What is Fast Pass +?
FAST PASS +
Disney World uses fast pass+ to reserve ride times, so you can skip those long lines. Fast passes are booked differently at Disney World than the paper ones you get at kiosks around Disneyland. All guests get to reserve three fast passes at Magic Kingdom days in advance (linked to your park tickets), which helps in organizing your day plan. After booking Fast Plus + for the 3 attractions you want, you will use your Magic Band, or Disney World park ticket to redeem them at the parks.
OFFSITE vs. ONSITE guests:
One of the big bonuses in staying onsite at a Disney World Resort is the 60 day advance on fast passes. Offsite guests get 30 days. This means that the most popular rides are going to be sold out of fast passes for the people that did not book an onsite Disney World Hotel. *update alert* Disney Springs hotels and some select offsite hotels will now be given 60 days advance reservations on fast passes along with Disney World hotels.
FAST PASS+ STEPS
Link your tickets:
You must have your park tickets purchased ahead of time to do this. Log in to your MyDisneyExperience account (either on the website or app), and enter your Disney park tickets to link them. Do a practice run of booking fast passes so you can become familiar with the system.
Have a plan:
Make sure you have written down a plan of which 3 attractions you want to book first. Seven Dwarfs Mine Train is the most difficult fast pass to get and the longest line at Magic Kingdom. That should be your number one priority. I have listed below which rides you should prioritize for your 3 fast passes. You may not get your preferred time, but I would aim for a later morning or early afternoon for using Fast Pass+, as long as it doesn’t interfere with any valuable dining reservations booked 180 days in advance. The reason I don’t recommend booking Fast Pass + for the early morning is so you can enjoy the rides you weren’t able to get fast passes for with the short lines of the early morning hours. *Note: you can’t use your 3 Fast Pass + reservations for the same ride. You must book 3 different rides.
Set your alarm:
*When booking fast pass +, you will need to set your alarm 60 days in advance (if staying in a Disney World hotel or participating hotel) and be ready to book them by 7am eastern time. I live in California, and had to wake up at 3:45am to be ready by 4am.
TIP: Make sure you re-log in to your Disney account a minute before that 7am eastern time mark, and have a back up ready to go on your mobile device, in case there are any problems with your computer. Sometimes there are glitches, and you want to be sure your account did not log out. Always have an additional back up ready to go so you don’t miss this important window.
MAGICAL TIP
I was able to book fast passes for my entire week at Disney World on my first booking window of 60 days ahead. (several cast members told me I wouldn’t be able to do this when I called) This means that getting high priority rides further into the week of my 7 day trip was much easier because it was actually more than 60 days ahead. It also meant I didn’t have to get up at 3:45am for 7 days in a row to book fast passes. I can’t promise this will continue, but it was a sweet surprise! Because of this perk, you need to have all of your Fast Pass+ plans written down for each park you plan to visit for your week at Disney World.
As an example, this was the time option for me on Seven Dwarfs Mine Train booking 60 days ahead:
I preferred to have a late morning reservation, but 4:10pm was the earliest one left that day. The reason that matters is that you can’t book additional fast passes at the park until you use up your 3 Fast Pass+ reservations. My second day at Magic Kingdom was much easier to get my preferred time because I was allowed to book it 65 days in advance:
Additional Fast Passes
Once you arrive at Magic Kingdom and redeem your 3 Fast Pass+ reservations (using either your Magic Band or park ticket), you can book a 4th fast pass. After that one is used, you can book a 5th fast pass, and so on.
Here are my favorite attractions you don’t want to miss, organized by priority for booking fast passes:
#1- Seven Dwarfs Mine Train
#2- Space Mountain
#3- Thunder Mountain
This is a snapshot from our My Disney Experience account showing a day of our Fast Pass + reservations. I recommend screen shots of all your reservations and plans for the day, and setting them as your home screen on your smartphone. It was an easy way to reference our plans throughout the day, and keep it all organized. *Sidenote: We have 4 Fast Pass + reservations on this screenshot because a person in our group could not ride Space Mountain, so they chose Enchanted Tales with Belle instead.
This next screenshot is of our extra Fast Pass+ we booked after redeeming our first 3 (we were done with out Fast Pass+ rides by 1pm) . That shows you why it’s important to book your 3 advanced Fast Pass+ reservations for late morning and not late afternoon. Splash Mountain would have been sold out of fast passes had we booked it much later.
If you are unable to get my 3 priority rides listed above, here are the SECOND PRIORITY FAST PASSES:
- Splash Mountain
- Peter Pan’s Flight
- Enchanted Tales with Belle
- Haunted Mansion
- Pirates of the Caribbean
- Meet Mickey at Town Square Theater
- Jungle Cruise
The other attractions are third priority for me because the lines are not usually a problem if you can get there early enough, and I prefer to do character meetings with dining packages. If you are unable to get fast passes for Seven Dwarfs Mine Train, Space Mountain, or Thunder Mountain, make sure to arrive early in the morning to ride them when lines are low.
*NOTE: Ride plans will need to be modified based on the ages or desires of the children. When dealing with a child fearful of rides, they might want a day plan focused more on character attractions, and shows. It’s important to be flexible and open to changes with your children should unexpected issues arise. Most older children will want more intense rides and less characters. Patrons of Disneyland may want to skip the rides that are the same in California and focus their day plan around attractions unique to Magic Kingdom My one day guide is based only on our favorite attractions.
COMMENTS
If you have any updates, tips, or questions please comment below. 🙂