FP Strategy

[DrankTheKool-Aid]

Our 60 day FP booking window opens soon so I’m trying to get prepared. I was expecting moderate crowd levels for our dates in mid April and thought my plan would be to schedule our FP for the morning in order to take advantage of the additional fast passes for the remainder of the day. The unusually high January crowds have me second guessing this strategy.

I know FP strategy is a personal choice and a debated topic but I’m curious if people change their strategy depending on the expected crowd levels? When crowds are moderate/heavy, is there still a decent selection of FP available during the day or are they pretty limited? I’m willing to check frequently but I do not want to live on my phone, constantly refreshing, instead of conversing with my family members.

If getting a few additional same day FP is not likely then I think I would prefer to use the FP a bit later in the day and spread them out a bit more. For those of you who have been there recently, what was your experience with additional same day FP? Thanks for your help!

 

[cassie58]

We always employ the same strategy - go at Rope Drop, take advantage of the first few hours with shorter lines, make FP for 11 - 2, and then try for 4th FP. During busier times, it will be harder to get the big rides for 4th, but usually some available, and you never know what may pop up. MK has the most choices because of more rides. You can also use afternoon for late lunch/early dinner or pool break or rides/shows without long waits and with AC!(Philharmagic, Hall of Presidents, People Mover, Muppets 3D, Pixar Shorts, etc)

 

[PrincessWithABlaster]

It depends on the size of your group too. Our experience is that it’s pretty easy to get FPs for the majority of rides for a group of 5 in CLs up to 6 or so with reasonable amounts of refreshing (say 5-10 mins or less). Not the hardest to get rides but things like Soarin, BTM, EE. We did find that on the CL 8 day of our last trip it was quite a bit harder and the things we could get with 10 mins of refreshing were more like PoTC and Little Mermaid. CL 8 is also about where I personally started to feel like it was too busy and not as much fun (obviously everyone is different on that).

I’ve been playing around with it lately (not in the parks) and have definitely noticed the difference in length of time it takes to get things between different crowd level days.

Other people report much better luck refreshing than I seem to have on the busiest days or the hardest to get rides but I’m also not willing to live on my phone the entire time and have a larger family. It may also just be luck.

On our last trip on the CL 8 day I definitely would have liked to have a few afternoon pre booked FPs so I think your strategy is reasonable.

 

[Klayfish]

I know FP strategy is a personal choice and a debated topic but I’m curious if people change their strategy depending on the expected crowd levels? When crowds are moderate/heavy, is there still a decent selection of FP available during the day or are they pretty limited? I’m willing to check frequently but I do not want to live on my phone, constantly refreshing, instead of conversing with my family members.

For those of you who have been there recently, what was your experience with additional same day FP? Thanks for your help!

Nope, our strategy doesn't change regardless of crowd level. In fact, since we stay off property, our window is only 30 days, and we don't even look at crowd calendars (we feel they're completely worthless). We just plan to go to whatever park we want to on whatever day. Yes, there is always a decent amount of FP+ availability. How easy they are to get can vary with the time of year...for instance a week in June is going to be far easier than the week between Xmas and New Years...which is the busiest week of the year. But even during the week between Xmas and New Year, which we were just there for, same day FP+ availability is there. We got Space Mountain with just 10 minutes lead time, Splash, Test Track, EE, and countless more with same day availability. Some of them took work, but it was the busiest week of the year. During less crazy times, it's a piece of cake. If your window opens soon, then I presume you're going in April. You should have zero issues getting 4th, 5th, 6th FP+. I understand the concern about wanting to spend time with your family instead of staring at the phone. We're a family of 5, so I want to spend time talking to DW and my kids too. But truthfully, digging for extra FP+ is such a "mindless" activity that it's quite easy to do even while being in full conversation with the family. Besides, the kids think it's fun too, because it's sort of like playing a lottery...will the winning ball come up next?