Everyone knows planning a trip to Walt Disney World can be time-consuming. For some, it’s a passion project to work out all the details, but for many others, planning a Walt Disney World vacation can feel daunting. We know at The DIS that your vacation should be a time of relaxation and family bonding.
When I was a child, I would sit with my mother and work out the details of our Disney vacations and one of the biggest issues we had after choosing our dates, booking flights, and choosing a resort was deciding which park to visit on which day! We checked the weather, we checked available FastPasses, we checked dining availability and anything else we could think of to figure out what order to visit the parks. I decided, “I should just share my thoughts with the world on my research,” so I created the Weekly World Forecast.
Every Thursday I will be posting an updated forecast to project which parks I believe will be the best to visit on each day of the upcoming week. I am basing my findings on currently available FastPasses, weather projections, ride closures, ticket prices, Extra Magic Hours (which are sometimes better to take advantage of and sometimes better to avoid), and anything else that might seem relevant at the time — so you can adjust your trip last minute to reflect the current forecast.
As always, if you find this forecast helpful and you’re ready to plan your next trip, head over to Dreams Unlimited Travel to get a free, no-obligation quote on your next Walt Disney World vacation from myself or any of our other Travel Specialists.
Friday, April 20 – Things are going to get wild over at Animal Kingdom starting on Sunday — Animal Kingdom will host the Party for the Planet starting on Sunday (Earth Day). So, if you’re coming for the weekend or wanting to beat the crowd, Friday is the best day to do Animal Kingdom parties like these, especially for a 20th Anniversary Party AND Earth Day.
Saturday, April 21 – Saturday is supposed to be overcast, and while I love the Flower and Garden Festival at Epcot being bright and sunny, I really love Epcot even more on an overcast day. Epcot has a tendency to feel really hot and I always get a lot more sun there than other parks, but it’s not supposed to actually be raining. So today is the right day to do Epcot.
Sunday, April 22 – Sunday is the perfect storm in my opinion. It’s Earth Day, which is the launch of Animal Kingdom’s 20th Anniversary Party for the Planet event, which will attract crowds because it’s new. This weekend also has runDisney events happening. In my experience, the first two days of runDisney are the shorter races and people have more free time to visit some parks (because they only ran “pretty far” instead of “crazy far”), but they will probably hold off on drinking until Sunday after the final race, and most of that would be at Epcot. So runners will probably be at Magic Kingdom and Hollywood Studios earlier in the weekend. The weather will be terrible on Monday, so I will say to do Magic Kingdom on Sunday.
Monday, April 23 – As I said for Sunday, the weather is going to be very bad on Monday (as of this writing). Currently, the forecast calls for a 90% chance of thunderstorms all day long. Hollywood Studios is the best park to do in the rain. Most attractions and shows are indoors and the problem with rain isn’t just ride closures, it’s the fact that all the people who have FastPass+ for the closed rides can then use their passes somewhere else. So, if you don’t have a FastPass, then your wait times are going to grow exponentially because of the sudden influx of FastPass holders from other rides getting rained out. Monday’s pick is Disney’s Hollywood Studios!
Tuesday, April 24 – On Sunday, Party for the Planet begins at Disney’s Animal Kingdom. While I wouldn’t go the first two days it’s open, I would go on Tuesday. I found one Fastpass to Avatar Flight of Passage at 8:15 PM, which is enough for me to know that Animal Kingdom shouldn’t be as busy as usual. Plus, the Party for the Planet would be cool to do — just not the first day or two when it’s crowded. On Tuesday, locals will be back to work, Vloggers will have already reported on it and the hype will simmer a little bit. So go to Disney’s Animal Kingdom on Tuesday.
Wednesday, April 25/ Thursday, April 26 – Wednesday and Thursday are fairly interchangeable. The Fastpass+ availability at all parks are virtually the same and the Extra Magic Hours are at Animal Kingdom and Epcot on these two days. So I would suggest Magic Kingdom on Wednesday and Hollywood Studios on Thursday. Very slight nod to Magic Kingdom on Wednesday; more people will arrive to start their Disney World vacation on Thursday as opposed to Wednesday, and more people choose to start at Magic Kingdom than Hollywood Studios. However, there isn’t a huge difference in Wednesday and Thursday.
