Magic band -staying offsite

[tinkerbelletreasure]

I have a question. We are staying offsite in July. I know you can buy magic bands from the Disney Store, or in the parks, but I am wondering if a) we will get much use out of them. B) are they reusable for future trips?

 

[tzolkin]

I have a question. We are staying offsite in July. I know you can buy magic bands from the Disney Store, or in the parks, but I am wondering if a) we will get much use out of them. B) are they reusable for future trips?

You will use them for park tickets and FP. So, it just depends on if you think they are worth it for that. (On site guests also have room key and charging on them.). We went to MVMCP (nothing else) over Thanksgiving and our teen DD did not stay on site with us (stayed with family), but she still bought a MB so she had one like the rest of us and it was convenient for FPs.

Yes, they are reusable.

 

[CarolynFH]

We were very fortunate to go to WDW 5 times last year, the first time onsite and the others offsite. When staying offsite we found the MBs were very useful - a lot easier to scan the band to enter the parks and for FP+ than to get the tickets out every time. Just wish we could have used them to pay too!

 

[tinkerbelletreasure]

Thanks! I wanted one of the special $30 ones but I didn't want to spend that much if we could only use them for the one trip.

 

[pad406]

There are 2 RFID chips in them. One, which is passive, is used for Park Entry, FP+, charging etc. This does not require a battery and should last indefinitely. The other is active, and does have a battery. As far as I know this is currently only used for On Ride photos and BOG (this is how the waiters find you). The battery has a life expectancy of about 2 years. Once the battery dies, these functions will no longer work, but the rest should.

 

[Brian Noble]

I could live without them personally, and would not have bought them for our most recent offsite stay, but we had some from an earlier stay that we re-used, no problem.

 

[Candleshoe]

I could live without them personally, and would not have bought them for our most recent offsite stay, but we had some from an earlier stay that we re-used, no problem.

Brian, did you guys have the MM? It's my understanding that they're necessary to get the auto-add-to-account features of MM, and the two videos.

 

[erionm]

Brian, did you guys have the MM? It's my understanding that they're necessary to get the auto-add-to-account features of MM, and the two videos.

You no longer need to purchase Memory Maker to have attraction photos automatically linked to your PhotoPass account. You just need to have a MagicBand.

 

[Brian Noble]

Brian, did you guys have the MM? It's my understanding that they're necessary to get the auto-add-to-account features of MM, and the two videos.

We did. But, it's easy to "tap" under the photo displays to add a picture to your account with the regular RFID cards. You can't get 7DMT photos/videos without a band (there is no photo display area), and may or may not get the Tower video without one. We have enough ride photos that that would not be a big deal to us.

 

[David Brent]

I don't mean to hijack the thread but I have a question. My wife and I have our bands from our Disney trip from last year and we used it last week to visit Magic Kingdom for the day with our Florida resident three day tickets link to the bands. I booked Pop Century for my wife's spring break and everything is linked to the bands as they are active etc. but when I looked on MDE it asks to "get started" on customizing two new magic bands I wonder if this is because I booked an on-site hotel? Our original bands are both active obviously so do I just ignore the new bands that are being offered?

 

[MakiraMarlena]

If you don't want the bands, then don't customize them. They will try to offer them to you at check in but you can say you don't want them.

Yes, you will receive bands with every separate onsite reservation.

 

[David Brent]

If you don't want the bands, then don't customize them. They will try to offer them to you at check in but you can say you don't want them.

Yes, you will receive bands with every separate onsite reservation.

Thank you. I just wanted to make sure.