A positive Genie + experience

[DisneyStarwars]

We have just come back and although we did not have genie plus we tried it for a day in the magic kingdom, we were late starting ( around 9) and used the rolling technique ( booking then rebook once in the queue for the other) and planned to do a mix of standby and genie +. by 5pm we had managed to complete 15 rides and the only 2 we did not ride were Space Mountain and Seven Dwarfs ( would have done dwarves on early opening if we had planned better) We picked off a couple of rides early ( Jungle Cruise and Pirates ) while queues we low, then had a genie booked for splash at 10, once in the queue managed to pick up a big thunder for 11 ( one tip keep refreshing if you do not see what you like as sometimes they pop up) this we continued trying to get the bigger queue times first like haunted mansion and peter pan, then moving on to the smaller bits as options and availability became tougher, by 5 we were happy, could have done space but had a 60 min queue so opted to do on another day as we had plenty of time left. Compared to a similar day when we did just 7 rides including an early start for dwarves, it also felt like a more chilled day as not standing in queue after queue

[Incarniac]

Originally Posted by Rac20

Is it definitely every two hours? Not once you’ve entered the line for the ride you’re currently riding? Is it different to Disneyland then? Thanks.🙏🏻

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It sounds little more complicated than it actually is (particularly when you start using it and get used to it), but a quick overview of how it works as follows:

1. You can book another Lightning Lane as soon as you touch in for the one you booked last.

• If you have not stacked any LLs, it is the one you had booked, or
• If you have stacked some then it is the last one you booked. This means you can stack some rides while keep ‘rolling’ LLs as long as it is always the last one you booked: For that to work the last one you book must always be the next one you use.

2. Everyone can book a Lightning Lane from 7am

• This does not include the separate Individual Lightning Lanes, those onsite guests can book from 7am but offsite guests from park opening

3. You can stack Lightning Lanes by booking the next one from two hours after booking the previous one, or from two hours after park opening (if you booked your first between 7am and park opening).

We just returned from our trip yesterday (we’re two), and like the OP of this thread, our experience with Genie+ and lightning lanes was very positive. We ended up using Genie+ on all our park days.

[Twinklestar1]

Reassuring to read a positive post re Genie +

[fl-veteran]

Great that you feel it was a positive experience but... should we really have to plan days at Disney with almost military precision? Should we really have to accept that after paying the high cost of entry (not to mention the high cost of parking, eating, drinking, magic bands) there's yet another cost (Genie+) and that one of the main benefits of paying that cost is access to another cost (lightning lanes) and any gain that we have in queue times and ride access comes at the expense of 'normal' park goers who may not be able ride 'premium' attractions at all.

The whole thing smacks of greed to me on the Disney side and "I'm alright jack" on the side of their better off customers who can afford all of these add-ons. I would much rather Disney had one fixed ticket price which included everything either for everyone or for no one.

If you want a sample of how it feels, try standing in the 2.5 hour standby line for 7DMT and watching 30 people pass you for every single position you move up in your hours long queue.

Apologies for the rant, I'm girding my loins for the pile-on / criticism you usually get when you dare to criticise Disney on here...

[SamH88]

Originally Posted by fl-veteran

Great that you feel it was a positive experience but... should we really have to plan days at Disney with almost military precision? Should we really have to accept that after paying the high cost of entry (not to mention the high cost of parking, eating, drinking) there's yet another cost (Genie+) and that one of the main benefits of paying that cost is access to another cost (lightning lanes) and any gain that we have in queue times and ride access comes at the expense of 'normal' park goers who may not be able ride 'premium' attractions at all.

The whole thing smacks of greed to me on the Disney side and "I'm alright jack" on the side of their better off customers who can afford all of these add-ons. I would much rather Disney had one fixed ticket price which included everything either for everyone or for no one.

If you want a sample of how it feels, try standing in the 2.5 hour standby line for 7DMT and watching 30 people pass you for every single position you move up in your hours long queue.

Apologies for the rant, I'm girding my loins for the pile-on / criticism you usually get when you dare to criticise Disney on here...

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But we didn’t plan with military precision at all. We would book a ride at 7am and then when we could book another we could just decide what to do based on what was available at the time. We would have had to be more precise without genie because we would have had to plan out our day based on doing rides in the order than standby queues are likely to be busy.

Booking fast pass + 60 days in advance would be way more like “military precision” to me.

Its €16 a day, plus extra if you want to pay for ILL rides, and we got to ride everything we wanted and it can be used in multiple parks in one day compared to Universals express pass which is $90 if you want to use it in the two parks in one day. For not a huge amount more that the price of a 1 day 2-park express in universal I got a whole week of genie +. I don’t see people talk about how greedy universal are to charge that much.

Your example about 7DMT is no different to how it would be in fast pass days because there would have been people who didn’t book on time 60 days in advance and missed out. Having to wait until the day you go to the park makes it much fairer in my opinion.

[SamH88]

Originally Posted by Rac20

Is it definitely every two hours? Not once you’ve entered the line for the ride you’re currently riding? Is it different to Disneyland then? Thanks.🙏🏻

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Depends if you’re “rolling” or “stacking”. If you’re rolling it’s tap in and book again straight away. For stacking it gets more confusing and the 2 hours come into play.

[fl-veteran]

Originally Posted by SamH88

But we didn’t plan with military precision at all. We would book a ride at 7am and then when we could book another we could just decide what to do based on what was available at the time. We would have had to be more precise without genie because we would have had to plan out our day based on doing rides in the order than standby queues are likely to be busy.

Booking fast pass + 60 days in advance would be way more like “military precision” to me.

Its €16 a day, plus extra if you want to pay for ILL rides, and we got to ride everything we wanted and it can be used in multiple parks in one day compared to Universals express pass which is $90 if you want to use it in the two parks in one day. For not a huge amount more that the price of a 1 day 2-park express in universal I got a whole week of genie +. I don’t see people talk about how greedy universal are to charge that much.

Your example about 7DMT is no different to how it would be in fast pass days because there would have been people who didn’t book on time 60 days in advance and missed out. Having to wait until the day you go to the park makes it much fairer in my opinion.

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Universal are plenty greedy too, it doesn't make it right.

My example applies just as much to the FP days, that was just as unfair (perhaps even more so, I've been hit by the "Can't ride the new ride because I stay off property" experience of people booking 60 days out).

This isn't a criticism of you, you're just doing what you need to to have a good holiday. I would simply prefer that everyone were on a level playing field and that there was one cost (even if that put up the cost of entry) for a good experience.

After all, if everyone buys Genie+ and pays for lightning lanes we'll all be exactly where we would be (queue wise) if none of these extras even existed.

We're not doing Disney this time (the kids are older now and want thrill rides) but will probably be back for a day trip Easter next year for my 50th. I want to visit all of the Pandora / Star Wars / Toy Story stuff. HS is a small park... but do I have confidence that I will get to ride everything I want? No. Will I end up paying for all of the add-ons for everyone? Probably, while gritting my teeth. Will I have to do rope drop for the first time in my entire 25 years of visiting? Probably...

[soap]

We used Genie+ for our trip late Feb/Early March and although it all worked fine I don't see the real benefits of the paid option over old "free" FastPass+.

Waking up by 7am every day to book rides is no fun, especially when slots are all gone within a minute or two. Slots do then become available later on if you keep checking but you have to time it right and on the couple of times we were successful with that the slots we were allocated were quite late on in the day.

For very popular rides, you will find that you are offered a slot, confirm it and then have another 2-3 hours added on to your time after confirmation. This even happens with ILLs, where you get a slot, then after submitting your payment you find that the 3pm time you had is now actually 6pm.

The app works well enough and you quickly get the hang of stacking, however bear in mind that often the rides you can pick up during the day have lower wait times anyway so you aren't getting as much benefit as you might have done for the extra money you are paying.

I can't grumble too much as I paid for Genie+ for all four of us and bought a few ILLs as well, so I made my choice. But I don't feel it is better than what we had before.

[SamH88]

Originally Posted by soap

Waking up by 7am every day to book rides is no fun, especially when slots are all gone within a minute or two. Slots do then become available later on if you keep checking but you have to time it right and on the couple of times we were successful with that the slots we were allocated were quite late on in the day.

For very popular rides, you will find that you are offered a slot, confirm it and then have another 2-3 hours added on to your time after confirmation. This even happens with ILLs, where you get a slot, then after submitting your payment you find that the 3pm time you had is now actually 6pm.

The app works well enough and you quickly get the hang of stacking, however bear in mind that often the rides you can pick up during the day have lower wait times anyway so you aren't getting as much benefit as you might have done for the extra money you are paying.

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We obviously had very different experiences and that’s to be expected, it will work really well for some people like us and not so well for others.

We were happy to be up by 7 to make selections as we tried to do early entry every day to make the most of our time. But there were still plenty of time slots available for bigger rides later in the day when we were there.

When the time changed on a slot we chose between the time we picked and when it was confirmed it was never more than 30 mins later than the time we had originally picked. Maybe we got lucky or maybe you were just unlucky.

The rides we got during the day were all rides that had wait times of 45 mins plus. We were able to book the likes of Splash and Thunder Mountain which had 60 min plus waits within an hour of riding. Same with haunted mansion, we booked at about 6pm for 8-9pm so we could ride after Enchantment, and when we got there the standby line was all the way back to the Liberty Square riverboat entrance.

In both Magic Kingdom and Hollywood Studios we probably avoided at least 4 hours of queuing a day.

As I said everyone will have a different experience. Most people only post about bad experiences so I wanted to share our positive experience to add some balance, and show people that it’s not all bad. Disney World is still a magical place where you can have an amazing holiday and for us Genie+ really helped.

[Nimbus]

Originally Posted by soap

We used Genie+ for our trip late Feb/Early March and although it all worked fine I don't see the real benefits of the paid option over old "free" FastPass+.

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Oh, I don't think anyone's really saying that the paid option is "better" than the old Fastpass+ system. Different, yes. And obviously it costs more than being free, which is a Bad Thing. I'm sure some people will prefer one to the other, just like how people had different opinions of Fastpass+ compared to the old paper Fastpass system.

What this thread is trying to point out is that, at least in SamH88's case, it's not as bad as a lot of people make out. Even when the parks were stupidly busy, SamH88 still had no issue at all getting Genie+ slots for the rides they wanted and they found it was 100% worth it. Using it helped them get onto lots of rides and enhanced their time at the parks. Sure, Fastpass+ probably would've also provided the same benefit, but they found Genie+ was very useful.

It's also interesting to read that although ILLS were sometimes “sold out” just after 7am, it seems more are released after 7am. So if you missed out at 7am you could still get a time later that day.