When you’re planning your next Disney World vacation, there are lots of things to consider.

You have to plan your travel, hotel, park tickets, dining plans, and much more. If you’re trying to plan your vacation on a budget, there’s even more to consider to ensure you stick to it. The costs of travel, hotels, food, souvenirs, and lots of other options all play a big part in how much you’ll end up spending on your vacation. So, when you’re planning your next vacation, we suggest asking yourself these four questions to help you stick to your budget and feel like you’ve done everything you want to do!

 

Do I want to use Lightning Lanes?

Lightning Lanes are the skip-the-line add-on that you can purchase for each day you’re in the parks. There are three ways to purchase Lightning Lanes — Lightning Lane Multi Pass, Lightning Lane Single Pass, and Lightning Lane Premier Pass. Multi Pass gives you access to a variety of rides at each park. Single Pass is purchased for one ride only, and Premier Pass is the most expensive pass that includes every Lightning Lane ride at the park that you purchase.

When you purchase Lightning Lane Multi Pass, you can make up to three Lightning Lane selections prior to your trip. For those staying at a Disney-owned hotel and select other hotels, you can make these selections at 7AM EST up to seven days in advance of your check-in day for your entire stay (up to 14 days), while all other guests will be able to purchase and select their first 3 Lightning Lane Multi Passes three days ahead of their trip (still starting at 7AM EST). 

Once you’re inside the park, you can make MORE selections once you’ve used up one of the Lightning Lanes that you’ve got pre-booked, and you can continue making new selections throughout the day each time you use another Lightning Lane. That way, you’ve got THREE in your back pocket at ALL TIMES.

You can also make Single Pass purchases ahead of your visit, which do NOT count as part of your three Multi Pass pre-selections. So you can still purchase up to TWO MORE Lightning Lanes in Single Pass format (for those premium, a la carte ride purchases, like Guardians of the Galaxy: Cosmic Rewind in EPCOT and Rise of the Resistance in Hollywood Studios, just to name a couple) and have up to FIVE LIGHTNING LANES already selected for each day if you wanna go this route.

Lightning Lane Premier Pass does NOT require any additional planning once you’ve purchased it for the one park you want to use it at(you can only purchase it for one park per day). Once you’ve purchased it, up to 7 days in advance of your trip for the extent of your trip (up to 14 days), you can just go to the rides without selecting a specific time, and it includes every Multi Pass and Single Pass rides in the park you purchased. However, Premier Pass is the most expensive option of the three Lightning Lane options.

Each of these Lightning Lane options uses flex pricing, which means the price for each park varies each day. Once you’ve purchased Multi Pass for one park, you can park hop and use it in the other three parks. Single Passes can only be used at the one ride you purchase, and Premier Pass is only for the one park you purchased. If you’re considering purchasing Lightning Lanes on your vacation, we suggest checking out our several YouTube videos on the subject to help you make your decision easier!

Am I going to need Advance Dining Reservations?

Depending of where you want to eat on your vacation, you may need Advance Dining Reservations. This is usually true if you want to eat at table-service restaurants that are very popular, such as Cinderella’s Royal Table, ‘Ohana, and other character restaurants. However, if you only plan to eat at quick-service restaurants (which typically cost less), then you would not need to worry about getting reservations.

If you know that you want to eat at one of these table-service restaurants, mark on your calendar what day will put you at 60 days BEFORE the first day of your vacation, because that’ll be the absolute EARLIEST you can start booking Advance Dining Reservations. If you’re not planning on staying at a Disney-owned or select other hotel during your trip, then you’ll need to wake up each morning, for each 60 days out marker, to secure MORE dining reservations for every day of your visit.

HOWEVER, if you’re staying as a hotel guest at a Disney hotel or select other hotels (Walt Disney World Swan, Dolphin, Swan Reserve, or Shades of Green), you’ll only have to get up early ONCE before your trip, since you’ll be allowed to make your bookings 60 days in advance, PLUS the length of your stay (no longer than 10 days). It’s also a good idea to be on the Disney World website or My Disney Experience app EARLIER than when dining reservations are supposed to go live. The booking window opens up for ADRs on the website at 6AM EST daily. That being said, it’s not unheard of for these reservations to go live even EARLIER (by 15-30 minutes), depending on the day.

What are my highest priority rides and attractions?

There’s a HIGH chance you won’t be able to do EVERYTHING inside the parks, but that doesn’t mean you can’t figure out ahead of time what you want your park “must dos” to be. Plus, if you choose to purchase Lightning Lanes, you’re chances of doing MORE may significantly increase, so keep that in mind as you’re deciding what your highest priorities are.

We suggest creating a list of your top priority rides for each park, that way when you get done with each of those, you’ll feel like you had a successful day. And if you get to extra, it’ll be an even sweeter day! You can find full lists of every attraction at our pages for Magic Kingdom, EPCOT, Hollywood Studios, and Animal Kingdom.

Do I really NEED a park hopper ticket?

Park Hoppers SEEM like a good idea in theory. You get to do and see MORE parks in Disney World, all within a single day or two.
Depending on the time of year you visit, how long you’re planning to visit, and which parks you were originally planning to visit, a park hopper add-on can cost between $65-$85+ per ticket. And they CAN be a good idea, especially if you’re going on a weekend getaway to the parks and only have a single day or two to spare.

But they can also be more of a hassle than they’re worth, especially if you’ve got the vacation time to FULLY explore each park as is. So, before you automatically jump into getting that park hopper add-on, decide how much time you wanna spend in each of the parks, and what you really want to accomplish in each park, as well. You might even find that, on your weekend getaway, you’d rather spend one-or-two full days in one-or-two parks rather than have to leave any particular one to try and squeeze in all four.

You can ALWAYS change your mind once you arrive and add that park hopper upgrade whenever you get to Disney World if you decide you want it at the last-minute. HOWEVER, just keep in mind that the park hopper add-on does not get cheaper if you add it later on in your trip. So, if you decide to get park hoppers on day 3 of your 5-day park ticket visit, you’re still gonna have to pay for that park hopping privilege for all 5 days even though you’ve already knocked out days 1 and 2. So it might be better to just buy it up front beforehand if you’re contemplating it and have it for ALL your park days, just in case you wanna use it, since it’ll cost ya the same either way.

We hope these questions, tips, and tricks help you have a magical vacation! If you need help planning, we suggest our friends over at Small World Vacations. They have tons of experience helping people have the best Disney World vacations. Plus, their services are completely free to you!

As you plan your next Disney World trip, keep following DFB for more tips!

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