Walt Disney World Theme Park Strategy: Touring Guide with Genie+ Tips

Walt Disney World park strategy plans have changed drastically with the return of normalcy to the parks! Disney has now introduced the new Genie+ to the parks which has permanently replaced FastPass+.

I travel often to Walt Disney World and have been watching park trends closely in between visits so I'm here to share our best Disney World park strategy with you!

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Attraction Guides

If you're new to Walt Disney World, don't worry- we can help! If you're unsure about which attractions you're interested in for each theme park- it will help to review our attraction guides so you know which rides are the best fit for your group.

• Magic Kingdom Attraction Guide
• Epcot Attraction Attraction Guide
• Animal Kingdom Attraction Guide
• Hollywood Studios Attraction Guide

Walt Disney World Genie+

Genie+ is the replacement for FastPass+ at Walt Disney World. Genie+ is a paid program that allows you to access quicker lines (Lightning Lanes!) to nearly 40 attractions from all four theme parks.

Disney Genie+ costs $15 per day per person at Walt Disney World. This is actually $5 less per day per person than the Disney Genie+ service at Disneyland.

A few A-list attractions (two from each park) are not included in the general Genie+ cost and need to be purchased separately for access via the Lightning Lane.

In order to have a solid plan for touring Walt Disney World right now, you need to understand Genie+ so you can plan your day! Read our guide on Genie+ along with our best strategies on how to use it and then finish reading our park strategies!

PERK for on-site Walt Disney World hotel guests- Guest staying on-site at Walt Disney World can book their upcharge Lightning Lane reservations at 7AM while guests staying off-site have to wait until the park opens.

How to Navigate the Parks Without Genie+

The key to avoiding long lines at Disney World has always been to arrive to the parks early or stay late!

Many guests don't arrive early enough and this puts them at a disadvantage to those that wake up earlier. If you arrive earlier, you beat the rush of groups that arrive around 11AM so this is a great way to cross a few popular attractions off your list?

If early mornings aren't a good fit for your family, staying until park closing is the other alternative! The parks clear out after the fireworks end and the lines will drastically empty out making it a great time to enjoy popular attractions. Especially in Fantasyland since many guests that enjoy that area have small children- late at night Fantasyland will mellow out and you can walk right on to rides like it's a small world with no wait.

Best Transportation Tips to Arrive Early

Since Walt Disney World Resort is the size of San Francisco (yes, you read that right!) figuring out your transportation to the parks is key so that you can arrive early with our Walt Disney World park strategy. Ultimately, the goal is to get to the gate of each park as early as Disney will allow you which currently is about 45 minutes to one hour. To accomplish this you need to figure out which transportation you will use.

• Walt Disney World Resort Bus– I recommend lining up at your bus stop at your Disney World resort at least 90 minutes prior to the park's official opening time.
• Driving – you can drive yourself to the parks or use rideshare (read our guide to using Uber at Disney World) which some people prefer especially if they plan to park hop. You will have to pay for parking though! Currently, Disney is only letting people in the parking lots an hour or less before the park opens so you have to time this right or you will be turned away.
• Skyliner- currently the Skyliner gets you access to Epcot and Hollywood Studios if you're staying at one of the Skyliner resorts. If you plan on using the Skyliner, arrive 45-60 minutes prior to park opening for Epcot and 90 minutes prior to park opening for Hollywood Studios.
• Transportation Ticket Center– the only way to get to the Magic Kingdom, if you're not traveling directly from a monorail from a Disney World resort or bus, is the Transportation Ticket Center. If you are driving this is where you will park your car and then you can arrive to the resort via bus, monorail, or ferry. If you use rideshare, this is the closest place you can dropped off.
  • If you're worried about your resort bus not getting you to Magic Kingdom as early as you like, you can take a rideshare to the TTC and get dropped off. We did this one of our trip days and I found it was faster than waiting for our resort bus. We were at the front of the line for security and the first group on the monorail to the Magic Kingdom.
  • As for choosing your transportation once you're in the TTC, the monorail or bus can often be the quickest options. The ferry is a popular choice though since it really doesn't necessarily take that much longer and the view is wonderful.

On our most recent visits we were staying at Skyliner resorts (Caribbean Beach Resort Hotel and Pop Century Resort) and we always used the Skyliner for our days to Epcot and Hollywood Studios. As long as we arrived early enough to get in line for the Skyliner, especially for Hollywood Studios, we were always in the first group of people in line at security. For Magic Kingdom and Animal Kingdom, we relied mainly on the Disney Resort Busses which worked well to consistently get us to the park early enough. I did discover that Ubering to the TTC for one of our Magic Kingdom days did get us to the park before the guests arriving on the buses so that is something to keep in mind.

Magic Kingdom

Magic Kingdom's most popular attraction is hands down the Seven Dwarfs Mine Train which is in Fantasyland. Many guests head to this ride first thing in the morning which is a good move if you're at the front of this large group. If not, save it for later in the day and don't waste your morning standing in the line that grows the quickest. You can also purchase Lightning Lane for this ride which is definitely worth the money if you can't get on it in the morning.

Genie+ Lightning Lanes- Magic Kingdom

• Big Thunder Mountain Railroad
• Buzz Lightyear Space Ranger Spin
• Dumbo the Flying Elephant
• Haunted Mansion
• “its a small world”
• Jungle Cruise
• Mad Tea Party
• Magic Carpets of Aladdin
• Mickey's PhilharMagic
• Monster, Inc. Laugh Floor
• Peter Pan's Flight
• Pirates of the Caribbean
• Splash Mountain
• The Barnstormer
• The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh

All of these attractions and shows are included with your Disney Genie+ purchase. You can reserve a Genie+ Lightning Lane reservation once every two hours or once you've redeemed your Lightning Lane reservation.

I recommend using Genie+ for:

• Splash Mountain
• Big Thunder Mountain Railroad
• Peter Pan's Flight
• Haunted Mansion

These rides tend to be the most popular at Magic Kingdom that offers Genie+ so you can expect long standby lines. However, you should really pick the reservations for the attractions and experiences that your family is the most interested in. As long as you plan on getting to Magic Kingdom bright and early at opening, you can cross off some popular rides first thing in the day. But just keep in mind, Genie+ attraction access can run out for some rides!

Individual Attraction Access- Not Included with Genie+

Lightning Lanes Individual Attractions service is an option for guests to purchase one off access to the most popular Walt Disney World attractions on the same day of their visit. Price ranges from $7-$12 per person, per ride. Limit two per day.

 Individual Lighting Lane- Magic Kingdom

• Seven Dwarfs Mine Train
• Space Mountain- added as regular Genie Plus through at least August 7!

I highly recommend you use it for Seven Dwarfs Mine Train! This ride is easily the most popular in the park and always has a long line- even at park closing and opening. Space Mountain you could likely ride first thing in the morning or at the end of the night with a lower wait so you could save money by accessing it that way.

Magic Kingdom Touring Plan

Based on our personal experience in the park, here's the order I would tackle the rides in:

• Seven Dwarfs Mine Train
  • only if you manage to be the first group of people entering the parks, if not skip this until before park closing or purchase Lightning Lane for it
• Splash Mountain
• Big Thunder Mountain Railroad
• Pirates of the Caribbean
• Jungle Cruise
• Haunted Mansion

At this point, all the lines will be at their typical length for the day and you can really go about the day at your own order but I like to continue making a circle around the park so I'm not zigzagging my way across. Magic Kingdom is spread out so you will be doing a lot of walking! Following this order once you knock out the key ones earlier in the day prioritizes that. But if you see one of these rides drop to a low wait, you can always change it up and head there before the others!

• Under the Sea- Journey of the Little Mermaid
• The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh
• Space Mountain
• Carousel of Progress
• Buzz Lightyear's Space Ranger Spin
• Tomorrowland Speedway
• Astro Orbiter
• Mad Tea Party
• Dumbo
• Barnstormer
• Mickey's PhilharMagic
• Prince Charming Regal Carrousel
• Magic Carpets of Aladdin
• Enchanted Tiki Room
• Country Bear Jamboree
• Swiss Family Robinson

And don't forget to grab a Dole Whip after you visit the Enchanted Tiki Room!

This strategy can be used with Genie+ which will greatly maximize your time- just make sure you're still hitting popular rides in the morning/evening even when waiting for your Genie+ Lightning Lane time to begin.

Most Popular Magic Kingdom Attractions

I would look at the list below from the top six most popular attractions and make those your priority in the morning or use Genie+ to access them:

• Seven Dwarfs Mine Train
• Pirates of the Caribbean
• Big Thunder Railroad
• Splash Mountain
• Space Mountain
• Peter Pan's Flight

This is why I save Space Mountain for later in the day, I can hit most of these rides listed above quicker in the morning because they're all located near each other. If you arrive and you see Seven Dwarf's Mine Train already has a long line, skip it, and go right to Peter Pan before heading towards the rides in Adventureland/Frontierland. If you do that, just save Seven Dwarf's Mine Train for later. We did this on our second day in Magic Kingdom, we skipped it in the morning to get on other rides quicker and then just hopped in line right before park close. You could also just purchase Genie+ for it which is worth the investment. Even at park close there will be a long line for that ride.

If you have small kids that can't or aren't interested in rides like Splash Mountain, Big Thunder, Space, etc. then just spend your day knocking out the rides in Fantasyland which can easily become more cramped as the day goes on. But Fantasyland always clears out in the evenings so if you can manage it, save it for the evening.

Magic Kingdom Transportation Hack

If being as close to the front of the line at the opening gates is TOP priority for you, especially if you want to do Seven Dwarf's Mine Train with no wait or needing to purchase Lightning Lane access, then here's two tips the serious park touring folks utilize to accomplish this since Disney World is currently not letting people use the parking lots earlier than an hour before the park opens.

1. Uber to the TTC in the morning, plan to get dropped off at least 60 minutes before the park opens. They will hold you there and not let you line up for awhile but you will be at the front of the pack when security opens. When we did this and we were easily in the first main group to enter the park!
2. Uber to the Contemporary Resort and walk to Magic Kingdom from there. The walk is less than ten minutes and doable with kids. Keep in mind that since the reopening Disney may ask guests to show proof of mobile order or restaurant reservation for drop off at resort hotels. You can easily mobile order coffee or arrive earlier for breakfast and walk over. I don't recommend doing the monorail from there though, just walk over as the monorail will already have a big group of resort guests waiting. UPDATE: It's been reported that during peak seasons that mobile ordering has been restricted to ONLY guests at the Contemporary Resort. You can still book a table service time at the on-site restaurant to get early access but mobile ordering is looking iffy right now depending on the time of year you visit.

Hollywood Studios

Hollywood Studios is the park that I get the most questions about when it comes to planning a trip because it's the park with all the newest attractions like Rise of the Resistance, Mickey & Minnie's Runaway Railway, Toy Story Land, etc. We achieved great success with our Disney World park strategy at this park and it definitely wasn't as complex as Magic Kingdom since there are less attractions. But since this park does have less attractions, it also feels the most crowded because there's not as much to do to space crowds out.

Genie+ Lightning Lanes- Hollywood Studios

• Alien Swirling Saucers
• Beauty and the Beast- Live on Stage
• Disney Jr. Play and Dance!
• Frozen Sing-Along Celebration
• Indiana Jones Stunt Spectacular
• Millennium Falcon: Smuggler's Run
• MuppetVision 3D
• Rock ‘n Roller Coaster
• Slinky Dog Dash
• Star Tours- The Adventure Continues
• The Twilight Zone Tower of Terror
• Toy Story Mania

All of these attractions and shows are included with your Disney Genie+ purchase. You can reserve a Genie+ Lightning Lane reservation once every two hours or once you've redeemed your Lightning Lane reservation.

I recommend using Genie+ for:

• Slinky's Dog Dash
• Millennium Falcon: Smuggler's Run

Slinky's Dog Dash is easily the most popular ride aside from Rise of the Resistance in Hollywood Studios! This means that Genie+ reservations often run out right away when the park opens. I would recommend booking Slinky Dog Dash immediately when you arrive at park opening- it's worth it! The line will stay long all day- even in the evening.

Individual Attraction Access- Not Included with Genie+

Lightning Lanes Individual Attractions service is an option for guests to purchase one off access to the most popular Walt Disney World attractions on the same day of their visit. Price ranges from $8-$15 per person, per ride. Limit of two per day.

Individual Lighting Lane- Hollywood Studios

• Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance
• Mickey and Minnie's Runaway Railway- added as regular Genie Plus through at least August 7

I highly recommend you use it for Rise of the Resistance! This ride is easily the most popular in the park and always has a long line- even at park closing and opening. Mickey & Minnie's Runaway Railway you could likely ride first thing in the morning or at the end of the night with a lower wait so you could save money by accessing it that way.

How to Ride Rise of the Resistance

If you want to ride Rise of the Resistance, the newest ride in Star Wars: Galaxy's Edge, the good news is that the process is now far less complicated than it used to be. You can either ride standby or purchase access to the Lightning Lane- this is a separate purchase than the general Genie+ access since Rise of the Resistance is not included in that price.

Hollywood Studios Touring Plan

• Book Slinky's Dog Dash with Genie+
• Ride Tower of Terror & Rock ‘n' Roller Coaster Starring Aerosmith at park opening
  • These two rides are directly next to each other and most of the crowds in the morning tend to run towards Slinky or Rise- leaving the path open to knock these out before the crowds build
• Go at your own pace enjoying the rest of the rides and use Genie+ to save time!

Since Hollywood Studios usually opens a bit later in the day at 9AM or 10AM, by this point in your itinerary the rides will be at the length they will remain for the rest of the day so you can go to the rest at your own pace. I would use Genie+ as often as you can in this park to help maximize your time!

Star Tours- The Adventure Continues, Lightning McQueen's Racing Academy and Muppet*Vision 3D typically have low waits consistently so they're good options to enjoy while waiting for your Genie+ reservation.

Hollywood Studios may be one of the most popular parks but if you arrive early, you can cross a few of those key attractions off your list with no to minimal wait times. I highly recommend getting Genie+ for this park, I would prioritize having it at Hollywood Studios above all others.

Hollywood Studios Transportation Hack

If being as close to the front of the line at the opening gates is TOP priority for you, especially if you want to do Mickey & Minnie's Runaway Railway, Rise of the Resistance or Slinky's Dog Dash with no wait, then here's one tip the serious park touring folks utilize to accomplish this since Disney World is currently not letting people entrance to the parking lot earlier than an hour before the park opens.

Update: parking hours have returned to normal at Walt Disney World but this is still a good tip if you want to Uber early and the parking lots are closed!

1. Take an Uber to the Speedway Gas Station- the Speedway gas station is in easy walking distance to the front gates of Hollywood Studios, about a ten minute walk or less, with only one road to cross. This is doable with kids and many folks do this so they can line up earlier than an hour before the park opens and be at the front of the security line. If you're dedicated, this is the way for you!

Animal Kingdom

Animal Kingdom is by far the largest park, in terms of how much you'll walk, but all the attractions are at a distance from each other making your decision on where to go first in the morning an important one. If you want to avoid purchasing Genie+ at Animal Kingdom then you want to do the opposite of what everyone else is doing. And what does everyone else do? Go straight to Pandora.

Genie+ Lightning Lanes- Animal Kingdom

• A Celebration of Festival of the Lion King
• DINOSAUR
• It's Tough to be a Bug!
• Kali River Rapids
• Kilimanjaro Safaris
• Na'vi River Journey
• The Animation Experience
• Feathered Friends in Flight

All of these attractions and shows are included with your Disney Genie+ purchase. You can reserve a Genie+ Lightning Lane reservation once every two hours or once you've redeemed your Lightning Lane reservation.

Individual Lighting Lane- Animal Kingdom

• Avatar Pandora Flight of Passage
• Expedition Everest- added as regular Genie Plus through at least August 7

Lightning Lanes Individual Attractions service is an option for guests to purchase one off access to the most popular Walt Disney World attractions on the same day of their visit. Price ranges from $8-$15 per person, per ride. Limit of two per day.

I highly recommend you use it for Flight of Passage! This ride is easily the most popular in the park and always has a long line- even at park closing and opening. Expedition Everest can be ridden standby, especially in the morning when the wait time is lower.

Animal Kingdom Touring Plan

You have two options with Animal Kingdom: go to Pandora first or do Pandora later. I only recommend doing Pandora first if you are literally in the first group inside the park. And by this I mean, you have successfully arrived at security early and you have been let into the park before the official opening time- if this is the case, then yes skip your tush straight to Flight of Passage! This will work even better in your favor if you do Animal Kingdom on a day that it opens really early like 7AM or 8AM. You could always opt to purchase access to Flight of Passage via the Lightning Lane which is a separate charge- it may be worth it!

Regardless, this is the order I recommend tackling the rides:

• Flight of Passage
• Na'vi River Journey
  • Only do these two rides first if you have arrived early enough like I described above. If you haven't managed to be at the front of the pack, this literally could even just be a 20 minute difference, then don't go here first.
• Kilimanjaro Safaris
• Expedition Everest- Legend of the Forbidden Mountain
• Kali River Rapids
• DINOSAUR

These rides always have really low waits so you don't have to worry about prioritizing these:

• It's Tough to be a Bug!
• TriceraTop Spin
  • This is by DINOSAUR, so if you want to ride this do this while you're in that area in the morning.

Since my son is getting older, we usually skip both of those but you can easily add them to your list with no problem.

Animal Kingdom Touring Plan Example

We had a lot of success with my plan before the debut of Genie+ and this is how our day panned out because we decided to wake up so early! We visited on a Saturday with park hours of 7AM-7PM.

• 6:10AM
  • Arrive at resort bus stop
• 6:25AM
  • Bus arrived
• 6:35AM
  • Entered Animal Kingdom
• 7:20AM
  • Finished with both Flight of Passage and Na'vi River Journey
    • When we were walking out of Pandora around 7:30AM the line for Flight of Passage was at 60 minutes. So you get my point, if you don't arrive as early as I did, definitely save this for later. You can spend that morning time much better by riding everything else when there's no long waits.
• 7:50AM
  • Done with DINSAUOR -no wait and we rode twice since no one was in line so they let us stay in our vehicle and ride again!
• 8:15AM
  • Done with Kali River Rapids- no wait and walked right on
• 9AM
  • Done with Expedition Everest- rode twice, waited 10 minutes first time and 20 minutes the second. By the time we got off the ride the second time, the line had grown to 30 minutes.
• 9Am-10AM
  • Explore the shops in the area by Expedition Everest, Harambe Market, etc.
  • Snack break for Mickey Pretzels by the Discovery River and watch the character boats pass by.
• 10:30AM
  • Done with Kilimanjaro Safaris, posted wait of 40 minutes and we waited 30 minutes.

So by 10:30AM, we were done with all the major attractions! As you can see from the gaps of time in my itinerary we really took our time to stop and take pictures, pop inside stores, and eat snacks. We weren't running across the park by any means, I am not that athletic. But we were so successful largely because the park opened so early and we arrived as early as we could. This also meant we were more tired by the afternoon so we took a break to hit the pool at our resort and came back refreshed in the evening. This worked out well so we could ride Flight of Passage again and see Pandora at night. That time we did wait about 60 minutes to ride but since the line queue weaves throughout the land it was a great way to enjoy Pandora at night at the same time so it was a win win!

Will this plan still work with Genie+?

Yes! But Genie+ has resulted in longer standby lines so your wait times won't be as short as ours were. But arriving early, and booking it to Pandora, works regardless of the impact Genie+ has had on the parks. I honestly wouldn't even say it's necessary to buy Genie+ for Animal Kingdom due to the smaller amount of rides and how spaced out the park is. I would recommend purchasing individual access to Flight of Passage and arriving to Animal Kingdom early so you can ride the rest with lower waits.

Epcot

Epcot is much more laidback in terms of attractions since there's only a few major attractions that draw large lines: Test Track, Remy's Ratatouille Adventure and Frozen Ever After. Regardless I still always arrive with a plan and with this one I prioritized going through the attractions in a way to save my feet rather than zig zag around the park. Epcot is large and you will thank yourself for just taking a wide circle around it to experience everything.

Read our complete Epcot Morning Strategy for tips to ride the most in the morning and maximize your time in the parks.

For Test Track and Frozen Ever After, you could always save one of those rides for right before the park closes if the line is already long by the time you get to the ride. Since Epcot has two entrances and more options of arrival for guests (Skyliner, busses, resort guests nearby can walk, etc.) it's a bit trickier to be at the ‘front of the group' for this park. We were one of the first groups to arrive at the Skyliner and we entered the park 20 minutes early. We headed straight for Frozen Ever After and there was already a large line formed from guests arriving from the opposite side of the park! Despite that, we were off the ride 10 minutes after official park opening since they started running the attraction early so it still worked out well.

Genie+ Lightning Lanes- EPCOT

• Disney and Pixar Short Film Festival
• Journey into Imagination with Figment
• Living with the Land
• Mission Space: Green & Orange
• Remy's Ratatouille Adventure
• Soarin' Around the World
• Spaceship Earth
• Test Track
• The Seas Nemos & Friends
• Turtle Talk with Crush

All of these attractions and shows are included with your Disney Genie+ purchase. You can reserve a Genie+ Lightning Lane reservation once every two hours or once you've redeemed your Lightning Lane reservation.

Individual Lighting Lane- EPCOT

• Frozen Ever After- added as regular Genie Plus through at least August 7
• Guardians of the Galaxy: Cosmic Rewind- NOW OPEN!

Lightning Lanes Individual Attractions service is an option for guests to purchase one off access to the most popular Walt Disney World attractions on the same day of their visit. Price ranges from $9-$20 per person, per ride. Limit of two per day.

I highly recommend you use it for Guardians of the Galaxy: Cosmic Rewind if you can manage to get on Frozen Ever After first thing in the morning as our strategy below advises. If not, you may want to consider purchasing access for both as these rides are incredibly popular!

Epcot Touring Plan

• Frozen Ever After
  • It's worth it to knock this off your to do list first- but only if you arrive early!
• Test Track
• Mission: SPACE
  • Green is the mild Earth mission which usually has a shorter line all day
  • Orange is the intense Mars mission which usually has a longer line
• Spaceship Earth
• The Seas with Nemo & Friends
• Soarin' Around the World
• Living with the Land
• Journey Into Imagination with Figment
• Gran Fiesta Tour Starring The Three Caballeros
• Explore the World Showcase

If you follow the Disney World park strategy above, it takes you in a circle around Future World in Epcot and directs you back into the World Showcase so you can leisurely explore and take in the shows that are offered in that area of the park. We took our time with this plan, we did not rush from attraction to attraction. Once we finished Frozen Ever After and Test Track, the wait times for most of the rides were reasonable throughout the day so there was no pressure to move quickly from ride to ride. Epcot is definitely the most ‘relaxing' park in that sense.

I also noticed that the wait times at Epcot were often much shorter than their posted time. We rode Soarin' three times in a row because even though the time said 20 minutes the ride was walk on.

As you can see from our experiences at Walt Disney World you can easily navigate the park with or without Genie+ right now and avoid long wait times if you wake up early and arrive with a Disney World park strategy. We will keep this article updated as we closely watch touring trends and how this might impact the wait times at the parks so our Disney World park strategy remains up to date!

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• Disney World Dining Guide: Food Options, Budget Tips, Restaurant Guides
• Star Wars: Galaxy's Edge
• Disney World Cheapest Hotels
• Be Our Guest Dining and Experience Review
• Sci-Fi Dine-In Theater Dining Review