6 Disney World Tips from a (Self-Proclaimed) Master Planner

The internet is full of planning advice for Disney World. How to save money. The best rides. The best places to eat. Genie+ passes versus Lightning Lanes. Etc. etc. etc.

Two things are certain: You will not be able to see everything in a Disney park and you absolutely need to plan to make the most out of your time there.

I spent a week in Orlando with my family (kids ages 14, 11, and 6). One day in each of the four Disney parks, one day at Universal Studios, and travel days on either end.

I’m also a former product manager. I live and breathe planning.

We ended each day exhausted, but happy. Did just enough to have a magical experience without feeling overwhelmed. And a huge part of that was thanks to planning.

1. Plan, but be flexible

I had an entire Notion database set up for our park visits: what were our “must-sees” and what time of day we would visit.

The parks are so enormous that if I hadn’t taken an attraction’s location into account, we could spend 15 minutes walking back-and-forth across the parks all day. So I studied the maps and plotted out a route.

Because there is an eight-year gap between my oldest child and my youngest, I also planned for us to split up. Sometimes my husband would take my two older kids to a ride and I’d take the youngest to something tamer. My Notion doc also included who was going to each attraction and where we’d meet up after.

Every day also included a 2-hour break back at our hotel, after lunch. We were staying in a Disney hotel so we had a shuttle service back to the hotel, but it could take up to 30 minutes to get to-and-from the parks. That left us with an hour-long nap: and that nap was critical for getting through the day without everyone melting down (myself included).

I’d also plan at least half an hour and sometimes an hour for each attraction, depending on how busy I expected it to be. Sometimes a less-popular ride might only take 15 minutes. But that gave us walking time on either end, time to explore the area and take pictures, and a trip to the bathroom.

Some events have specific start times (like Indiana Jones Epic Adventure in the Hollywood Studios Park). I’d note that on the schedule so that we’d know we had to be there at a certain time.

Of course, we had to be flexible. Sometimes things didn’t go as planned. But it was easy to look at the Notion doc and understand how we could rearrange, if necessary. I used the app on my phone throughout each day in the park. My husband and kids used printed versions of our plans.

The result? We saw and did almost everything we’d set out to do — and then some.

2. Be strategic about rides

We went to Disney World in October, which is far different than going during peak season. Even so, I was prepared for long lines and how much we’d be willing to wait.

Because we stayed in a Disney hotel, we had early access to the parks every day — at least 30 minutes before the gates opened for everyone else. We’d use that time to head to one of the most popular rides, taking advantage of a shorter line.

You can buy the Genie+ service that will get you access to a Lightning Lane throughout the day. A Lightning Lane lets you go ahead of everyone else. You have to wait two hours between Lightning Lane selections so you can get two or three rides per day.

But for us, this didn’t make sense. We were swapping parents with different rides. Plus we were getting one ride without much of a line by entering the park early.

So instead, we bought Individual Lightning Lane Entry for one ride per day. Individual Lightning Lanes are a la carte and the prices vary. We paid anywhere from $14 to $22 per person, per ride. At most, we’d have two or three riders — one parent, plus one or two of my older kids, depending on who wanted to go. This kept the cost more tolerable and we figured that paying $66 for one exciting ride was worth gaining the extra time in our day.

You can make your Individual Lightning Lane selections starting at 7:00 a.m. on the day of your park entry. I’d log into the app, knowing what ride we were targeting, and buy a pass for late afternoon — after nap, when I knew it would be busier in the park and the Lightning Lane option would be worthwhile.

3. Budget your food appropriately

Food, like everything else in Disney World, is expensive.

Every day, we did breakfast in the hotel with food we brought and a few items purchased upon arrival. Then we’d do one Quick Service meal and one table service meal per day.

QS are (relatively) inexpensive, about $10 — $15 per person. We usually ended up spending about $60 on a QS meal.

Table service meals are pricier. For us, that was part of the experience and gave us a break from walking around, whether it was lunch or dinner.

You can make reservations online 60 days in advance. Every one of our table service meals had a reservation. Be prepared that some of the reservations close quickly so have a plan and a backup plan.

I goofed on one reservation and didn’t realize that it was a bar with only snacks and not a full-blown restaurant. But I checked the Disney app that day in the park and found a last-minute reservation at a restaurant — likely a cancellation from someone else.

We ate at the early end of lunchtime and dinnertime, whether it was Quick Service or table service, which minimized the wait times. With reservations, we usually only waited five minutes.

We did one Character meal, where some Disney characters walk around the restaurant which was very, very expensive but completely delighted my kids. And sometimes the character lines in the park can be really long.

We also bought almost no snacks in the park. We carried granola bars, goldfish cracker, apples, and water bottles. A few times we (ahem, my husband) caved and bought ice cream treats, but this also saved on the food costs.

4. Don’t be an ATM for souvenirs

If your kids are like my kids, they’ll want “one of everything.”

I anticipated this and started preparing my kids months in advance. If they wanted souvenirs, they should save their allowance. My 6-year-old had a birthday a few months before we left and she got some Disney gift cards from friends and family (at my request).

I gave each of my kids $100 to spend, but told them anything beyond that was on them. And told them that souvenirs would likely be pricey.

I use an app called Greenlight for my kids’ allowance. Each of their accounts has an associated debit card. Using the debit cards and Greenlight app made it very obvious how much each kid had spent and how much they had remaining.

I also talked to my kids about making souvenir choices based on how many days we had left. (“Sure you can buy this $35 stuffed animal, but then you’ll only have X dollars left.”)

(If you’re in the U.S. you can earn $30 when you sign up for Greenlight. Note that this is an affiliate link.)

5. Keep your kids entertained

While we did a lot to minimize wait times, there was still some waiting around.

Oh how the world has changed; I didn’t even have a smartphone last time I visited Disney World back in 2010. My older kids carried handheld gaming devices in their backpacks.

My husband and I carried extra battery packs to charge devices if needed. This included our own smartphones, and I was using the Disney World app a lot since it had walking directions from one attraction to another using Google Maps.

The hardest part of the day was leaving the parks. We’d be exhausted and still had to walk back to the shuttle bus, ride the shuttle bus, and get to our hotel room.

I started singing Disney songs with my 6-year-old, saying things like, “As soon as we’re done with this song, we’ll be almost there.” It wasn’t always true, sometimes we’d have to sing several songs, but she’d focus on singing instead of how tired her legs were.

6. Memory Makers are worth the money

Disney has photographers around the parks and they’ll snap your pictures. As many moms can attest, sometimes you’re so busy taking photos that you’re not in the photos.

The photographers will take several photos of your family at more than 100 locations around the parks. Most of the time, the wait is very short or there’s no wait.

A Memory Maker allows you to access and download all of the photos (versus buying them individually). It’s well worth the money. I ended up with hundreds of photos from our trip — truly an amazing way to capture the experience.

Decide how you want to spend your money and time

Our family will likely only go to Disney World this one time, due to the cost. Because of that, I wanted to make the most out of our trip — and that included planning ahead and budgeting carefully.

There are plenty of ways to save money. For us, it was always a question of time. Could we have skipped a nap every day and spent more time in the parks, to get more bang for our buck? Sure, but then my kids would have been really crabby. Could we have skipped Lightning Lane purchases? Sure, but then we’d have to contend with hour-long waits (or longer).

Everything was a decision of some kind. How did we want to spend our money and how did we want to spend our time.

But the biggest factor in making the most out of our trip was planning. We didn’t waste any of our time in the parks and stayed very close to budget — both of which eased the stress of such a large vacation with five people.

If you like tips and tricks to make your life easier, you can check out my newsletter: Tinkering With Ideas.