Disney's Hollywood Studios at the Walt Disney World Resort opened as as Disney-MGM Studios on May 1, 1989 and recently added two new lands: Star Wars: Galaxy's Edge and Toy Story Land. The park in 2020 opened Disney's first ride devoted to Mickey Mouse — Mickey & Minnie's Runaway Railway, which you will find inside the replica of Hollywood's Grauman's Chinese Theatre that stands in the middle of the park.
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Our recommendations below come from our ongoing survey of Theme Park Insider readers. Locations with star ratings ★ ranked especially highly among our readers. Vote here to take part in our surveys and submit your picks for top attractions.
Elsewhere at Walt Disney World, Theme Park Insider readers recommend Citricos, a Mary Poppins-themed, fine-dining dinner restaurant at Disney's Grand Floridian Hotel and Topolino's Terrace, serving French and Italian cuisine at dinner with a character meal at breakfast, in Disney's Riviera Resort. In Disney Springs, our readers recommend Chef Art Smith's Homecomin' for a Florida-inspired "farm-to-fork" table-service meal, and The Polite Pig for casual service barbecue.
To vote for your favorite Walt Disney World Resort restaurants, please visit www.themeparkinsider.com/vote/best-wdw-restaurant.
Disney's Hollywood Studios is part of the sprawling Walt Disney World Resort, located in Lake Buena Vista, Florida – about 24 miles from Orlando International Airport (MCO).
Note that Disney no longer provides free Disney's Magical Express bus service to and from the Orlando airport for its hotel guests.
If you are renting a car while visiting Orlando, you can save on toll road fees by getting a Visitor Toll Pass at the Orlando airport rather than renting a toll transponder from your rental car company: Toll Discounts Return for Orlando Theme Park Visitors
Disney's theme park ticket prices vary by day, so you can use Disney's pricing calendar [scroll down] to see which days have the highest expected crowds. The lower the price for a ticket, the smaller the expected crowd that day.
In general, you will find the lightest crowd levels at the Walt Disney World theme parks during these periods:
Large crowds will fill the parks on runDisney weekends:
In addition, crowd levels are high during:
If you want to visit more than one Walt Disney World theme park on a single day, you will need a "Park Hopper" ticket.
Dining reservations can be made via the Disney World website, and each date's reservations open 60 days in advance, at about 5:45am Eastern Time. Disney's on-site hotel guests may make reservations for their entire stay (up to 10 days) starting 60 days before their check-in date. That gives Disney's on-site hotel guests an advantage in making reservations for the most popular restaurants.
Starting July 24, Walt Disney World Resort hotel guests may purchase and book Lightning Lane access for their entire stay (up to 14 days) starting seven days before their arrival. Other theme park guests may book Lightning Lanes up to three days in advance of their visit.
Lightning Lanes are Disney's new name for the old Fastpass return queues. Access to Lightning Lanes can be bought via a Lightning Lane Multi Pass or a Lightning Lane Single Pass, depending upon attraction. You can learn more about the system in our Guide to Disney's Lightning Lane.
Disney's hotel guests also get 30 minutes of early access to each of the resort's four theme parks every day. So hotel guests should plan on an early start each morning to take advantage of empty queues. Unfortunately for guests staying off site, this new early admission policy means that they no longer have any opportunity to be the first to enter any Walt Disney World theme park in the morning.
Because Disney's hotel guests slam Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance first thing in the morning, we recommend waiting until later in the evening to ride that attraction - or consider paying for Lightning Lane Single Pass access.
Honestly, this is the one park were we most recommend paying for Lightning Lane access. Slinky Dog Dash often has even worse wait times than Rise, with long wait times also common for Rock 'n' Roller Coaster, Millennium Falcon, Runaway Railway, Toy Story Mania, and Tower of Terror.
If you don't get Lightning Lane, start with Slinky Dog, then go to Runaway Railway. Then look on the Disney World app to find the shortest wait time among Toy Story Mania, Tower of Terror, and Rock 'n' Roller Coaster and do that next. If the times are close, start with Toy Story, then do RnR and ToT. Save Rise for late in the day, aiming to arrive to that queue around 6-7pm, and after riding Millennium Falcon.
