One-Day, Two-Day, Hopper or Plus? Making Sense of Disney World’s Ticket Options

Going to Disney World is awesome. Planning a trip to Disney World is a little less so. With so many decisions to navigate before you even get to Orlando, it can be overwhelming. I’ve shared previous tips to help with your decisions on when to visit and where to stay. Today’s post covers Disney World’s ticket options.

Let’s start with all the offerings that are available. Then we’ll cover how to pick Disney World tickets for your specific trip.

OPTIONS

Disney offers theme park tickets by the day. Options range from a one-day to a ten-day pass. Pricing per ticket varies by season and by park. In general, the longer you stay the less you’ll pay per day.

Once you choose the number of days you want to visit, you have two additional options to consider: Hopper and Hopper Plus.  A Hopper enables you visit multiple parks in the same day. For example, you could tour Magic Kingdom in the morning and then “hop” to Epcot for dinner.  If you don’t purchase the Hopper, you will be limited to visiting one park per day.

A Hopper Plus expands the offering to include access to Disney’s two water parks, two miniature golf courses, ESPN Sports Complex and Oak Trail Golf Course. These types of tickets costs the most (roughly $90 extra per person per trip) because they offer the greatest flexibility. You can visit any of the four parks you want on a given day, as well as ONE of the additional entertainment options for every day of tickets you purchase.

If you’re interested in purchasing more than ten days of tickets (lucky you!) you can purchase multiple multi-day passes (say that three times fast!) or a Disney World annual pass. In true Disney fashion, the company also offers three types of annual passes. The Platinum pass is basically a 365-day Hopper ticket. The Platinum Plus resembles Hopper Plus. Both of these options also include parking, discounts and the photography service (Disney’s Memory Maker). They also provide access to resort discounts at various times throughout the year.

The final type of annual pass is the Water Park Annual Pass, which wins the prize for the most straight forward ticket name! This pass, as you may have guessed, provides access to the two water parks year round.

HOW TO CHOOSE TICKETS FOR YOUR TRIP

Now that you know your ticket options. Let’s walk through the main factors that effect your specific trip. You basically need to determine: how many days you want to visit the parks, which parks you want to visit and how many parks you want to visit in the same day. Cost is a factor for most of us too, so I’ll cover that as well.

NUMBER OF DAYS

First, you need to decide how many days you want to visit the parks. This number could be different from how many days you’re spending in Orlando. If you book through Disney, they will probably offer you a day of tickets for every night you’re planning to stay in their resorts plus one. That means if you book a six night trip, they will start your package with a seven day ticket. This may or may not make sense for you.

You may not have time to visit the parks on your arrival and departure days, for example. You may also want to take a break from the parks in the middle of your trip to enjoy the resorts, restaurants or activities at Disney Springs. If you follow this approach, a four day ticket could easily cover a seven day trip. It really just depends on what you want.

Think about how you want to spend your time in Orlando. If you’re all about the parks and experiencing every aspect of them that you possibly can, then go for the maximum number of days!  Just keep in mind who you’re traveling with and whether or not they feel the same way and are capable of covering that much territory! If you’re interested in experiencing entertainment outside of the parks or enjoying a slightly more leisurely pace, consider decreasing your days.

SHOULD I PURCHASE A HOPPER?

Next, you need to decide whether or not you want to visit multiple parks in the same day. This can be harder to determine, especially if you haven’t been to Disney World very often. Let me share a few examples of how a Hopper ticket can be useful.

Guests like to purchase the Hopper because it gives them more flexibility in touring. Maybe they finally snagged a reservation for Be Our Guest for dinner, but it happens to be the same day they’re booked to eat breakfast with the princesses at Epcot. A Hopper option enables you to do both on the same day. Other times people jump to different parks in an attempt to beat the crowds. Maybe they’re hanging out in a long line at Epcot and the Disney app shows greener pastures, I mean shorter lines, at Hollywood Studios.

Another reason people like the Hopper is to take advantage of specific attractions. Maybe there isn’t a full day of activities that interest you at Hollywood Studios at the moment, but you’d still like to see the Fantasmic show in the evening. A Hopper could also be useful when it’s raining, so you can jump to another park that offers more indoor attractions.

See what I mean? The flexibility of the Hopper gives you more options, but it’s certainly not a requirement for having a good trip. There are plenty of entertainment options within each park to keep you happily occupied for a full day. Plus, there are a few downsides to purchasing a Hopper too. The two biggest ones are time and money.

Traveling from one park to another takes some time. Some of the trips are relatively easy, such as taking the monorails from Magic Kingdom to Epcot. Others take longer, like the bus from Magic Kingdom to Animal Kingdom. If you use the Hopper you’ll trade some of our touring time within the parks for travel time.

Upgrading to a Hopper ticket also costs more. It’s usually $60-80 more per person per trip, depending on how many days of tickets you purchase. That can add up quickly if you’re purchasing tickets for a large travel party. If you’re on a strict budget, it’s an easy option to skip.

WHAT ABOUT A HOPPER PLUS?

The decision on whether to spring for a Hopper Plus is way more straight forward. If you love water parks, then go for it. The incremental cost from a Hopper to a Hopper Plus is minimal (about $15 per person per trip). You could also consider a single-day water park pass if you’re not planning to purchase a Hopper. If you don’t like water parks or you’re visiting during the winter when some of the water parks are closed, then skip it.

COST

Cost is a factor in whichever tickets you purchase too. In fact, park tickets may be the greatest expense of your total trip! Here’s a chart of the multi-day park tickets from Disney World’s website. Prices are likely to change soon, so consider this a guide. These prices are for United States-based guests from outside of the state of Florida. Including all of the options for Florida residents and international guests would require a MUCH bigger chart!

I organized the chart to show how the prices vary by number of days with and without the Hopper options. Prices reflect total cost per visit per adult (ages 10+)  including tax. Disney’s sites tend to show the cost per day without tax, so keep that in mind if you’re price shopping with other vendors. Tickets for children ages 3-9 are roughly $20 less than the rates shown here.

You’ll notice in the “cost for extra day” column that the price for an additional day’s worth of tickets drops dramatically once you purchase more than three days of tickets (from $65-96 for one more day to $21 dollars per day). It drops again if you spring for a seventh day.

The pricing for a Hopper or Hopper Plus increases slightly once you’re over a few days, but then stays consistent. Upgrading from a standard ticket to a Hopper costs about $60 more for 2-3 days and $80 for 4 days or more. Hopper Plus jumps from $80 to $95 more per trip. The longer your visit, the better the value of the Hopper options because you’ll have more chances to use them.

You can play around with your own scenarios using Disney World’s ticket calculator here.  You may also want to compare prices at the Undercover Tourist. (I don’t have affiliate relationships with either of these sites, just passing along links that could be useful.)

OTHER TIPS REGARDING PRICING

• If you’re planning to take more than one trip to Disney World within the same year that includes four or more park days, consider purchasing an annual pass. A Platinum/Hopper Pass is currently $830 (including tax) and it includes Disney PhotoPass service ($169 if purchased separately) and additional discounts in the parks. Two, four-day Hopper passes cost $906.
• Single day park tickets vary by season and park, so I did not include the detail on my chart.
• Lately Disney has been offering a four-day four-park pass with more frequency. These passes allow you to visit each of the four theme parks once, for a full day. They tend to be less expensive than a traditional four-day pass, so it’s worth exploring if cost is a primary concern to you.

I hope this post shed some light on your Disney World’s ticket options. If you still have questions or need some help, feel free to leave me a comment below!

Add a little magic to your world!