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Fall is correct across the nook and, with that, Magic Kingdom enters a brand new section for the rest of 2024. Halloween and Christmas seasons deliver with them a curler coaster of crowds, with dramatic variations in wait occasions and attendance in selecting the most effective vs. worst days to do MK. This explains why, with lists of the least & most crowded dates in August via December, and a handful of pink flag dates to keep away from in any respect prices.
At the same time as this summer season has been comparatively sluggish at Walt Disney World (see Summer season (Nonetheless) Is NOT Excessive Crowds Season at Walt Disney World), the parks are nonetheless about to get slower as faculties return into session. For all intents and functions, August is the tip of summer season, and begin of the low season, Halloween-time, and “Celebration Season.” (Earlier than folks with a standard idea of “seasons” get mad at me, I don’t make the foundations–Disney is the one which begins Halloween in early August, not me.)
Celebration Season is an enormous deal at Walt Disney World as a result of it disrupts attendance dynamics and creates a “porcupine sample” of wait occasions and crowd ranges. In a nutshell, the group phenomenon is that each Mickey’s Not So Scary Halloween Celebration and Mickey’s Very Merry Christmas Celebration push attendance a lot larger on the dates they’re not occurring and decrease on days of the occasions.
That is nothing new–we’ve been banging the Celebration Season drum the final decade, at the least. Magic Kingdom crowd patterns throughout Celebration Season are a key dialogue factors of our August via December crowd calendars. It’s really one of many best “predictions” we make–akin to forecasting longer strains for Seven Dwarfs Mine Prepare than the Magic Carpets of Aladdin.
For our half, we’ve been strongly recommending that readers go to Magic Kingdom through the day on Mickey’s Not So Scary Halloween Celebration and Mickey’s Very Merry Christmas Celebration nights, after which bouncing to a different park at round 4 pm. Park Hopping is crucial throughout occasion season. When you’re searching for the quick and candy of this put up, that’s it.
The underlying rationale for that is that many day friends keep away from Magic Kingdom on days when MNSSHP or MVMCP is being held at night time as a result of the common park hours are shorter and Fortunately Ever After fireworks should not proven to common friends. This ends in considerably lighter crowds on days of the vacation events when Magic Kingdom closes at 6 pm.
These identical friends then flock to non-party days in Magic Kingdom. For guests with out Park Hopper tickets (which is most friends), visiting Magic Kingdom on non-party nights is the plain, intuitive alternative. For a similar admission worth, they get a number of extra hours within the park and get to see the fireworks.
In any case, Magic Kingdom closes at 10 pm or 11 pm on non-party nights. That quantities to staying an additional 4-5 hours later, seeing fireworks, and attending to benefit from the cooler night hours within the park. Only a few rational friends who base their visits on revealed park hours will select the 6 pm closing days. (Which is exactly why Disney places the above join on the park entrance, so friends complain on their manner into the park and might doubtlessly be accommodated fairly than performing stunned on the finish of the day.)
In concept, it’s a no brainer! However that line of considering is strictly why our zig after they zag advice has been to do Magic Kingdom on days of Mickey’s Not So Scary Halloween Celebration or Mickey’s Very Merry Christmas Celebration and to Park Hop someplace else at round 4 pm, which is when the mix-in begins for these onerous ticket occasions.
Regardless that Magic Kingdom has longer hours on non-party days, you’ll usually get much less carried out than you may earlier than 4 pm on a celebration day–in 4-5 fewer hours! As long as you’re snug lacking the fireworks, we extremely advocate doing all of your days in Magic Kingdom on occasion dates as a result of considerably shorter strains and decrease wait occasions. It’s often so sluggish on nowadays that utilizing Lightning Lanes is pointless, which additionally means saving cash by not having to purchase Lightning Lane Multi Cross.
For friends with Park Hopper tickets, that is the actual no-brainer. You are able to do Magic Kingdom till 4 pm on the day of MNSSHP or MVMCP, after which bounce to EPCOT or Disney’s Hollywood Studios and have dinner and benefit from the nighttime spectaculars in a kind of two parks.
On a non-party day, you can begin out at Disney’s Hollywood Studios and/or EPCOT–our favourite choices as these sometimes see decrease crowd ranges on non-party days and have extra headliners benefiting from decrease waits. Then you may bounce again to Magic Kingdom within the night hours for the final couple of hours to catch Fortunately Ever After and nighttime within the park.
If nighttime in Magic Kingdom is a should for you (and we do advocate it–nothing beats seeing the park illuminated within the evenings!) that is the optimum strategy for minimizing your publicity to crowds and congestion. Yeah, it’ll be chaos on Predominant Road and that post-fireworks night exodus is a nightmare. Fireworks crowds are already unhealthy sufficient on regular nights all year long–now think about compressing 7 nights of Fortunately Ever After crowds into solely 2-3 nights!
However you don’t have to observe Fortunately Ever After from Predominant Road–you may go to Fantasyland for a comparatively relaxed spot. It’s also possible to wait out the post-fireworks crowd by taking a spin on the TTA PeopleMover or doing one of many many different rides which can be higher at night time. Because you’ll have (presumably) carried out each essential attraction on the occasion day, the stakes are decrease for you than one thing who spends all of that crowded day in MK.
One of many added upsides to visiting the park on a celebration day is Magic Kingdom Early Entry at 7:30 am (on some dates). If park opening strikes ahead to eight am in your dates, that makes this strategy a double no-brainer (earlier than you get pedantic about “doubling nothing nonetheless being nothing,” simply needless to say this saying is smart to these of us with out brains within the first place).
Sadly, Walt Disney World moved away from 8 am opening occasions on MNSSHP dates through the doldrums of the low season. They largely returned to eight am opening occasions for MVMCP, however it wasn’t each single date.
Our hope is that they revert again to eight am openings for 2024, however we’re not optimistic. Park hours have already been extending for early to mid-August, and the primary MNSSHP reveals 9 am to six pm hours. Granted, that’ll be an extremely sluggish day and isn’t essentially consultant of what’ll occur for dates the next few months, however it’s most likely secure to say that August via mid-to-late September aren’t getting 8 am openings.
Now that we’ve defined the why and the way of this, right here’s the record of least-crowded dates at Magic Kingdom for the rest of the 12 months.
Finest Days at Magic Kingdom in August 2024
- August 9, 2024
- August 13, 2024
- August 16, 2024
- August 20, 2024
- August 23, 2024
- August 27, 2024
- August 30, 2024
Finest Days at Magic Kingdom in September 2024
- September 2, 2024
- September 6, 2024
- September 8, 2024
- September 10, 2024
- September 13, 2024
- September 15, 2024
- September 17, 2024
- September 20, 2024
- September 22, 2024
- September 24, 2024
- September 26, 2024
- September 27, 2024
- September 29, 2024
Finest Days at Magic Kingdom in October 2024
- October 1, 2024
- October 3, 2024
- October 4, 2024
- October 6, 2024
- October 8, 2024
- October 10, 2024
- October 11, 2024
- October 14, 2024
- October 15, 2024
- October 17, 2024
- October 18, 2024
- October 20, 2024
- October 21, 2024
- October 24, 2024
- October 25, 2024
- October 27, 2024
- October 29, 2024
- October 31, 2024
Finest Days at Magic Kingdom in November 2024
- November 8, 2024
- November 11, 2024
- November 12, 2024
- November 14, 2024
- November 15 2024
- November 17, 2024
- November 19, 2024
- November 21, 2024
- November 22, 2024
- November 24, 2024
- November 26, 2024
- November 27, 2024
- November 29, 2024
Finest Days at Magic Kingdom in December 2024
- December 1, 2024
- December 3, 2024
- December 5, 2024
- December 6, 2024
- December 8, 2024
- December 10, 2024
- December 12, 2024
- December 13, 2024
- December 15, 2024
- December 17, 2024
- December 19, 2024
- December 20, 2024
As for probably the most crowded dates, it’s mainly simply the other of the above–the dates which can be not listed.
The schedule can range round vacation weeks, however days which can be sometimes going to be worst are Mondays and Wednesdays. Monday as a result of it’s all the time been the busiest day in Magic Kingdom–and since there are often events on Sunday and Tuesday. It’s the same story with Wednesday–there are sometimes events on Tuesday in addition to Thursday and Friday. Earlier within the Celebration Season (all dates earlier than September 25), Wednesday can also be the night time that Magic Kingdom hosts Prolonged Night Hours, which additionally exacerbates daytime crowds beginning within the afternoon.
In earlier years, it was once the case that Saturdays had been the worst day of the week at Magic Kingdom throughout Celebration Season. That could find yourself being true once more through the coronary heart of the vacation season, however weekends haven’t been as unhealthy the final couple of years. It stays to be seen how this modifications (or doesn’t) for Celebration Season, particularly October via December.
Be notably aware of non-party dates which can be sandwiched between or amongst occasion dates. That is the largest pink flag from mid-October via December, when Celebration Season “expands” from 2-3 days per week to 3-4 days per week.
There are some 4-5 days stretches when Magic Kingdom is just one till 10 pm or 11 pm as soon as. This creates main issues, as there are a number of days of crowds consolidated right into a single date by advantage of these concentrated 6 pm closings.
Crimson Flag Late 2024 Dates at Magic Kingdom
- September 25, 2024
- September 28, 2024
- October 2, 2024
- October 5, 2024
- October 9, 2024
- October 16, 2024
- October 19, 2024
- October 26, 2024
- November 13, 2024
- November 16, 2024
- November 20, 2024
- November 23, 2024
- November 25, 2024
- November 28, 2024
- December 4, 2024
- December 7, 2024
- December 11, 2024
- December 14, 2024
- December 18, 2024
We might extremely advocate avoiding Magic Kingdom in any respect prices on the dates above, if in any respect attainable.
If it’s not attainable for no matter purpose, you’ll completely wish to reap the benefits of Early Entry and buy Lightning Lane Multi-Cross. Take a noon break, keep late, use savvy technique, and so on. These are the dates you’re more than likely to come across 7/10 to 10/10 crowd ranges at Magic Kingdom. That’s nonetheless “beatable” however provided that you’re correctly ready!
One particular date we wish to draw your consideration to is December 18, 2024.
December 17 and 19-20 are Mickey’s Very Merry Christmas Celebration nights, and Saturday, December 21 is the beginning of Christmas week. It was the very same dynamic final 12 months with December 20.
That date ended up having a 9/10 crowd degree with 48 minute common wait time. Against this, Dec. 19 was 28 minutes on common and a 3/10 crowd degree; Dec. 21 was 31 minutes and 4/10. Comparable story for the opposite MVMCP days in that neighborhood. December 20 really ended up being the busiest day of Christmas or New 12 months’s weeks at Magic Kingdom–all different parks had been a lot, a lot worse within the lead-up to NYE.
Including insult to damage, Magic Kingdom was solely open from 9 am to 10 pm on December 20. This 12 months will probably be barely completely different as a result of timing of Christmas, however we’re nonetheless anticipating December 18, 2024 to be uniquely terrible, even amongst these pink flag dates.
My hope a method Walt Disney World has realized from its errors is making each a kind of pink flag dates have working hours of at the least 9 am to 11 pm and, ideally, 8 am to midnight. The early October and mid-November dates won’t want 8 am to midnight hours, however the remainder of the record nearly definitely will.
If Walt Disney World goes to promote Magic Kingdom twice on so many dates from August via December and create these nightmarish crowd dynamics, the least they will do is 8 am openings and midnight closings. That is one thing that Disneyland is doing proper now every day, and can all through the low season. And that’s and not using a sea of 6 pm closings on the calendar!
One other factor to notice is that the above least crowded record is relative to the dates inside every week or normal date vary.
As a normal matter, the Celebration Season begins out slower on all dates from August via mid-September, after which has a slight spike on the finish of September. Attendance slows down to start out October, however ramps up for fall break and continues that development till later within the month. November and December have excessive highs and low lows primarily based on vacation breaks, however are nonetheless, as a normal matter, busier than August and September.
In different phrases, in the event you’re a neighborhood who has a large open calendar and desires to select an assortment of dates primarily based upon absolute crowd ranges and nothing else, goal for the sooner dates in August and September. There’s a powerful likelihood that these will find yourself having the bottom wait occasions of all dates on the record when the mud settles.
Nobody really thinks or behaves this was, so the level is that crowd ranges should not static on the aforementioned record of the least crowded dates. Magic Kingdom tends to get progressively busier over the course of Celebration Season, however even that could be a generalization.
Nonetheless, whilst occasion days get progressively busier (relative to dates earlier within the Celebration Season), the rise tends to be even better for non-party dates. Said in another way, the hole in wait occasions really will increase on non-party vs. occasion days in October via December. That’s attributable to a mixture of larger crowd ranges as an entire throughout these months and extra occasion nights every week–thus consolidating crowds on fewer non-party days.
For instance, Magic Kingdom’s crowd degree may find yourself being 1/10 with a median wait time of 25 minutes on the occasion day of September 15. On the non-party Monday of September 16, it could possibly be 4/10 with a median wait time of 32 minutes and crowd degree of three/10. That’s a distinction of seven minutes.
On the occasion day of November 8, Magic Kingdom’s common wait time could possibly be 35 minutes or a 6/10 crowd degree. Nonetheless, the non-party day of November 13 possible will spike considerably (it’s the one date in a 5 day stretch with out an early closing), presumably to a crowd degree of 8/10 or 9/10 and a median wait time of round 45 minutes. Regardless that the group ranges and common waits are considerably larger than their September counterparts, the profit of selecting the least-crowded date really elevated, because the hole in wait occasions grew to 10 minutes. That is precisely what occurred final 12 months on the equal dates.
All of that could be onerous to observe, however the backside line is that you just’ll take pleasure in 1/10 to three/10 crowd ranges by doing Magic Kingdom on occasion days for concerning the subsequent month. After that, crowd ranges will enhance–however regardless of that, you stand to achieve much more by visiting on occasion days since crowd ranges will spike even worse on non-party days. So merely keep on with occasion days for the bottom attainable crowds in Magic Kingdom from August via late December!
One last notice is that Walt Disney World has thrown a monkey wrench into the entire above with the Free Park Hopper Deal. Actually, it’s actually troublesome to evaluate the influence this promo can have. For one factor, there’s been nearly no buzz about it–we haven’t heard from many people who find themselves eligible and plan on taking benefit (largely the other).
In concept, providing free Park Hoppers would normalize crowd ranges to some extent. When you learn the above, you’d know the optimum technique for leveraging Park Hoppers throughout Celebration Season. However the factor is, that’s counterintuitive zig after they zag technique. Most individuals gained’t learn this or assessment historic wait occasions information. Who actually desires to depart Magic Kingdom at 6 pm and miss fireworks? There’s restricted enchantment, even for friends with Park Hoppers.
Accordingly, I feel it’s simply as possible–if no more so–that this gambit backfires and is counterproductive. It’ll completely redistribute crowds to some extent, however in what path? This may increasingly not end in larger attendance on 6 pm park closing days in any respect. If I needed to wager, I’d wager that extra folks having Park Hoppers will imply much more friends crammed into Magic Kingdom for these exceedingly uncommon and intensely attractive 11 pm closings.
As such, I’m mentioning the free Park Hopper promo as one thing that needs to be in your radar as impacting crowd ranges…however there’s a superb probability that gained’t normalize attendance in the way in which that Walt Disney World hopes, and as a substitute will trigger much more crowding on late nights in Magic Kingdom.
In the end, that’s why we strongly advocate visiting Magic Kingdom through the daytime hours of each Mickey’s Not So Scary Halloween Celebration and Mickey’s Very Merry Christmas Celebration. Hopefully “exhibiting our work” on a few of this helps you make extra sense of this dynamic, and why it’ll nearly definitely be true for August via December 2024.
There’s no purpose to imagine days when the Magic Kingdom closes at 6 pm will probably be busier than days the park closes at 10 pm or 11 pm (or hopefully midnight on these pink flag dates). Crowd ranges and common wait occasions from Celebration Seasons previous are fairly conclusive on this–the info is indeniable. And that’s simply from a numbers perspective, which doesn’t measure “looks like” crowds. From heaps of anecdotal expertise, we are able to guarantee you that the hole is even better there–particularly on Predominant Road earlier than and after Fortunately Ever After.
After all, that is simply the target angle. There are nonetheless compelling subjective arguments in favor of doing Magic Kingdom on non-party days, particularly in the event you worth evenings within the park and use savvy technique. And that’s completely comprehensible! Our focus right here is totally on the numbers, as many friends see the calendar and draw the fully logical conclusion that they’re higher off with ~4 additional hours of the day in MK. The issue is that that is the thought technique of most friends, and you may come out forward by zigging after they zag! However ideally, you’ll have a Park Hopper for a “better of each worlds” strategy.
Planning a Walt Disney World journey? Study resorts on our Walt Disney World Inns Critiques web page. For the place to eat, learn our Walt Disney World Restaurant Critiques. To economize on tickets or decide which kind to purchase, learn our Suggestions for Saving Cash on Walt Disney World Tickets put up. Our What to Pack for Disney Journeys put up takes a novel have a look at intelligent objects to take. For what to do and when to do it, our Walt Disney World Experience Guides will assist. For complete recommendation, the most effective place to start out is our Walt Disney World Journey Planning Information for every little thing it is advisable know!
YOUR THOUGHTS
Does this persuade you that you could, from an goal perspective, come out forward by doing occasion shortened days throughout Celebration Season at Magic Kingdom? Or, are you continue to unpersuaded, favoring the longer day and subjective superiority of nighttime in Magic Kingdom and attending to see Fortunately Ever After? Did you go to on any of the ‘pink flag’ dates final 12 months? Do you agree or disagree with our evaluation? Any questions we can assist you reply? Listening to your suggestions—even if you disagree with us—is each fascinating to us and useful to different readers, so please share your ideas beneath within the feedback!
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