While attendance at the largest theme park companies in the world was up 4% in 2019, Disney Parks saw a drop in attendance of 0.8%. Disney did, however, hold on to the top spot for theme park companies and individual theme parks.
Attendance numbers at Disney’s domestic parks were mostly flat, but lower figures at international parks caused the company-wide drop from an estimated 157,311,000 to 155,991,000.
Disney’s closest competitor, Merlin Entertainments Group saw 67 million guests visit its parks in 2019, up 0.9% over 2018. Universal Parks and Resorts was fourth with just over 51 million, gaining 2.3% over last year. Six Flags was seventh (up 2.5%), Cedar Fair was eighth (up 7.8%), and SeaWorld Parks was ninth (up 0.2%)
Keep in mind that Disney doesn’t report attendance numbers, however, the Themed Entertainment Association and its partners at AECOM’s Economics are able to estimate attendance using other data that is collected throughout the year.
Looking at individual theme parks, Disney held on to 8 of the top 10 spots. Here is list of top 25 theme parks for 2019:
- Magic Kingdom – 21.0 million (up 0.5%)
- Disneyland Park – 18.7 million (no change)
- Tokyo Disneyland – 17.9 million (no change)
- Tokyo DisneySea – 14.7 million (no change)
- Universal Studios Japan – 14.5 million (up 1.4%)
- Disney’s Animal Kingdom – 13.9 million (up 1.0%)
- Epcot – 12.4 million (no change)
- Chimelong Ocean Kingdom – 11.7 million (up 8.4%)
- Disney’s Hollywood Studios – 11.4 million (up 2.0%)
- Shanghai Disneyland – 11.2 million (down 5.0%)
- Universal Studios Florida – 10.9 million (up 2.0%)
- Universal’s Islands of Adventure – 10.4 million (up 6.0%)
- Disney California Adventure – 9.9 million (no change)
- Disneyland Park (Paris) – 9.7 million (down 1.0%)
- Universal Studios Hollywood – 9.1 million (no change)
- Everland – 6.6 million (up 12.9%)
- Lotte World – 6.0 million (down 0.1%)
- Nagashima Spa Land – 5.9 million (up 0.5%)
- Europa-Park – 5.7 million (up 0.5%)
- Ocean Park – 5.7 million (down 1.7%)
- Hong Kong Disneyland – 5.7 million (down 15.0%)
- De Efteling – 5.4 million (no change)
- Walt Disney Studios Park – 5.2 million (down 1.0%)
- OCT Happy Valley – 5.2 million (up 29.6%)
- Chimelong Paradise – 4.9 million (up 4.8%)
Neither SeaWorld Orlando or SeaWorld San Diego were in the top 25, but both saw modest growth in 2019.
Walt Disney World’s water parks saw a small drop in attendance, but remained in the number two and three spots worked wide. Typhoon Lagoon had an estimated 2.25 million guests and Blizzard Beach saw 1.98 million guests.
Source: TEA/AECOM
Tom is the former host/producer of the Disneyland Edition podcast and is currently the co-host of the Connecting With Walt podcast, plus is also providing Disneyland content from the parks. He enjoys traveling with friends and spending time with family, including his son and grandson. In his spare time he volunteers with Scouts BSA and Cub Scouts, and helped found his son's former Cub Scout Pack. His favorite Disneyland attraction is Space Mountain.
