Transcription
I haven't been to Walt Disney World in over 4 years, and that's weird for me, as I was someone who had an annual pass and went many times throughout the year. But after the pandemic, I really just didn't feel the need to return after a palpable creative stagnation and the introduction of blatant anti-consumer practices. In fact, the company has constantly raised prices, eliminated formerly complimentary services, and is making the whole theme park experience a lot more complicated than it ever used to be.
Now, a Disney vacation is a costly proposition, more than it ever has been. But how much exactly? Well, I wanted to find out. I'm going to return to the parks for the first time since 2019, pay out of pocket for an entire single day trip to Disney, and find out how much it all costs in the end.
Okay, so when I say I'm doing a trip to Disney, I'll be doing the core aspects that would make up the average Disney World vacation. It'll be the things most people traveling here will do when they're on a Disney-only trip, things like transportation, hotel, lunching, park tickets, park add-ons, as well as food. For this analysis, we'll be going under some assumptions too, mainly doing the type of trip Disney wants you to have, meaning we'll be doing a trip within the Disney bubble. So, we'll be taking the average Disney World family vacation within the property, meaning we won't be staying at any third-party hotels, getting food elsewhere, or anything that might save you a few extra dollars. We'll also be doing a more middle-of-the-road trip, staying at a moderate hotel for two people, and not getting any fancy dinners or special merchandise like this diamond-encrusted Cinderella's castle that's for sale at the Magic Kingdom for $285,000. It's not even one of a kind; it's one out of 50. Anyways, I'll of course talk about some alternatives to the trip and throw in my own opinions at the end, but for now, let's stay as objective as possible and watch my credit card evaporate as we take off to Orlando, Florida.
So, we start here at the Orlando International Airport, and we need a way to get to our Disney Resort. Since 2005, Disney has had a complimentary bus service that shuttles guests to and from the airport called Disney's Magical Express. It was a fantastic and very clever service that was free to the consumer, which meant it incentivized people to stay at Disney Resorts and kept them within the property. But that service was discontinued in 2022, being replaced with an option that is now operated by Mears. Now, for logistical reasons while filming this video, I opted for a rental car instead. But we'll keep to our trip and, for the sake of this video, say we took the bus to our Resort, which for two people on a round trip would cost $67. Not a great start for a service that used to be free. Though I will point out that it is cheaper than alternatives like Uber, but it's also not as direct as the standard bus service makes multiple stops.
When we do arrive, though, we actually find a pretty great Resort. This is Disney's Port Orleans Riverside. It began construction in the late 1980s and opened as Disney's Dixie Landings Resort in 1992. This followed the opening of its other half, which was then known as Port Orleans, that was until both Resorts were rebranded. This one to Riverside, and the other to the French Quarter. Both Resorts were designed by a Florida-based architectural firm, and Riverside in particular has some nostalgia with me, as it's where my family stayed during our Disney trips. It's also what I consider to be the best moderate Resort on property. We got a king bedroom here and were placed in The Arcadian House, one of four antebellum-style manors overlooking the courtyard fountain. I thought this room was pretty nice. We had plenty of room, a nice table set up, and a large TV. I like the wooden furniture and especially love this piece of concept artwork, presumably from the late 1960s. The bathroom vanity is in theme, as are the faucets. And while this room layout definitely shows its age with the closet essentially being part of the bathroom sink area, I think it's totally fine. Though this curtain separating the bathroom to the living area is absolutely hideous. The bed was comfortable enough, as were the linens, and it was nice that we got a unique corner room which allowed lots of light to shine through our two windows.
Now, it definitely has that '80s and '90s style mega resort with motel-style outdoor walkways, and that honestly is a bit of a downside, as despite our corner room, anyone walking by can easily see right into your space if you have the curtains open. So there really is no privacy if you want natural light. Regardless, I think this is passable for the money. But what really shines is when you're outside of the room. I think this is a beautiful resort with plenty of places to explore and relax. We were in the Magnolia Bend area with all of our buildings themed to these large manors, all with different architectural looks and landscaping. But if you want a more Louisiana swamp style, there's also the Alligator Bayou area with ultra-lush landscaping. The main lobby provides a beautiful check-in area with themed marble desks and a central hardwood floor seating area. The lobby building also features a themed gift shop, a comfortable fireplace-lit lounge attached to a bar, which also happens to have one of the best little-known shows performed by pianist and comedian Ya Bob Jackson. Right beside this bar and lounge is a sit-down restaurant, and beyond that is a large quick-service hall that has pretty good food and a really good atmosphere with a lot of kinetic energy with this centerpiece crank being turned by the large paddle wheel outside. The whole area is really well themed and also provides boat service down the river to other resorts and Disney Springs. The pool is also great, as it's located on a small island with a secluded themed bar, play area, and a whole fishing dock. I really love this Resort, and I don't think the price was too horrendous. I got a discounted rate at $249 a night, but that really turned out to be $280 a night with tax.
So, to start our Disney day, we went to go eat breakfast at Riverside's dining hall, and we both got the bounty platter, which was pretty good apart from the eggs. The platter is $22.79 per person, and that came out to an okay $72.24 with tax. But we are at Disney, so let's go to the parks. From here, we can hop on Disney's complimentary bus transportation from the resorts. Now, again, I haven't been to the parks in a while, and when I was coming here often, I had an annual pass. Since then, Disney has completely reformatted the annual pass system and bumped up the prices for both the passes and regular day tickets. We chose to do the classic park, Magic Kingdom, which also happens to be the most expensive park. Unlike days of the past, Disney now has variable pricing for each park depending on when you're going. Magic Kingdom was the most expensive park out of the four and cost $154 per person, making it $328 for both of us with tax for one day. As expensive as that sounds, at least it's not on a more expensive day like in late November, where day tickets can get as high as $184 per person.
So, apparently, everyone else thought this was a good deal too, as I unknowingly picked a bad day to visit the Magic Kingdom. Crowds were insane today, which meant lines were long at basically every attraction in the park. With that being the case, you'll probably want to use FastPass, a way to skip the lines. It was a system that was first introduced in 1999 and was free to use with the cost of your tickets. Then there was FastPass Plus, a reformat of the same system, this time mostly digital, that I found kind of annoying but dealt with. And then that was changed to a system called Lightning Lane in 2021, and that's because Disney discontinued FastPass and replaced it with a similar pick three attraction system. But in this iteration, they now charge you money for it. But Lightning Lane is not necessarily its own thing; you can only access Lightning Lane when you purchase Genie Plus. Confused yet? Well, it gets even more convoluted because not only do you have to pay for the privilege to now use Lightning Lane, there are also certain attractions like Seven Dwarfs Mine Train that only offer Lightning Lane as an additional purchasable add-on. That's called Individual Lightning Lane. This whole thing is very confusing, and this was even after the time where you had to make a park reservation, and it all just felt very daunting. I can't imagine what older people who aren't as tech-literate feel when people explain this whole system to them. I mean, I still don't even really get it.
So, what does Genie Plus cost? Well, it's also under variable pricing, so it's going to change day-to-day. But during our trip, we paid $23 per person, making it $46 for both of us. So, after purchasing the privilege of something we used to get for free, we booked a few attractions for later in the day like Pirates and Haunted Mansion. But throughout the afternoon, the wait times were consistently long pretty much everywhere. I mean, 75 minutes for The Little Mermaid, 90 for Thunder Mountain, 80 for Jungle Cruise. I do not like crowds at all. I don't like standing for long periods of time. This is all very uncomfortable for me. So, we really didn't do all that much. It was really bad. I didn't even get to do the People Mover. We walked around, we did Country Bear Jamboree, Hall of Presidents, and Carousel Progress.
By this point, it was time for lunch. We went to what I consider to be the best quick-service restaurant in the park, Columbia Harbor House. We got chicken strips, clam chowder, and a grilled shrimp skewer, all of which were pretty good. All three items came out to be $31.70, which isn't too bad for lunch, but it isn't great. We did find a nice seat on the second floor and watch the enormous amount of people flow through Liberty Square. And then through the rest of the day, we didn't do much else. Though, to be fair, that was kind of my choice, as I just didn't want to stand for an hour and a half on a queue. In the meantime, Emmy wanted to get a drink to keep her awake and a little snack like a classic popcorn. We stood in line at the Joffrey's Coffee shop and in Tomorrowland, where Emmy got a regular iced vanilla cold brew that was a staggering $7.20. Not much better was the popcorn, which came out to be $5.50.
As we walked around the park, we knew that we had one attraction that we really wanted to try, and that was TRON. Tron Lightcycle Run is the newest attraction at the Magic Kingdom, a launch coaster which was first announced all the way back in 2017 and finally opened here in Spring of 2023. Regardless, instead of doing a traditional queue, since it's a new ride, Disney has you join a free virtual queue on the app either at 7:00 a.m. in the morning or again at 1:00 p.m. We missed the 7:00 a.m. one but tried to get a boarding group for the 1:00 p.m. one. We did this while in the waiting area at Hall of Presidents, and despite waiting on the app right at 1:00 p.m., I guess it just didn't work or they distributed them out already. I don't know, but that left us with one other choice: the evil choice. We had to purchase the Individual Lightning Lane, as that would be the only way we could ride it. On the app, it shows what the price for the attraction will be, and I thought it was already calculating the price for two people, but no. To ride this attraction, it would be $20 per person. So, we paid $42.60 to go ride Tron later that evening. $42 for a 60-second attraction is a hard pill to swallow.
Regardless, we got off right when the firework show was starting up. Thankfully, Disney has brought back Happily Ever After, and I honestly did miss the show. And seeing it from within the park was pretty nice. It was by far the happiest I had been all day. In fact, the whole park and experience got a lot better once the sun went down. But it was now time for dinner, and we booked reservations at a table-service restaurant called Skipper Canteen, a relatively new restaurant that opened in 2015, and I've heard really good things. The restaurant itself is really well-themed, and the cast members are great. The food, however, was really nothing special. Emmy got two appetizers for her main meal: shrimp and rice, along with a seasonal soup, while I got the chicken. Emmy's soup was really good, but she didn't think the shrimp was anything special, nor did I with the chicken, as I found it to be a little bland. We also got a chocolate banana dessert, which was pretty good. The total before tip came out to be $67.60, and after tip, well, you'll be floating around the $80 mark. Honestly, Disney food, especially table service, is often really good, but I think I found this to be a little overpriced for what we got. So, this whole dinner was definitely not worth it.
Once we left the restaurant, it was around 10:00 p.m. We had also snagged a Space Mountain Lightning Lane that evening, but it apparently broke down right before we were about to board. Despite receiving a Lightning Lane for any attraction, it was cold out, it was still busy, and I didn't feel like walking across the park again, so we just decided to leave. And that was our day at Disney. It was nice to be back in some ways, but the park was just far too busy to actually have an enjoyable time. Then again, Magic Kingdom has never been my favorite park, so I don't know. But I bet you're wondering what the damage is. To tally this all up, I'm going to only include the one-way fare for the Mears bus to the resort, as the full round-trip cost would be the total cost for an entire trip, and for this, we're just taking a look at a slice of a full trip. So, when we add everything up: the hotel, the park, the park add-ons, all the food, the total cost for a single day at Disney for two adults came out to a jaw-dropping $886.
2017, just having to substitute menu items from 2024 for similar food selections, then since some of them didn't exist. So, the exact same trip in 2017 would have cost a total of $567. That's almost a $320 difference between two trips. That's a 44% increase in just 7 years, far outpacing inflation, which is around 24% since 2017. Now, a few things jump out at you when you look at this, too. Obviously, some of the free offerings like airport transportation and FastPasses were free. That alone is another $155 extra for two people. So, yeah, doing a Disney World trip has gotten a lot more expensive. And remember, this is without buying additional merchandise or any other snacks or even MagicBands, which used to be free but are now like $35 for some reason. To be fair, though, there are many ways to reduce costs. For instance, you can bring your own water and snacks into the park, so you can easily go without buying anything. $280 for a hotel is already pretty decent for the area. We could also stay at one of the Flamingo Crossing hotels for as low as $130 a night. There are just so many other ways to trim the fat off your vacation if you're trying to get frugal. There are many tips and sites out there that will help you do that.
Now, that $886,000 add with tickets. The more of a discount you get. So, let's take a look at what an entire trip would cost for a hypothetical family of three, two adults and one child, spending six total days at a resort and 4 days at the parks, along with all of the established food and drink costs, plus all the basic Genie Plus add-ons. With that, you're looking at around $4,000 for Disney's ultra-cheap All-Star Music Resort, $4,560 at Port Orleans, where we stayed, and around $5,688 at a cheaper Deluxe Resort like Beach Club. All of these Resorts were priced out with a pretty decent discount, and this is all without some optional extras like Park Hopper. There's also Magic Maker, their photo service for $185, and other special ticketed events like dessert parties and holiday parties, and even a dining plan. And this is all during some of the cheapest times to stay at some of the resorts. And if you want an actual nice or luxurious room of any kind, that 6-day trip becomes a lot more expensive, especially if you add more people, upgrade your food, and just anything else. But even if you expand our actual trip out to the hypothetical 6 days, we'd be landing around the $4,375 range with everything all in.
That gives you quite a bit of money to go pretty much wherever you want. In my previous video, I priced out a trip to the French Riviera for just $3,462. Even when you tack on food, it's still cheaper than this. Same if you want to go somewhere really out of the way like Bali. I've calculated that that would cost you right around the $4,660 range, plus you get to stay at this incredible villa at the Maya Ubud Resort. Even if you want to do something Disney, you can easily get a week-long Disney Cruise for that, even on the Disney Fantasy in a balcony cabin. So, after spending all of this time and money for this video, finding out what Disney really costs these days, yeah, it's difficult to justify how expensive the whole experience has gotten, especially for me, as I didn't even really enjoy my day at the Magic Kingdom. But after I answered my own question on how much it all costs and pretty much came to the conclusion that it's not worth it, I can't help but think that nobody seems to care if Disney is just staggeringly more expensive than it used to be, all while removing perks that used to be free. At this point, there basically is no argument to be made for Genie Plus and the elimination of FastPass. It is simply anti-consumer, as are these steep price hikes. But the thing is, the park was packed with people, so I guess most people just eat the costs. And I mean, it shows the Parks division of the Walt Disney Company, not the entire corporation, just the parks, generated a truly unbelievable $32.5 billion in fiscal year 2023. It is the largest profit center for the entire company. But at the end, I really am frustrated by this whole thing. I remember hearing or reading Testa from Touring Plans say something along the lines of how a family should be recommended to purchase Genie Plus and just accept the $400 or $500 extra cost to a trip because if this is your once-in-a-lifetime family trip to Florida, then yeah, it's probably worth it if it allows you to experience the park at its very best. But boy, is it frustrating to see Disney make something that used to be free generate tens of millions from it and give no extra value in the parks. I think we've gotten to a point now where it's just too much. Yeah, there were 600 million people in the park with me that day, but there is a narrative that's sticking on how Disney World is just out of reach for many families, and I'm now seeing very brand-loyal people break ranks and complain about the consumer squeeze. I think it's very important that when companies unapologetically make anti-consumer choices that affect the most budget-conscious people, it's an important thing to make your voice a legitimate concern, especially when it makes a place that you love going to a lot harder to do. And that's what I've found personally with this. I really do love the Disney parks, but I'm not willing to put up with the huge price hikes and this convoluted system where I know there are better places for my money to be spent. The value proposition of the parks is not growing along with the price. If anything, it's getting worse. So, I would really suggest looking into what else you can do with your four, five, $6,000 and all the places you can see and do without that kind of money. Thanks for joining me on this very deep dive, and I really am curious to hear your thoughts on the state of Walt Disney World right now and if you personally think it's worth the money. I genuinely don't know how I feel. I don't want this video to be taken seriously negative; I guess I'm more sad than anything else. So please do leave a comment and tell me what you think. I also mentioned that there are some luxurious and premium hotel offerings aside from our hotel, and we did in fact try out a few. So make sure you subscribe to the channel if you're interested in hearing my honest thoughts on them. But until then, my name is Jake, and thank you very much for watching.