Is park hopping worth it?

[laurabelle]

We want to park hop two days between MK and HS. However, we were planning on going to Epcot as well but didn't necessarily want to park hop that day. I was looking at the tickets and it's cheaper for us to get three day park hoppers than two day park hoppers and one day one park tickets.

Cheaper still to buy a 3 day base ticket. Is there a pressing reason why you need to park hop between MK and DHS instead of doing one park each day?

Would it be worth it to get up early and go to MK for a few hours?

I like the am emh at MK, if it works for my itinerary, but I will leave for my resort right after lunch. It will be a very long day without taking a break.

 

[rg35]

We used to feel that hoppers were necessary. We had always purchased that option "just in case." Then in 2015 we wound up not hopping at all despite paying for them so we didn't buy them in 2016 and 2017 and haven't really missed out. As our kids have gotten older (they are only 9, for perspective) we have found that we just spend more time in a single park, sometimes the entire day depending on what they want to do.

On longer trips hoppers can be useful for instance if you want to rope drop MK a couple of days but then have dinner in the World Showcase. It can be useful for a situation like that but whether or not they are "worth it" really depends on every individual group and how they plan out their trips.

 

[Lovetherodent]

Just because you can hop doesn't mean you have to. I have 4 days hoppers and will only hop on two of the days. Hoppers are worth the extra expense to me because for me, HS and Ak are not full day parks, and I don't want to stop touring after just 4-6 hours!

 

[crazedprincess]

I have a hard time with this because we make all our ADRs and FPs based on the park we plan to be in that day. I feel like we can't switch things up last minute or fly by the seat of our pants without canceling reservations that I made 180 days prior! With that being said, we have never purchased park hoppers but I've thought about it for our August trip.

 

[Jack!]

I love park hopping and am very fortunate that the UK tickets automatically include it. For me, it's nice to have the flexibility and freedom to think I can enter any of the six parks whenever I like throughout my entire stay. On our recent trip, we went to Magic Kingdom for just a few hours on five separate evenings after we'd done another park during the day - and on only one of those occasions did we have an ADR. On our last day, we did all four parks and I loved it so much that I'm determined it'll become a new tradition on any future trips.

But I appreciate everyone's style of touring is different and I actually think on a shorter trip I'd prefer just to focus on one park per day, to ensure they were as close to "finished" as possible.

 

[skyblue17]

We got Hoppers on our past trip but mostly for Food & Wine and being interested in attending multiple Eat to the Beat concerts. If we hadn't been doing that, I'm not sure we would have needed them. The only other day we used them was our final day, when we went to MK for the last time, used up all of our FPs and felt "done" with that park, so we went back to Epcot for another pass at F&W. Even THAT might not have happened if not for F&W, since we only had about two hours there and we probably easily could have stuck around at MK or resort-hopped a bit more (we went to Boardwalk first before going to Epcot).

But if you trip is relatively short and you want to be able to go to be more spontaneous (say, you're ready for an MK break and omigosh there's a Soarin' FP available in an hour!), it's definitely worth it to have. I was ultimately glad we did, even though for the most part, we would have been able to stick to one park per day.

 

[CyndiLooWho]

We're doing hoppers for the first time this trip, thinking that our YA boys are not going to want to do MK as an all day park. We figure the PH will give us the opportunity to snag some 4th/5th FPs at the other parks after we hit the things we want to do at MK. Also, since FPs are tiered at Epcot, we figure to try park hopping to try to get on all the rides we want to do there.

 

[wdwjeffc37]

We always get Park Hoppers for the flexibility it gives us. We like to get to the parks early and like to be able to go to whatever park we want in the evenings. Magic Kingdom for HEA, Epcot for Illuminations, Hollywood Studios for Star Wars. Our last trip (End of May 2017) we were able to go to Animal Kingdom/Pandora four of our evenings. It was such a different experience at night. We were also able to use the Express Transportation, which was a great time saver, but is not offered anymore. Anyway, we just feel too limited without Park Hoppers. Cheers!!!!

 

[Haley R]

Now everyone has me seriously considering changing our 2day base tickets to 3 day park hoppers. We would still have one off day to hang but we could use the third ticket for our dah day. Decisions decisions.

 

[ttintagel]

We've always parkhopped in the past, but I don't think we will the next time we go. It’s nice to head over to another park if the one you're in closes early, but there's also free/cheap stuff to do and see at the resorts or Disney Springs.


It does require a little more planning if you have dining reservations; you kind of have to decide 180 days out which day you'll go to which park. But the crowd calculators I've used have been pretty reliable, so choosing park days in advance isn't that hard.

 

[kittyab]

we like to hop, part of the day at MK then get on the monorail and go to Epcot.

 

[sdomino11]

When I look at the cost of hoppers, I’d always rather add an extra day (or two) of tickets instead.

 

[Leelo]

We love the freedom of doing what we want so we always buy park hoppers. Sometimes we spend most of the day at one park and hop to another just for our favorite snack or ride.