The Genie Usage, Tips and Strategy ONLY Thread

[Katherine Brock]

We are going for 10 nights in early December. Our strategy is to not buy genie+ for the first 4 days (each park) and see how wait times are and how many of our "must do" attractions we were able to experience. We would then consider buying Genie+ on our second go round through the parks if there are "must do's" that we were not able to do on the first park visit. That is just our plan and I hope it works out for us.

We went for 8 days and only wound up purchasing the Lightning Lane pass for three of the days as the wait times weren’t too bad.

 

[Sjm9911]

For rides with 2 tapstiles in the LL do you have to be through the 2nd one within the 15 mins?

I think only the first one, but the LL were never 15 mins long.

 

[Sjm9911]

For rides with 2 tapstiles in the LL do you have to be through the 2nd one within the 15 mins?

I think only the first one, but the LL were never 15 mins long.

To piggy back this question, is there a compiled list of rides with 2 taps vs 1 tap tor LL's?

Most I remember as having 2 taps. Even if the tapins spots were down they had a cm with a portable reader.

 

[cgattis]

Any tips on what to do if your reservation (specifically Sean/Dolphin—posted on that resort thread too) comes unlinked sometime between when you go to bed and when you wake up for the next day’s Genie and IAS purchase if you can’t re-link it yourself??? Had that happen this morning and lost my chance to IAS Rise. Called the number that popped up in the app but got disconnected. Called back and said 160 minute wait. Guest relations, when I went in person, just basically said “thems the breaks.” (BTW it eventually let me re-link it myself after a few hours but too late to get any IAS we wanted.) Anybody know the magic number to call if that happens again???

 

[PepperjackDragon]

Best video I've seen for stacking.
https://vm.tiktok.com/TTPd2DdC9U/
The key would be how do you try getting SDD for 11 without missing out all together?

this would work for any ride if you wait for an 11 time slot

BUT like mentioned on a really busy day at HS all LL can be gone by 1..

so is it better to forgo stacking at HS and get earlier than 11 return times..

Hummm

I can’t see how that would help honestly. If you book early by the time you ride it will be pushed out until 11-12 anyway, so you will still have used a weak early morning LL and then wait until 11ish, but by then you will only be able to catch one evening at best. Seems to me either way you slice it you will end up with 3 at best.

So probably best to pick up SDD, grab a second at 11 for Smugglers or other top priority, and hope you can still get a third at 1pm, or we’re lucky with your 1st or 2nd to start a stack and secure the third and maybe a 4th before they are all gone—but realistically you would be limited to 3 in that scenario regardless of what you do, I think. Thus, the key would be to make the few you do get count.

we all need to be writing them to get evening hours switched from Epcot to Hollywood though, total waste of evening hours imo, with so few rides and the restraunt closed. Especially On busy weeks, if LL is gone so fast, they really need to offer that imo.

 

[CBMom01]

Any tips on what to do if your reservation (specifically Sean/Dolphin—posted on that resort thread too) comes unlinked sometime between when you go to bed and when you wake up for the next day’s Genie and IAS purchase if you can’t re-link it yourself??? Had that happen this morning and lost my chance to IAS Rise. Called the number that popped up in the app but got disconnected. Called back and said 160 minute wait. Guest relations, when I went in person, just basically said “thems the breaks.” (BTW it eventually let me re-link it myself after a few hours but too late to get any IAS we wanted.) Anybody know the magic number to call if that happens again???

Oh that sucks. I’m sorry.

 

[StarrySkye21]

This is an awesome post .So informative We aren't going July but super excited already Slight confusion. I read your post as you bought genie+but not LL yet you said you did LL Have i misunderstood ?

When you buy Genie+, the entrance that you use to redeem your selection is the Lightning lane.

Genie+ Is the program that allows you to pay $15/day to periodically skip the standby lines and use the lightning lane.

Lightning Lane is the lane that Genie+ users, DAS users, VIP tours and ILL$ users use.

Individual Lightning Lane Selection is the additional purchase of up to two select rides per day In order to skip the standby lane and use the lightning lane.

It’s Disney’s fault for making the terminology so confusing.

 

[Mango7100]

It looks like all LL’s and ILL$ in Hollywood studios for rides were gone by about 1:00 PM today. That does not seem sustainable as Disney returns to normal crowd levels. Are they till selling and pushing genie for casual guests who come into the parks int he afternoon and don’t know that they need to wake up at 7 am to grab a fastpass for 7 pm? They need to increase the number of LL’s given out.

That’s terrible! We were able to use 4 LL in HS one on Tuesday 11/16 and could have done a 5th, but it was also not very crowded. Any holiday period is going to be awful with Genie Plus I suspect

 

[meghanmione]

Just remember, if all you want is to purchase an ILL$ for Remy, you do not have to pay the $15 for Genie+. Genie+ is for the Genie+ LL rides like Soarin’, Frozen, etc. if you think you might want them, wait until you arrive and can check Genie to see if the Genie+ LL rides you want are still available. You can buy Genie+ then and book them.

Oh that's good to know!! We will be getting to the park late so it may just be best for us to see how the rides are. We do wish to do Soarin' and others that are on Genie+ that evening. Do you think we should still purchase Genie+ and keep refreshing until later times become available or just see how it is upon arrival?

 

[Lsdolphin]

Can I purchase genie+ on the morning of my arrival day and select a ride/time for later in the day Or does the app just select for you? With the old fast pass+ you were able to select a time....

 

[twincruisers]

Can I purchase genie+ on the morning of my arrival day and select a ride/time for later in the day Or does the app just select for you? With the old fast pass+ you were able to select a time....

You select the ride and they just offer the next available time slot. No selection of time slots.

 

[Lsdolphin]

I arrive on 11/30

You select the ride and they just offer the next available time slot. No selection of time slots.

well that stinks.....

 

[mom2cinderella]

I had a concern earlier today. I have not yet added Genie+ to my tickets for our Christmas week trip. Genie+ itself doesn't sell out to the point you can't even buy it right?!

Disney has said they would not limit sales. The OP in this thread had issues due to the way the system handles adding Genie+, so maybe keep that in mind.

 

[Sydnerella]

So the app Wouldn’t let me book my inlaws IAS LL this morning for ROTR or MMRR. First park day with them, we started Friday.

I recall reading others having this issue but thought it was a glitch, how are parties on different reservations supposed to ride together if this isn’t allowed?

I took screenshots and will bring to GET but it seems like a weird thing not to allow.

then I had to also add the stupid email code which made my next 2 LLs much later than I wanted for MMRR and TOT…

 

[JakeAZ]

Anyone else have their app crash this morning for the 7am genie money grab? Booked jungle cruise right at 7. Got 940-1040. Then the app crashed. Multiple email code requests. Once it finally came back, it showed my genie JC reservation for 2pm!! A little while later it showed correct again, but keeps bouncing around. So I took some screenshots when it bounced to the correct time.
Genie + on a crowded day….so far, it’s a nightmare and, at least in my case, Disney IT couldn’t handle the rush.

 

[Sydnerella]

Any tips on what to do if your reservation (specifically Sean/Dolphin—posted on that resort thread too) comes unlinked sometime between when you go to bed and when you wake up for the next day’s Genie and IAS purchase if you can’t re-link it yourself??? Had that happen this morning and lost my chance to IAS Rise. Called the number that popped up in the app but got disconnected. Called back and said 160 minute wait. Guest relations, when I went in person, just basically said “thems the breaks.” (BTW it eventually let me re-link it myself after a few hours but too late to get any IAS we wanted.) Anybody know the magic number to call if that happens again???

Thank you for posting this I just tried to book my in-laws individual paid attractions and they are booked at the Swan starting today and are driving here from another location in Florida. I am wondering if this is the issue and reason I was not able to book their’s. I asked them to check and make sure the reservation is linked.

 

[tguz]

We went for 8 days and only wound up purchasing the Lightning Lane pass for three of the days as the wait times weren’t too bad.

That is good to hear. I hope to not purchase it at all. I have seen posts where wait times at the attractions were listed as 60 minutes but were really only 20.....if that is the case, we won't be purchasing except maybe a LL for Remy's, we really want to do that.

 

[kappyfamily]

Did the post-window 15 minute grace period get reduced to 5 minutes in the past week?

Nope! We tapped in at the 14 minute late mark at jungle cruise last night with no problem.

 

[CarolynFH]

Oh that's good to know!! We will be getting to the park late so it may just be best for us to see how the rides are. We do wish to do Soarin' and others that are on Genie+ that evening. Do you think we should still purchase Genie+ and keep refreshing until later times become available or just see how it is upon arrival?

If I knew I wouldn’t be getting to the park until later, especially Epcot where many rides have relatively short standby lines, I wouldn’t buy Genie+ until I was there or close enough there to see that standby times were long enough to make the purchase worthwhile and that the available Genie+ LL times would work for us. If I could, I might monitor Genie+ LL times through the day as I traveled, but of course if I’m flying I wouldn’t be able to do that.

 

[wisblue]

Oh that's good to know!! We will be getting to the park late so it may just be best for us to see how the rides are. We do wish to do Soarin' and others that are on Genie+ that evening. Do you think we should still purchase Genie+ and keep refreshing until later times become available or just see how it is upon arrival?

if you’re arriving in the late afternoon and Soarin is your top priority, you might not need Genie+ unless you are visiting at a peak time.

On our visit last week Soarin often had posted wait times of 20-30 minutes in the late afternoon and early evening, and the actual waits were probably less than that. All of the other Genie+ attractions except for Test Track were virtual walk on.

If you do want to do TT, you could purchase Genie+ in the morning and wait to book TT until the return time is late enough to fit your arrival. That might happen between 7 and 9 AM or a little later. If you do that, you could book another LL for Soarin 2 hours after Epcot opens if it is still available.

After those two any LL reservations you get might not save you much time.