One of the most common complaints about Genie+ replacing the prior FastPass+ is the loss of advance booking for rides. Genie+ currently does not offer any advance booking for rides and all ride reservations are done in the parks the day of your visit.
Under the old FastPass+ system, guests were given the ability to book up to three advance ride reservations per day. These reservations were for specific times, just how access to Genie+ works now, but they were booked 30-60 days prior to your vacation. Then once guests arrived in the park, they would redeem their advance selections and book other selections that were available.
Walt Disney World has already announced that they were taking guest feedback into account to bring back some form of advance booking for Genie+ and individual Lightning Lane selections. Now we have the first clue that Disney is ready to start making these changes!
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Disney Announces Genie+ Advance Booking Change
In May 2023, Disney shared that they were looking into ways to simplify the Genie+ experience. According to Disney, they are considering how to give guests the chance to book “Disney Genie+ service and individual Lightning Lane selections before the day of their park visit.” No other specific details were shared but Disney did say more information would be shared at a later date.
Note that the language includes both the general Genie+ service and Individual Lightning Lanes as options that will be available for some type of advance booking.
Well, it's nearly one year later and we still have not received any further updates on this change coming to the Genie+ program. Despite this, I think Walt Disney World is preparing to make an announcement on these new changes that may come as soon as next month! Let's get into the details of how FastPass+ worked and talk about why I think Disney is ready to roll out advance booking.
How FastPass+ Worked
The FastPass+ program at Walt Disney World allowed guests to book FastPass reservations in advance before their vacation. Guests were given up to three advance FastPass+ selections to pick from at each park. This means guests could pick three rides and experiences for each park day. Once guests fulfilled their advance FastPass+ reservations, they then could redeem additional FastPass selections once in the parks.
Each FastPass+ selection had a return time window and you would choose these return windows when you booked the FastPass+ prior to your visit. Guests would then redeem their selections by entering the FastPass line, now called the Lightning Lane, which is a much shorter wait than the standard queue.
The advance booking for FastPass+ was separated into tiers based on ride popularity. Guests staying on-site at Disney World always were given first dibs on booking reservations before off-site hotel guests. Guests were also limited to only booking FastPass+ reservations for one park per day. So that means if you planned on starting off at Magic Kingdom and moving to Animal Kingdom, you could only book FastPass+ reservations for one of those parks for that day.
How Would Advance Genie+ Reservations Work?
One big change would be needed to make Genie+ advance booking possible and that would be allowing guests to purchase Genie+ in advance. Currently, guests at Walt Disney World cannot purchase Genie+ until the day of their visit. Pre-booking will require early purchasing along with Disney World tickets.
In terms of pricing, it's likely that Disney will use the same tiered pricing for booking Genie+ in advance as they do now in the parks. Tier based pricing means that the price of Genie+ varies depending on the day with more crowded days costing more and lower crowd days costing less.
When Will Disney World Bring Back Advance Ride Reservations?
Disney announced just this week that they are bringing sweeping changes to the DAS (Disability Access Service) program at Walt Disney World that would ultimately result in a reduction of guests in the Lightning Lane. Disney revealed in this announcement that the amount of DAS users has more than tripled since the switch from FastPass+ to Genie+. By moving to a more limited eligibility criteria, currently phrased as for those with developmental disabilities like autism or similar, this will naturally create a reduction in DAS use.
This lines up with the experiences we've had in the parks when we've seen the lines for Lightning Lane stretch out past the queue. This is because there are just too many guests in the Lightning Lane to make the service efficient. Now that Disney is cracking down on the use of DAS, it is likely they are preparing to start rolling out these new changes to Genie+ which include the advance booking. Reducing waits in the Lightning Lanes is a positive impact for everyone and especially for those that use DAS.
Read more about the changes to the DAS eligibility including FAQ and our thoughts.
Part of the changes to DAS also includes the removal of ride pre-selections that is currently available to DAS users. All these new changes go into effect at May 20th at Walt Disney World. This is why I am predicting a Genie+ announcement to come soon after, perhaps to prepare for summer, to allow guests the ability to prebook Genie+ ride reservations. Once the DAS program is under control and no longer putting a strain on Genie+, Disney will likely feel more confident that these changes can roll out smoothly.
Removing the DAS pre-selection also would make purchasing Genie+ the only means to have advance Lightning Lane reservations which would make that service more appealing than DAS. Improving Genie+ is a win win for every guest but will also especially be helpful for guests that may no longer be eligible for DAS.
The ability to book Genie+ Lightning Lanes in advance will be a game changer for guests to plan their vacations and also move the bulk of the planning to prior to your park arrival. This means less time spent staring at your phone while in the parks which is a compliant we hear often from guests navigating Genie+.
I expect we will hear news of this change to Genie+ once the DAS program has been modified so look for news soon on this upcoming change.
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will they also be doing this for Disneyland? also when and why do you still have to make park reservations at Disneyland and not Disneyworld? thank you in advance! we are going the last week in Sept.
Right now Disney has only mentioned plans for Walt Disney World. That makes sense to us, because the Disneyland Genie Plus offering actually works pretty well right now.