Crowd levels right now?

[epcotobsessed]

We leave tomorrow and we have been thinking (hoping?) that crowds won't be so bad because of SWGE opening later in August - how have crowds been these last several days? See you all soon

 

[nerdyone]

I've been monitoring the ride wait times and things seem to have started to calm down a bit. The wait times are still bad between 2-8 but the morning has been okay.

We arrive on 8/4 and I can't wait. The only thing I am concerned about is the chance of a tropical depression. One may form off of PR this week

 

[SaintsManiac]

From what I have been reading on here it's same as we experienced 7/4-7/9. MK always VERY busy. Rest of the parks are lighter.

 

[GADisneyDad14]

I posted this in the July Happy Dance thread yesterday, but it might have some relevancy to the question:

I know "summer crowds" is a common topic around the DIS. We did late June/first week of July in 2017 & 2018. This year we needed to travel later, just got back from a week at WDW.

I was curious to see any difference between early and late July, crowd wise. I think I'd peg things as definitely on the busier side late July judging from this past week. I had been looking at what I deem pretty stout wait times on many rides in the days before we left, and it generally matched that on the ground. It wasn't the holidays, but it wasn't "summer slow" either.

I was reminded of some rather obvious circumstances, such as how storms really wreak havoc on some FP lines when anytime FPs get flooded through the system.

Still had a great time - did everything we wanted, dodged the weather, plenty of park and resort time, etc. It was maybe just a touch more crowded than I expected, and for clarity, I am mainly thinking of MK (and DAK to some extent) when I say this.

 

[epcotobsessed]

We arrive on 8/4 and I can't wait. The only thing I am concerned about is the chance of a tropical depression. One may form off of PR this week

Oh yeah, more serious storms are a concern for sure. We were there last year in early July but this is our first August trip in several years. The inevitable afternoon downpour is no big deal but fingers crossed it never turns into more than that!

 

[BeachPrincess]

We were there last week and thought all the parks were very crowded and there were numerous very large groups, cheerleaders I think. It didn't stop us from doing everything we wanted to do and having fun, but we were not expecting it to be as crowded as it was.

 

[jreed]

We were at MK on Thursday. Crowds were the highest we have seen in our 3 trips but this is the first time we have gone in the summer. As far as MK goes, the more popular rides were around 90 mins or so during the afternoon.

 

[DisneyGirlMI]

This is the last full week of summer for a lot of kids, so I expect that it will be very steady this week. We arrive end of the week. I’m hoping that it calms down next week when kids start going back to school and there is a lull before the end of August madness.

 

[TheSouthernBelle]

I've been monitoring the ride wait times and things seem to have started to calm down a bit. The wait times are still bad between 2-8 but the morning has been okay.

We arrive on 8/4 and I can't wait. The only thing I am concerned about is the chance of a tropical depression. One may form off of PR this week

ditto, they're not sure on projection yet if we will be water logged or not. We are there Aug 2-5.

 

[epcotobsessed]

We don't go back until after Labor Day so I didn't realize that. Oh well.

 

[nedac]

Confirmed... I was there last week... crowds were stupid at MK. Worst I have ever seen... in 17 trips. AK and HS were manageable... only did a day at each. Epcot was the only exception... absolutely dead... waited 15-20 minutes for Soarin and Test Track.

 

[epcotobsessed]

Confirmed... I was there last week... crowds were stupid at MK. Worst I have ever seen... in 17 trips. AK and HS were manageable... only did a day at each. Epcot was the only exception... absolutely dead... waited 15-20 minutes for Soarin and Test Track.

Oh, that is music to my ears! If Epcot is like that on the days we are there I don't care if everywhere else is packed to the gills!

 

[GADisneyDad14]

To me, one area I really feel the shades of grey of “crowded” is with rope drop. If crowds are on the lower side, you get more of a rope drop advantage... you can cover more ground and it takes things just a touch longer to fill in to where lines are longer than I typically want to deal with (generally speaking). When crowds are higher (which in my view they were last week), the rope drop advantage goes away pretty quickly. I felt that was the case last week, particularly at MK.

 

[epcotobsessed]

To me, one area I really feel the shades of grey of “crowded” is with rope drop. If crowds are on the lower side, you get more of a rope drop advantage... you can cover more ground and it takes things just a touch longer to fill in to where lines are longer than I typically want to deal with (generally speaking). When crowds are higher (which in my view they were last week), the rope drop advantage goes away pretty quickly. I felt that was the case last week, particularly at MK.

I think that's spot-on and why we are only planning to RD Epcot because we're staying at BC, so if crowds are nuts we'll just go back to the hotel for a while and try again later. We were fortunate to get the exact FPs we wanted at the times we wanted at the other parks, which made me think that maybe crowds wouldn't be so bad, but that seems unlikely.

 

[TheFloatingBear]

To me, one area I really feel the shades of grey of “crowded” is with rope drop. If crowds are on the lower side, you get more of a rope drop advantage... you can cover more ground and it takes things just a touch longer to fill in to where lines are longer than I typically want to deal with (generally speaking). When crowds are higher (which in my view they were last week), the rope drop advantage goes away pretty quickly. I felt that was the case last week, particularly at MK.

I'm heading down in a week and will do a few rope drops and hoping my question makes sense...are you comparing 9am openings from year to year, do you think? It seems like it's all 9am openings next week for us as opposed to 8ams, which of course seems to increase the rope drop crowd, and with seemingly fewer hours in the evenings to stretch crowds out, I'm concerned we won't get much of an advantage with a 9am opening. Am I making sense?

 

[blessedby3]

We were there yesterday (MK) just for the day (just bought tickets last week so no stellar FP available). We got to the parks at 7:30, were only about 12 people deep to get through the tapstyles and were first at the rope for 7DMT. It was also a special ticket event that morning. I was so scared before we got there about what the crowds would be. I have to say it wasn’t bad at all! We did so many rides, saw a few characters and had a break at the Grand for about an hour and a half. I was super happy with the crowds and even the heat wasn’t as bad as I was expecting. I didn’t see any tour groups either. The o my bad thing was we didn’t get to see the fireworks. A super bad storm came through about 7:30 and we were stuck in the BTMRR queue for about 40 mins. Once the rain let up a bit we headed for the front of the park. It had been lightning like crazy the whole time and my daughter was petrified. I don’t think there is any way they had the fireworks with how bad that lightning was. It is the only thing we missed out on.

 

[Mousefan mom]

We leave tomorrow and we have been thinking (hoping?) that crowds won't be so bad because of SWGE opening later in August - how have crowds been these last several days? See you all soon

We were just there from 7/20-7/21. I'm almost afraid to tell you because I don't want to spoil your trip--but this is the honest truth. We stayed at the Poly, booked all reservations well in advance, and did FP at 7AM at the 60 day window. We have gone this time of the year (give or take a week) the past 6 years consecutively. Huge Disney fans, love, love, love....best Disney vacation ever just last summer. Having said that, we had absolutely planned to go again next summer (already working with travel agent to book 2020) until we went this summer.

The crowds (which we anticipated would be lower due to SWGE opening later and it has been the past couple of July's) were insanely crowded and there was just no escape from them this year. We even booked a Disney after hours (Villain), which we had did last summer...except this summer they let so many more people into them that what was a peaceful non-crowded MK last year with walk on rides....were now 20 minute average wait times to ride this year (not okay during an after hours--and we didn't get to ride a lot of things we had wanted). It felt more like EMH'ers versus the after hours party we paid $130 per person to attend.

The Disney transportation seemed to take so much longer this year (on average over an hour to get from resort to park). I am blaming this also on just more people/higher crowds--and they fact the parks have such limited hours (I still remember when MK was kept open until midnight, the past 2 summers Hollywood and AK had later hours, etc.). We attempted to park hop from Hollywood to a dining reservation in Epcot one day, they shut down the water boats, told us it would "quicker" to take a bus--we waited over 45 minutes to get a bus out of Hollywood--had it not been pouring we would have walked. Monorails were often very hot, and almost always standing room only packed. Getting out of the MK after the Villain after hours was stressful and packed--like at park closing. It truly felt like park closing because there were SO many people there. We were also planning to do the Hollywood after hours party, and ended up not doing it because the MK one was so disappointing. I am not sure if it was the free dining, just more AP this year due to all the new stuff opening--but the crowds were intense. Normally we do our 3 fast passes, and then immediately book others--this year there was nothing left that you would even need a FP for. Lines were long for all rides. Epcot had slightly less wait times, but when it rains they close test track and then that swamps the other lines. We had a FP to test track and it was down due to wetness, and they would not allow us to use it for FEE (which I felt we should have since both are tier 1).

We think Disney could have done a better job at extending park hours to disburse the crowds, and we are also blaming the new FP systems (people were talking about being able to buy 6 of them now if you stay club level, and I believe good neighbor hotels also get to book them early now)...but even at our 60 day mark, we were unable to get SDD until the last day in our trip, etc. Sorry--I know I sound so negative. We still love Disney--but we plan to take a break this year and hope to find our magic by 2021...

 

[Mousefan mom]

From what I have been reading on here it's same as we experienced 7/4-7/9. MK always VERY busy. Rest of the parks are lighter.

All of them were insanely packed in our experience, particularly Hollywood. Took forever to get through security and into a park too...just tons of people.

 

[epcotobsessed]

Mousefan mom, that stinks! I'm so sorry you had such a lousy experience. We were there over July 4 last year and it was great - maybe it was just that particular time, but I would recommend considering that time period for next year. Our favorite time to go is during our March school break but it didn't work for us this year, hence going now.

 

[Mousefan mom]

I posted this in the July Happy Dance thread yesterday, but it might have some relevancy to the question:

I know "summer crowds" is a common topic around the DIS. We did late June/first week of July in 2017 & 2018. This year we needed to travel later, just got back from a week at WDW.

I was curious to see any difference between early and late July, crowd wise. I think I'd peg things as definitely on the busier side late July judging from this past week. I had been looking at what I deem pretty stout wait times on many rides in the days before we left, and it generally matched that on the ground. It wasn't the holidays, but it wasn't "summer slow" either.

I was reminded of some rather obvious circumstances, such as how storms really wreak havoc on some FP lines when anytime FPs get flooded through the system.

Still had a great time - did everything we wanted, dodged the weather, plenty of park and resort time, etc. It was maybe just a touch more crowded than I expected, and for clarity, I am mainly thinking of MK (and DAK to some extent) when I say this.

I'm not sure if its an early versus late thing--we usually always go late July or early August--it was just insanely packed this year compared to previous trips we've taken--and the park hours just were on par for the crowd levels. During times this crowded, MK can be open from 7AM-11pm normally--sometimes even until midnight. This year it was 9-10 most days. Last summer Hollywood at longer evening hours on Friday--they closed about 9pm this year (and Hollywood was packed!), the summer before that Animal Kingdom had later evening hours--but they also closed by 9 or 10pm most nights too...