Park reservations for off-site guests?

[Guest]

This year's holiday (we were due to leave in two day's time ) is cancelled, so we are very keen to re-schedule our trip for August 2021. Hopefully by then the need to make park reservations at the Disney parks will have ended, but in the meantime I'm trying to understand how I make park reservations, so would appreciate any help.

We will be staying off-site and have the usual 14-day tickets. Before the lockdowns started we registered our tickets on the MDE app, so we're 'in the system' as it were. Are off-site guests able to make park reservations now, or do we have to wait until closer to our holiday?

[SMAX]

You can do them now. You just need the tickets on MDE.

[JoanicSicos]

Originally Posted by robrar

This year's holiday (we were due to leave in two day's time ) is cancelled, so we are very keen to re-schedule our trip for August 2021. Hopefully by then the need to make park reservations at the Disney parks will have ended, but in the meantime I'm trying to understand how I make park reservations, so would appreciate any help.

We will be staying off-site and have the usual 14-day tickets. Before the lockdowns started we registered our tickets on the MDE app, so we're 'in the system' as it were. Are off-site guests able to make park reservations now, or do we have to wait until closer to our holiday?

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As far as I'm aware, as long as you have the tickets in hand, and have registered them on MDE, you should be able to make reservations all the way up to Sept 21.

Good luck!

[curlysue2]

If you have registered your park tickets you can book now , so I would get booking if I was you.
Reservations are open until September 2021

[novocastrian]

does a reservation guarantee you will get in ?

seems insane to have to choose what you want to do each day over a year in advance

[PixieBoot]

I’ve booked our days for next Jul 🤞
Not too bad if you have an idea how many days you want at each park - In the absence of all the usual considerations including crowd level projections etc I think it’s simplified the initial planning for me and I can work any meal reservations around then as and when.

[Guest]

Once booked, is it possible to change your reservations? Also, is there a 'no-show' penalty of any kind if plans change at short notice and you're not able to cancel your reservation?

[eddiethorne]

Originally Posted by robrar

Once booked, is it possible to change your reservations? Also, is there a 'no-show' penalty of any kind if plans change at short notice and you're not able to cancel your reservation?

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Once booked you can cancel and rebook another park. I think I saw some where if you have 3 no shows your tickets get blocked for so many days. We have booked a park for each day we are in Florida next july, my plan is to see closer to the time if the water parks need booking and universal then we can cancel them but at the moment we have somewhere to go each day.

[PixieBoot]

Originally Posted by robrar

Once booked, is it possible to change your reservations? Also, is there a 'no-show' penalty of any kind if plans change at short notice and you're not able to cancel your reservation?

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Yes you can change them around as long as there’s still availability for the day you want. Haven’t come across anything about fees, very much doubt it.

[Nimbus]

Originally Posted by novocastrian

does a reservation guarantee you will get in ?

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It doesn't provide an absolute guarantee, no. For example, if there's a hurricane on the way and Disney has to close the parks then your park reservation will not let you into the closed park. Similarly, if the CMs scan your forehead and find you have a fever your park reservation will not let you into the park.

However, under the current system, without a park reservation you will not be able to enter the park. Even if you have valid tickets for that day.

Originally Posted by novocastrian

seems insane to have to choose what you want to do each day over a year in advance

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You are right, it does.

However, I would point out that it seems you don't have to book the park reservations over a year in advance. Right now there are still park reservations available for every park today or tomorrow. So you could book any park you want just the night beforehand based on the current availability.

Of course, the closer you leave it to the day you want to visit, the greater the chance that the park reservations might have run out for that day. But that chance of missing out is still very small (based on current observations).