Plan Ahead with Lightning Lane Entry at Walt Disney World Starting July 24

[123SA]

My daughter is at DHS and just scanned into MMRR. I grabbed her a RnRC and there were lots of availability when I modified the time.

So...best Mom ever? You are sitting at home securing her LLMPs? That's excellent.

 

[LoveToDisney]

Don’t forget you have a LOT of people who use to get DAS that now have to purchase the Lightning Lane passes in order to have the shorter wait their health requires. You will have a lot of them opting to pay for LL because they have no other option to not be in long standby lines. Even with the DAS changes, one may not see the drop in LL line use because many disabled families will now be purchasing LLs because they need to. In the old FastPass+ days, many tier 1 and popular tier 2 rides were always gone after the advance sign up time. It will be interesting to see if that will change.

 

[mamaofsix]

Last week

Ah, that makes sense. It's awesome that you got so much done in the first two hours, but it was very low crowds last week. When we went over spring break this year, we could usually only get 2 rides done in 2 hours with EE / RD. Almost everything was immediately a 45 min-1 hour wait as soon as EE started.

 

[CoasterGT24]

It seems like Hollywood Studios dropped some additional availability at park opening time as can be seen here: https://www.thrill-data.com/waits/park/wdw/hollywood-studios/parkLL/2024/07/25/15

 

[DisneyFive]

Well since the biggest complaint with G+ was waking up at 7 am to book LL, by far EE/RD still has the biggest advantage even with the new LLMP system. You’re able to get in 4-5 rides within the first 2 hours of each park opening without any LL and extremely low waits.

Strategy: We were able to do at the following at EE/RD without LL each morning within 2 hours of opening in order.

MK: Pooh, IASW, Haunted Mansion, Pirates, & Ariel.
EP: Frozen, 3Cs, Mission Space, Spaceship Earth.
DHS: ToT, RNRRC, MMRT, TSM
AK: Navi, Dinosaur, FJEE x2, Safari, Kali.

Hope this helps anyone out.

It depends on which rides you're talking about at rope drop, and time of year. Headliners you'll get 1, maybe 2, in with low waits. Tier 2 you can get A LOT first thing in the morning. Your list of attractions confirms that at MK, AK and EP. I will say, you had a great first two hours at HS without LL's! (it definitely helps having TOT and RnRC right next door for sure)

At least that's our experience.

 

[ThereYouSeeHer]

For those who have to make park reservations, are the pre-bookings limited to that park?

Can the reservation be for Epcot and the three prebooks be for MK?

If I'm understanding the questions correctly, it seems you can have a theme park reservation for one park and purchase LLMP for a different park. (This would be different from buying LLMP for one park and making advanced selections for a different park, which cannot be done--unless you were to change the LLMP park after purchase, which I believe is allowed).

Someone reported this working, see below....

Has anyone seen any reports about either of these scenarios?

(1) You have a date based park hopper ticket and do not require a park reservation. Can you make advance lightning lane selections in Magic Kingdom but scan in to Hollywood Studios in the morning before hopping to Magic Kingdom?

(2) You have non-date based park hopper tickets or an annual pass and you do require a park reservation. Can you have a park reservation in Hollywood Studios but make advance lightning lane selections in Magic Kingdom?

I can't confirm #1, but it seems likely you can do this as I was able to confirm #2 - I made a reservation for MK with a legacy non date based ticket and was able to book HS.

 

[mi*vida*loca]

So...best Mom ever? You are sitting at home securing her LLMPs? That's excellent.

Yes something like that. Lol. It’s her first trip without a parent so I offered to help her out.

She gets caught in the moment and forgets to book the next one. She did this Monday at MK too. Apparently I’m going to be getting nice souvenir as a thanks.

I also want to test it out before our next trip which isn’t until May but I still get a little look at it.

 

[mistysue]

Don’t forget you have a LOT of people who use to get DAS that now have to purchase the Lightning Lane passes in order to have the shorter wait their health requires. You will have a lot of them opting to pay for LL because they have no other option to not be in long standby lines. Even with the DAS changes, one may not see the drop in LL line use because many disabled families will now be purchasing LLs because they need to. In the old FastPass+ days, many tier 1 and popular tier 2 rides were always gone after the advance sign up time. It will be interesting to see if that will change.

Please don't bring DAS issues into this. Saying "LOT of people...health requires" is entering an argument, lot is subjective, and it's a fact that at least a significant portion are people misusing the system due to convenience. We have zero data on how many people are buying ONLY because denied das, even in the disability conversations most who say they will buy are saying they would buy it whether or not they had DAS.

 

[jennypenny]

No, it will only offer you Epcot

Wait, what? If I have a park reservation at Epcot, I can't opt for 3 LLs at HS in the evening?

 

[RedmonFamily]

Wait, what? If I have a park reservation at Epcot, I can opt for 3 LLs at HS in the evening?

Sorry I thought you meant can you buy an Epcot multipass and choose Mk rides, no one has reported reservations limiting their pass selection process

 

[gottalovepluto]

Yeah all individual LL gone already? Just when I was going to give in and purchase rise of the resistance haha, o well I’ll save the money…

On the tip board now I see FOP, Tron and GOTG.

I would not expect ROTR day of as it sold out fast under the old program.

 

[georgina]

No, it will only offer you Epcot

Are you sharing your personal experience, because others have reported different experiences with this scenario

 

[RedmonFamily]

Are you sharing your personal experience, because others have reported different experiences with this scenario

The question was clarified and I answered that reservations were not limiting anyone's experience in purchasing Multipass

 

[spewey]

I liked your post, and I just wanted to add that I had pretty much exactly the same thoughts and questions, which otherwise haven't really been addressed in this 120-page thread.

Looking at MK in particular, how were LLs so limited yesterday afternoon, while posted wait times were also relatively high (suggesting Disney was NOT holding back LLMP availability)? Were there users a week ago who paid over $20 for Genie+ at MK and barely booked any rides? I find that hard to imagine. Why would the change to LLMP result in more users, or why would Disney reduce ride capacity on the day of a new system rollout?

What is it about LLMP that created less availability? It can't be all the bloggers on day 1, can it? I would think the number of {bloggers looking for day 1 content} is less than {the number of people who would have bought Genie+ but avoided LLMP because it was brand new}. But is that wrong? What is the missing factor?

The answer I am hoping is that Disney DID reduce LL capacity while not reducing ride capacity. This would result in shorter actual standby waits, but Disney could still choose to post high wait times when the actual wait times were much lower. Can anyone who was at MK provide their experience?

Yep, there's something missing at the moment. I just checked - rides that had availability all day under Genie+ are showing as sold out already for today. And with a few reports of nearly empty LLs, that really points to much lower LL capacity.

Unless ...

Don’t forget you have a LOT of people who use to get DAS that now have to purchase the Lightning Lane passes in order to have the shorter wait their health requires. You will have a lot of them opting to pay for LL because they have no other option to not be in long standby lines. Even with the DAS changes, one may not see the drop in LL line use because many disabled families will now be purchasing LLs because they need to. In the old FastPass+ days, many tier 1 and popular tier 2 rides were always gone after the advance sign up time. It will be interesting to see if that will change.

THIS could be an important piece of the puzzle (understanding this is a delicate issue - not making a judgement here at all, just trying to do the math). Folk that could access LLs before without booking through the Genie+ system now opting to purchase, thereby effectively increasing the number of people vying for each spot (compared to before). Plus, if it was actually true that a significant percentage of people using LLs under the Genie system were there through DAS, having those same people now book through LLMP (assuming the number of LL spots remains the same) will result in fewer people in those lines.

How much of an impact is this? Time will tell I suppose. Hope the dust settles soon.

 

[LoveToDisney]

Please don't bring DAS issues into this. Saying "LOT of people...health requires" is entering an argument, lot is subjective, and it's a fact that at least a significant portion are people misusing the system due to convenience. We have zero data on how many people are buying ONLY because denied das, even in the disability conversations most who say they will buy are saying they would buy it whether or not they had DAS.

Okay…understand. There are former users that will be using LL that did not use Genie+ so that will increase numbers. I was NOT wanting to get controversial. Some former users of das used FastPass+ when it was available so it makes sense they will use LL. Sorry you thought I was causing an issue with my observation.

 

[CStorm]

Please forgive my ignorance. I have a couple questions. Just for reference, we are 3 adults, no children

• I check in to my hotel on 9/15. Do I reserve my LLs on the 8th or the 9th? I think it's the 8th, I just want to make sure I understand the 7 days out.
• Please confirm, am I able to buy single LLs for rides in different parks on the same day and then LLMP for the park I don't start in if I hop? For example, we are going to start in AK one morning, hoping to grab a really early FOP LL and Rise LL for the afternoon. With EE and rope dropping, I think we could hit Everest and Safaris, pretty quickly, do FOP whenever scheduled, then head to HS and use the LLMP in the afternoon. Do you think this is feasible?
• We are doing MK the day we arrive and will purchase LL for Tron and LLMP for three others. We will only have about 7 hours in MK because MNSSHP is that night and we don't have tickets. Planning to hop to EPCOT to do Food & Wine Fesitval.
• We don't care about Meet & Greets or the parades, FYI.
• Can my daughter be on her app and getting us some LL passes while I am on the app working on other days?

 

[mistysue]

Yep, there's something missing at the moment. I just checked - rides that had availability all day under Genie+ are showing as sold out already for today. And with a few reports of nearly empty LLs, that really points to much lower LL capacity.

Unless ...

THIS could be an important piece of the puzzle (understanding this is a delicate issue - not making a judgement here at all, just trying to do the math). Folk that could access LLs before without booking through the Genie+ system now opting to purchase, thereby effectively increasing the number of people vying for each spot (compared to before). Plus, if it was actually true that a significant percentage of people using LLs under the Genie system were there through DAS, having those same people now book through LLMP (assuming the number of LL spots remains the same) will result in fewer people in those lines.

How much of an impact is this? Time will tell I suppose. Hope the dust settles soon.

Okay…understand. There are former users that will be using LL that did not use Genie+ so that will increase numbers. I was NOT wanting to get controversial. Some former users of das used FastPass+ when it was available so it makes sense they will use LL. Sorry you thought I was causing an issue with my observation.

I just wanted to say something hoping to prevent it becoming a thing - but those people have all been being moved into G+ since May. so G+ a week ago vs LLMP yesterday wouldn't have been a massive shift purely from DAS users. G+ a year ago vs yesterday - absolutely would be worth a question.

I look at the timing and feel like it's an obvious side effect from people booking 3 at a time. So 100 people book 300 slots vs 100 slots. This makes the "sell out" happen faster. As to the super fast LL returns - our April/May trip this year experienced the same thing under the old DAS rules - we saw much longer standby times than in the past and LL was immediate load the whole trip. To me a more significant factor would be not how fast LL queues are moving, but LL speed COMBINED with the capacity being given to that line.

Single example so very limited, but as an example on our last trip IASM loads two boats at a time. The front boat was 100% LL, and they were doing about 25% LL on the rear boat. Standby was only getting around 40% of the available slots. If standby was getting 80% of slots and LL was still no wait, THEN it would be evidence LL was being highly restricted, but we can't get to that conclusion from booking availability alone.

 

[DavidNYC]

I appreciate that and I'm glad to hear about Disney Hurricane Policy, which reasures me quite a bit, however we might be coming from two different places. For this perk we will be spending over $3000, it's no small amount what if the family comes down with COVID or Influenza and was out of action? Sure we do have travel insurance but I still believe that when the item you purchase is of such a high amount the vendor should still hold some responsibility.

Responsibility for what? This is exactly what travel insurance is for. Disney is not a travel insurance company. I cannot think of any logical reason why Disney should be on the hook due to something that has (1) zero connection to any action they've taken and (2) not something they can easily confirm.

 

[Laura's Dad]

Onsite just got alot more valuable again

I am sure that is what Disney wanted.

 

[andrewilley]

Just to clarify.....for split stays. Our first resort day is Jan 15 but we check out of resort Jan 20 to move to second resort, both are on-site. Can I book my preselects for all 10 days on Jan 8? Is it tied to the ticket or tied to the resort ressie requiring me to split up my preselects at Jan 8 and 13th?

As far as I'm understanding it from what other people have said (and it's all very new) the system doesn't seem to be recognising the end dates of hotel stays. So if your ticket media allows enough days, you could technically make LL bookings for a full 14 days beyond your arrival date - regardless of whether you are actually staying that long or only for a few days. I suspect may be what people are seeing when they say they can book for split stays.

Andre