WDW without purchasing Disney Genie +?

[DMLAINI]

Going 8/8-8/14/22. I'm considering not purchasing Disney Genie+. This is my 9th. Trip. I can navigate the parks well & will be using the Touring Plans app. Will be using early entry for all parks other than AK. Will be also using extended evening hours for MK. thoughts? Has anyone gone without Disney Genie+ & had a good trip?

 

[StageTek]

I have gone without Disney Genie+ & had a good trip. Sure, you end up in a few long lines but the trip is still good.

 

[DMLAINI]

I have gone without Disney Genie+ & had a good trip. Sure, you end up in a few long lines but the trip is still good.

Thank you!

 

[Smugpugmug]

I feel like AK is the one park where you need to do early entry the most. I didn't buy Genie+ on my AK day and I knocked out every ride minus FOP before noon. With FOP I did buy the Lightning Lane but if you choose not to, you can hop on the line right before park close.

 

[Her Dotness]

Yup. Like you, we're WDW veterans and can scope out standby lines to decide if they seem to be moving fast enough to suit us and aren't too terribly long.

DH played around a bit with Genie+ very soon after 7:00 a.m. a couple days but quickly concluded it was useless to us for as much as it costs.

We experimented a bit with Genie and got some laughs but nothing else. It tried to send us repeatedly across MK to rides we had no interest whatsoever in doing. When we were standing beside POTC, for instance, which had virtually no standby line. Genie is an enormous joke.

We managed our parkgoing much as we've always done. Waited longer than in the past in lines as we used to make strategic use of FP+ but had a reasonably good trip, given the changes.

 

[DeeBee3]

I've one without it as well. Take advantage or early open or late nights. Just prioritize what you really want to do and then it all works out.

 

[Marionnette]

Going 8/8-8/14/22. I'm considering not purchasing Disney Genie+. This is my 9th. Trip. I can navigate the parks well & will be using the Touring Plans app. Will be using early entry for all parks other than AK. Will be also using extended evening hours for MK. thoughts? Has anyone gone without Disney Genie+ & had a good trip?

I think that it depends on how well you tolerate standby lines. Utilizing early entry and extra evening hours will help. Have a strategy for which attractions to concentrate on during those exclusive hours. And have a feeling for which attractions are "do any time". The TP lines app will be a big help in that regard.

 

[erinch]

We were just there the past couple of weeks. It was steamy, glaring hot. We went later in the day, which lets you stack LLs. We only stood standby on a ride for 20 minutes, because I wanted to ride Ariel and didn’t fit in the LL schedule. Oh, I went to AK to ride safari, arriving at 8:15. When I got in line posted wait time was 45 and the lines app though 35. Fine, I thought. 90 minutes later I climbed on my safari, drenching wet because a bunch of the fans aren’t working. When the famdamily got there we marched by the line for LL and that was a big relief.

Because we went later in the day to the parks, genie+ saved at a minimum 240 minutes at AK and a whopping 660 minutes at MK. We thought it more than worth it. I know we are outliers on that opinion.

 

[Jennasis]

G+ can kiss my grits! We had a marvelous trip in May without it. Toured old school using the LINES app and rode all the things.

 

[farfaraway]

We also went in May without Genie +. We utilized early mornings and got many things done by noon. We also took a midday break at MK and Epcot. Then we went later in the day and did extra evening hours. Definitely rode things during fireworks/parades because afterwards the lines get longer.

 

[MakiraMarlena]

I've been a few times and never used it. It's necessary to plan what you want to stand in line for and when, but it's easy to do. I have been doing lots of shows, too

 

[loveswdw]

We were there June 5-11. Didn't buy Genie+ or buy any ILLs. We did fine. Yes, we did stand in line. We did parks at open, went back to the resort around 1-2, went back to the parks around 5-6 each day. 4 day hoppers.

Longest waits were a little over an hour for Slinky Dog and about 95 minutes for Smugglers Run (won't wait that long again!). And all these folks saying the lines are shorter than the posted wait time...we only found that to be true once. RnR stated 45 minutes and we waited and were off in 20. Most of the time, we'd get in a line with a 25 minute wait and that went up to a 45-55 minute wait while we were in line. And we waited that long. I just have a hard time on principal paying $60 extra per day for my family of four to experience attractions that we've already experienced MANY times prior.

We did extra magic morning hours for DHS twice to get in line for RotR. In line before park opening and heading straight to RotR and still waited an hour for each ride.

We did MK on evening extra magic hours (11p-1a) and waited about 20 minutes for PPF around midnight. We do not ride SDMT anyway so no line experience for that.

We only went to AK for a few hours on Friday evening. We got in line for EE at a 25 minute wait and it quickly went to a 55 minute wait. And we waited 55 minutes. We then went to eat dinner at Satuli. Afterwards, we got in line for FOP around 7:45 (park closed at 8). We waited around a half hour for FOP.

 

[TheSouthernBelle]

Going 8/8-8/14/22. I'm considering not purchasing Disney Genie+. This is my 9th. Trip. I can navigate the parks well & will be using the Touring Plans app. Will be using early entry for all parks other than AK. Will be also using extended evening hours for MK. thoughts? Has anyone gone without Disney Genie+ & had a good trip?

We've done all the parks without G+ recently and even when we do G+ for one or two parks, I've never used G+ for AK or Epcot and we've always had great time. I don't see a point in using G+ for those two parks and imo I only feel like it's really beneficial at MK and DHS. I would just plan to prioritize your RD/early entry goals and EEH plans too. Don't be afraid to get in lines at MK with long posted waits. Most times they're inflated. If you use the TP park planner, that's always helpful too.

 

[DMLAINI]

Thank you everyone a

 

[nursejackie]

We are staying on site in mid-August for 10 nights. We always utilise the early morning park time (shame it's not the full hour it used to be), and as it's our first time without free, pre-booked fastpasses I will try the Genie+ (subject to availability of course) once for each park, then if it's not worth it, I won't bother for subsequent days. However, I've read on other sites it only seems to be worth your while in MK and HS, but I suppose we all have different priorities so what works for some may not work for others.

 

[jimmymc]

With Genie+ I can usually skip two big lines and two smaller ones, saving 3 to 4 hours a day. But even without it, I can still get on all my top priority attractions plus a few others.

 

[loves to dive]

I was there in April and didn't use it. Caveat: I was solo, I go often (it was my 4th trip since the previous April), I don't mind waiting in line, I had park hoppers (AP). I tried to do early morning hours but usually ended up arriving about 5 min. after early morning hours started. I did not do any of the extra late hours, although I could have. Since I had an AP I could go to a park on arrival afternoon.

By going to a park on arrival afternoon (I actually went to two - Epcot and MK), and doing semi-EE hours and hopping to the park I had reservations for on the next day during the afternoon before, I got pretty much everything done. Example: hopping to MK in the late afternoon and having a reservation for MK the next day. That included standing in 4 lines for about a hour only to have the rides go down (Rise, Navi, Remi), one of which we had to be evacuated from (Frozen). I did eventually ride them all except Frozen, cause I don't even like that ride. I only watched one night time show, Epcot. I did watch the Frozen show, Indy, Lion King, the bird show and MK parade. It also included waking up on Thurs. (I was leaving on Sat) with a bad cold starting so I spent the majority of Thursday and Friday in bed, leaving for quick hops for food and in one case to ride a ride. Any time on Thursday and Friday I was indoors I double masked and single masked even outside. I had planned to watch MK FW on one of the nights I was sick but after I got sick, didn't think it was a good idea to be jam packed with all those people, even double masked.

I rode pretty much everything I wanted to. I don't ride RRRC - hurts my neck, MF - not fun when you are solo, FoP - makes me a little sick, EE - backwards makes my head hurt, Space Mountain - hurts my neck. The only things I didn't ride that I might have wanted to were Peter Pan, CoP, Splash and TT. I had plenty of time to have done those and more since I was pretty much down for the count the last two days. I only stayed to park close one night at Epcot and one night at AK, the rest of the time I left about 1/2 before regular close. I went back to my room every day for either pool time or to nap. Basically I had 3 full days in the parks, 1 half day and maybe 2 or 3 hours on Thurs. and 2 hours on Friday.

 

[abidale]

Have gone once without, and once with, in the past year. Without, we had a fine time and didn't struggle to get on anything that we planned to ride--that being said, we didn't take an afternoon break, and we rope dropped, so we were usually pretty exhausted by the end of the day. But it's totally doable-- I stubbornly refused to spend money on it and honestly didn't notice any massive difference in what we accomplished.

With, the only day it made a real difference was Hollywood Studios, and going forward, I'll buy it for our DHS day every time. There are just so many headliner attractions there-- ROTR, SDD, ToT, ROTR, MMRR, etc... we could NEVER have gotten on everything without opting in (outside of waiting in some 2+ hour waits, which none of us are willing to do.)

 

[zebrastreyepz]

I have a tack on question to this:

With 2 days at each park, will our group still need G+ even at places like HS? We have a dedicated Star Wars day for one of the two days.

 

[erinch]

I have a tack on question to this:

With 2 days at each park, will our group still need G+ even at places like HS? We have a dedicated Star Wars day for one of the two days.

As the outlier on this thread, I had length of stay G+ with a 10 day park ticket. Again, we never got there earlier than 11, and had a TS lunch. It was so hot that only half an hour or 40 minutes was excruciating. At AK, it was very useful even for Nemo and Lion King because we got right in. Going later in the day, lines were 60+ for many attractions and the time saved added up quickly. The whole family said they would never go without it. We were offsite at Vistana, so that made a difference.