The Disney World Ticket Perk That Is Making A Comeback In 2024
With four theme parks (twice as many as Disneyland), Disney World can keep you busy for a week or more. There's so much to see and do at the Florida resort that you may want to hit up more than one park during the same day. That's about to get easier, as Disney World is restoring the benefit of all-day park hopper access to its parks on January 9, 2024.
The park hopper option is an add-on you can select when purchasing your Disney World tickets. It raises the price but allows you to visit multiple parks on the same day. For the last two years, annual passholders and guests with date-based park hopper tickets have only been able to use this benefit to move from one park to another after 2 p.m. at Disney World. Bringing back all-day park hopper access will give visitors more leeway to maneuver between parks in the morning and early afternoon.
When the change goes into effect, guests with date-based tickets will no longer need a theme park reservation for Disney World. Annual passholders, on the other hand, will still need to plan around blockout dates and book a reservation for some days, like they usually would. However, once passholders enter the park they've reserved, they can then hop to another park at any time of day. Starting in January, Disney World will also be opening up its calendar with new "good-to-go days," when annual passholders can enter the parks without reservations.
The benefit of park hopping
If you're visiting Disney World for an odd number of days, you may not have a full day or two to devote to each park. This is where park hopping comes in. It allows you to do half-days or squeeze in extra time at a park without committing a full day to it.
For instance, you could start the day at the world's most-visited theme park, the Magic Kingdom. Then, you could take the monorail to Epcot and enjoy the best food deals there. You could even ride the Disney Skyliner or a Friendship boat from Epcot to Disney's Hollywood Studios later. The park hopper option allows guests to mix and match parks in any combination.
The only time when date-based ticket holders might be unable to park hop is those rare but exceptionally crowded days when certain Disney World parks reach full capacity. On the downside, you'll also have to spend a little more to visit Disney World since it recently raised its prices. That said, all-day park hopping can be particularly helpful if you're using the My Disney Experience app to join the virtual queue for popular new rides like TRON Lightcycle / Run and Guardians of the Galaxy: Cosmic Rewind at 7 a.m. Since you don't have to physically be in the park for that, you could visit another park first and then head to the one where your ride's boarding group is.