WDW Touring 202: Early Entry Strategies for Hollywood Studios and Magic Kingdom 

I'd love to see a video on strategy and start times to actually get from the different resorts to the park so that you can be close to the front of the pack for early entry.

Wow I love these videos! You do such a great job explaining the strategies. Keep them coming!

Thank you, Becky. As always, Great video! Can't wait to use these Strategies.

Becky, you are such a fantastic teacher, I feel like giving you an apple! 😀 I’d like to see a video on touring strategies for the two Disneyland parks! Hope you have a great vacation!

These videos are very helpful!! I am passing them to my wife and daughter as we get ready to come home in September! Thank you and enjoy your vacation!😀

We have used Touring Plans to create our customized plans for our last 4 trips to WDW and will use it again in 2023. Your advice for using Early Entry at each park is spot on. Thank you. The challenge in using Early Entry is to get the young ones up and out early in the morning. That's not always an easy task and never possible the day after a fireworks show.

Excellent plans! Thank you!

A "sleep in" plan would be great. Also, plans for high crowd days. Maybe park hopper plans where you do early entry at one and then stack genie + at the other?? Love the idea below about those first 3 party hours. These are great!!!!!

I love these videos and am geeking out watching them all getting ready for our trip coming up in just a few days. I'm excited to rope drop and use genie +! I love MOST of your strategies, BUT, I couldn't help but notice you suggest us genie+ users stack our reservations for fantasy land when...the only one I would want to use a valuble reservation on especially at 7am or 11 am would be PPF. All the other attractions in fantasyland that have genie+ are not "priorities". Little mermaid, winnie the pooh, small world, philharmagic all can be ridden with pretty low waits throughout the day and have genie availability throughout the day. I love the idea of rope-dropping space mountain and just buying the ILL for SDMT, and doing fantasyland as a group later! Just not so sure about using my valuble genie+ on those low-wait rides! I'll be using my reservations hopefully for Splash, Jungle Cruist and PPF if I can!

Best video ever! Super clear and easy to fallow. Love the map as I have not been to disney and will be a bit lost to start. Love it. Tha k you . Going in may23

Love these videos! Since we don't stay on property, I'm looking forward to seeing strategies for those who enter the parks at regular rope drop. Thanks!

LOVE that shirt!!!!!

You’re absolutely right about HS. We have done rise and still made it over to Slinky before they opened the early hours queue

Your MK strategy was interesting. I missed the memo about Adventureland not being open for early entry (bad girl). I had chosen Peter Pan's Flight for first Genie +. I wish I had chosen JC instead due to the 1+ hour standby wait and running out of Genie + before PPF/2 hour window. We noticed that if you bypass the crowds at BTR and head over to Splash the wait is pretty easy. When we head back to BTR, the line moved to SM and again the wait is pretty sweet.

A ton of information, simple and easy. Great job! I'd love to see strategies on park hopping in general, best combos and such. But particularly between HS and EP. Which one to tackle first? Going on high crowd level day just after New Year.

How about Extended evening hours park strategies?

Love this! How about the flip side of early entry strategies: ie, 2pm+ park hop after we ace your early am entry ideas?! (Park hopping HS to MK Labor Day Friday w/ genie+ & Individual LL…staying DVC)

For our homework, here's my questions....I've watched your video on stacking then watched this one. Which would be better for a moderate day in HS or MK in February? Or, is there a way to use the Genie+ and early entry, together, as we're staying on property, to get the most out of our day? Love the videos! It's so nice to see someone describe everything from the books, makes even more sense! You do a great job with these!

These are very helpful, thank you!! Are you planning to update these as tourism seasons change (ex., will there be updated touring strategies for winter/spring)?

would love to see some strategies for going during Christmas week!

I'd love to see someone at TouringPlans try these out, especially the Hollywood strategies. My family was there in May, and the wait times suggested seem a bit ambitious. The propensity of Rise to break down (or not open immediately in the morning, as was the case on our visit) had us resigned to purchasing ILL, and ToT's current capacity is a real issue.

Love these videos - so helpful! Question - would you be open to doing a video on strategy for Mickey's Not-So-Scary Halloween Party? Specifically if you can enter at 4pm but the party does not start until 7pm, what should families do within the first few hours?

Someone else mentioned transportation, but hoping for an answer anyway! :D We're staying at AoA for a trip the week before Thanksgiving, so concerned the skyliner won't get us to the park in time for the "unofficial" early entry at 7:30am. Is that a valid concern? Any tips on how to ensure we're there in time? I'm thinking some creative bus hopping and/or paying for a Lyft? Curious if you have any advice!

Thank you so much for your video! I have a question. I don't have a vehicle and lives in on of the resorts that only have buses as the transportation. However, according to the official website, it says that the bus service from resorts to theme parks begins 45 minutes before the theme parks opens. So for example if Magic Kingdom opens at 8 a.m, the first bus from resorts to MK is 7:15. However, the early entry starts at 7:30, so in this case is it like even taking the first bus doesn't allow me to enter the park early? Thanks.

I would like videos of touring strategies for the Disneyland parks, with and without G+.

I always RD RoTR.

Thanks for the advice. Love it. I don’t care about Peter Pan (sorry) so I’m thinking space then mine train then JC then splash/BTM.

For EE, if you are using ILL and LL at HS, start at Tower then RNRC. Reason, if Rise is down you are stuck, which happens quite a bit. Book ILL for Rise and LL for Slinky.

Do you have any strategy for doing early entry and also watching the welcome show on main street??

Thank you! For the MK plan, what alternative do you suggest with G+ if your fam won’t rope drop a 2nd time to JC or you can’t make it in time or back of pack? Would you go do the rides in Fantasyland that you don’t have passes for or something else? With you on EE to Tomorrow land:)

Hello. Very informative video, thank you. If you're rope-dropping at Rise, any reason not to hit Smuggler's Run next as opposed to Slinky Dog Dash given the proximity?

Just love these videos - thank you. Wondering how I can use a Cinderella's Royal Table 8.15am reservation to help with my touring strategy (if at all)? We are not staying in a Disney resort so have no Early Entry.

Or, alternately, you can clone yourself ;). Good, thoughtful advice from our touring plans teacher as usual. Hail and farewell.

In the Genie Plus option - where would you fit in MFSR?

Can you do a full day for Hollywood studios and magic kingdom like you did for animal kingdom?

It’s been 10 mos since this video. Is Rise still letting people on earlier than Early Park Entry? Will be going in August, hoping it’s the case.

As much as I would like to stay on property in our next group it’s with a larger group that is thinking of staying off property so I would love strategies for rope dropping but at normal opening hours

I like the thought of concentrating genie plus in a land- but seems that fantasyland isn’t very “rich” except for Peter Pan? I’d maybe lump Peter Pan and Haunted Mansion since they are so close and can get long waits. I love the idea of rope drop Tomorrowland early entry and then rope drop Adventureland.

Is HS still opening early for Rise?

with it being july/august and 1000 degrees, could you show an example of an itinerary for doing ONLY indoor attractions/shows with the least amount of walking/zigzagging? :)

I would love to know how best to strategically use DAS & Genie+ together in each park. It will be my 4 yo granddaughters (who has sensory issues) 1st visit Disney. Travel party will be my husband & myself (the grandparents, granddaughter (4yo), her mom (28) and then my youngest daughter (19yo).

I have the average genie+ return times from you all in hand, but I have no idea how to prepare for my day with them. If I plan for a 5:45PM Slinky (average0, but get a 2:30pm return, my entire plan is out the window. Do I just decide on rides, and essentially come up with a plan after I get that first genie+ reservation at 7:15AM?

I would love to know what the best Early Entry plan would be for Hollywood Studios if you don't want to ride Rock N Roll Coaster or Tower of Terror but would like to do ROR, Millennium Falcon, Slinky Dog, TSM & Runaway Train. What's the best order to do them in?

What if I have Genie+ for MK but not interested in getting a Lightning Lane for Seven Dwarfs Mine Train? Where should I fit it in the plan?

Is this strategy still accurate as of September 2022? Do they still open Rise of the Resistance early before early park opening hours?

Any updates for 2024?

So for those of us that are more west coast and normally somewhat nocturnal even in our own time zone: We like the idea of early entry and rope drop and doing all the things with minimal crowds, but that would necessitate being up at roughly the same time we normally go to bed and that is going to mean that we probably won’t actually remember any of the fun we had in the parks on the first couple days of our trip. So, I’d love to see videos on how to approach a later start time. If you budget for a deluxe and can take advantage of the extra evening hours, how do you maximize that time? If you may not be coherent enough to make a 7am genie+ reservation, and start looking for genie+ options at say 9am with park arrival at more like 11am, how do you still make the most of the day? Would it still be better to just live with the terrible “jet lag” effect and tackle early mornings circadian rhythms be darned?

How realistic is it to actually be able to enter early HS (getting to gate at 7:15am) and ride the Rise of the Resistance? Should I just plan on paying the Lightning Lane fee and maybe ride it?

Not sure if you saw this question that I posted to a different video of yours- how many genie + reservations can you generally get for a low crowd day at each of the parks? Thanks!!!

How do these plans change if you are doing rider swap?

Just got back from WDW and rope dropped 6 of 8 days. Rope dropping was of no value because in every case our target attraction or attractions were down for extended times. Attractions that were open now had a glut of interest. Basically a waste of the best times of the day. Very frustrating and not magical😢

Why is slinky dog so popular?