Touringplans.com

[msb578]

I use it all of the time.

And although most of what I use is part of the free website, I feel like I support the entire site when I purchase the subscription.

I am considering subscribing again because of how wonderful the ADR finder was for us. That part is free, but I do feel a bit indebted to the site because of how much that feature helped us out.

 

[rebrick2006]

Thanks everyone! I did purchase the subscription! I love it!!!! If I have a disney travel agent can I still fax room requests?

 

[SaintsManiac]

Thanks everyone! I did purchase the subscription! I love it!!!! If I have a disney travel agent can I still fax room requests?

Yes

 

[greg9x]

For what it's worth re wait times, the site says the following:
The attractions above come from our core group of 27 attractions used in calculating crowd levels. To assess accuracy, we calculate the average posted wait time between 11 AM and 5 PM and compare that to our predicted average wait time for that time period. A negative number means that the average wait time was lower than our prediction; a positive number means the average wait time was higher than our prediction.

OK - as a statistician I see a lot of issues with that assessment method but I won't get technical.

They say they pretty good yesterday. They were within 3 minutes on 10 attractions (they list which ones BTW); 5 min on 3; 7 min on 3; 10 min on 3.

But that's only 20 out of the 27. So they were likely worse than that on 7 (and I can't see which they were.)

So the value of the lines portion of this is to be determined. And that makes me a BIT leery of the plan optimizer.

We shall see!

(EDIT - actually there is a LOT more information available for a given day in the past to assess. Far more than I can summarize - but the important thing is they are transparent in their results good and bad. Just not sure a average over a 6 hour period is the right way to assess. Actually, I'm sure it ISN'T the right way.)

The Lines app is what I like most.. last year they were pretty accurate.. of course there are delays that throw things off, and a ride that shows a 15 minute wait might change to a 30 minute by the time you get there. But I found it to be much more accurate than Disney's times.

 

[tink2]

We’ve used it for the past several trips- I don’t use their touring plans- but love the lines app. We use it as much as the disney app. I use the crowd calendar too- not sure how accurate it is the past few years with fast pass plus and magic bands- but I use them as a guide.
I’m a planner and to me- the app is worth the price to give me another resource during my trip

 

[seelyt2]

In addition to what the others have said, I like their fastpass+ availability tool and the menu search. I'm been looking to see where I can get the jungle juice slushy and with a few clicks I can find out where it is available. Now, whether or not Mahindi actually has it is another story. The last time I went they were "out". However it shows that I can get the one with Myer's dark rum at Dawa Bar so may I can score that! I find the website and app very useful and well worth the small cost.

 

[Karen46]

I found the site to be very helpful. The Room request worked great for me for the last two visits but I am sure it has not worked for everyone. I liked the site.

 

[norrsund]

We didn't use it last June when we went to WDW, but did on our trip to DL in the fall. For WDW I basically did manual research here and on other forums to determine the best order of things, but using TP for DL definitely made things more efficient and easier to plan out. I would say their predictions were relatively accurate and we were able to jump from ride to ride with little wait. Their dining reservation finder (free) is also really good, much quicker than mouse dining for getting alerts to book hard to get meals. We're using TP for our January trip and think it'll be great!

 

[YesterDark]

Hell, for $15 it's worth the entertainment of setting up touring plans to build up the excitement and give you something to do until you wait for your trip. Even if you never use them!

 

[33Legend]

I've seen a few people mention how they love Touring plans in help with ADR. Can someone explain what makes it specifically better then tracking it from the MDE app? Thanks much!

 

[caribbeandream]

I am a super planner and I still find that Touring Plans is still worth it. I like how they take my own touring plan ideas and then tell me how to make them even more efficient. Also, dining reservation finder is everything!

 

[YawningDodo]

It's been interesting to me reading this thread and seeing what features people highlight. I've always steered away from TP because the idea of having a ride-by-ride plan for the day makes me feel sick to my stomach every time I consider it. That being said, the Unofficial Guide (by the same team) has been my guidebook of choice whenever I've felt the need for a guidebook to WDW or DL. I find their restaurant reviews refreshingly honest, and I like that they include reader approval ratings for the restaurants alongside their own ratings. If those reviews are included in the TP subscription, I may have been making a mistake by buying the books and ignoring the website; I think they're about the same price and I would've gotten the app if I'd done it that way. Hmm.

In addition to what the others have said, I like their fastpass+ availability tool and the menu search. I'm been looking to see where I can get the jungle juice slushy and with a few clicks I can find out where it is available. Now, whether or not Mahindi actually has it is another story. The last time I went they were "out". However it shows that I can get the one with Myer's dark rum at Dawa Bar so may I can score that! I find the website and app very useful and well worth the small cost.

Okay, this might be what gets me to buy a subscription next year. How easy is the menu search to use? Do you need to know exactly what item you're looking for, or can you ask it broader questions? A real world example: this past January I was in WDW for a day and wanted to get a hot breakfast in AK because I was rope-dropping FoP and knew I would leave the resort too early to eat at the food court. I was able to identify my options using MDE, but I had to comb through each quick service location's menu to do it. Because I'd thought ahead it wasn't a huge deal to do that ahead of the trip, but if I'd run into that issue on the fly it could have been really annoying.

 

[jeff_h]

It's been interesting to me reading this thread and seeing what features people highlight. I've always steered away from TP because the idea of having a ride-by-ride plan for the day makes me feel sick to my stomach every time I consider it.

I'm with you on that one - I don't use the TP app to that extent, when it comes to planning rides I use the app to estimate crowd levels and that factors in how I plan which park to make the initial three FP reservations, then use the lines app after that to see what is left and then reserve with the MDE app. Other than that I may use the lines app during the day to check wait times.

Okay, this might be what gets me to buy a subscription next year. How easy is the menu search to use? Do you need to know exactly what item you're looking for, or can you ask it broader questions? A real world example: this past January I was in WDW for a day and wanted to get a hot breakfast in AK because I was rope-dropping FoP and knew I would leave the resort too early to eat at the food court. I was able to identify my options using MDE, but I had to comb through each quick service location's menu to do it. Because I'd thought ahead it wasn't a huge deal to do that ahead of the trip, but if I'd run into that issue on the fly it could have been really annoying.

This is another place where I use the lines app, from the main menu under the "WDW Planning Tools" section there's an option named "Browse Menus by Location" and one that I like better is the option next to that which is "Search Menus for Items" so if you want to look up 'churro' or 'pineapple' or 'pretzel' or whatever search term - it will show the matches from all results or there is an option of "modify advance search filters" if you want to narrow things down to a given park or resort.

 

[TinkSassy]

The help with ADR is if you can't get what you want - you can go in and tell it the time, day and restaurant you are needing. It will text you to log in and book as soon as one becomes available (you do have to be fast). With that I got the BOG reservation at Easter that I had been working on for weeks. Text at 4am and I booked from my phone at 4:01a. I have one in for my trip in November (I decided to go after 180 days and have one that I can't get now). They watch for me so I don't have to be obsessed with reviewing it all the time!

 

[seelyt2]

How easy is the menu search to use? Do you need to know exactly what item you're looking for, or can you ask it broader questions?

Okay, so I typed in "hot breakfast" with a filter of Animal Kingdom and it came back with 82 entries/3 pages and it appears it picked up items, all in Animal Kingdom that have the word "hot" or "breakfast". Breakfast Bandits Kids' Meal at Rainforest Cafe, Hot Breakfast Wrap at Kusafiri Coffee Shop. It's pretty broad. When I replace "hot breakfast" with "toast" it narrows it down to Tonga Toast at Rainforest Cafe, Fresh Toast at Satu'll Canteen, Kids French Toast Sticks at Yak & Yeti. I'm sure if you're looking for something specific like eggs or pancakes it will pull up those as well and you'll get additional menu items.

Don't discount the FastPass+ availability tool. You can check FP+ availability 60+ so you know what you're facing before you go to make your reservations. I knew at 61 days in advance what day to shoot for Slinky Dog Dash the next morning when I went to book. I'll admit that this is easier to at look far out dates on the computer. The app is helpful in this when you're looking at rides with availability for today, tomorrow, etc., So if you're looking at Animal Kingdom. So looking at today (at 8:02 p.m.) the only thing available is It's Tough to Be a Bug, Dinosaur, Kali River Rapids, Primeval Whirl, and Rivers ofLight. It gives you the time periods, too. The Disney app might give you this too, but here it's all on one page and handy.

 

[10CJ]

Overall I really like it. I have been using it since 2015 and am still using it for our upcoming 2019 trip.

I do wish I could edit the train station data in the personalized plan. Ex. I want to ride the train from frontierland to fantasyland. It just assumes I want to go the entire way around.

 

[bwang123]

not anymore. it was nice a long time ago but after going many times, its not worth it. the only part we use now is the reservation finder which is free. if they charged for it, we wouldn't pay to use it.

 

[Smittolis]

We use it as a general guide for crowds and parks, but as with anything these are best guesses even when based on current data etc... We enjoy using the app for views of hotels, rooms etc. but the main reason we use it is for the FAX function. The ability to use a system that is familiar with the jargon and short hand of the Disney Hotel booking CM is worth the $12 or so for the year. We have had great luck with the system so far and will be using it again this coming trip in August, so I guess that will be a good indication as to its continued use! However, we find it useful to put in our plans and see them in real time and somewhat tangible, this is a great way to iron out bugs or little details you may have missed etc...

We sometimes use the app for wait times and the like, however, as above it is mainly for the room choice.

 

[2boysmom1998]

Is tourningplans.com worth the money? We have a disney planner but I also like to plan quite a bit myself.

Thanks

I have purchased it a couple of years. I didn't find them to be very reliable with their numbers. I wouldn't pay for it again.

 

[33Legend]

The help with ADR is if you can't get what you want - you can go in and tell it the time, day and restaurant you are needing. It will text you to log in and book as soon as one becomes available (you do have to be fast). With that I got the BOG reservation at Easter that I had been working on for weeks. Text at 4am and I booked from my phone at 4:01a. I have one in for my trip in November (I decided to go after 180 days and have one that I can't get now). They watch for me so I don't have to be obsessed with reviewing it all the time!

That sounds fantastic.

Does it do the same with Fastpasses as well?