We previously reported on the upcoming changes to WDW’s “skip the line system”. Goodbye, Genie+. Hello Lightning Lane Multi Pass!
Starting this week (July 24th specifically), you can forget everything that I’ve taught you about Genie+ strategies. You’ll have to learn some the new strategies for maximizing Lightning Lane Multi Pass. While it is hard to develop a good strategy until we have more data and experience with the new system, I wanted to provide some initial thoughts on possible strategies that one might be able to exploit in order to get your money’s worth.
What is Lightning Lane Multi Pass?
Lightning Lane Multi Pass (LLMP for short) is WDW’s latest “skip the line” system. It allows you to reserve timeslots where you can experience an attraction with a much shorter wait time. Here are some key points to know:
- Guests can pre book up to three LL one hour return time windows for rides that support LLMP (which is most rides except the most popular ones – those require a separate purchase)
- All your pre bookings for a particular day must be for the same park
- Of the three pre bookings, only one can be for a “top tier” ride
- On your actual day of visit, after you have redeemed a Lightning Lane booking, you immediately can book another return time for any ride at any park, based upon availability
- You can only use a LL once for a particular ride per day
Now… Let’s Talk Strategy!
Since LLMP hasn’t started when I am writing these words, everything I write is based upon a heavy dose of speculation. It probably won’t be for a couple of weeks until we truly have data on the new system. Once we have some experience under our belts, I’ll have to write a followup article to update my thoughts on strategy.
There are generally two choices that a guest needs to make when using LLMP:
- What rides should I select?
- What times should I select?
What Rides Should I Select?
With only three pre-selections, you’ll need to choose wisely. You don’t want to waste them.
As with Genie+, your goal with LLMP should be to save the most time. Clearly, this means that it makes the most sense to select rides that generally have the longest wait times. Obviously, ride popularity waxes and wanes, but below are the rides where a LL reservation could give you the biggest payoff.
Tier One Rides
As noted above, you can only pre-select ONE top tier ride per day. Of course, Disney puts rides into this top tier because these rides generally have the longest wait times. This means that there isn’t really a wrong choice, Anything you choose will give you a significant time savings. Nevertheless, some rides are better to choose than others!
Magic Kingdom
At the Magic Kingdom, your tier one choices are:
- Big Thunder Mountain Railroad
- Jungle Cruise
- Peter Pan’s Flight
- Space Mountain
- Tiana’s Bayou Adventure
Honestly, none of these are terrible choices. All of these rides can have pretty decent wait times. The only one that I would consider not selecting is Big Thunder Mountain Railroad. Of all of the rides in this tier, this one probably has the lowest standby wait.
Tiana’s, of course, still have a Virtual Queue. However, even with this, the standby line can still be pretty substantial. In addition, with the VQ system, there is no guarantee that you’ll even snag a spot. Booking a LL for this ride will eliminate that uncertainty.
EPCOT
EPCOT’s top tier choices are:
- Frozen Ever After
- Remy’s Ratatouille Adventure
- Soarin’ Around the World
Frozen and Remy are the clear choices here. Both are generally the most popular rides in EPCOT with the longest wait times. While Soarin’ might have a decent wait time, it is usually nowhere near as long as the other two.
Hollywood Studios
At Hollywood Studios, your top tier rides are:
- Mickey and Minnie’s Runaway Railway
- Millennium Falcon: Smuggler’s Run
- Rock ‘n’ Roller Coaster Starring Aerosmith
- Slinky Dog Dash
At HS, you will generally want to target Slink Dog Dash as your tier one choice. It has by far the longest wait time of any of the rides in the group. If you can’t get a reservation for Slinky Dog Dash, any of the others is a decent choice. That said, if you are willing to use the single rider line at Smuggler’s Run, you might want to just skip a LL for this one.
Animal Kingdom
AK makes it simple. There are no tier one choices here. You can choose any three rides in this park with no restrictions.
Tier Two Rides
This tier include the rest of the rides that support LLMP. You can choose up to two rides from the main tier. Or if you didn’t select a tier one ride, all three of your selections can be from this second tier.
Unlike the top tier, there can be a wide gap between the “winners” and “losers”. Some choices can save you a considerable amount of time. Meanwhile, there are other choices that you shouldn’t bother with, since these attractions already have a short standby time.
For the purposes of this exercise, I’ll call out the rides that are definitely worth using a LLMP selection for. I’ll also list a few honorable mentions. These are rides that are good alternative choices if one of the heavy hitters isn’t available. For everything else, it probably isn’t worth it.
Best Choices
Here are the rides that are definitely worth using a LLMP reservation on:
- Magic Kingdom
- Buzz Lightyear’s Space Ranger Spin
- Haunted Mansion
- The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh
- Pirates of the Caribbean
- EPCOT
- Mission Space
- Spaceship Earth
- Animal Kingdom
- Expedition Everest
- Kali River Rapids {when the weather is warm)
- Kilimanjaro Safaris
- Na’vi River Journey
- Hollywood Studios
- Twilight Zone Tower of Terror
- Toy Story Mania
Honorable Mentions
- It’s a Small World (MK)
- The Seas with Nemo and Friends (EP)
- DINOSAUR (AK)
- Alien Swirling Saucers (HS)
Obviously, you should “salt to taste” based upon your group’s personal preferences. For example, if you aren’t a thrill ride person, it probably isn’t worthwhile to book Space Mountain or Expedition Everest!
What Times Should I Select?
We will look at two potential strategies for determine what return times to choose.
Strategy #1: Book Rides for the Morning
Because you can book another ride… any ride, any park, any tier, after you have used each LLMP reservation, you might want to book one or more of your reservations early in the day. That way, you can take advantage of booking a fourth, fifth, etc Lightning Lane for later in the day.
How could this work? Here is an example:
- Pre select LL’s for 9am, 10am, and 11am prior to the day of your visit
- After you check into your 9am LL, book another LL for noon
- After you check into your 10am LL, book a fifth LL for 1pm
- After you check into your 11am LL, book a sixth LL for 2pm
- After you check into your noon LL, book yet another LL for 3pm
- Etc
Remember, when you book these same day LL, you no longer have to worry about tiers. The field is wide opened!
Because you can book same day LL at any park, this could also be a great strategy for park hopping. Book all of your rides in the morning at park #1. Then as you use your LL’s in park #1, start booking additional rides in park #2.
However, the big wild card is same day availability.
if there’s really not going to be much same day availability, then the ability to book these additional Lightning Lanes isn’t all that valuable. Which brings us to another possible strategy…
Strategy #2: Book Rides for Later in the Day
It is proven fact that wait times generally are shortest in the morning when the park first opens, and then they grow throughout the day. Therefore, you might be better off saving your Lightning Lane reservations for the afternoon or evening, when lines are at their longest. Then use the morning hours for touring via the standby line. Yes, you’ll be waiting longer mornings using the standby line, but it won’t be as long as if you had to use the standby line in the afternoons.
For park hoppers, that means using the standby line in park #1, and reserving all of your LL’s in park #2. By the time you park hop, standby wait times might be higher. However, you won’t care since you’ll be living it up in the Lightning Lane!
Yes, with this strategy you would be forgoing the ability to book additional same day LL’s early in the day. But if you think you might only be able to get three good LL reservations anyway, you’ll want to really make the most of them!
Wrap Up!
We truly won’t know what the optimal LLMP strategy will be until we get more data on availability. Until then, we can only speculate on what the best options are. Hopefully, I have given you some food for thought for when you start developing your own LLMP strategy when it opens up this week.
Let’s know in the comments if you have any other thoughts or ideas on how to maximize Lightning Lane Multi Pass. We’d love to hear them!
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