Walt Disney World has FINALLY announced how its new Disney Park Pass System will work for guests looking to attend any of its theme parks starting July 11th:
Magic Kingdom park and Disney’s Animal Kingdom theme park will begin a phased reopening on July 11—with Epcot and Disney’s Hollywood Studios reopening on July 15.
To manage attendance during this reopening period, while also helping Guests plan ahead before their arrival, we are introducing the new Disney Park Pass system. During this time, all Guests with valid admission will be required to make a reservation in advance for each park entry, using this new online tool.
To enter a park, both a park reservation AND valid admission for the same park on the same date are required for each person in your party ages 3 and up (limit one park per day).
Booking Dates for Park Reservations
The Disney Park Pass system will be available soon to select Guests. Booking dates vary based on your plans.
- Beginning June 22, 2020, Disney Resort and other select hotel Guests with valid theme park admission can make reservations.
- Beginning June 26, 2020, Annual Passholders without a Resort stay can make reservations.
- Beginning June 28, 2020, existing ticket holders can make reservations.
Park reservations will be available through September 26, 2021, based on your Resort stay and ticket eligibility or ticket eligibility window.
If you booked a vacation package, your ticket eligibility is tied to your package travel dates. To make a park reservation for a different date, be sure to modify your vacation package dates.
If you have a room-only reservation at a Disney Resort or other select hotel for a stay in 2021, please call the Disney Reservation Center or call your travel professional beginning on June 24 to upgrade to a vacation package with tickets—and then make your theme park reservations.
Want to Book a New Vacation?
By June 28, all Guests will be able to purchase new Disney Resort hotel packages and theme park tickets and make their park reservations for arrivals starting in 2021 as our phased reopening continues. Guests will be able to view park reservation availability online prior to purchasing their tickets.
Here are a few important details to know about this new system:
- You’ll need a My Disney Experience account, as this is where your Walt Disney World Resort plans are stored and managed.
- You’ll also need a valid theme park ticket or Annual Pass that’s linked to your My Disney Experience account.
- If you have a Disney Resort hotel reservation, be sure to link it to your My Disney Experience account beforehand, as well.
Once you’ve logged into your My Disney Experience account and linked your ticket, you’ll have access to a calendar of available reservation dates for each theme park. If you have a multi-day ticket, you will be required to make a park reservation for each date of your visit. Families and friends can link their tickets together and look to arrange theme park entries at the same time.
Please note, park reservations are limited in number and subject to availability. Availability can change until the reservation is finalized. At this time, guests will be able to select one park per day; visiting more than one park per day will be temporarily unavailable upon the reopening of the theme parks due to attendance limitations. Guests with existing tickets that include the Park Hopper Option or Park Hopper Plus Option have options available to them for ticket modifications and cancellations, and can visit DisneyWorld.com/Updates for more information. We hope to bring back the ability to visit more than one park per day soon and will continue to offer these add-ons for 2021 ticket purchases.
For Existing Ticket Holders and Annual Passholders: Beginning this week, Disney will reach out to existing ticket holders and Annual Passholders with more information on when they will be able to check availability to make their park reservations. We will open the Disney Park Pass system to these guests in phases, beginning with those with future Disney Resort and other select hotel stays. Later this summer, we will resume sales of 2020 tickets and Disney Resort hotel arrivals, based on availability of park reservations, while we continue to provide guests with existing tickets and Annual Passholders the opportunity to make park reservations for 2020 dates.
Planning a New Trip for Next Year: By June 28, all guests will be able to purchase new Disney Resort hotel packages and theme park tickets and make their park reservations for arrivals starting in 2021 as our phased reopening continues. Guests will be able to view park reservation availability on DisneyWorld.com prior to purchasing their tickets.
As you begin planning your upcoming visits, we’re also exploring engaging ways for guests to use their mobile tech to experience the magic – particularly now as the use of phones and apps continues to evolve. In 2021, we plan to unveil an innovative new offering as part of the My Disney Experience app that will bring features of a MagicBand to your smart devices, building on the app’s existing digital key feature. With this new offering on the horizon, we will be retiring our complimentary MagicBand distribution to Disney Resort hotel guests for new reservations with arrivals beginning Jan. 1, 2021. Disney Resort hotel guests will continue to have the option to purchase new MagicBands at a discount, and we’ll be introducing even more colors and designs featuring favorite Disney characters in the future. Guests who prefer not to purchase a discounted MagicBand will be able to use the My Disney Experience app or a Key to the World card during their visit. We will still offer MagicBands in retail locations and on shopDisney.com, and guests will be able to continue using the wearables throughout Walt Disney World Resort.
We understand these updates may change the way you plan your visits to the Walt Disney World Resort theme parks and Disney Resort hotels for the time being. We are focused on making your Walt Disney World Resort experience magical, convenient and enjoyable. To find out more information, please visit DisneyWorld.com/Updates and continue to check back with us here at the Disney Parks Blog. You can also call the Disney Reservation Center, submit questions to the Disney Parks Moms Panel or speak with your travel provider for more details.
This says so much, but at the same time is still very confusing, especially for Annual Passholders.
For example, we have platinum passes that were going to expire before the summer, but since they closed WDW in early March, Disney has repeatedly said (and in print) that they will push everyone’s AP expiring date out by the number of days they were closed.
Meaning, if you still had a few months, weeks, or days before your pass would expire, they were going to basically give you extra days for the inconvenience. So, if your pass was going to expire on April 1 and they will reopen starting July 11, you would get 101 days added to your pass, meaning it will now expire October 20, 2020.
However, going through the Disney World app the last few days, I am suddenly apprehensive that they will follow through on this, as my pass updated to say it would expire on July 16. You know…like one day after ALL the parks are finally open. AND, it directs me to renew my pass for the SAME HIGH PRICE it would have been before all the extras like parades, fireworks, Fast Pass, certain attractions were stripped away! How does that make any sense?
Speaking with Disney reps on the phone were also not that reassuring. I understand that Covid-19 is going to impact many things, but why would you give such mixed messaging to your (in their words) “Most valued guests?” And why would you charge them the new higher price? There should definately be a big discount to tickets, especially when you cut out so much value…
I believe you read that wrong. If your pass had 19 days left when the parks closed, on the say they reopen (July 11), you will once again have 19 days left. At least that’s how I read it to mean.
Just go and Check you disney account my passes expired on may 15 i purchased renewal certs early in my I logged in and have my renewal cert and my pass with new exp dat of sep 9th
I have 3 problems at the moment as a annual pass holder. 1. I bought my pass because it was unlimited which Disney now took away but has said nothing about reducing the price or not having us pay until we get back to some normalcy. 2 you once again crapped on pass holders by pushing us back to the middle ahead on hotel guest( shows you only care about money) 3. Our unlimited passes which we paid for to allow us to park hop to as many a day as we wish now are paper weights. I get it covid happened and things had to change but that doesn’t mean we pay the same amount for bs. You need to rectify a better plan to keep us long term m pass holders. Universal was smart enough to recognize we as pass holders keep coming back and renewing every year because they treat us with respect and appreciate us.
so youre saying “just ok is not ok”?
Completely agree! As FL residents (2.5 hrs away from WDW) a majority of our trips are for one day only so park hopping is a big deal. I understand the need to restrict crowds but our fear is we won’t be able to get reservations (or as many) as we want rendering the full price AP a waste of money. They probably won’t have the AP entrance (aka shorter line) available either to accommodate temp checks, etc. Disney should adjust the prices of the APs or come up with some other incentive to take care of their “most valued guests”.
I’m hoping that they will extend passes into next year like Shanghai did. It’s highly unlikely my family and I will get to go, and we’re also a bit higher risk so don’t really feel comfortable right now. Also, two of us are APs and my bc got a 4 day pass in January. They extended the expiration date to september of next year but now it says 2020 again. So I guess that’s money down the drain too.
It says no park hopping and mentions options for those with hopper+ tickets, but the link to updates does not mention anything about hoppers except you can’t hop. So what are these options we should have. I would hope it would be a refund of the price of the hopper option, but no where does it say so.
I reached out to Disney website chat and was told to call ticketing after the 22nd to ask for a refund on the park hopping part of our tickets
This all just seems like such a jumbled mess. If you originally book one of the parks, can you then change that booking if there is space available at another park, or are you committed and locked in? Say I commit to EPCOT twice during my stay to ensure I have something, but the kids would rather do the Magic Kingdom because we didn’t cover as much territory as planned, is a change allowed if reservations are available?
I also think that if you book a package spur of the moment, or buy tickets at the last minute, will you have transparency to know that you’ll get the park you want or is that’s going to be information that is available only if you have a ticket in hand first? I’m going to be reluctant to buy a ticket with the intention of visiting the Magic Kingdom but when I go to make the reservation only Animal Kingdom is available and Disney refuses to refund the base 1 day ticket that I bought.
I think there is too much complication and risk involved for the more casual repeat visitor that hasn’t planned coming 6 months in advance.
What if you have a room only reservation for 2020? I still want to buy tickets and reserve a park day for my visit in 2020 but I haven’t bought tickets yet.
I’m very disappointed that Disney seems to have “forgotten” people who have paid resort reservations for 2020 and still need to buy tickets! I called guest services and was told I could buy tickets “later this summer”. I have a non-refundable DVC rental. I really hope I don’t have to take my kids down there and tell them, “sorry, we’re just going to hang out at the resort this time…”
We have the same problem.
I booked a universal hotel because they have the bogo days but still wanted to visit at least 1 park. I held off getting tickets because we didn’t know what was going on. Can we still purchase tickets for September??
So if I’m reading the article correctly, if you don’t have an existing ticket or AP, you have to wait until DW sells tickets to everyone in order to visit?
Disney is forgetting a large swath of customers who have existing Disney resort reservations but do not have park tickets yet. There is no information on WHEN we will be able to purchase park tickets to even start the process of trying to get park reservations. WHERE IS THAT ANNOUNCEMENT DISNEY?
Tom, do we have a list of the “select hotels” that will be allowed to make a reservation on the 22nd? I’m at Wyndham Garden in Disney Springs, which is an official Disney hotel that has 60 day FastPass access. I am wondering if this hotel counts.
AP extensions need to be set to the first day each Passholder returns for the first time, or refund the pass. The latter, obviously, will never happen so the the initial suggestion NEEDS to.
I will not attend until the parks are back to normal.
Does anyone know exactly what the comment about “select hotel guests means”? Aren’t only the dvc resorts open for reservation? Or are any of the “good neighbor” hotels includes in the valid reservation?
We also found the above instructions somewhat confusing, especially since neither of us are very tech oriented. As Annual Pass Holders, I know that Disney has agreed to extend our end date by the number of days the Parks were closed.
But now I realize with the new Reservations Procedures that we have two potential problems:
#1) We do not have a smart phone. How will the Disney App help us with ordering foods or making payments? Surely others have this same glitch.
And even more troubling #2) The reason that the Parks closed was due to the COVID19 virus being active. By all due respect, the COVID19 virus is still very active! In fact as of today, June 20, 2020, everyone in Orange County, FL, is required to wear a mask when in public due to the huge increase of local cases. The CDC stated in the very beginning that only the professional quality N95 masks were effective in protecting the wearer and they stated that wearing of other masks, as illustrated on their website, will potentially slow down the spread. Given these aforementioned facts, why is Disney risking their employees’ and patrons’ health by opening at this time?
I’m not sure I understand… My annual pass expires in September. We lost the ability to use them on March 16th. So is Dosney extending our passes the 4 months we lost, plus 1 additional month, or are we just getting 1 month beyond the expiration date?