Is Our October Vacation Going to be More Crowded?

Kindermouse · Sep 18, 2017

deide71 said:
We have been going in October since 2005. The crowds have been increasing noticeably. That being said I still love October trips. The weather is usually fantastic ( one year had a couple of 90 degree days but generally mild with very little rain).

Get to the parks before rope drop and plan your fastpasses wisely. Use a good touringplan and you will have a great trip!

This. It absolutely captures my October trips to Disneyland over the last 10 years to a T (minus about 3 years in the middle when I was at a job that didnt have time off in October-that sucked). Has it gotten more crowded-yep. But I still love October. Fall is my favorite season, my birthday, and it has costumes and ersatz spooky things. It is still awesome and it will be fun no matter what. I expect the same to hold true for WDW and this years Mickeys not so scary.

agavegirl1 · Sep 19, 2017

I love October. But yes, it has been getting busier. I go every 4 years so 2010,2014 and a planned 2018 trip. (Also a number of trips prior but I didn't really lurk or subscribe here). 2010 was really great, a few cool nights, nothing unmanageable and crowds were like 3-4 on weekdays. 2014 was 5-7 crowds on weekdays. Weather was the best I have ever had in Orlando. No clue on 2018 quite yet. I have a Touring Plans test trip set up with similar dates for our 2018 trip to get general planning ideas. There are plans that work for busy days and plans for not so busy days but I get updates for my "fake" or "test" plans. New hours change the crowd calendars. New events also change them (adding a ROL show etc). I have been receiving updates re crowd calendars from Touring plans for selected late October dates (I have a two year subscription). I will pay a little more attention to my plan and adjust my expectations accordingly. If you only go every four years for a couple of decades (I went before joining this board with children and only used Touring Plans), you notice a trend. October is still a great time to go.

I like October for weather and fall decor. I like October for Food and Wine and I can deal with October if it throws me a curve.