Disneyland is raising prices again. Will it ‘thin the crowd’?Comment on this storyCommentAdd to your saved storiesSave
Travelers looking to visit the most magical place on Earth will once again be forced to pay more for the privilege.
Disney on Wednesday confirmed price increases for some categories of admission and parking at its two most popular theme parks, Walt Disney World in Florida and Disneyland in California.
At Disneyland, the price hikes impact the park’s version of the annual pass, Magic Key, as well as its date-based tickets, with increases of more than 8 percent for the two most expensive ticket tiers. At Walt Disney World, the price increases are only for annual passes.
The price hikes for tickets are effective immediately. They range between $5 and $15 per day of admission, depending on the type of ticket. The price for one-day, one-park tickets within each resort will stay the same for its lowest-priced tickets, which are $109 at Disney World and $104 at Disneyland.
Robert Niles, editor and founder of website Theme Park Insider, sees the new prices as indications of each park’s popularity.
“Disney’s decisions suggest that things are going much better for them right now in California than in Florida,” he said in an email. “Disneyland got hefty price increases in daily tickets and annual passes, while Walt Disney World only saw minor annual pass increases.”
And while Walt Disney World customers will no longer have to deal with park-hopping and reservation restrictions, a possible strategy to boost park attendance, these restrictions remain in place in Disneyland.
And while some Disneyland fans may be frustrated by the substantial increases on ticket prices, Niles suggested that may be Disney’s very goal.
“Some Disneyland fans and visitors will decide this latest increase is the last straw for them, and frankly, I think that Disney is planning on that,” he said. “The parks are filled in California, and Disney needs some way to thin the crowd without leaving fans frustrated with an inability to book scarce reservation slots.”
The move to increase prices follows ups and downs in the past two years. Disney customers have complained about rising ticket prices for years. Since the pandemic, especially, customers have also had to deal with new add-on costs for previously free perks and costly changes to replace established services like FastPass.
The constantly shifting whirlwind of expenses, both new and foreseen, threatened to uproot the reputation of Disney theme parks as family vacation hot spots. A weekend vacation that could easily run up to $5,000 for a family of four was simply inaccessible for many.
Just before former Disney CEO Bob Iger returned to help the company in late November 2022, Disney had announced two separate price hikes in a matter of months. In the following January, Disney policy shifted: The company announced it would add more lower-priced days to its ticket sales and offer some perks like free Disney World hotel parking, earlier park-hopping at Disneyland and more free ride photos overall.
In March, Iger admitted that the theme parks’ ever-rising ticket prices flew in the face of some company values. “I always believed that Disney was a brand that needs to be accessible,” he said in a Morgan Stanley media conference. “And I think that in our zeal to grow profits, we may have been a little bit too aggressive about some of our pricing.”
The company also announced Wednesday that Disney World would bring back all-day park hopper access, which allows customers to move between different parks within the resort at any time of the day, beginning Jan. 9. Previously, visitors had to wait until 2 p.m. before being able to move onto their second park of the day.
Disneyland will be continuing its park reservation system; Disney World will remove its version starting Jan. 4. The booking window for Disneyland reservations has now been extended to 120 days, the company announced Wednesday.
