Early Entry

***Updated 3/18/25

If you are staying at one of the Disney resorts you can make use of Early Theme Park Entry and enter the park 30 minutes before non-resort guests. We highly recommend using Early Theme Park Entry in order to beat the crowds and spend less time in line for some of the more popular attractions. Not every attraction opens early, so you need a clear strategy to take advantage of this.

We recommend getting to the park at least 30 minutes BEFORE the posted Early Theme Park Entry time. You will, in fact, get to enter the park about 20 - 15 minutes prior to the Early Entry opening time to join a queue for one of these rides. Then once the clock reaches the official opening time guests will get to start riding. If you wait to enter the park at the official Early Entry time there will already be a 30 minute or more wait for most of the popular rides.

Let’s look at the attractions that open early and our recommended strategies at each park.

Magic Kingdom

Magic Kingdom Early Theme Park Entry Rides:

• “It’s a small world”

• Astro Orbiter

• Buzz Lightyear’s Space Ranger Spin

• Dumbo the Flying Elephant

• Mad Tea Party

• Mickey’s PhilharMagic

• Peter Pan’s Flight

• Prince Charming Regal Carrousel

• Seven Dwarf’s Mine Train

• Space Mountain

• The Barnstormer

• The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh

• Tomorrowland Speedway

• Tomorrowland Transit Authority PeopleMover

• Under the Sea ~ Journey of the Little Mermaid

• Walt Disney’s Carousel of Progress

We recommend taking this park either left to right or right to left if possible, there are a lot of rides and you can find yourself zipping from Tomorrowland to Liberty Square, to Adventureland, to Fantasyland (a bad route if you look at the map) if you are not careful. Lightning Lane Multi or Single Pass some backtracking may be unavoidable, but a general plan will help minimize this. The exception to this is if the rides in Fantasyland are super important to you. Fantasyland is the most popular area of the park and as such it becomes crowded very quickly compared to other areas in the park. If this area holds a lot of must dos for you and your family we recommend arriving for park opening (so an hour before park opening) and going to Fantasyland first. Unless you really are at the front of the crowd going in for Earlly Theme Park Entry, Seven Dwarfs Mine Train and Tron Lightcycle/Run will likely already have a sizable wait by the time you get to it. Know that if you join that queue it will probably be the only thing you accomplish with your extra park time, and lines for other attractions will be building by the time you get off. If you are trying hard to avoid spending the extra money on ILL then that is still going to be your best option for riding either Tron Lightcycle/Run or Seven Dwarfs Mine Train. These are still the ride most people go to at park opening and its wait time builds fast and typically remains high all day. There is a possibility of getting in a ride with only a short wait if you stay until park closing and slip in line shortly before the park closes. However, the Cast Members will sometimes close off the queue before park closing to prevent an hour long line after park closing. However, if you are okay spending the money, we recommend just grabbing the a Lightning Lane Single Pass for both of these rides.

Epcot

Early Theme Park Entry Rides:

• Beauty and the Beast Sing-Along

• Frozen Ever After

• Mission: SPACE

• Remy’s Ratatouille Adventure

• Soarin’ Around the World

• Spaceship Earth

• Test Track (Currently closed for a long refurbishment)

• The Seas with Nemo and Friends

• Guardians of the Galaxy: Comic Rewind

If you are aiming to ride Guardians of the Galaxy, then it is easiest to enter through the main entrance at the front of Epcot. However, if your aim is to rope drop Remy’s Ratatouille Adventure, then entering through the International Gateway, which enters right next to the France Pavilion, will cut your walk to that attraction down considerably, putting you ahead of a lot of people hustling their way from the front to the back. This of course is easy for guests staying at either Epcot area resorts or Skyliner resorts. However, if you do not fall into one of those categories we recommend getting an early morning breakfast reservation at either Cap May Cafe (at the Beach Club Resort), or Topolinos (at Riviera). From either of those hotels you can make use of the International Gateway entrance. Unfortunately, you cannot be dropped off at one of the Disney resorts without either a hotel reservation or dining reservation at one of the resort’s restaurants, so you cannot just uber to one of the resorts and then enter in the backway.

Hollywood Studios

Hollywood Studios Early Theme Park Entry Rides:

• Alien Swirling Saucers

• Mickey & Minnie’s Runaway Railway

• Millennium Falcon: Smugglers Run

• Rock ‘n’ Roller Coaster Starring Aerosmith

• Slinky Dog Dash

• Star Tours - The Adventures Continue

• Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance

• The Twilight Zone Tower of Terror

• Toy Story Mania!

We prefer to use this time to knock out the Sunset Boulevard thrill rides. We will get in the line for Rock ‘n’ Roller Coaster, ride it first thing with only a 10 minute or so wait once the park opens and then hop in line for Tower of Terror. The wait time for Tower of Terror is normally about 20 minutes by this time, but still very doable. If Rock ‘n’ Roller Coaster and Tower of Terror are not priorities for you then we recommend focusing on either Toy Story Land or Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge. Either of these will end up taking a little longer than the Sunset Boulevard set, but you will still be able to ride two popular attractions with reasonable waits. If you head to Toy Story Land get in the queue for Slinky Dog Dash and then hop over to Toy Story Mania! once you get off. In Galaxy’s Edge start with Rise of the Resistance and then jump into line for Smugglers Run. We cannot stress enough that the earlier you get to the park prior to the opening, and we mean the opening with Early Theme Park Entry, the farther up in the pre-queue you will be and the easier it will be to knock out those two attractions with limited wait. If you roll up to the park right at opening there will be tons of people already waiting ahead of you, increasing your wait time significantly.

Animal Kingdom

Animal Kingdom Early Entry Rides

• Avatar Flight of Passage

• DINOSAUR

• Expedition Everest - Legend of the Forbidden Mountain

• Na’vi River Journey

Most of the people who rope drop Animal Kingdom will be headed for Flights of Passage. If you are not doing an ILL for Flights of Passage you will either want to get here EARLY and book it over there, knowing almost everyone will head that way then move on to Na’vi River Journey. Or else plan to come right before the park closes. Lines will often be shorter than the listed wait time then, and they let people into the line almost right until Animal Kingdom closes. Your other strategy is to head for Expedition Everest. This is the one we personally prefer. It usually takes some time for people to make their way back to Asia, so the wait time for Everest will be reasonable for the start of the day. We often can ride twice, and then head around the back way, past the NEMO show for DINOSAUR. Then off to Kilimanjaro Safari after the rest of the park opens.