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extra magic hours

Walt Disney World: whats best as far as crowds.

From thomas snell
Posted February 17, 2013 at 3:49 PM
ok i have read several different takes on the extra magic hours. looking to beat the crowds. some say to take advantage of the extra magic hours and other say to avoid the parks that have them due to crowds. going in September 1st-7th not sure if crowds will be an issue.


Comments in chronological order. Most recent at the bottom. Scroll down to respond.

From Anthony Murphy
Posted February 17, 2013 at 8:57 PM
Based on the time, you shouldn't have too much a problem with crowds. I find Animal Kingdom and Magic Kingdom are good for morning and night magical hours. EPCOT is good for night extra magical hours, DHS for the morning.

From Duncan Henny
Posted February 17, 2013 at 11:54 PM
it would depend on whether your staying at the disney parks and can use the extra hours if you can great if you can't i would avoid the morning extra hour parks, as last september we stayed off-site and made the mistake of not checking and going to hollywood studios we got in at 9am but the shortest queue was around 40mins

From Russell Meyer
Posted February 18, 2013 at 7:35 AM
Actually Anthony, the time noted in the original post is Labor Day weekend. It's not the busiest holiday weekend, but they should expect pretty heavy crowds.

The bottom line about EMH is that if you're staying at an on-site hotel, you should take advantage of the hours, but be willing to hop to another park when it gets crowded. Early EMH will draw on-site guests for the extra hour they can access the park before off-site guests. However, once that hour is up, everyone else will start flooding that park, and those who don't buy park hoppers are stuck in that park for the entire day. However, if you're an off-site guest, you should avoid the early EMH park because by the time you'll be allowed to enter, the lines will have already formed and FastPass return times will likely be after noon. All of the on-site guests who don't have park hoppers will be stuck in that park for the day, so it's usually better to go to a different park. Also parks with early EMH don't have an opening ceremony, so if you like seeing those, you might want to avoid the early EMH park.

Late EMH are a little different, not only because they're usually more than an hour, but are not quite as popular, especially on really busy days when EMH extends closing times to 1 AM or later. Late EMH are great for guests without families, but in my experience, they dont' affect crowd intensity during the day. So while you might not need to avoid a late EMH park if you're staying off-site, you might want to take advantage of the late EMH if you are staying on-site and want to marathon some rides. However, a good rule of thumb is that if you don't have park hoppers, you should avoid any EMH park so you lessen the chances of getting stuck in a park that's packed. If you have hoppers, you should probably avoid an early EMH park, but you at least have the flexibility of hopping to another park if you feel it's too crowded.

From Anthony Murphy
Posted February 18, 2013 at 9:48 PM
Sorry, I missed that detail.

I find the MK EMH at night are the best. Nightime rides on Thunder Mountain, Haunted Mansion and Pirates? Yes please!

From thomas snell
Posted February 18, 2013 at 9:49 PM
awesome thanks for the great advise. i will stay away from the parks with the early magic hours. i have gotten so many good tips from the people on this site.

thank you for you advise

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