Planning Timeline

When planning a Disney trip, there are so many things to think about and do.
In order to help stay on track, I put together a schedule of what needs to be done and when to help keep it all organized.

6- 12 (or more) months ahead

Decide when you want to go

• Review best times to do based on on-property room rates.  Lower rates means lower number of people in the parks. For details on how to review room rates, click here.
• Check out parade videos on YouTube for the time you are planning to go.  This will give you a good feel for the crowd levels at that time of year. It will also give you a feel for how warm or cold it might be based on how people are dressed. 

Consider the Disney Dining Plan
Look into the Disney Dining Plans.  Take into consideration how you like to eat on vacation.  Having a Dining Plan can make the trip feel like an all-inclusive experience.  Look at the differences in plans and pricing here.  There is also a spreadsheet to help with this decision from SeeYaReelSoon.

Decide on resort and room

• Decide where you would like to stay.  Do you want to stay on-property or off?  What are your preferred resorts?  In what kind of room do you want to stay? 
• The earlier you make reservations, the more likely you are to get the room and resort you want.
• Consider renting Disney Vacation Club points to save some money.  This may also allow you to have larger accommodations if you have a party of more than four. I have looked into this but haven't yet had the opportunity to do it.  It is on the list for our next trip.  If you are interested in looking at this option, check out DVC Rental Store
• Consider what parks you would like to visit the most often during your trip.  Staying close to them will help to maximize park time.
• Make your reservations!

6 months ahead

Pick your park days

Determine which park(s) you will attend on each day of your trip.  I have found the crowd calendar from TouringPlans a valuable resource for this information.  There is a charge for the service, but it is less than $25 for a year's subscription.  You can also use their calendars to check for special events, fireworks, parades, and Extra Magic Hours that you may find helpful.

Get My Disney Experience account all set up

• Create your Disney username and password (if you don't have one already).
• Log into the site and enter your confirmation number for your reservation if you are staying on property.  If you are not staying on property, enter your ticket information and assign the days upon which you plan to use your tickets.
• Provide any necessary details required for your traveling party.  This will make it easier to track your whole group, It will also allow you to select Lightning Lane experiences together, when you are closer to your travel date.
• As you make park plans (like where you are going on each day) enter the details into My Disney Experience.  That will help you to keep track of your plans.
• As you making Advance Dining Reservations, be sure to place the confirmation numbers into My Disney Experience.  This will keep your information all in one place. You can also make dining reservations via My Disney Experience.
• Download the Disney World application to your smartphone.  You use the same username/ password information to access the information anywhere, including while you are at the park on your vacation.

60 days ahead

Make Advance Dining Reservations  

If you are staying on Disney property, you can make dining reservations for the first 10 days of your trip.  If you are staying off-property, you can make dining reservations for only dates between 0 and 60 days of the present day.

• I typically make reservations based on what park I will be in on a given day.  
• Be sure to plan for special meals like Character Dining or Fantasmic Dining Package as early as possible to improve your chances of getting the experience you want.  Some of these experiences require a deposit and must be made on the phone with an agent by calling 407-WDW-DINE (407-939-3463). 
• When scheduling, try to have a few different restaurants for any given meal, in case my first or second choice isn't available.  
• Be flexible on times.  While you might want to have dinner at a "reasonable" hour, you might be able to pick up a snack in the afternoon and settle for that later dinner reservation if it is somewhere you really wanted to experience.
• Consider making reservations at nearby resorts rather than in the park itself.  It has been our experience that the resorts have great table service restaurants and it gives you a little break from the hustle and bustle of the parks.
• If there is somewhere special you want to eat, but cannot secure reservations at the 60-day mark, keep trying.  Often people will cancel reservations as plans change.  What wasn't available 60 days before might be available two or three days before.

Magic Bands

• If you are staying on property, your room key, park ticket, and Lightning Lane passes are all linked to your Magic Band.  For more information straight from Disney, click here. 
• You can purchase at a discount one band per guest on the reservation.  For each guest, you will be allowed to pick a band and assign a name.  The name will be placed on the reverse of the band (which is nice in case you have duplicate colors). The deadline for selecting these customization can be found on your My Disney Experience account.  For US residents, Magic Bands will be delivered to your home about 30 days in advance of your arrival date. For others, they can be picked up at the front desk of your hotel.
•  If you purchase the Magic Band +, you will have access to additional in-park experiences. My family really enjoyed the bounty hunter experience within Galaxy's Edge at Hollywood Studios.
• You do NOT have to be staying on property to use a Magic Band.  You can purchase them at multiple locations, either within the parks or at Disney Springs. You link the band to your My Disney Experience account, and then you can use it for park entry and Photopass locations. 

Just before you travel 

Memory Maker
Consider if you want to purchase Memory Maker.  If you purchase it before you arrive, there is a discount from the regular price ($185 rather than $210).  If you are going with children, plan to visit lots of characters, and/or really like the ride photos, this might be a good option for you.  I like that it provides you with digital copies and a digital release, so when you want make a canvas of the family photo in front of Cinderella's castle you can do just that!

We purchase this for every Disney World trip we take.  This makes it easy and convenient to get pictures of the whole family. Honestly, it is the one time we are guaranteed to have all of our smiling faces in the picture. 

There is an additional option to purchase it for just one day for $75.

Lightning Lane selections 
If you are staying on property, you can log into My Disney Experience seven days in advance of the first day of your trip. If you are off-property, it is three days in advance.

Lightning Lanes are broken into two classes: Lightning Lane Single Pass and Lightning Lane Multi Pass. 

Lightning Lane Single Pass is used to pre-schedule a time for the most in-demand rides at each park.  These passes are purchased per person per day. The rides they can be purchased for are:

• Magic Kingdom- Seven Dwarfs Mine Train and Tron Lightcycle/ Run
• Epcot- Guardians of the Galaxy: Cosmic Rewind
• Hollywood Studios- Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance
• Animal Kingdom- Avatar Flight of Passage

Lightning Lane Multi Pass is used to schedule times for other rides and experiences in the parks rather than waiting in stand by lines.  There are two tiers of experiences, and you can only 

You can make changes to these selections from now through your trip, so don't feel like this is your only opportunity.  However, if you want to experience Space Mountain, Big Thunder Mountain, and Splash Mountain all before noon, this might be your best way to make that happen.

Well, that is all I can think of for now.  If I come up with anything more, I will be sure to come back and update this list.  If you have something you think I should add, please post it in the comments below!

How can I see room rates?

I will admit to being in a constant state of planning a trip to Walt Disney World.  Most of these trips never happen, but I like to consider different options regarding time of year, dates of travel, etc.

Part of this consideration is the price per night for the room.  But how do you find that when the site always gives you the package price?  I'll show you!

Go to the Disney World website https://disneyworld.disney.go.com.
Put in your travel dates, number of guests, and resort in which you are interested. Click the  green View Rates button on the right side.

Next you will be presented with information regarding that resort's option.  Change the radio button to reflect "Room" and you should get something that looks like this:

Under the price, on the right hand side, there is a blue link that says "Rate Details" just above the blue Select button. Click on that link and you will get a screen that looks like this:

From here, you have two different paths you can follow.
If you are pretty sure you want to travel around the dates originally provided, then you can use the arrows on the right and left to move the dates forward and backward.  This is an easy way to look at the price differences for weekends versus weekdays or even what the following or prior week's prices are.

If you are really open on your travel dates, you can click on the blue link on the bottom left "View Rate Calendar". This will show you the per-night prices on a calendar.  Again, you can use the arrows to move forward and backward in time.

To go back to the prior window, simply click on the blue "View Price Per Night" link on the bottom left.

I hope this helps to give you some different options for reviewing room rates.  If you have questions or comments, please put them in the comments below and I will get back to you.