW to make a 9am RD - due to the excitement of being at WDW.

 

[teacher100]

I was able to make FP reservations, go to Frozen, Soaring and Test track all in the first hour at Epcot. If you need to make fp reservations at epcot at a Kiosk you need to do that first.

We went to MK this morning around 9:30 Bag Check was Long! (around 15-20 minutes). I gave my small purse to my son to put in the backpack while I went to make SDFP. I know it was one of the mornings that people could pay to enter the park early however.

My family isn't a huge rope drop family so we really don't make it often.

 

[DisneyKeepsUsYoung]

I have been to WDW 4 trips and have never made rope drop. I have 2 small kids that are not early risers. Waking them even 30 min early does make a BIG difference in their moods for the rest of the day. And we move slower by the end of the week from staying for fireworks. We have never felt like we didn't have a great time and accomplish what we wanted. Non-grouchy kids make for a happy vacation for all of us. I look forward to seeing the MK opening show one day, (hopefully once this next trip), but I will not stress over it as our days feel plenty Magical without alarm clocks on vacation.

 

[JohnDaleswife]

We have usually always arrived around 10-15 minutes after rope drop. Not sure how that will work out in February.

 

[scrapquitler]

In doing my touring plans, I have us arriving at the parks in enough time to be up near the front of the rope drop crowds. However, toward the end of my trip (end of August) predicted crowd levels drop substantially. So couldn't we be arriving later on these days? As an example we'll be at MK on a CL 2 day. Even if we still do arrive for rope drop, could we still arrive later than the 8:15 I'll be arriving at when we do an earlier MK day which has a CL prediction of 9? If we can all sleep in a half hour later, then I'd definitely like to take advantage of the lower crowds by showing up later.

I've never done rope drop, ever. Our experience is that it's easier to arrive a bit later and avoid the crush of the crowd waiting for the bus, waiting for bag check, waiting at the turnstiles etc. We get on the bus around 9:00 on a 9:00 open day and avoid all the craziness and still don't wait forever in line. But we also never do princess meet and greets, 7DMT first thing in the morning, and will never plan to do FEA without a FP.