I'm guilty of using the "Bad Fastpass strategy" according to Mousehacking

[123SA]

I generally pick 10,11,12 FP. I tried moving up my 2nd or 3rd FP last August but I didn't have a lot of luck.

 

[Ismo]

Do whatever works for you. We have our own system. We shoot for FP+ at roughly 11, 12 and 1PM, when the parks are busiest. We take a mid day break from around 2ish to 5ish, then hit another park at night.

This is pretty much what I like to do. I RD, ride some big rides then like to take a break at the hotel when it's the hottest out. If I can, I'll try to pull FPs for my second park that day.

 

[DisLiss]

Do what works for you. If you're happy with how you're using the system then go for it. Let's face it, if we all decide we want our FPs at the same time, it'll just be more difficult to get any, right? It's good if some of us use them early and some save some for fairly late.

 

[Tomh]

I usually schedule my first FP for either 9:30 - 10:30, or 10:00 - 11:00. I take advantage of those early morning short lines as much as possible, and head into that first FP towards the last half of it's window. I will try to bump up the second one, sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. I don't worry about it too much. If I can't bump it up, I will hop on any other ride with a short wait in the general area to fill in until the next window opens. As soon as I tap into my 2nd FP, I will then try to bump up my 3rd. This usually works. As soon as I tap into FP #3, I then start using refresh to try to grab number 4 for as soon as possible, and so goes my day.

This has worked well for us in MK, Epcot, and AK. We haven't been to DHS recently, so I haven't tried this there.

 

[JETSDAD]

We use lots of FP's early and often. MK we may do 1 or 2 standby first thing but then it's FP from there on out. Tiered parks we try to have used/burned 3 FP's in the first hour. I guess we use a horrible strategy lol.

 

[annadreamsofdisneyworld]

I aim for 9:30, 10:30, 11:30. I try to get the first 3 done before 12 then schedule the next one for after lunch.

 

[SaintsManiac]

We use lots of FP's early and often. MK we may do 1 or 2 standby first thing but then it's FP from there on out. Tiered parks we try to have used/burned 3 FP's in the first hour. I guess we use a horrible strategy lol.

Same for us. We rope drop the MK, ride 2 rides and use the first FP before it expires 10-10:30ish. Then we roll them.

For the other parks we do not rope drop.

 

[Nick6300]

We book 10, 11, 12... Rope Drop headliners from opening until 11... Ride FP1 at 11:10, FP2 immediately after, and FP3 at 11:55. All 3 done in 45-50 minutes and no need to modify anything. Go for more after that then get out of Dodge while the park is getting crowded. Head back to a park at about 5:00. Average 8+ FPs a day that way.

Same strategy as ours except an hr later. We had 9am 7DMT, 10am Pan, 11am Space. We’d go on 7D at 10:10-10:15, say 10 min getting through/waiting in FP line, 3 min on, 3 min to Pan, Pan at 10:30, Space at 10:55 - would have to burn few min before by going to restroom next door. Not usually able to move 3rd FP since we try get a decent 3rd FP, that isn’t easy to move up in am. And that’s not a large margin of time to work with for a potential move up.
4th FP selected at 10:55am. Typically aim for 10FP or so if staying all day. If especially busy, either leave to diff park w/ FP or mix in a lot of shows like Tiki, Country Bears, Presidents, Carousel.

 

[mjr0483]

Too much work for me.

 

[Nick6300]

Trying to imagine how the mouse hacking strategy would work well... EP would be easier to move up Nemo (3rd) after Spaceship (2nd) or maybe possible to move before Spaceship if Spaceship gapped 15-30 after 1st FP but how much time is that really saving you? We typically spend time walking around the Seas to see the fishes, sometimes also see Turtle Talk, and Spaceship is a bit of a walk back and a long attraction. AK might be a better option since EP doesn’t have worthwhile tier 2s, but can’t see moving up Everest, Kali, or Safari that easily for a small target in the am. Maybe early Jan for Kali.

 

[Nick6300]

We use lots of FP's early and often. MK we may do 1 or 2 standby first thing but then it's FP from there on out. Tiered parks we try to have used/burned 3 FP's in the first hour. I guess we use a horrible strategy lol.

Does burning 3 quickly work for you well at a non MK park? So you’d pick 2 maybe closeby tier 2 FPs after the 1st tier one to tap, move up if possible, and tap to go after another tier 1. Presumably 1 extra Soarin or Test Track, but mainly for HS until the re-tier.

 

[Anna131517]

We never do a 4th FP. We just do three at the beginning of the day and go with the flow. We do rope drop or get an early breakfast in the park. I’m always pleasantly surprised by some of the stuff we walk onto. This year I really enjoyed the little mermaid show at HS and enchanted tales with belle and speedway at MK. Never did them before, walked in when there was little to no wait, and the kids and I loved it.

 

[MomOTwins]

Does burning 3 quickly work for you well at a non MK park? So you’d pick 2 maybe closeby tier 2 FPs after the 1st tier one to tap, move up if possible, and tap to go after another tier 1. Presumably 1 extra Soarin or Test Track, but mainly for HS until the re-tier.

Yes, I think early FPs are the way to go everywhere followed by refresh the rest of the day. The sooner you use up your FPs, the sooner you can start getting more, and the better selection you will have for your 4th.

 

[JETSDAD]

Does burning 3 quickly work for you well at a non MK park? So you’d pick 2 maybe closeby tier 2 FPs after the 1st tier one to tap, move up if possible, and tap to go after another tier 1. Presumably 1 extra Soarin or Test Track, but mainly for HS until the re-tier.

For Epcot we'll often actually start the day with only 1 FP, that being a Tier 1 at 9AM. If we get there right at RD we may ride it once standby and then right back on with the FP otherwise we'll just go straight to the FP. As soon as we tap into the tier 1 we'll look for a tier 2 nearby, either use or burn that tier 2 (often we'll actually use it but it depends on the plan for the day), then do it again for the third FP. Now we're an hour or so into the day and making additional tier 1 FP's (Soarin' has been an easy one to get but we also ride TT and FEA this way). At HS (pre-ROTR) we had used our tier 1 FP at 9AM and burned 2 tier 2 FP's by 9:30. There were so many tier 1 FP's available that we were able to take advantage of because we were already able to select more early into the day.

Sometimes we have different strategies depending on the plans for the day. There are times where we want to sleep in so we may set a FP or two to expire before a tier 1 (sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't though it's has been working well for us recently). I think it's good to know a number of strategies just in case plans change or the system is acting screwy but refreshing for FP's gets us on to a lot of rides without waiting (or minimal wait). If I can save 20 minutes here and 10 minutes there, that's another ride I can do instead of waiting around (not even including the waits on the top tier rides).

 

[Faldred]

Specific situation is always more important than generic advice. I'm doing a whirlwind 2-day trip with old non-expiring park hoppers I have days left on, prioritizing Pandora and SWGE because they're both new for me. I booked late (kind of an impulsive decision to go at all) and so my 1st day is centered around when I could get ANY Flight of Passage FP - wound up being late afternoon - 4:30 or so, so I built my day (and other FP selections) around that - no way would I ever normally use a1st 3 FP selection for Rivers of Light, but since I have no real hope for a 4th FP anyway, why not guarantee myself a seat to a show I've never seen? But since I'm now loaded up late afternoon/early evening at AK, I figure I can rope drop MK and get a few things in without FP before lunch and a transit over to AK.

Day 2 is just the opposite - I'm at DHS for rope drop (and RotR boarding group signup) and while I didn't get Slinky Dog or Millennium Falcon, I do have a decent set of early FPs (9:00 Tower of Terror, 11:00 Toy Story Midway Mania), 12:30 Star Tours), so here I'm hoping to score a 4th FP, likely to use later in the day at MK where I'm going for EMH that night.

This plan works for this trip and the availability of what I could get about 30-45 days out. It won't work for everybody and not necessarily even for me for another trip.

 

[PrincessWithABlaster]

The other thing I don’t understand is why mouse hacking doesn’t understand that having a 9:00 or 9:15 FP doesn’t mean you’re using it at 9:15. It’s good until 10:15 or 10:30. Then you can ride it back to back with your second FP.
Admittedly, I have on occasion used an FP at 9:15 but those were FOP and 7DMT and I was specifically avoiding backtracking in those cases. Sometimes sanity wins out over ‘good strategy’.

 

[Little E]

@Nick6300 thank you for posting the Mousehacking link. I had never seen this before, and it was really helpful to read through. I'm so grateful for everyone's responses on this thread. It's great to get a variety of perspectives.

We have been to WDW many times, but never during spring break. Our trip this year falls at the end of March/beginning of April and I'm really trying to figure out the best approach to address spring break crowds. The Mousehackers link makes it sound like tons of awesome FPs are available after the first three FPs are used. Is this really the case? We are a family of 4, so I get that it's easier to snag FPs for smaller groups.

Am I correct in assuming it's easier to pick up 4th and 5th FPs for the more popular rides at MK because there are more rides, and maybe less likely to pick up headliner 4th and 5th FPs at the other parks?

 

[_19disnA]

There are lots of Disney related websites/blogs/etc. and you can probably find an opinion on most topics. Do what makes sense for you/your family regarding FastPass, no one approach works for everyone. Honestly, you can only pre-reserve 3 FastPasses each day, so a lot of the stuff you will read is making a bigger deal out of this then is required. When we went to Disney last year, we reserved FastPasses for the rides we thought would have the longest lines (i.e. most popular rides) and which park we would do each day. None of us wanted to wait in 2hr lines for any ride.

It also helps to know the park layout so you aren't constantly walking from one end of the park to the other just to satisfy your next FastPass. Beyond that, we didn't think it was that big of a deal.

 

[cjlong88]

I think the only "bad" FastPass strategy is simply not using the FP system.

You know what works for you and your family. You do you!

 

[Bete]

I agree with other posters that the bigger your group is the harder it is to change. Even if you divide the group into two or more groups then it's even harder to change same day; because, you have two groups or more groups to change.
like early magic hours without

If we are onsite, we use extra magic mornings and then get to the back of the park when rope drop happens for the general public. We go another hour without fastpass in the back of the park; until, the general public catches up to us. Now, we use our three fastpasses usually an hour apart. This has always worked for us without changing mid-stream. We check for a 4th fastpass and if it's not looking good we leave the park. We take a break and look for the fourth fastpass later early in the evening. Our evening we spend enjoying shows and fireworks while looking for a 5th or 6th Fastpass. Sometimes, we will stand in the regular ride line depending on the wait times.