I recently returned from a week-long vacation in Walt Disney World and had a lot of great opportunities to use the Lightning Lane system.
The BIGGEST change - Disney has recently updated their system so you purchase Genie+ the morning of your visit. Disney has noted this has the possibility to sell out - this has NOT happened to date. That said, I can see this selling out if you are traveling during the busy season, such as the week of Thanksgiving or Christmas Break. This is why it’s important to add Genie+ as early as possible on the day of your park visit. This can be added at midnight eastern time.
You can book your first Genie+ Lightning Lane at 7am the morning of your park visit. If you are staying at a Walt Disney World Resort, you are able to purchase your Individual Lightning Lanes at this time as well. For guests staying offsite, you can purchase Individual Lightning Lanes at park open (time varies depending on the park).
There have been more experiences added to Genie+ since it opened, these are mostly including character experiences. The Mickey & Minnie meet and greet at Town Square Theater at Magic Kingdom has become one of the most popular Genie+ Lightning Lanes - so if this is something you’d like to do with low wait times, I highly recommend making it your FIRST selection. Why first? If you are lucky to grab the 9am - 10am spot - you’ll walk right into the park and scan in for your first Lightning Lane, after you visit with Mickey & Minnie you can select your second Lightning Lane, all before 10am! It’s a GREAT use of time.
On our last day of our trip, we used this strategy and it worked great! For this day, our Genie+ Lightning Lane Plan was:
Meet Mickey & Minnie at Town Square Theater
Buzz Lightyear Space Ranger Spin
STANDBY for Tomorrowland Transit Authority PeopleMover
Mad Tea Cups
The Barnstormer
Dumbo the Flying Elephant
Seven Dwarfs Mine Train (PAID INDIVIDUAL LIGHTNING LANE)
LUNCH
We did ALL of that before our 12:30 lunch at Cosmic Rays! Right after lunch my husband and oldest daughter used a Lighting Lane to ride Space Mountain, while the younger kiddos and I used a Lighting Lane for Tomorrowland Speedway. After this, we walked back to our resort for a swim break!
You’ll note, we didn’t head to Adventureland/Frontierland with this trip and that was intentional. We split Magic Kingdom into two days and focused on different areas to best maximize our Lightning Lanes and this strategy worked really well. If you have TWO days at Magic Kingdom, this is a great plan!
Here are my top takeaways from each park:
Magic Kingdom offers a lot for Genie+ - while attractions do sell out, they do so later in the day than the other parks.
The most popular Genie+ attractions at Magic Kingdom tend to be:
Jungle Cruise
Peter Pan
Meet Mickey & Minnie at Town Square Theater
Hollywood Studios continues to be the toughest to navigate with Genie+ as many attractions sell out. I hope they add the meet and greets at Star Wars: Launch Bay to Genie+ as I think this would help spread out the popularity of some of the rides.
The most popular Genie+ attractions at Hollywood Studios tend to be:
Slinky Dog Dash
Hollywood Tower of Terror
Millenium Falcon: Smugglers Run
Rock ‘n’ Rollercoaster
EPCOT is still undergoing a lot of construction at the moment, but the big draw here is Guardians of the Galaxy: Cosmic Rewind, which is not available on Genie+ but rather as an individual Lightning Lane or Virtual Queue. We used Genie+ at EPCOT and we were able to experience every attraction except for Spaceship Earth (this was because it was closed when we had it scheduled to visit). My plan is ALWAYS to book Test Track FIRST then Frozen or Remy’s RIGHT after we ride Test Track. This plan worked really well, so I encourage you to give it a try as well!
The most popular Genie+ attractions at EPCOT tend to be:
Test Track
Frozen Ever After
Remy’s Ratatouille Adventure
Animal Kingdom is the one park where I think you could skip Genie+ and do standby lines and still have a great day. IF you really do NOT want to wait in lines, you’ll really enjoy Genie+ at Animal Kingdom. There is one attraction that does sell out of Lightning Lanes consistently but it is the INDIVIDUAL Lightning Lane and NOT part of Genie+: Avatar Flight of Passage. So you can always book Avatar: Flight of Passage and then experience the rest of the park via standby queue and save a good amount of time this way.
The most popular Genie+ attractions at Animal Kingdom tend to be:
Na’vi River Journey
Meet Favorite Disney Pals at Adventurers Outpost
Kilimanjaro Safaris
Kali River Rapids (during warm weather, cooler weather this is not as popular since it’s a water ride!)
My biggest takeaway is that Genie+ is worth the cost ($15 plus tax per person, per day) if you do not want to wait in lines. We really enjoyed the Genie+ experience over the summer - our crowds were a little lower than when we first used Genie+ back in November and I think that helped with our overall experience. We also improved our strategy on Genie+ and split up a few times when our kids wanted to do different things. This helped maximize our Genie+ day!
You won’t be able to ride EVERY ride on Genie+ but you can save a lot of time by using this system. We tended to get more than 3 rides per day - which ultimately is better than the previous Fast Pass system, even if we had to pay this was worth it to me to save time. Any questions - please let me know below!
To get all of my tips and tricks on Genie+, book your next Disney Vacation through Middle of the Magic and receive access to my complete guide! Plus I’m available throughout your ENTIRE trip to help you strategize and plan to make the most of the magic! Start planning today!