When are park hoppers not worth it vs. worth buying?

[sghokie]

I typically always buy park hoppers whenever I go because I like the flexibility, however on my trip this past week I found the park hopper upgrade to be relatively worthless.

Here are my thoughts on when they are good to have vs not worth the extra money per ticket.
I am sure this has been hashed out somewhere on the board. Feel free to chime in as this is my opinion only.

Worth it list.
When the parks are open really late, this makes it easy to split time between 2 parks on the same day. Some past visits have had MK open to 12.
When you don't want to spend a lot of time in one park, maybe after you have already been there and only want to do a few things.
When you want to get in the queue of FOP or another popular ride at the end of the day. The fastpass people slow down the line a lot.
When you are planning to be at Disney for 5 or more days.
If you are staying very close to one of the parks, you could go to two parks easier.
AK used to close much earlier made it worth it, now AK closes much later, so this one doesn't count as a pro at this point.
Hopping between Hollywood Studios and Epcot (world showcase part) is relatively easy with the boat, (I didn't try the skyliner yet).

Not worth it list.
When the parks all close at 8 or 9 pm. I just got back and all 4 parks this past week all closed at 8 or 9 pm, MK closed at 10 this past Friday, it was a pretty busy week, so I was surprised that MK wasn't open later other days.
When staying for 4 or less days, park hopping takes time. You can pretty much expect to lose at least 1 hour of time to hop, so hopping can take up valuable time, (figure walking to park exit, wait for bus or get to your car, travel to the next park, go through security.)

All in all I think the biggest factor for me in deciding to buy the park hopper next time will be park hours for the week I would be there, short hours = no need for park hopper, I would probably rather just buy the after-hours ticket upgrade for a day in that case.

 

[seashoreCM]

Why not start off by buying a non-hopper? Then, if you cannot resist hopping on a given day, go to the next park, add the hopping option (only needs to be done once) at a ticket booth, and go in.

The pros and cons have been discussed elsewhere but I do not recall all in one place.

 

[sghokie]

Why not start off by buying a non-hopper? Then, if you cannot resist hopping on a given day, go to the next park, add the hopping option (only needs to be done once) at a ticket booth, and go in.

I didn't know you could do that. Good to know.

 

[Katie1174]

I enjoy reading everyones thoughts and touring styles.
For us, we absolutely have to get park hoppers for every trip, no matter the length, but usually we do go for a week or more. We are go, go, go people. We always go to one park in the morning and either jump to another park for afternoon or evening or go back to the room after the morning park, hang out for an hour or two than go out to our second park. We even morning park, afternoon different park, evening different park. The thought of being in one park all day with not being able to go to another park would drive us insane. We love gong to Epcot multiple times to mainly snack, have dinner or browse the shops so we have to have hoppers for that too. Plus the convenience of me , for instance, browsing a shop in the parks, not buying something, deciding i want it after all and then being able to go back and get it plays into the hoppers as well. We will also randomly go to a park at any time if i manage pull a same day fastpass for anything we want to ride. I will clarify though that although we will take a bus from park to park if we are leisurely, we will happily pay for a Taxi or Uber from park to park to save time so the travel time between parks doesn't play into our decision to much.
Every family has there own way of doing things that works for them and their needs and personalities, but our vote is hoppers all the way.

 

[epcotty]

I think it'd only be worth it if you want to go less days and you don't find enough in one or more parks to spend a whole day there. don't think it's really warranted just because one park has a later closing time

 

[gharter]

We used to buy park hoppers and found we rarely jumped parks.
Once we got APs, and visit WDW more often, we tend to park hop more often. Often to go to a park that is open later or just to see a night time show.

 

[kiford]

I think your list of when it is and isn't worth it, is a personal choice for you. We have always had a park hopper even for visits of 4 days (and now have APs) because that's how we tour. We don't feel that the time on a bus is necessarily wasting valuable time since it's often our time to sit down in air conditioning and we don't feel like every minute in a park has to be on an attraction so an hour out of the park here and there isn't a big deal to us. We like to be able to decide on a whim to go to a different park, to go to one park in the morning and go for dinner in a different park. Total flexibility for us is the most important thing.

 

[scard192]

Worth it if you travel from later in August into December when MK closes early four nights/week for the "parties".

 

[Gehrig1B]

Always worth it for us. Flexibility, not tied to one park for attractions, dining, and nighttime fireworks/activities.

 

[LindyWebb]

Worth it for us because we like a lot of the restaurants in one park and we don’t necessarily want to be restricted to where we get fast passes. Booking dining 150 days out then fast passes 60 days out can be complicated if you don’t do park hopper and you are eating at sit downs a lot.

 

[disneygirlsng]

I only get hoppers if I'm there 3 days or less, that way I can go to all of the parks. 4 days or more, I find no need to get hoppers. Way more than enough to do to fill a full day at each park.

 

[ENJDisneyFan]

Personally I think hoppers are great for repeat visitors, but not needed for first timers. On a first trip there is plenty to do at each park to fill an entire day without needing to hop.

 

[Jadyreen1282]

Staying in the Boardwalk area its very convenient to hop over to HS or EP after dinner or another day at AK or MK. Just too convenient.

 

[5kidsmommy]

We always get hoppers. For us the thing is we don't have to ride every ride anymore. There are specific things we like to do on our trips so with hoppers we are able to do that. I can't imagine going without them.

 

[sharonabe]

We are another "always hoppers" family. We like to take advantage of the early EMH, but rarely want to spend the whole day at that park as they do tend to get busier throughout the day. We also use the "hopping time" as our down time/rest time. By the time we get to the next park, we're ready to go again.

 

[Disney Bubble Lover]

One thing to consider in addition to park hours is how many reservations you have booked. If you have a lot of dining reservations, dessert parties, BBB or other special events that can take up a lot of time you may not want to sacrifice additional park time on transportation between parks. Additionally, the timing of the dining reservations and fast passes you’re able to secure as well as the other events you have on your itinerary (parade, fireworks, etc) might limit your flexibility and ability to use the hoppers.

We purchased hoppers for our first trip and only used it one of five days due to reservations and busy touring plans. Our second trip was longer and less scheduled so we were able to use the hoppers frequently.

 

[DisLiss]

I'm pretty sure my husband would curl up and die if I tried to take him to WDW without hoppers. We use them every trip, and almost every day of every trip. We both adore Epcot at night. So we like to go over there several nights each trip. Even if we only go over for a couple of hours, it's worth it to us.

Plus, we're hope for the best, plan for the worst types, and on the off chance we hit a park and it's just not working for us that day, instead of sticking it out and not loving it, we can just leave, go have fun elsewhere and try again at the original park another day.

We're laid back Disney-goers. We don't bring any major plans into a park with us, and we like a break during the day, but we don't always feel like we need to actually go back to tour resort. So for us, that time it takes to hop is the break. Sit back, relax, and take a load off until you reach your next park. It's not for a lot of people, but we love it.

Oh, and when everyone wants a different park to be the first day's park, hoppers let you make everyone happy.

 

[5kidsmommy]

I'm pretty sure my husband would curl up and die if I tried to take him to WDW without hoppers. We use them every trip, and almost every day of every trip. We both adore Epcot at night. So we like to go over there several nights each trip. Even if we only go over for a couple of hours, it's worth it to us.

Plus, we're hope for the best, plan for the worst types, and on the off chance we hit a park and it's just not working for us that day, instead of sticking it out and not loving it, we can just leave, go have fun elsewhere and try again at the original park another day.

We're laid back Disney-goers. We don't bring any major plans into a park with us, and we like a break during the day, but we don't always feel like we need to actually go back to tour resort. So for us, that time it takes to hop is the break. Sit back, relax, and take a load off until you reach your next park. It's not for a lot of people, but we love it.

Oh, and when everyone wants a different park to be the first day's park, hoppers let you make everyone happy.

My husband and kids want to also be at Epcot nearly every night. They really prefer eating their meals at the various quick service restuarants in the World Showcase. So everyday we at least spend a couple hours at Epcot.

 

[Slapshot1188]

The best advice I got years ago was to get to the parks for rope drop, hit as much as possible, and then head out to the hotel (or other offsite location) around lunch time. It’s the most crowded time as well as the hottest in the summer. When the kids were small we used to go back for naps. Now (sadly) my youngest is 16... but we still almost always head out for a few hour break around noon.

Then since we are out already, we like the flexibility of having the Hoppers so we can mix up the parks and visit a different one at night if we choose (which we usually do)

If you are pressed for time and want to get as much in as possible then staying in 1 Park from rope drop to close is always going to be the best route. But if you can spare a few hours each day to cool off, de-stress and relax a bit, the hoppers are great. And the money you will save just be eating lunch off site (even at the hotel) may save you enough to make up for the hopper cost depending on how many days you visit.

Of course that only really applies to the reasonably close/onsite hotels.

 

[acarsme123]

The first trip we took 6 years ago, we never used our Park Hopper once. But I wanted the flexibility.
The second trip however, since Hollywood Studios still had a lot under construction and there wasn't a ton to do, we were only at that park for half the day...then we went to Magic Kingdom to do the Extra Magic Hours later that night.
I'd probably always get it for future trips just because I like the flexibility.