HS wait times look terrible...

[disneylover102]

So I’m planning on going to WDW in late August and today I looked at the app at 8:30 AM and the wait times were all terrible at HS! 70 for TOT, 80 for RnR, 70 for MFSR, 90 for SDD, etc. ST was “only” 20 minutes but still... I assume this has to do with everyone trying to get BGs for ROTR and hopefully they’ll stop that by August. But if the crowds are still awful like this in August, how do you do these rides lots of times without waiting? Has there been luck getting 4th FPs? Will that change a ton when the FP tiers change in a couple weeks? How are crowds at night?

I’m just worried because HS is my favorite park besides MK and I don’t want to wait an hour and a half for everything all day...

 

[Unvoiced_Apollo]

At 8:30? That sounds about right normally, even before RoTR.

 

[Davey Jones II]

Except for a day in which I was trying to get a BG for ROTR, I would take the contrarian strategy and show up in the evening. Before closing time, the waits will have dropped for everything.

 

[SaintsManiac]

Yep HS is the best park to ride near park close. The 2 nighttime spectaculars are popular and wait times go way down.

 

[CastAStone]

I assume this has to do with everyone trying to get BGs for ROTR and hopefully they’ll stop that by August.

That's a big part of why the crowds are there early, yes. Waits all day today seem to be unusually high for some random February weekday though.

But if the crowds are still awful like this in August, how do you do these rides lots of times without waiting?

By August MMRR will be online and sucking up guests from other lines. They also usually schedule more shows in the summer so that will absorb more guests out of lines as well. In addition, if ROTR is on Standby or FP+Standby by your trip, it will also suck up more guests out of other lines than it currently is. But it's not going to be an easy park to ride all 9 rides twice in a day, that's for sure.

Has there been luck getting 4th FPs? Will that change a ton when the FP tiers change in a couple weeks?

It is extraordinarily easy to get a 4th FP now if you book your first 3 for the morning, but that's because you can only prebook max 2 rides now. When the tiers change you will be able to prebook 3, and at that time they are also bringing online MF:SR into FP, and then 2 weeks later MMRR. At that point, the total FPs/hour should be something between 7,500 and 9,000. So if it's a day that the park is open for 12 hours and there's 36000 people (a reasonable estimate of current average attendance), that's ~3 ride FPs/guest. So getting a 4th banks on other people not knowing what they're doing and booking a Frozen FP as a prebook.

How are crowds at night?

Great. I think it will get a little busier though with MMRR and MFSR adding FP+ - more people will stay a little longer if they have a FP.

 

[Frozen2014]

Wondering if the current times are fair to compare since the tiering changes in a couple weeks?

We are going late August as well , and hoping for smaller crowds...esp with the heat.

 

[disneylover102]

Well, it’s about park closing time at HS and most waits are fairly reasonable: 15 for ST, MFSR, and TSM, 5 for AS2, 30 for RnR, and 55 for SDD. However, ToT is 145. I hope that’s an overestimate? That’s even worse than it was in the middle of the day today...

 

[Rhianna.07]

Yes, almost every day now the wait times are horrible. I went over MLK weekend in January and ToT was up to a 180 minute wait. Almost every single attraction in the park was over 60 minutes with most being 100 or more minutes. It was a hard day for sure. I managed to get a 4th fastpass for ToT but because of the new tiering system I'm not sure how easy it will be to pull more fastpasses now. Because you're going in August, the summer crowds will still be around and you can expect pretty awful wait times then as well. They are the new showcase park with all the new ride openings and I don't expect the crowds to die down for another few years. I won't be going back to HS for a long time for that reason.

 

[figmentfinesse]

Late August is actually a pretty good time to go. I went mid to late August last year and will be going again this year. Refreshing the app always got us (party of 2) really good fastpasses. I wouldn’t worry too much.

 

[disneylover102]

Yeah, I’m hoping late August isn’t too crowded. I’ll definitely try to get extra Fastpasses and I’ll get a park hopper go to HS mainly in the evening when it’s apparently less crowded. At park closing last night the waits weren’t all that great but it looks like Fantasmic was cancelled last night so that’s probably why.

 

[YawningDodo]

Well, it’s about park closing time at HS and most waits are fairly reasonable: 15 for ST, MFSR, and TSM, 5 for AS2, 30 for RnR, and 55 for SDD. However, ToT is 145. I hope that’s an overestimate? That’s even worse than it was in the middle of the day today...

On the day when ToT went up to 180 during my visit it was because one drop shaft was out of commission, dropping the ride to half capacity. That seems to be something that still happens occasionally, and when it does ToT's wait times balloon out of control like that. I was fortunate in that I was already planning to revisit DHS later in the trip, so I just skipped ToT that day.

Overall...it's just going to be difficult, maybe impossible, to do the rides lots of times. I didn't while I was there the last week of January. The most I'd ride any given ride in a day was two, maybe three times if I'd managed to finagle a FP+ and was willing to do standby at least once--and I never rode all the rides in one day. But I wasn't trying to maximize my time on rides, so I wasn't pushing very hard for it--if I were more focused on re-rides, I think I'd either stack all my FP+ for morning and try to play the refresh game, and/or come in the evening and hit a few favorites in the last hours. But even then--I got in line for SDD a minute before closing during evening EMH, and I still waited half an hour. That was a lot better than if I'd hit it earlier in the day, but it's still not getting on the ride without waiting, that's for sure.