Does My Family Need The Park Hopper On Our Disney World Vacation?

Are you in the throws of Disney World planning and trying to figure out if you need a Disney World Park Hopper ticket or not? Depending on who you ask you will be told you have to have one or it’s a waste of money, don’t bother! We are going to go through the pros and cons of each side to help you determine Does My Family Need The Park Hopper On Our Disney World Vacation?

Disney World Park Hopper

We are here to help you decide what’s best for you and your family on your next Disney World vacation! The Disney World Park Hopper add-on definitely has its benefits, but also has some drawbacks!

Park Hopper Positives

A park hopper is a ticket add-on that allows you to visit multiple theme parks in one day. Its biggest selling point is that it will give your trip more flexibility. If you want to rope drop Magic Kingdom and have dinner at the World Showcase at Epcot, a park hopper ticket will allow you to do that. If you want to experience Extra Magic Hours at Animal Kingdom one morning and check out Star War’s Galaxy’s Edge in the evening, you will need a park hopper ticket. Speaking of rope drop, here are some great reasons to make an early start in the parks!

The park hopper allows you to squeeze more in. This is especially true if you have limited time at Walt Disney World and want a sampling of what each park has to offer. With concern to flexibility it also gives you more table service restaurant options. When you go to make your advanced dining reservations, you are not limited to a single park or your resort each day and can jump around from park to park for a meal if you want.

Park Hopper Drawbacks

The biggest drawback and one of the most important to consider is the price point. A park hopper will add an additional $65 to $85 dollars to the ticket price per person. If you have a small party that probably doesn’t seem like a bad deal but if you are a family of five, that adds on quite a bit.

Will you miss out tremendously without one? Not necessarily! With good planning you could get more in without a hopper in that you are spending less time traveling from park to park and more time in the park itself. If it is your first time or you haven’t been in a while, a half-day at Magic Kingdom is simply not enough! If we are being serious, a full day will not give you enough time to experience everything either so why spread yourself thin? A regular park ticket also allows multiple entries to the same park within a single day. This means you can still enjoy the morning, go back to your resort if you want for some down time in the afternoon and head back to that same park to enjoy their evening offerings.

Lastly, you also cannot make your initial fastpass+ reservations at multiple parks (three per day, per person at single park to start), so a park hopper is not giving a leg-up in that department either.

Is A Disney World Park Hopper right for my family?

While there are definite positives to having a park hopper ticket add-on it may not always be the best option for your family. When trying to figure out if it is for you, ask yourself what do you foresee your touring style to be? How much time will you be at Walt Disney World? Does a park hopper add too much to my budget, could I make better use of that money elsewhere?

Still not sure if it’s for you? Talk to a travel planner and they will help you maximize your budget and your time. They will be able to get a good idea of what you want out of your Disney World vacation and determine if you should add it on or not.

Do you always add on the park hopper? Or do you not? We would love to hear your responses! Join our Facebook Group, DISNEY EXPRESS LANE and let us know!

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