Saturday Feb 8th Magic Kingdom was shoulder to shoulder

[CastAStone]

If you recall, there was a lot of people on the Disboards and other sites who indicated they were moving trips from last fall to this spring to avoid the crowds associated with the opening of SWGE. This was especially true after they announced Extra Extra Magic Hours.

Oops.

 

[Brett Wyman]

If you recall, there was a lot of people on the Disboards and other sites who indicated they were moving trips from last fall to this spring to avoid the crowds associated with the opening of SWGE. This was especially true after they announced Extra Extra Magic Hours.

Oops.

Normally you don't see these levels when school is in! I guess a lot of folks are pulling kids out of school.

 

[ilovetotravel1977]

My Folks were at Epcot and HS on Tuesday and they said it was really busy. They are also at USO for 5 days and said it is really busy compared to the same week the last two years.

 

[Sarahslay]

How bizarre! I wonder what happened. We were just there 1/31-2/6 and found the crowds to be pretty comfortable. By rope dropping, using our 3 FP by lunch time and then booking more, we barely waited in line for anything. Lines in the evening were also pretty short. We ate a lot of QS and didn’t have much trouble finding tables for our large group. We were a party of 9 and were able to book a good number of additional fastpasses by refreshing.

I have seen other reports about yesterday’s heavy crowds elsewhere. I wonder why this weekend is so much busier than last weekend.

I was there from 1/31-2/4 and had a similar experience (although it was just me, I didn't have a group). I've never been this time of year to WDW so I guess I found it nice compared to other times I went, but I can see how people who frequent this time of year would think it's super crowded. I know weekends are usually pretty nuts with locals, plus overlaps of people at the end of their trips/arriving for trips, so I usually go in expecting general craziness. Last Saturday was actually pretty awesome, I did AK book ended by HS (had to get that boarding group), and was able to pick up some pretty awesome FP for that evening in HS and rode all the TSL rides at night with little wait, and Smugglers. After looking at the wait times on the app yesterday I was pretty happy I wasn't there this weekend though

 

[Sarahslay]

Normally you don't see these levels when school is in! I guess a lot of folks are pulling kids out of school.

I have friends across the country who had kids out all this week for winter breaks, every school system is different, but it's hard to know when places from other cities and states have it, especially if you're in a place that doesn't do a winter break between christmas and spring break (my kids schools don't).

 

[patman]

This is one of the times of year where I think the tightening up of park hours has gone too far relative to the crowds that still come. Take the number of open park hours at MK for that same Saturday going back a few years....

2016 - 17 hours
2017 - 14 hours
2018 - 16 hours
2019 - 14 hours
2020 - 13 hours

And there's no real relief valve anywhere - yesterday MK closed at 10pm, Epcot at 9pm, DHS at 8pm (even with their billion(s) dollar new land) and DAK at 8pm. To me that is eaaarrrlllly across the board.

One of the reasons I actually like the major holidays and other times of year is longer park hours and the variability it provides for crafting a day. The same numbers of people jammed in to shorter park days never seems to work well.

Outstanding work. When the park is open 16 hours families take a break mid day or dinner time and come back by 7. if the park is only open 13 hours there is less chance for off site or non monorail resorts guests to get a break. As a guest who always stood offsite, at least 1/2 of my days included a break.

 

[MomOTwins]

If you recall, there was a lot of people on the Disboards and other sites who indicated they were moving trips from last fall to this spring to avoid the crowds associated with the opening of SWGE. This was especially true after they announced Extra Extra Magic Hours.
Oops.

I think this is a huge part of it. It's the groupthink that is the downfall for everyone. Everyone has the same logic: "I want to wait to go to WDW until they open the new star wars land, but not before they open the flagship ride, and I should avoid going in December because that'll be super crowded because of winter breaks, so I should go in January/February which all the internet blogs say is cooler weather and low-crowd season." Except when everyone thinks that way, crowds are higher.

It's the flip side of how now, summer has been (comparatively) slow the last few years. Everyone is doing their "research" on the same blogs that say to avoid summer because it's hot and kids are out of school so it will be peak crowds. But our summer trips in the last few years have been far and away the least crowded because everyone thinks that way, and because even though kids are off school, they have three months in which to pick a week to go, unlike other holiday weeks throughout the year when everyone is off the exact same week.

The one thing that remains constant is spring break and christmas week are always crowd-city.

 

[randumb0]

Summer crowds have been great

 

[mom2rtk]

Disney knows what kind of crowds are coming. There's no excuse for cutting back so much on the hours.

Honestly I don't even care if I can still get the same number of rides done. The magic just disappears when walkways are shoulder to shoulder.

 

[Cherry Limeade]

Am at MK today and it is insanely crowded. There’s evidently a cheer competition in town. But yeah, there are so. Many. People. Here.

 

[focusondisney]

And yet when some of us said this time of year is getting busy, we were blown off as being wrong. Literally 2 weeks ago a poster told me early February was slow 2 years ago so will be fine next year. So all you people must be mistaken about the crowds there now.

 

[GADisneyDad14]

Just going from wait times at MK right now (5:15 on a Sunday) - things look stout.

 

[mom2rtk]

We were in the MK on 1/7 and TP says the crowd level was 8. The park closed at 8, which was ridiculous. They did the Kiss Goodnight with Main Street still packed with people. I'm sure Disney sees it as a win in spite of the fact that I see it as a disappointment.

 

[midnight star]

If you recall, there was a lot of people on the Disboards and other sites who indicated they were moving trips from last fall to this spring to avoid the crowds associated with the opening of SWGE. This was especially true after they announced Extra Extra Magic Hours.

Oops.

And to think we almost booked our trip for this past week, but went with Jan 21-25.

 

[ucf_knight]

This is one of the times of year where I think the tightening up of park hours has gone too far relative to the crowds that still come. Take the number of open park hours at MK for that same Saturday going back a few years....

2016 - 17 hours
2017 - 14 hours
2018 - 16 hours
2019 - 14 hours
2020 - 13 hours

And there's no real relief valve anywhere - yesterday MK closed at 10pm, Epcot at 9pm, DHS at 8pm (even with their billion(s) dollar new land) and DAK at 8pm. To me that is eaaarrrlllly across the board.

One of the reasons I actually like the major holidays and other times of year is longer park hours and the variability it provides for crafting a day. The same numbers of people jammed in to shorter park days never seems to work well.

What a great observation. I never put two and two together about the hours. Some of my best days at MK would be past 8-9 pm when the park was open until 1-2 am. Walk ons for so many rides. Had a whole boat to myself and a friend on pirates and splash.

 

[GaSleepingBeautyFan]

We are here now. I bailed on Epcot at 7pm. Cheerleaders everywhere as well as locals and us tourists.
Today was hollywood studios for 3/4 of the day. We got tired of the crowds and left at 4pm.

I agree that the park hours are too short. If they were later I would have slept in some, arrived at the parks later and stayed later. And most likely spent more money in the parks.
I go home tomorrow and I'm actually kind of glad. The crowds have worn me down.

 

[SG131]

Touring plans said the actual crowds yesterday were at 10 at MK, Epcot, and AK, and a 9 at DHS. MK was a 6 the same Saturday last year.

I was at Epcot Saturday before a 6 pm flight and it was a madhouse! My mom had an ecv and it was really tough to get around. Earlier in the week had been much better.

 

[elaine amj]

Yeah. It was nuts at MK and Epcot on Saturday. We were at epcot in the evening and it was shoulder to shoulder! Happily Ever after fireworks in MK was wall to wall crowds. I said it felt worse than NYE!! (We were just there over Christmas).

Midweek felt pretty dead though.

 

[TeresaWen]

Yeah. It was nuts at MK and Epcot on Saturday. We were at epcot in the evening and it was shoulder to shoulder! Happily Ever after fireworks in MK was wall to wall crowds. I said it felt worse than NYE!! (We were just there over Christmas).

Midweek felt pretty dead though.

I was in Epcot yesterday and commented that it seemed more crowded than NYE. It was an absolutely perfect weather day!

 

[elaine amj]

I was in Epcot yesterday and commented that it seemed more crowded than NYE. It was an absolutely perfect weather day!

I think ride wait times were not so crazy as NYE but man EVERYONE was clustered around World Showcase. At least during NYE you can walk. On Saturday, we could barely move through the crowds.