Walt Disney World annual passholders soon will no longer be required to make reservations to visit the theme parks in the afternoons and evenings on most days, Disney Parks Chairman Josh D'Amaro told cast members today.
Reservations will not be required to visit after 2pm at most parks under the new policy, which will take effect "in the next few months," D'Amaro said. Only the Magic Kingdom on Saturdays and Sundays will be exempt from the new policy, which otherwise will allow visits starting at 2pm at all parks on weekdays and Epcot, Disney's Hollywood Studios and Disney's Animal Kingdom on weekends.
Pass blockout dates will continue to apply.
Park reservations will continue to be required for morning visits, for visitors using single- and multi-day tickets, and for all visits at the Disneyland Resort in California. However, D'Amaro also announced several operational changes at Disneyland, including price cuts on some single-day tickets. See our post Disneyland to Cut Ticket Prices on Some Dates for the details.
In other changes at the Walt Disney World Resort, D'Amaro announced that complimentary self-parking for guests staying at Disney Resort hotels will return as of this evening, January 10. Disney World implemented overnight parking charges for its guests in 2018 [Walt Disney World to start charging for overnight hotel parking], and many Disney fans have been complaining about the upcharge ever since. D'Amaro said that the end of the parking fee is one of the "changes that will help our guests get the most out of their visit" that Disney World will be making this year.
Finally, D'Amaro announced that Walt Disney World theme park guests who buy the Disney Genie+ service soon will receive digital downloads of their Disney PhotoPass attraction photos taken in the park on the day of their purchase. That change is coming, again, "in the next few months," D'Amaro said.
While that's a nice addition to the now ever-changing cost of the Disney Genie+ ride reservation service, over at the Disneyland Resort, all park guests will be getting free Disney PhotoPass digital downloads of attraction photos starting February 4. D'Amaro said that giveaway will continue throughout the Disney100 celebration. Again, see our Disneyland to Cut Ticket Prices on Some Dates post for the details on that and other changes announced for the west coast.
If you would like to hear more from Josh on why Disney is making these changes at Walt Disney World and Disneyland, please read my Exclusive Interview With Josh D'Amaro on Today's Disney Changes.
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Now if only we can get Universal to drop the resort parking fees. #aguycandream
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The elimination of the resort parking fee is HUGE. I wonder what caused the change of heart, because that had to be a massive infusion of cash from a previously untapped source when they initiated the practice a few years ago.
For us, the resort parking fee (along with the elimination of Magical Express, which allows you to stay at WDW without renting a car or paying for a 3rd party ride service) pushed us exclusively to off-site hotels.
The attraction photo perk for Genie+ is also pretty interesting. I wonder if that will change the pricing for PhotoPass since guests purchasing Genie+ will get a large number of photos for "free".