Current Crowd levels right now?

[a*lil*bit*goofy]

aw man. I am really second guessing our trip for next year now. :O( I may have to bump it up a few weeks earlier, but I want to see the fall decorations. Perhaps first week of October may be better.

THe FP business I don't get, I have stayed away from most of that talk until there is a final word in place, and a final plan to move forward with. Perhaps all the uncertainty and trial and error has made things worse? Iam also in denial, as we travel without smart phones, and like to have at least part of our trip unplanned (what ride what time for goodness sakes) So hopefully things will level out....perhaps I am being too optimistic.

 

[strangedesign]

We are here now and this is the 2nd time we have come in Oct. I would say Sat MK was a ZOO!!! But surprisingly the lines weren't that long. Yesterday in MK was much more manageable and about what I expect in Oct. SM was a 30 min standby for reference when we left the park around 2:00. Today EPCOT didn't feel too bad but Soarin's FP time was 7:30-8:30 when we go there around 10 AM and TT was a 130 min standby around Noonish. WS was full but no problem getting food or anything. So far this trip is a little bit more crowded than usual I think but not much.

 

[busymomma123]

Wow!! This will be our third October trip on Wednesday. Now I am starting to get a little nervous about it.

 

[mieuxmew]

We were there Oct 19-25th. We have gone to Disney every October for the past 6 years. MUCH more crowded than in previous years! We knew to avoid Epcot Fri, Sat and Sun as the crowds head to the Food and Wine Festival.

In addition to the crowds, the Magic Bands/Fast pass plus roll out really was a problem for anyone not having a Magic Band at especially Epcot and Hollywood Studios. Paper fast passes were quickly gone within the first 1-1 1/2 hours for Test Track, Soarin', Tower of Terror and Toy Story Mania. Standby lines were often 60-120 minutes. I have no idea how the system is going to handle Christmas and New Years week when the parks are really going to be packed.
Magic Kingdom and Animal Kingdom were a bit more manageable as paper fast passes remained available until later in the day.

 

[Bama_C]

We are walking on in HM, Splash, Ariel, etc in MK.

 

[scrappinannie]

I just got back. We were there the 19th-27th. We go during Oct. every year for fall break and I have never seen it this crowded before. Not sure what was up this year, but it definitely seemed worse than usual. Not what I expected for October at all.

Yep. We just returned today after spending the 21st-27th in the parks. Our first MK day was just NUTS!!! People everywhere. FPs (paper, not plus) were completely out by 10am most days, standby lines easily reaching 45-70 minutes early in the day and staying that way all the way up to park close. This is our first visit since the NFL expansion and it was very hard for us to enjoy any of the details or even stop to look at anything with all the people. We never even made it into Ariel's Grotto. Just had to prioritize and deal with it. Now we went back on Sunday and crowds were much lower, or at least it felt that way. Weather has been beautiful, so I'm sure that brings lots of people out who can't deal with the heat and humidity that is Florida for 3/4ths of the year, but man, wasn't expecting quite the crowds we saw this last week.

We're here right now. Yes, it's more crowded than our previous October trips, but we have found it to be manageable. We were at Epcot today. F & W was very busy, but very pleasant with no behavior problems witnessed. We did leave the park at around 5:00 so I can't speak for the evening. Weather is perfect. We will go again in Oct. but will try to avoid the FL school vacation and possibly free dining if that's possible. We were at Kidani which was also busy. Bus service was excellent. Longest wait for a bus at the resort or the parks was 10 minutes. All in all we had a good time.

Evenings were busy. We were there on Tuesday, all day, had dinner at Via Napoli in Italy and up until dinner time, we had very little problems. Yes, Test Track and Soarin' had long waits all day. We rode both stand by. Soarin' wasn't too bad at 30 minutes right after lunch, but we waited about an hour for Test Track and that was our first ride of the day. FPs were totally out by 9:30 or so. We only got through a handful of WS countries before it was time for our ADR and afterwards things were very crowded in WS. There was F&W and an Eat to the Beat concert going on and it was wall to wall people. We left shortly after dinner, as we couldn't really enjoy anything with the kids at that point.

We were there from the 19th-26th. Crowds were not as high as our last trip (spring break 2012), BUT... The new FP+ really seemed to impact the headliners/rope drop.

Yes, I think so, too. I don't know how you're supposed to ride everything you want without using some sort of FP and I believe the number of paper FPs being offered has really decreased, making standby lines that much longer. Winnie the Pooh was listed at 70 minutes most of the day on Wednesday! 70 minutes for a 2 minute ride!! Thank God for the interactive line or our kids would have been climbing the walls!!!

We were there from the 18-25 for probably our 20th trip, 4th in October and it was much busier than we were expecting. For the first time we stayed off property so couldn't use FP+ which greatly affected what we could ride and which FP we could get. We found that standby lines were much longer than normal.

We were in the same boat. Plus I had heard that My Magic+ went live for all resort guests on the 21st, which meant everyone staying at a Disney property was able to book FP+. Not that they did, but at times it sure felt like it!

 

[Bama_C]

We were in EPCOT this morning and TT, Soarin, Se were significant wsits, but crowds were lower when we left at 2 pm for MK. Waits for E ticket rides were 30-40 min standby. We used FP+ effectively. EMH at MK tonight snd most rides are walk on!

 

[ShiPooOwner]

Our plans changed so we were at HS yesterday instead of MK and it was very crowded. At 9:05 there was a 25 minute wait posted for TSM but it was more like 30-35 minutes. Got a FP immediately after riding and the return time was 6:45-7:45. Didn't expect that!

Was talking to a CM at HS and he said they were told to expect about 19,000 yesterday which he said they classify as a "medium" attendance day. He said 30,000 is about the heaviest. IHHO, there aren't many light days anymore like there used to be.

Hope AK is less crowded today but I don't expect that will happen.

ETA: AK was surprisingly "empty" until about 2 P.M. yesterday. Then ??? Population explosion!! EE usually had standby of ten minutes or less. Single rider line was open at 9 and it was always walk right on.

 

[DaisyNY]

Everybody go home! LOL! We arrive tomorrow! Crowds disperse!!!