Realistic Number of Attractions in a Day?

Kbosch

Mouseketeer
Joined
Jan 23, 2019
My last time to DW was 15 years ago, and after going multiple times a year for many years I now feel like such a newbie with so many things.

We'll be there late September. I know SW will affect the crowds so it's hard to know for sure, but say on past party days at MK, how many rides do you think you can usually get on if you make good use of your FPs and get a few additional? I've been using Touring Plans and trying to map things out - right now I have 9 attractions from 9am to 4pm (factoring in a snack break and CP lunch break). Is this realistic or should I lower my expectations?

If it was just me I would love to get up extra early and take advantage of the EEMH, but no one else wants to get up that early on vacation (although if we only get on 2 rides our first day they might have to change their minds.) 😝
 
I'd suggest getting to know the FP system well so that you can get more attractions in. The unknown is how GE will impact other parks but you should be able to get more done than 9 attractions even if it does get busy.
 
No one in my group does mornings, but I promised naps in exchange for rope drops. We also believe that 1-4 is not a time to be outside in the heat so that time would only be used for indoor shows anyway. That was actually the big reason people agreed to rope drop- the heat.
 
On our last visit to MK, we did 16 rides in 4 hours from 8 pm until midnight with no FastPasses. That’s the only time I’ve counted, but we probably do more in a full day when we use FP refresh.

The key is staying late when the lines are the shortest. Mornings are too crowded and stressful for us. 11 am is about the earliest we arrive.
 


Our family won't wake up early, no matter what I do, and we don't usually make it to a park before 10 am. So I learned how to use fastpasses. In one day, we did:
Jungle Cruise
Pirates of the Caribbean
Tom Sawyer Island
Haunted Mansion
It's a Small World
Barnstormer
Big Thunder Mountain RR
Prince Charming's Carousel two or three times
Tea Cups
Carousel of Progress
PeopleMover
SpeedWay
Haunted Mansion again
watched fireworks
Seven Dwarf Mine Train

We also ate two counter service meals (with mobile ordering), had ice cream, had coffee, stopped for two photopass photographs and headed out at park close.
 
When I plan my trips and friends' trips, I budget 2 attractions per hour. That way we have time for bathroom breaks, snack stops, and soaking in the little details.
 
FP is your friend with rides. Magic Kingdom has so many rides it is the easiest park to pick up multiple fast passes throughout the day. When I took my friend who hadn't been before we ended up riding every single ride (minus the really little kiddie rides we didn't want to go on) and didn't wait in a single line. We also entered the park at 1pm and stayed until close. I recommend making your first three fast passes earlier in the morning. Whatever time you plan to enter the park try and make your first fast pass ending near that time. That way you can go straight to that ride and then as soon as you get off you can go on your second one. Also try and have the fast passes back to back like 10am-11am, 11am-12pm, 12pm-1pm. If you make your first three for harder to get rides that also helps.

Once you use your fast passes pick up a 4th and then a 5th. Modifying is very helpful. If you see a ride that doesn't have the best time you can grab it and modify the time up. It is much easier to modify a fast pass you already have than finding a brand new one with the time that works. Sometimes it can take a bit of time with refreshing. I would pick up fast passes as soon as we tapped into the fast pass line for our current ride, so that when we got off we'd have another ride to go on. If you have a bit of a gap between fast passes that's a good time to ride rides that don't have fast pass like Carousel of Progress or the People Mover.
 


All of them. And if you didn't, you wasted your money and you should feel shame.

Just kidding.

Depends on the day and what rides you'll consider a success. Like what FSU Girl said, get your fast passes scheduled early and just jump fast pass to fast pass. Find some crowd calendars and attraction wait time tables (if you want to get that deep in to it) and you can create a touring plan that takes advantage of projected lower wait time attractions.

Also depends on if you rope drop. You can typically get on 2-3 different rides fairly quick first thing in the morning.
 
Example if you learn to use FP+refresh: MK Sunday (Yesterday) Arrived at 905. On the bus over made FPs for BTMRR 330, JC 1115, HM 915. Walked in and did HM, Moved JC to 930, BTMRR to 1045. Did JC and moved BTMRR to 1015. Did BTMRR and pulled a Splash for 1035 while in FP line for BTMRR. While in line for Splash, pulled a Pan for 230 and modified to 1115. Did Pan and pulled a Buzz for 1130. Did Buzz and in line pulled a Space for 250 and modified to 1205. Did TTA to kill time and relax, did Space and pulled a 7DMT for 8PM, modified to 1235. Pulled a POC in line for 7DMT for 1250. Walked over, did POC and at 1PM pulled an FoP for AK at 205. So in less than 4 hours we used 9 FPs at MK and pulled a 10th at AK for FoP. And we went into the day with zero FPs booked. Party of 2, but, we have done this regularly at MK with parties as big as 4 and if its a larger party we split and overlap.
 
Refreshing is almost as fun as the ride themselves. It's like having an EZPASS (toll pass for the Northeast) when they first came out a long time ago and watching all the plebes tossing quarters into baskets on the NJ turnpike.
 
Yes it does. It becomes an obsession with some. We generally have at least 3 in a party of 4 or more and in our party of 2 or 3, all of us understand FP and refresh. We have gotten to the point we can do pulls and modifies just standing in the FP line for the current ride to pull the next one. Then we enjoy the ride and the walk tot he next FP. Sometimes it takes a bit more time to modify certain attractions. 7DMT, FoP, SDC, and TT tend to be the most difficult to modify, but, it isnt impossible.
 
We travel with my parents and they can't do what they used to. We still manage 4/5 in a day but that's coupled with lots of resting and people watching. You could easily double that if you book fp and are in good health.
 
Local passholder. All the tips about back to back fp’s, refreshing, etc are what will allow you to ride nearly everything without waits. The only ones you will have trouble getting a fp for are Peter Pan and 7DMT. Not impossible, but harder. Best to prebook those for early in the day or rope drop one them. We typically open the park and leave around 3 or 3:30. Our typical day looks something like this (though not in this order), with some variations visit to visit:

Pirates, BTMR, Splash in warm months, HM, PP, IASW, Philharmagic, Little Mermaid, Pooh, People Mover, Buzz, Carousel of Progress or Laugh Floor, parade in cooler months. We’ll usually do one “kiddy” ride like Dumbo or the carpets.

In cooler weather we may meet a character or two. We nearly always pack all of our food and drinks, so you would need to factor in time for buying stuff. We almost never get in a line with a posted time of more than 15 minutes. After 10:00 or so when lines build up, we use fp for everything that has it that we do (except Philharmagic).
 
Just got back from a few days in Disney with my 16 yo son. Obviously, a lot easier with 2 people who are willing to traverse back and forth across the park based on wait times we see on the app than it is with our entire family. The rain also helped us as it hit while we were eating lunch & once we saw the rides were shut down the plan was to get to them as the rain was moving out.

/ arrived at MK 9:20a /
Splash - FP 9:30
Thunder - wait 30m
Space - FP 10:30
People mover - wait 10m
Mine Train - FP 11:30
Pirates - wait 10m

/ 1230p Starlight Cafe - heavy rain, good timing! /

Thunder - wait 10m (stood near entrance in light rain with ponchos on waiting for it to reopen)
Splash - wait 15m (also just reopened after rain/lightning)
Splash - wait 40m (posted wait time was 25m, but wasn't updating fast enough after reopening)
Buzz - FP 2:50
Haunted Mansion - wait 20m
Pirates - wait 15m

/ 4-6p Bay Lake Tower - walked back to our resort to get out of heat/humidity after rain & eat /

Speedway - wait 30m
Space - wait 50m
People Mover - wait 10 min

/ as crowd started to move toward castle/main st for fireworks we headed to Adventureland / Frontierland knowing wait times would drop /

Haunted Mansion - wait 10m
Splash - wait 35m (fireworks over castle while on ride)
Thunder - wait 20m
Splash - wait 25m

/ left park around 10p /



So we managed 19 rides. My son's favorite ride is (if you can't tell) Splash Mountain & we were able to get on that 4 times - but were really aided by the rain/lightning starting as we were having lunch. It was my son who pulled out the weather radar and said it was ending soon & let's go "stalk" Big Thunder.

Also, If you're willing to give up sitting on Main Street during the fireworks, you can really take advantage of the lack of people in other areas of the park... and still see the fireworks (IMHO it's better when on a ride anyway). MANY people leave right after the fireworks, so stick around and catch a few more rides if you can!


Best advice I could give though, is be flexible and let the wait times on the app dictate where you go next
 
Thank you everyone!

We'll be there with my 3 young kids so I know I'll end up needing to take more breaks than I can even plan on but hopefully I can get the hang of FPs and still see most of what we want. Really trying not to over plan but I can also see myself being like "We need to be at this ride in 6 minutes or the day is ruined!" 😆
 
Before our last trip (May 29-June 5) I would have replied with an average of 8-10 rides/attractions per day. Unfortunately that wasn't the case for our party this last time. I personally feel that the FP+ system has made WDW worse instead of better. Don't get me wrong WDW was busy but you'll never convince me it was so busy that every standby line was nearly 60 minutes plus all day every day of our trip. I dunno, I'm kind of sour right now.
 
Before our last trip (May 29-June 5) I would have replied with an average of 8-10 rides/attractions per day. Unfortunately that wasn't the case for our party this last time. I personally feel that the FP+ system has made WDW worse instead of better. Don't get me wrong WDW was busy but you'll never convince me it was so busy that every standby line was nearly 60 minutes plus all day every day of our trip. I dunno, I'm kind of sour right now.

We went during the same week last year and probably did 20+ rides per day. FP+ made all of the difference in the world.

I wondered if it’s busier this year so I looked up some Touring Plans stats from yesterday. About 2 hours before closing time last night, the MK headliners including 7D, Space, Big Thunder, Splash Mtn, etc all had actual waits reported between 5 and 20 minutes. Based on this, a guest could have likely hit 8-10 rides in just 2 hours last night.
 
We were at MK on June 6th here is what we got done
9am rope drop
At rope around 8:30
BTMRR - rope drop no wait
Splash (twice) little to no wait
SDMT FP 9:45-10:45 -- No wait at all - FP Walked right on
Pirates (40 min wait!!)
Jungle Cruise FP 11:05 - 12:05 (there was a 20 min or so wait for FP)
Haunted Mansion FP 12:10 -1:10 (there was a 20 min or so wait for FP)
BOG Lunch Reservation around Noon ish
So we got 7 items done before lunch
 

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