Everything Genie, Genie+ and Individual Lightning Lane - Please Read Posts 1-7

[golex]

Hi guys.

We are here now for another visit. We have been 2-3 trips per year people for 20 plus years. We are a rope drop family that hits it hard till noon. Then go for a nice dinner and then go back in at night.

We have zero issues getting on everything. Virtual cues no issues. Headliners multiple times per trip no issue. We just wait when we need to.

I’m not knocking genie plus. I hear people talking in line about their genie plus jump from ride to ride but they are also rope dropping. It confuses me so can you guys tell me the max you can do from rope drop till noon in any park as an example.

I feel we do a lot in that till noon time frame but would I be able to do even more with rope drop and genie?

Example: AK 2 days ago

Rope drop avatar. Then to the river. Over to safari. Rapids 2 times cause kids wanted to. Lion king. Coffee and a bite in there somewhere.

I think Genie+ lets groups like ours and yours (our general park plans sound very similar) supercharge the day a bit. It makes it more intense but you do get more done.

We just did our morning at AK today with Genie+. We got hung up this morning so didn't get into the park until just after regular park open, but our rides were similar to yours (only on Kali 1x though) and we also did:
Everest
Tough to be a bug
Dinosaur
Tusker Brunch

And walked out the park at 1pm. It makes the day very intense but you do pack in more rides. Honestly we only do one or two of our trip days like this, the rest of them we skip Genie+ and rope drop and relax more like your typical days. We only visit every other year and our trips aren't very long (normally 4-5 park days) so a few Genie+ days in there helps make sure we check everything off our list. We are going to Epcot tonight and have Genie+ bookings for Remy & Test Track stacked, and should be able to snag Frozen before heading to the park.

Hope this helps provide our perspective of how we use Genie+.

 

[branv]

I have searched but can’t seem to find an answer to my park hopping question.
I understand that I can use Genie + for both the first park I have the reservation for and that I can make Genie + LL for after 2 pm at the park I am hopping to. What I’m confused about is if these are considered two separate entities in that they do or don’t affect each other with the 120 or tap-in rule.
As an example:
I am at MK. It’s 11am and I just booked a LL for Pirates at 1:30. But I just noticed that at Epcot, where I’ll be hopping to that evening, a Soarin’ LL is available at 5.
Can I book that LL spot at Epcot even though I just booked a LL at MK? Or would I have to wait 120 minutes after I booked that Pirates LL?
I’m just wondering if I have to sacrifice using Genie+ mid-day at the first park in order to start stacking for evening at the second park.
Thanks for any clarity!

 

[musicguy856]

I have searched but can’t seem to find an answer to my park hopping question.
I understand that I can use Genie + for both the first park I have the reservation for and that I can make reservations for after 2 pm at the park I am hopping to. What I’m confused about is if these are considered two separate entities in that they do or don’t affect each other with the 120 or tap-in rule.
As an example:
I am at MK. It’s 11am and I just booked a LL for Pirates at 1:30. But I just noticed that at Epcot, where I’ll be hopping to that evening, a Soarin’ LL is available at 5.
Can I book that LL spot at Epcot even though I just booked a LL at MK? Or would I have to wait 120 minutes after I booked that Pirates LL?
I’m just wondering if I have to sacrifice using Genie+ mid-day at the first park in order to start stacking for evening at the second park.
Thanks for any clarity!

If you booked Soarin you would have to wait 2 hours before booking anything else at MK.

 

[Disturbia]

I have searched but can’t seem to find an answer to my park hopping question.
I understand that I can use Genie + for both the first park I have the reservation for and that I can make Genie + LL for after 2 pm at the park I am hopping to. What I’m confused about is if these are considered two separate entities in that they do or don’t affect each other with the 120 or tap-in rule.
As an example:
I am at MK. It’s 11am and I just booked a LL for Pirates at 1:30. But I just noticed that at Epcot, where I’ll be hopping to that evening, a Soarin’ LL is available at 5.
Can I book that LL spot at Epcot even though I just booked a LL at MK? Or would I have to wait 120 minutes after I booked that Pirates LL?
I’m just wondering if I have to sacrifice using Genie+ mid-day at the first park in order to start stacking for evening at the second park.
Thanks for any clarity!

If you see a low wait for something say Pirates <30 mins but see another ride (say Space) for a great time you can always modify your pirates LL to something else (I believe it has to be within the same park) and ride it standby (do not cancel or it will reset your 120 min wait). Per link below you would have to cancel pirates to book Soarin (different park) and it will reset the 120 min wait.

I’m not 100% sure if the link below has been updated to the change in park rules (system doesn’t automatically book past 2 pm to a park you’re hopping to; you have to wait for return times to jump to 2 pm+)

https://touringplans.com/blog/step-by-step-guide-how-use-genie-and-lightning-lane-at-disney-world/#:~:text=Genie+ reservations can be modified,need to cancel and rebook.

 

[Tom_E_D]

I have searched but can’t seem to find an answer to my park hopping question.
I understand that I can use Genie + for both the first park I have the reservation for and that I can make Genie + LL for after 2 pm at the park I am hopping to. What I’m confused about is if these are considered two separate entities in that they do or don’t affect each other with the 120 or tap-in rule.
As an example:
I am at MK. It’s 11am and I just booked a LL for Pirates at 1:30. But I just noticed that at Epcot, where I’ll be hopping to that evening, a Soarin’ LL is available at 5.
Can I book that LL spot at Epcot even though I just booked a LL at MK? Or would I have to wait 120 minutes after I booked that Pirates LL?
I’m just wondering if I have to sacrifice using Genie+ mid-day at the first park in order to start stacking for evening at the second park.
Thanks for any clarity!

You have to wait until 120 minutes after booking Pirates. That's 1:00 in your example. The fact that you're going to two parks does not allow you to book rides at both of them at the same time. That could effectively give you almost twice as many Genie+ rides that day as someone who was only going to one park. It doesn't work that way. You can only book one Genie+ every 120 minutes-- unless you sooner tap in to your most-recently-booked one or cancel it or have it expire. It doesn't matter if they're in the same park or different parks. So, yes, booking rides in your second park is at the expense of booking more rides in your first park.

 

[jimim]

I think Genie+ lets groups like ours and yours (our general park plans sound very similar) supercharge the day a bit. It makes it more intense but you do get more done.

We just did our morning at AK today with Genie+. We got hung up this morning so didn't get into the park until just after regular park open, but our rides were similar to yours (only on Kali 1x though) and we also did:
Everest
Tough to be a bug
Dinosaur
Tusker Brunch

And walked out the park at 1pm. It makes the day very intense but you do pack in more rides. Honestly we only do one or two of our trip days like this, the rest of them we skip Genie+ and rope drop and relax more like your typical days. We only visit every other year and our trips aren't very long (normally 4-5 park days) so a few Genie+ days in there helps make sure we check everything off our list. We are going to Epcot tonight and have Genie+ bookings for Remy & Test Track stacked, and should be able to snag Frozen before heading to the park.

Hope this helps provide our perspective of how we use Genie+.

Ok that’s exactly what I was looking for.

Oh we had bugs life in there too. Lol.

So we are pretty much on track with genie plus users. Maybe not the exact tier of rides back to back to back but like I said we r here 2-3 times a year and we always stay 7 plus full days not counting travel days.

 

[piglet1979]

Hi guys.

We are here now for another visit. We have been 2-3 trips per year people for 20 plus years. We are a rope drop family that hits it hard till noon. Then go for a nice dinner and then go back in at night.

We have zero issues getting on everything. Virtual cues no issues. Headliners multiple times per trip no issue. We just wait when we need to.

I’m not knocking genie plus. I hear people talking in line about their genie plus jump from ride to ride but they are also rope dropping. It confuses me so can you guys tell me the max you can do from rope drop till noon in any park as an example.

I feel we do a lot in that till noon time frame but would I be able to do even more with rope drop and genie?

Example: HS today.

Rope drop slinky. Toy Story mania 2x. Tower. Rockin. Sat to have a coffee and a bite till beauty and the beast at 11. Then out.

Example: AK 2 days ago

Rope drop avatar. Then to the river. Over to safari. Rapids 2 times cause kids wanted to. Lion king. Coffee and a bite in there somewhere.

Example: Epcot yesterday

Rope drop remi. Hoofed to front for guardians group 11. Test track 2 times single rider. Space. Moana. Figment. Pixar shorts. Out for lunch by 12.

At nights we got Star Wars. Mickey/Minnie train. At MK we have literally done every ride once and big thunder 3 times already. Tron 3 times already all virtual cues.

We got our way it works. We just bounce based on lines. It always always gets done and kids are never “wish we could have gotten on that again”.

We still have a few days left. We have been here since Friday morning.

But a bunch of you lay out your ROPE drop with also using genie. Are you doing a lot more than we are? I think you might be but also think we aren’t doing too bad.

I really feel like the people using it are first timers or those who haven’t been here in a while but I also was deff listening to people who are here a lot and rope drop but also use genie thst day so it got me wondering.

Thanks all!!! Again I’m not knocking either side. I want to hear the stories. I don’t want to hear the whole day stories. It isn’t us never will be.

Here is a trip report that I am doing for our trip over Easter. We tour a lot like you. We used Genie + each day. Some of the days it was not needed and others it worked great to stack for the afternoon. It made our 2 afternoons in HS really great in such a busy time of year. We also don't like to zig zag the park so it was nice to set up times in the same area that we are in to minimize wait and walking.

https://www.disboards.com/threads/f...ds-added-in-a-spring-break-2023-trip.3916738/

 

[jimim]

Here is a trip report that I am doing for our trip over Easter. We tour a lot like you. We used Genie + each day. Some of the days it was not needed and others it worked great to stack for the afternoon. It made our 2 afternoons in HS really great in such a busy time of year. We also don't like to zig zag the park so it was nice to set up times in the same area that we are in to minimize wait and walking.

https://www.disboards.com/threads/f...ds-added-in-a-spring-break-2023-trip.3916738/

You guys did really well with your plan and the days seemed to do pretty smooth. I liked your trip report. I never actually completely read through one before yours. It was really well put together.

 

[piglet1979]

You guys did really well with your plan and the days seemed to do pretty smooth. I liked your trip report. I never actually completely read through one before yours. It was really well put together.

Thank you. It is the first one I have done. For Genie +, I was on here from the beginning knowing I wasn't going for years and just keeping up with how it worked and reading how everyone else used it. Closer to the time of when we went I started watching some Vloggs too.

I still have one day to finish for this trip. Hopefully I can finish it soon.

 

[igrsod]

Question: if we have a park hopper with reservation for animal kingdom, can we purchase only for Hollywood studios and start stacking in the morning for when we hop over there in the afternoon? Or do we have to purchase the multi park option even though we don’t really need it for our animal kingdom morning?

 

[thanxfornoticin]

You should be able to purchase for only HS and do what you're planning by starting the day at AK. Keep in mind, though, if your trip is prior to 1/9/24, park hopping is still restricted to 2PM or later. That means you cannot schedule a LL at HS until the return times for the HS attraction you wish to book has reached 2PM or later (sorry if you already knew that!).

 

[nuge67]

I tried reading up on it and watching videos but I am old-school and not really understanding any of it.

Does anyone care to simplify it for me? I have two active boys who I am sure can benefits from these three, except I have no clue what the pros and cons are or what they even do?

 

[soniam]

Have you tried to read the first 7 posts of this thread? There is really good info there.

https://www.disboards.com/threads/e...lightning-lane-please-read-posts-1-7.3856734/

 

[scrappinginontario]

I tried reading up on it and watching videos but I am old-school and not really understanding any of it.

Does anyone care to simplify it for me? I have two active boys who I am sure can benefits from these three, except I have no clue what the pros and cons are or what they even do?

Unfortunately there isn’t an ‘easy’ explanation. We did our best but it’s a complex system. Please read the posts on page 1 as they’re as simplified as we could make them. Links to helpful videos are also included.

You may wish to read the posts that are pinned at the top of this board as we have created many ‘Everything’ posts that contain current information on the first page.

 

[Tom_E_D]

I tried reading up on it and watching videos but I am old-school and not really understanding any of it.

Does anyone care to simplify it for me? I have two active boys who I am sure can benefits from these three, except I have no clue what the pros and cons are or what they even do?

You mentioned in another thread that your boys are 18 and 21. Presumably, they're not "old-school" and can figure out how the system works themselves. There comes a point where you don't have to do all the research for the family. They're grown-ups now. Give them the responsibility for planning their days.

 

[Tom_E_D]

I tried reading up on it and watching videos but I am old-school and not really understanding any of it.

Does anyone care to simplify it for me? I have two active boys who I am sure can benefits from these three, except I have no clue what the pros and cons are or what they even do?

While I stand by my earlier answer, in the post above, I guess I can give you a brief "pros and cons" for Genie+, ILLs and the Virtual queues.

For Genie+/ILLs: Pros are shorter lines, Cons are extra cost (these are the paid replacement for fastpasses)
For VQ/Standby: Pros are no extra costs, Cons are longer lines

You don't get to choose between Genie+ vs. ILLs. Disney has assigned some rides to Genie+ and others to ILLs.
You don't get to choose between VQ vs. Standby. Disney has made a few lines VQs; those do not have standby lines. The others are standby (no VQ).

If you want to know the details of how they work, that isn't simple. If you can't figure it out, let your sons try.

 

[nuge67]

You mentioned in another thread that your boys are 18 and 21. Presumably, they're not "old-school" and can figure out how the system works themselves. There comes a point where you don't have to do all the research for the family. They're grown-ups now. Give them the responsibility for planning their days.

I am old school and would like ti make sure they use everything they can to maximize our two full days in Disney.

 

[MainMom]

Curious to everyone's thoughts on the modify feature? I first used Genie+ in June 2022 pre-modify and I did not like it. (I loved FP+.) I could just not get a good flow going with the trip like I could with FP. I also had a party of 7 so I'm not sure if that was a factor or not. Do you find the modifying results similar to FP+ when looking for a new time? I didn't modify alot with FP, but I feel like this could possibly help with my dislike of Genie+. My next trip is in February and will just be 2 of us.

 

[scrappinginontario]

Curious to everyone's thoughts on the modify feature? I first used Genie+ in June 2022 pre-modify and I did not like it. (I loved FP+.) I could just not get a good flow going with the trip like I could with FP. I also had a party of 7 so I'm not sure if that was a factor or not. Do you find the modifying results similar to FP+ when looking for a new time? I didn't modify alot with FP, but I feel like this could possibly help with my dislike of Genie+. My next trip is in February and will just be 2 of us.

It's a feature we like having. Sometimes we use it, other times we don't but it's a great option. Just a quick pull down of the screen refreshes. sometimes I've only needed to do it a couple of times and other times for more popular attractions I've done it for longer but 95% of the time doing it can secure the return time we want.

 

[CarolynFH]

Curious to everyone's thoughts on the modify feature? I first used Genie+ in June 2022 pre-modify and I did not like it. (I loved FP+.) I could just not get a good flow going with the trip like I could with FP. I also had a party of 7 so I'm not sure if that was a factor or not. Do you find the modifying results similar to FP+ when looking for a new time? I didn't modify alot with FP, but I feel like this could possibly help with my dislike of Genie+. My next trip is in February and will just be 2 of us.

I love the modify feature. I used it quite a lot last January to optimize our plans, because we don’t enter the parks until late afternoon most days. I also love being able to over lap return times - for example, Jungle Cruise at 4:30-5:30, Pirates 4:45-5:45, BTMRR 5:30-6:30. No more having to hang around for 30-40 minutes waiting for your window to open on the ride next to the one you just left!