So how much are you accomplishing using genie+ and LL?

[emmabelle]

Did you chose those later times, or was that just what was available @ 7 am?

That was all that was available at the time I was trying to book. It worked for us though because we wanted night times.


Today is turning into a waste of Genie+. We had space Mountain for 11am. I canceled it. The park was soooo crowded we just left at 10am.

I rebooked a Smugglers Run for 6:25pm. I just now booked a ToT for 4:45pm. Not expecting much to be left at 2:15 to book.

 

[casperthegm]

We used Genie + at each park about three weeks ago. We stayed offsite, so even though we got there at "rope drop" we were already behind the on-site guests. But we offset that loss a bit by using Genie + each morning at 7 am to make a reservation. We found it to be most useful at MK and HS. Combining the strategy of rope drop to get shorter lines the first couple of hours, hitting attractions with shorter lines to fill in gaps while waiting for our Genie + return times, and diligent use of the app, we did pretty well.

Did I enjoy trying to navigate the app and staring down at it half the day, like all the people I usually make fun of? Not really. But it's what we've got, so we went with it, and it does work pretty well if you work to maximize its effectiveness.

 

[sandrews0608]

Returned yesterday after spending Sunday-Thursday at Disney. Spent one day in each park and purchased Genie Plus upfront for all parks. If I had to do it over I would have only purchased for Magic Kingdom and Hollywood Studios. We are not early risers but did get up at 7am to make the first LL on all days except MK day. We had already been to the Christmas Party earlier in the week and rode a lot of what we wanted to.
1. Hollywood Studios - got up at 7am and got a 5:20 Slinky Dog Dash Lightning Lane. Also purchased Star Wars at 7am and got a 6:20 return time. Went back to bed for a while. Later in the morning secured a LL for Toy Story Mania mid-afternoon. Because of the SDD and Star Wars times we got LL became useless rest of day. There was nothing else available that didn't conflict with SDD and Star Wars. We spent about an hour each in standby line for Tower of Terror and Minnie Railroad in the afternoon. Didn't mind the wait as we really enjoyed the rides. Even though we only got a few LLs I still felt worth the price because the park closed at 9pm and helped us do other things with our time.
2. Epcot - Got up at 7am and used the virtual queue for Remy. Got a mid-afternoon LL spot for Test Track. Disney cancelled our Test Track LL as we were walking over. Was not able to replace it. That was all we were able to get the LL for. Waste of money for us. Also extended evening hours was a bust for us. Remy was not open and Frozen shut down.
3. Animal Kingdom - Got a LL for Safaris. Would not buy Genie + again for AK. No waits for Expedition Everest. No long standby waits for other LL rides. Daughter rode EE 4 times with 10 minute wait.
4. Magic Kingdom - worth it for us to buy Genie Plus and would buy again. Used it for Peter Pan, Buzz Lightyear, Space Mountain and a few others.

Just curious if at 7:00 on your HS day did you get SDD first or Rise. Just wondering if trying for Rise first if I have a chance at an earlier time.

 

[GoofyDad_4427]

Did HS on Sunday Nov 7. We stayed offsite. Party of 5. Since it was only 1 day, we were very willing to pay for Genie + and all the ILL rides.
Park was open 9-9.

We arrived about 15 minutes prior to park opening and did the following in this order:
RnR (standby, walkon)
ToT (standby, 20 min)
Vacation Fun Short Film (standby, 5 min)
MuppetVision (standby, 5 min)
Star Tours (standby, 15 min)
Lunch at Mama Melrose
TSM (G+)
Walt Disney Presents (standby, walkon)
Beauty & Beast show (standby, walkon)
Star Tours (G+)
Rise (ILL, was down for a bit while in line so this took a while)
Slinky (G+)
TSM (standby, 15 min)
M&MRR (ILL)
RnR (G+)

There was also lots of shopping breaks in between. Left the park around 7pm with low lines all around.

We really liked the way the day and our trip went. We have typically been the family that comes every 3ish years, but would get an annual pass and come twice within 365 days, then take a few years off. For the immediate future, i think we will do the 1 day per year thing. Dealing with G+ and all that comes with it was great for one day, but doing it for several days in a row would get very annoying.

 

[conniehar90]

Is there a rhyme or reason for the times being offered? I read that someone kept refreshing to get an earlier time. I would think they would just give them out in order? Can you cancel and rebook if a better time shows up? I thought I read that once you commit, you cannot change it.

Thanks!

 

[scrappinginontario]

Is there a rhyme or reason for the times being offered? I read that someone kept refreshing to get an earlier time. I would think they would just give them out in order? Can you cancel and rebook if a better time shows up? I thought I read that once you commit, you cannot change it.

Thanks!

People's plans change so they cancel reservations which opens these to other people.

 

[Zippa D Doodah]

Would like some personal experiences on how many rides you are able to do at a certain park using these add ons.

Be fair and say if you are using early entry or any other extra hours along with these add ons.

Do you feel you would have skipped certain rides without these add ons because you wouldn't do the regular ride queues and wait it out?

Thanks for your input.

My wife and I have used it at three different parks. At DHS we were able to ride Slinky Dog Dash but the return time was around 4pm. B the time we qualified for another ride, it was also a late return time for Toy Story. Honestly, we could have just waited in the queues and been done with the park quicker.

G+ was irrelevant at AK. Dinosaur and KS were walk-ons when we arrived mid afternoon. We also used it for NRJ (which had a 50 minute wait posted). We definitely would have skipped NRJ without G+, but its not a ride we like anyway. Also, we had only a 20 minute standby wait for Flight of Passage

We get good use out of G+ at MK. We've used it twice there, getting 7-8 LL rides per day. One ride I would have missed without G+ was Jungle Cruise. No way were we doing that standby queue. My theory is that MK has plenty of attractions but the others are lacking inventory

 

[popy]

Well it looks like to me those who choose just lost their money. Kind like a scam, if you would of bought that from a store you would be standing line with receipt in hand trying to get your hard earned money back.
suckers are born everyday, sure a lot of suckers on the loose at Disney, now days. Look at the post.

 

[igrsod]

We were given G+ for our first HS day due to unforeseen circumstances. We used it to ride TT, TSMM, and MFSR. We waited in lines for RnRC, MMRR, SDD, Star Tours, and Muppets. We didn't have to pay for it, but it helped us to avoid about 3 hours worth of rides, so it was helpful. So value... of course.... out of principle I don't want to purchase what used to be included and easier to use and allowed me to plan our days properly in advance, allow me to sleep in on vacation and allow me to stay off my phone all day.

For comparison, we did HS later in the week on a 10/10 capacity day. We went for the 1 hour early entry and rode, MMRR, TSMM, RnR and ToT during that one hour. After which, lines quickly filled up to over an hour per ride. We stood in line for SDD, avoided Star Wars area, saw Indiana Jones and Frozen shows, and then went back to the resort for a pool day.

So for us, it was cheaper and less chaotic to just get up early and do the rides during that time and then do other things when wait times go up.

If it wasn't a full capacity time of year, you definitely don't need Genie+ to get things done.

 

[buzz1fan]

We had a great day at magic kingdom 12/20. Rode everything we wanted I may have rode buzz 7 times.
The extra hour in am helped. We rode then Buzz- space- people mover then headed over to adventure land. We did have fast pass and it was great for splash- jungle cruise- haunted mansion. We ended up leaving earlier and didn’t use a pass end of day. One thing that is positive in new pass genie + was you literally walk on the rides with pass no waiting around.

 

[GatorChris]

We used it 10 days ago. We went to MK, Epcot, and AK. Stayed at Riverside, so we did early entry at the first two parks, but only by a few minutes. We used G+ for MK. That was super helpful, stacking up LL throughout the day. We probably got to do 2-3 more rides that day because of it. Maybe more???

We didn't use it at Epcot because of their lack of rides and the fact you can get on Remy's by virtual queue. I sorta wish I'd done G+. The lines slowed us down just enough to where we didn't get to hit Soarin' that day. Then again, we didn't make it a priority since we had just done a 5 day DL trip two months earlier. Soarin' is there and we hit it twice so it wasn't a huge need. Frozen took us 25 minutes, so paying for that is unwise.

We did use it at AK. Didn't get there early because it opens at 8am. It helped us skip a big hour long line at Safari in the morning. It also helped us skip the hour long line at Navi River, which no one should EVER wait more than 15 minutes for. That ride is lousy. It sorta helped at Festival of the Lion King, as we didn't have to line us quite as early. But I'd say it didn't really matter overall for that attraction. We did skip the big line for Dinosaur. But by 3pm, we had essentially used up our ability to use the LL service because you can't use it twice for anything. I'd say it's a wash at AK. It was helpful, but it did have limitations.

Overall, I liked the ease of the service. But in the end, having to pay $75/day for my family of 5 to use it really sucks. We went to Universal right after WDW, didn't use Express Pass and it worked out great. In fact, it was a nice vibe to have a completely unplanned, uncontrolled day. Very Disneyland-ish.

 

[Erzengel]

We stayed offsite and we missed ROTR when we did HS. We did use LL for MMRR mid afternoon. We were able to do 3 rides on G+, TOT, SR and TSM. We did standby for Star Tours, Aerosmith, ROTR and Slinky. The standby added probably over 3 hours of waiting on line. Since HS is my favorite park, I like to visit all the shops and I feel it's probably one of the parks you really need Genie+ for. We also did Animal Kingdom and Epcot on separate days and we only did 3 attractions in each because we had to leave early to park hop one day and have a fancy dinner the other. Neither day we used Genie+.

 

[spot28]

Would like some personal experiences on how many rides you are able to do at a certain park using these add ons.

Be fair and say if you are using early entry or any other extra hours along with these add ons.

Do you feel you would have skipped certain rides without these add ons because you wouldn't do the regular ride queues and wait it out?

Thanks for your input.

Dec 18-20 We did do early park entry on 2 days, no hopping, with G+ But only used on rides shown below as indicated.anything we did not ride was just our preference, not that we ran out of time.

Fri MK 730a to 8p. SM x2 once with ILL, one standby. Buzz x2, CoP, speedway, peoplmover,, barnstormer, Ariel, PP, (longest standby wait 45 mins) Mine train with ILL, IASW G+, TM G+, Splash mtn G+, JC with G+ , Tiki, PoC G+, HM G+, HoP, Tom Sawyer island. Sit down dinner at 750, jungle canteen.

sat AK 1030a to 8 p. FoP ILL, dinosaur G+, EE 4x 1 with ILL and many times right before park closure, single rider! Bird show, gorilla falls trail, Kali, safari G+, Navi g+, triceratop, 1 sit down dinner at 645 yak and yeti.

sunHS 730a to 9p, alien saucers, Indiana Jones, MMRR G+, MFSR standby at opening, no wait! Mupoetvision, RR 3x all standby once at open 2x before closing single rider, slinky g+, ST 2x g+ and standby, RoR ILL, TSM G+,ToT at park open. Sit down dinner at 730 brown derby. Due to crowds and heat, hopped the skyway and left for 3 hours in middle of day to eat lunch at hotels on route and returned. So much more peaceful!

 

[spot28]

Just curious if at 7:00 on your HS day did you get SDD first or Rise. Just wondering if trying for Rise first if I have a chance at an earlier time.

Slinky is G+, rise is iLL, at 7 AM one of us did one and the other the other so we are essentially doing them at the same time for rise it would’ve run out her we’re not done it right at 7 AM slinky dog shortly there after….