Are the lines at Disney World long? No, in case you follow the following pointers

It’s been 17 years since my last trip to Disney World.

How much could have modified?

The parks are still improbable. But the times of jumping aimlessly from ride to ride are over. Now, a successful journey – defined here as reducing the time you spend standing in lines – requires more walking, adopting Disney technology and carrying a cell phone with impressive battery life.

The web is stuffed with strategies for avoiding lines at Disney. But in case you are a rare visitor, traveling with babies or not interested plunging into the world of Disney blogsbuying access to shorter lines is one of the best selection.

download My Disney Experience app and place it in front and center of your phone’s home screen. This is the important thing to the primary rule of avoiding live at Disney World: the acquisition of Genie+, a service that permits visitors to book “Lightning Lanes”, which offer one-time access to shorter lines for many attractions.

The service starts at $15 per day per person, in response to Disney’s website. But on my trip over Memorial Day Weekend in May, it averaged around $24 a day.

Is it too expensive? It is dependent upon your budget. But I estimate the service saved us a minimum of 4 hours in line a day, which I believe is a steal.

Additional cost: roughly $145 per day for a family of six.

Once you have purchased Genie+, you are ready to start out booking your group’s experience – the method begins promptly at 7:00 AM. Starting any time later, even a number of minutes later, can delay the booking of windows by several hours.

I acted as a booking person for my family, which was a crucial but thankless job. Responsibilities include evaluating attraction wait times, ride popularity, and proximity to your current location to find out one of the best and best use of the following Lightning Lane – which may only be used once or every two hours.

Disney estimates visitors can use Lightning Lanes to enter two to 3 attractions per daybut on many days we booked five times the quantity.

This means the important person has the privilege of explaining to the family why they pass by favorites – “Aladdin” and “Peter Pan” for the youngsters, “Presidents’ Hall” for the husband – to benefit from the rare parting in the group across the park.

This strategy saves time queuing but leads to more walking – on some days we averaged 25,000 steps. But I’ll take walking as a substitute of standing still day-after-day.

Tip: As soon as you check in at Lightning Lane, book the following one. You do not have to attend for the ride to finish.

This could also be controversial advice, but to save lots of time and simplify scheduling, consider skipping “virtual queues.”

Currently, only two attractions use them in all 4 amusement parks: Guardians of the Galaxy: Cosmic Rewind and Tron Lightcycle/Run.

There isn’t any reserve or standard line for these rides. So many visitors are vying for places within the virtual queue which might be free. Reservations open twice a day – and sometimes disappear inside seconds.

We tried and did not get Tron slots at 7am on the primary day of our trip using one phone call. At 1:00 PM we tried again with three calls – one was successful. The reservation, which we monitored all afternoon, was finally called around 7pm. By this time the youngsters were drained and the queue was the longest of the day.

Spoiled by Lightning Lanes, we forgo the virtual queues for the remainder of the trip, opting to purchase Individual lightning strips for these two rides plus 4 others if the service is on the market. These are one time purchases to access shorter lines.

It’s not the most cost effective way by any means, but this strategy allowed us to decide on fixed ride times, unencumber time spent monitoring my phone, and is simpler to book than virtual queues (especially for guests staying at a Disney affiliated hotel).

Extra Cost: Varies, but around $12 to $20 per attraction.

If paying for these services doesn’t fit, compare them to the fee of booking private VIP tour. Tours range from $450 to $900 per hour, depending on the season, and last a minimum of seven hours. Please note that this price doesn’t include park entrance tickets.

“For those on a budget, that is the best thing,” said Jonathan Alder, general manager of the travel agency Jonathan’s Travels. He said tours take visitors between parks and supply access to personal entrances and shorter lines.

“I’d say two parks in a large day with a mean distance of 13 miles is about all you possibly can get with out a guide,” he said. But with one: “I’ve done all the foremost rides in all 4 parks and only had about 10 miles of walking.”

Additional cost: from $3,150, but rates can easily double.

During my family’s five-day trip to Disney, we saw just about all the attractions on the 4 parks. But we only waited in five reserve queues, the longest of which was about half-hour.

We took these lines once we were between Lightning Lanes or desired to do the identical ride twice (Lightning Lanes can only be used once a day). But we waited for the opportune moment – parks opening within the morning or fireworks at night – to do it.

Staying at a Disney Resort – there are greater than 25 of them in total — gives visitors a 30-minute head start within the morning (i occasionally also within the evening). That may not look like much, nevertheless it allowed us to quickly tackle a minimum of one major attraction a day without having to take care of large crowds.

In many cases, I’ve seen individuals with MagicBands pass by visitors on the lookout for the correct screen on their mobile phones to enter Lightning Lanes.

They also save time when buying food and goods. In addition, they act as a memento that children can wear long after they leave the parks.