EPCOT Early Entry Guide- Available Rides, Best Strategy

Maximizing Early Entry at EPCOT is key to enhancing your day in this incredible park, especially when visiting during peak seasons. Early Entry, available to guests staying at Disney resort hotels and select other properties, allows access to the park 30 minutes before official opening. This extra time offers a great advantage, providing the opportunity to experience some of EPCOT’s top attractions with shorter wait times. With the right strategy, you can enjoy more rides and experiences while avoiding the long lines that build up later in the day.

The first step to getting the most out of the Early Entry perk is to plan ahead and prioritize the must-see attractions. By utilizing Early Entry, resort guests can get a jump on their day and enjoy more of what EPCOT has to offer while avoiding the busiest times later in the day. This added time provides a more relaxed pace for exploring the park, dining, and seeing shows, giving hotel guests a valuable head start on their magical adventure.

We often take advantage of the Early Entry perk at EPCOT, and have developed some of the best strategies to start your day efficiently. Below I will discuss which rides are available for Early Entry and how to best utilize this incredible perk that is offered to Disney World resort guests!

Who Has Access to Early Entry at EPCOT?

To get Early Entry at EPCOT, you need to stay at a Disney resort hotel or one of the select partner hotels that offer this benefit. Guests of Disney’s Deluxe, Moderate, and Value resorts, as well as those staying at Disney Vacation Club properties, are all eligible. Additionally, some nearby hotels, such as the Walt Disney World Swan and Dolphin, and select other accommodations, also provide Early Entry privileges. This perk is part of Disney’s effort to enhance the experience for resort guests by giving them a head start on popular attractions before the general public enters the park. Resort guests can enter any Disney World theme park 30 minutes early on any day during their stay, including on the day of check-in and check out. However, be sure to check to see when the themes parks open as they vary from park and by day.

Once you’ve booked your stay at an eligible hotel, simply check EPCOT’s park hours and arrive at least 30 minutes (or more depending on the crowd calendar) before the scheduled Early Entry time to maximize the opportunity. There will be lots of other Disney resort guests taking advantage of this perk, so you’ll want to be one of the first people to scan into the gates. Make sure everyone in your group has a valid park ticket for EPCOT on the day of your visit. Everyone must also be on the resort reservation which is verified by Cast Members upon entry. Being prompt and prepared will give you the best advantage to enjoy EPCOT’s attractions with minimal wait times.

Which EPCOT Attractions are Open During Early Entry?

During Early Entry at EPCOT, pretty much all of of the park’s most popular attractions are available to guests. While not every ride is guaranteed to be open during Early Entry,  you will have the unique opportunity to experience key attractions with shorter wait times. Here are the rides typically available during Early Entry:

• Frozen Ever After
• Guardians of the Galaxy: Cosmic Rewind
• Mission: SPACE
• Remy’s Ratatouille Adventure
• Soarin’ Around the World
• Spaceship Earth
• Test Track – temporarily closed until late summer 2025
• The Seas with Nemo & Friends

As you can see, the most popular EPCOT attractions are open during Early Entry, which is an amazing perk! The top three attractions are, without a doubt, Guardians of the Galaxy: Cosmic Rewind, Frozen Ever After, and Remy’s Ratatouille Adventure. You can’t go wrong by choosing any of these three during Early Entry, but we’ll get more into our strategies below. We’ll also discuss how you can use Early Entry and Lightning Lane to guarantee a short wait time for the most popular attractions at EPCOT.

Free Disney World Vacation Quote

Our favorite Disney-approved re-seller, Get Away Today, can get you a no obligation Disney World vacation quote for free! In addition to great discount prices, their customer service and easy support is absolutely fantastic. They have an entire department dedicated to making sure every order has a wonderful experience and they are on-call to help you during your vacation if you need them. And at no additional charge, you get FREE concierge Walt Disney World services! These services include having Get Away Today’s Walt Disney World experts take care of all your reservations and price monitoring for your trip. This really takes all the stress out of planning a Walt Disney World vacation. Rather than waking up at odd hours of the night to book all your reservations, why not let their travel agents take care of it for you- for free!

Find discount Walt Disney World tickets here!

Buying tickets from Get Away Today is easy and convenient since all their tickets are sent electronically. You can take their vouchers and head straight to the gate without needing to wait in any ticket booth lines. They also offer low deposit fees and layaway plans so you can pay off your vacation over time.

EPCOT Early Entry Strategies and Tips

As of February this year, Disney World got rid of the virtual queue for two popular attractions, including Guardians of the Galaxy: Cosmic Rewind, which is one of the most popular rides at EPCOT and in all of Disney World. Therefore, this means that the Cosmic Rewind standby queue is now open and available to all guests throughout the day! Luckily, Cosmic Rewind is open during Early Entry, and I highly recommend heading straight to this incredible roller coaster if you are interested in riding this attraction. Another upside to riding Cosmic Rewind first is that it’s towards the front of the park, and it’s a pretty easy walk from the front gates of EPCOT, especially compared to Remy’s Ratatouille Adventure and Frozen After Ever, which are located in the France and Norway pavilions of the World Showcase, respectively. Another perk to riding Cosmic Rewind during Early Entry is that it can save you some money on a Lightning Lane Single Pass. I will discuss maximizing Early Entry with Lightning Lane more below.

However, if you want to ride all three marquee attractions at EPCOT, and both Lightning Lane Multi Pass and Single Pass are in your budget, I recommend starting with either Remy’s Ratatouille Adventure or Frozen Ever After. The only way to guarantee short wait times for all three is by booking a Lightning Lane Single Pass for Cosmic Rewind, and booking a Lightning Lane Multi Pass for either Remy’s or Frozen. Although you can book your first three Lightning Lane Multi Passes at the same time, you can only choose one attraction out of the top tier EPCOT attractions. These attractions include Remy’s Ratatouille Adventure, Frozen Ever After, and Soarin’ Around the World. The Lightning Lane Multi Passes go quickly for Remy’s and Frozen, but usually there are reservations available for Soarin’ throughout the day.

When choosing between Remy’s and Frozen, one thing to consider is which EPCOT entrance you will be using. The main entrance to EPCOT is located closer to Frozen Ever After. However, if you are taking the Disney Skyliner from one of the various Disney resorts on the Skyliner, you may want to head to Remy’s Ratatouille Adventure first. Remy’s is located very closely to the International Gateway entrance, which is where guests are dropped off when riding the Skyliner to EPCOT. Either way, if you can book a Lightning Single Pass for Cosmic Rewind, a Multi Pass for Remy’s or Frozen, AND ride either Remy’s or Frozen during Early Entry, this is the best way to get a head start on your day at EPCOT.

Regardless of which attraction you choose to ride during Early Entry, and even if you don’t purchase Lightning Lane, you will absolutely have a great advantage on any of the EPCOT attractions during Early Entry!

Lightning Lane and Early Entry at EPCOT

Depending on how busy the park is and what attractions you want to prioritize, you may wish to purchase Lightning Lane Multi Pass in addition to taking advantage of Early Entry. Especially at EPCOT, taking advantage of both Early Entry and Lightning Lane is the best way to guarantee a short wait for the most popular attractions. Guests can purchase Lightning Lane Multi Pass in order to book return time windows for popular attractions where they will enter a much shorter line than the standby queue. Typically, Lightning Lane Multi Pass costs around $21 per person at EPCOT, or more if you choose to purchase Lightning Lane Multi Pass for multiple parks on the same day. When purchasing a Lightning Multi Pass for EPCOT, guests will be prompted to make their first three selections.

Guests can choose one experience from the following top tier group of attractions:

• Frozen Ever After
• Remy’s Ratatouille Adventure
• Soarin’ Around the World

Guests can choose their other two experiences (or all three) from the following group of attractions:

• Disney and Pixar Short Film Festival
• Journey into Imagination with Figment
• Living with the Land
• Mission: SPACE
• The Seas with Nemo & Friends
• Spaceship Earth
• Turtle Talk with Crush

Once guests redeem a Lightning Lane reservation, they can choose another Multi Pass experience from either group (subject to availability). All Lightning Lane reservations can be booked 7 days in advance of a Disney hotel reservation or date-based ticket, or 3 days in advance for non-date based tickets (such as annual passes) without a hotel reservation. If you’re looking to get the most out of your day, I almost always recommend purchasing Lightning Lane.