Ridemax or Touringplans?

[Ptaylor81]

any suggestions on ride max verses touring plans? Is there a better option?

 

[Huff]

For planning your day to minimize ride waits I only have experience using Touring Plans and WDWMagic. Both of which are good.
Touring Plans has some features that make it worthwhile. It will recommend which buildings and rooms to request at your hotel and even fax Disney a request on your behalf automatically 5 days before arrival. For restaurant reservations Touring Plans allows you to enter a date, time and restaurant you'd like and it will check several times a day and send you a text message alert when it finds something. I was able to get and ADR for Be Our Guest thats otherwise near impossible. They also have a similar service for same day fast past alerts.

 

[Blue32]

I have used Ridemax for DL a couple times and once for a day in MK before FP+ with success. Can't speak much about TouringPlans although some people really like the Lines app. Next trip I will use Josh's cheat sheets from EasyWDW as a rough guideline for touring.

 

[nfdavenport]

Ridemax was good for routes, but didn't work well for us because of inaccurate wait time estimates in WDW. We have had very good results with it in Disneyland though. It also doesn't take into account that you might want to use your FP+ early and try for more after your schedule. Their tips are often pretty useful though. I wasn't unhappy having paid for it. A late answer, but figured I would chime in.

 

[ChasingLeslie]

I used Character Locator by @kennythepirate ...it was a big help with planning character meet times and FPs.

 

[Dismamx2]

We've used both for WDW and DL and have similar experience. TP tends to give you the best case scenario and it's easy to start lagging behind the plan. Ridemax overshoots on the times/waits and we were often ahead of our plan so plenty of time for snack/restroom breaks etc. I still combine both, I like to use TP for overall info; crowd calendar etc and making initial plans in advance as Ridemax only works a couple of months out. I am an obsessive planner so it's money well spent to me for 2 subscriptions

 

[emij]

I found RideMax to work well for Disneyland.

 

[Princesca]

TP found me my ADR at BOG so I am a fan!

 

[GoofysNCCrew]

We've used both for WDW and DL and have similar experience. TP tends to give you the best case scenario and it's easy to start lagging behind the plan. Ridemax overshoots on the times/waits and we were often ahead of our plan so plenty of time for snack/restroom breaks etc. I still combine both, I like to use TP for overall info; crowd calendar etc and making initial plans in advance as Ridemax only works a couple of months out. I am an obsessive planner so it's money well spent to me for 2 subscriptions

I agree with this. I've used both with similar results. TP does have great additional features making it a better value.

 

[FortForever]

I've used Touring Plans since 2002 with good results. Never heard of Ridemax, I may have to go check it out. Sounds like a combination of both would be best.

ETA: Just went and signed up for Ridemax and I don't like it. May take advantage of their 30 day money back deal. It only allows planning through October at this point, and doesn't give any crowd number ratings to parks. Just has a "recommended" and an "avoid." But gives you know idea of the numbers.

I don't think I will be keeping this. I like much more detailed information, and I like it well in advance.

 

[CarrieR]

I did Ridemax for both DL & WDW five or so years ago. Great experience. We were at DLR for two days; I asked my travelmates what they wanted to see and she said "everything." Ridemax made that happen. I did find if to be a VERY commando style, but it worked as advertised...

We now know WDW so well we don't use anything anymore, outside of the hours, EMH parks & easywdw, so I don't have more recent experiences.