Touringplans.com How accurate?

[VioletSparkles]

Has anyone ever used the website touringplans.com to create a strategy for the parks? I signed up and am a little skeptical of the waiting times they list... For example on a day at Animal Kingdom it has our wait times listed and shows the longest wait time of 10 minutes? We don't have fast passes entered in there (we haven't reserved them yet) and have it set to "minimize walking" and "relaxed walking pace"... I just can't imagine that this is accurate. We are going in September and undercover tourist crowd calander lists this day in AK of having crowds as a 2/10 but that still seems like hardly any wait time at all.

When I look at Magic Kingdom it has similar, very low wait times. Undercover tourist lists Magic Kingdom as having 3/10 crowds this day. Touringplans.com shows that we can do all of adventure land and all of tomorrowland by 2pm? Longest wait time is 15 minutes.

Just looking for some input on how accurate these have been for veteran Disney visitors. This is our first time and while I don't expect to follow these to the minute, but it would be nice to have a general strategy of how to tackle the parks with a 2 year old!

 

[MasterGracey84]

Len Testa and the statisticians over at TP have done some pretty in depth research over the years to optimize one's visit. I cannot speak for their present touring plans, but I have used a 1 day MK plan on the old fastpasss system and it worked beautifully. I would encourage giving one a try and seeing how well it goes for you. Apologies, but that is all the input I can offer.

 

[MomofKatie]

The touring plans are surprisingly accurate. As MasterGracey84 says, the Unofficial Guide guys have been gathering data and analyzing and refining their plans for a long time. There might be slight variations in times due to unforeseen circumstances, but overall the plans are pretty reliable.

 

[loutoo]

Nobody can account for unforeseen circumstances such as weather and rides going down due to technical issues, but my experience has been the plans at touringplans.com are very accurate and reliable. you have the distinct advantage of going at quite possibly the slowest time of year, and should enjoy minimal waits even for the headliners, just as touringplans predicts. Enjoy.

 

[cigar95]

One of the advantages of using their "pre-packaged" plans is that they've been tested and refined and tweaked by users in the park before being published, so they've been demonstrated to work well.

The personalized plans come straight out of the computer algorithms, so while they're usually pretty good, you'll sometimes get a bit of "weirdness". I almost always tweak what their optimizer gives me to give something I'm happier with, and it often reduces my expected times a little bit compared to what the optimizer produced.

 

[IrishNYC]

I was skeptical like you, but we found them to be very accurate when we were there in May.

 

[threeboysmom]

I've been in September many times before, and 10-15 minutes waits are normal. I rarely saw anything more than that except for between 12-3 pm.

Enjoy! I'm jealous!!

 

[Mrs. Max Goof]

We used their 1-Day MK plan on a crowd 8 day and never waited more than 15 minutes for anything!

 

[BuzzinDownToDisney]

We've used both their established plans and personalized and have found both to be extremely accurate. Granted the occasional ride breakdown can throw things off a bit, but otherwise they're great.

OP the phenomenon you are seeing is one of the rare low times that still exist at WDW

 

[VioletSparkles]

Well this is all crazy good to hear!!!
We picked September because we heard it was "low crowd" time but I never thought it would be that low especially since it's free dining time- but I'll take it!!

 

[harrowgirl]

I've used touringplans.com several times and I've actually gotten through the plans even faster than it said in the plan every time. I've definitely never waited more than 20 minutes. Usually less than 10

 

[Kathryn777]

I think they're pretty accurate IF they accurately predict the park crowd level. We have used it on several trips and a couple times they expected the park to be a 4 but when I went back in to the day and look at the "what we expected vs what we saw" it was a 7, it would usually mean I had issues following the plan

 

[ConnecticutNonna]

We used their 1-Day MK plan on a crowd 8 day and never waited more than 15 minutes for anything!

Holy Cow!

 

[C.C. Langley]

I love the touring plans resources! I found wait times to be very accurate last month. I also like how you can check off things as you do them in the app, and I like how you can constantly re-optimize your plan if you change your mind about something, or you see a non existent line on a ride and want to add it on the fly. For instance, a late lunch lasted way longer at Tusker house than I had expected. I got over an hour behind on my TP schedule. Also, I had used up my first 3 FP's by then, and got a Kilimanjaro Safari FP for 6pm from the kiosk. So whilst waiting for Donald to come to our table, I just pulled out my phone, and added my new FP and new time frame I was working with, and the app re-optimzed based on the time I still had left. Voila, new plan! So handy. I also find that their live wait times in the app are way more accurate than the disney apps estimated wait lines.