Current wait times look pretty long. I was thinking September had lighter crowds. Is there anything special going on that might account for the

[eric8]

large number of crowds (I'm basing this on wait times)?

 

[tguz]

I don't rely on wait times much. Back in Dec 2022, almost every line we waited in was overstated by quite a bit.....like 45 min posted waits were 20- 25 a lot of times.

 

[rwdavis2]

Also, lack of staffing on some rides. For example, only one track of Space Mtn. Running

 

[lugnut33]

IMO, Disney posts higher wait times to steer you towards purchasing Genie+ and ILL.

 

[brandelyncon74]

I just got back yesterday and the longest line we waited in all last week was 25 minutes. Crowds were very low. Last Tuesday we got to DHS at 8:15am and we rode Tower of Terror totally by ourselves. We were the only ones in the entire elevator car. They were running both sides of Space Mountain at least last week. I do think ride times are overinflated.

 

[parasail_of_congress]

(removed)

 

[MomOTwins]

Welcome to party season. Today is a Monday. Halloween parties yesterday and tomorrow (Sunday and Tuesday). Meaning everyone without park hoppers or a party ticket flocks to MK on Mondays. This is mostly an MK problem—if you look at AK for example, FOP only has a 50 minute wait and the Safari is a walk on. Wait times are never truly short at HS, but not a single wait is triple digits—that’s pretty low for midday.

It’s only truly MK that is crowded today, and it’s all due to the party schedule. Everything will be short waits tomorrow (party day).

 

[SoCalDisneyFan2708]

Welcome to party season. Today is a Monday. Halloween parties yesterday and tomorrow (Sunday and Tuesday). Meaning everyone without park hoppers or a party ticket flocks to MK on Mondays. This is mostly an MK problem—if you look at AK for example, FOP only has a 50 minute wait and the Safari is a walk on. Wait times are never truly short at HS, but not a single wait is triple digits—that’s pretty low for midday.

It’s only truly MK that is crowded today, and it’s all due to the party schedule. Everything will be short waits tomorrow (party day).

Yep. I was there yesterday and it was one of the lightest crowd days I’ve ever seen. During party season it’s actually better to go on party days. Yesterday during the day MK was basically a ghost town. At night in HS literally everything was a walk on. Even Rise and Slinky had 5 min waits.

So to the OP, yes September is/was considered “offseason“. I feel like over the past several years crowds were heavier than they had been at this time. For whatever reason though this year I’m seeing more days like yesterday. I don’t know why that is but I’m definitely going to take advantage of it as long as I can

 

[RoseGold]

ROTR and TOT were down this morning. Ouch.

 

[eric8]

Thank you everyone for your reply. So, are the party days (MNSSHP) usually on Sunday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday? We are going a year from today and I had a park reservation for Magic Kingdom for Monday Sept 11th 2023. If the party is on a Tuesday then I might swap reservation days. I just wanted to check first before I did that. If they are usually on a Tuesday then I might swap my Epcot and Magic Kingdom dates around. Again, thank you everyone for the reply.

 

[Davey Jones II]

The basic strategy during party season is to go to MK on Party days, then park hop when the party crowd starts to show up at 4 (unless you have some lightning lanes stacked up at MK).

If you want to see fireworks, show up that night, maybe an hour before the show. You can also see the fireworks from outside the gate.

 

[igrsod]

We just got home last night and I can account first hand that wait times are severely over inflated. We got in the ROTR line stated for 60 minutes and we were on the ride in 25.
That was the norm for the whole trip in every park. Genie + would be unnecessary. We rode absolutely everything multiple times and never purchased a LL or G+.
When wait times went up was when other rides would be done, thus putting more pressure on other rides. In 10 days we never waited more than a 1/2 hour for anything.

 

[Jennasis]

Disney Lies. We've been here since Saturday and it's been one of the lightest crowds in the last 2 years. Quite manageable.

 

[sponica]

Disney Lies. We've been here since Saturday and it's been one of the lightest crowds in the last 2 years. Quite manageable.

I feel like that's a return to "normal"?. 2019 is a hard year to use as a "normal" year because GE opened and all the parks had EXTRA EMH, so I think you have to use fall 2018 as a comparison, and I feel like this part of the calendar is a softer part of the calendar.

 

[inspectorgadget]

We just got home last night and I can account first hand that wait times are severely over inflated. We got in the ROTR line stated for 60 minutes and we were on the ride in 25.
That was the norm for the whole trip in every park. Genie + would be unnecessary. We rode absolutely everything multiple times and never purchased a LL or G+.
When wait times went up was when other rides would be done, thus putting more pressure on other rides. In 10 days we never waited more than a 1/2 hour for anything.

I will be there in 2 weeks, spending one day at HS and one night at the Halloween party. You say Genie+ isn't necessary, but you were there for 10 days. I'm wondering if it would be helpful if only spending one day at HS?

 

[Kingoglow]

I don't know what data you are looking at, or what you consider long waits, but I was there the week before Labor Day (8/29-9/5) and most waits were 15-20 minutes; basically a walk on all day.

Slinky Dog was the exception at 70 minutes. I even walked onto Rise as my second ride of the day and only waited 20 minutes.

 

[Kingoglow]

I will be there in 2 weeks, spending one day at HS and one night at the Halloween party. You say Genie+ isn't necessary, but you were there for 10 days. I'm wondering if it would be helpful if only spending one day at HS?

If you have one day at HS and you want to accomplish most of it, I would say that it is a good idea to purchase Genie+ and an ILL for the day. Again, this is only if you feel like you will be disappointed if you don't ride Rise/Slinky Dog.

I visit twice a year and I usually only do HS for one day per trip and still always buy Genie+. My situation may be different than yours.

 

[gorkt]

Are they inflating ride times more than they have in the past? I feel like they have always inflated them a little, because it makes people feel better to wait for 40 minutes when they expect 60. Is there any hard data on this?

 

[inspectorgadget]

If you have one day at HS and you want to accomplish most of it, I would say that it is a good idea to purchase Genie+ and an ILL for the day. Again, this is only if you feel like you will be disappointed if you don't ride Rise/Slinky Dog.

I visit twice a year and I usually only do HS for one day per trip and still always buy Genie+. My situation may be different than yours.

Thank you for your reply. My family visits once a year (although haven't been since 2019 due to Covid) and we alternate parks. I think we will purchase Genie+ since we won't visit that park again for a few years.

 

[_19disnA]

Part of the lower crowds could be that all schools are back in session and parents are less likely to take their kids out of school right at the start of the year. International travel is probably still not fully back to normal either. Other factors like high costs, lack of interest are much more difficult to quantify.

When we last went to Disney in 2019 (before Genie), posted ride wait times at the entrance of various rides were all over the map. Some obviously too high, others clearly too low. No idea how those are determined and if any type of manual updates are done by those operating rides. We decided what to ride based on how long the line was and how fast it was moving.