Heading down to Disney in a week and I have been checking the touring plans app a few times throughout the day just to get in the flow. Have been shocked at some of the differences in times between what is posted by Disney and the expected wait time. Just now was another great example. Meet Cinderella has a 20 minute wait time but lines App is saying expect 51 minutes which is pretty crazy. I’m curious if those that have used the app in the past have seen stuff like this before and if the app is correct in these scenarios.
In my experience the wait times that TouringPlans have calculated have been quite accurate - some are a little bit higher and some are a little bit lower than actual, but the total wait time for the entire day averaged out to the prediction. Check out the TouringPlans Blog - they have weekly posts that compare the prior week’s predictions to what actually happened.
Ok so maybe I am misunderstanding what expected means in the app. Does expected mean at beginning of day what they expect the wait to be at this exact moment OR does expected mean at this moment if you were to enter the line it will take X number of minutes to ride?
The expected means: although Disney says the wait time is this- you can expect to wait this long…I have found it to be very accurate- sometimes it even under estimates ( expected wait time 15 minutes with a timed actual wait time of less than 10 minutes).
Also, while this doesn’t explain the Cinderella M&G discrepancy, the times for Lines are ‘wait times from encountering a line to sitting in a ride vehicle’, so (for example) for HM, Disney will quote wait times to the ‘stretch room’, while TP will quote time to the doom buggy.
Thanks guys, I am a big data nerd so these differences are fascinating to me. I will be heading there on Wednesday and cant wait to use the app to my advantage!
We were at the MK last Wednesday and did not find the TouringPlans wait time to be accurate. In a previous trip I remember them being accurate, but I was a little disappointed to see them underestimate wait times last week. I’m the tech guy in the family and received some friendly criticism every time the app was wrong. 
1 Like
I was at MK early and I timed almost all my waits. I believe every single actual was under the predicted time ( I left around noon).
1 Like
I hope you’ll report back to us 
Down there now. I booked meet tink, peter pan, and 7dmt fastpasses for right when we got in and then made a plan for the first night after a late dinner and didn’t even use it since we walked on just about everything. I couldn’t believe how much stuff we went on, we got off on something and just headed to the next closest attraction. Yesterday I was excited to give the day 1 plan a shot and I think it ended up being a little more busy than TP anticipated and mid morning I had to skip the pooh ride as I was worried we would miss the fastpass I had to meet Cinderella. But after that I grabbed another fastpass at the kiosk and another one after that. It felt so good just walking on everything. I had been opening and studying the app times before we got there to get an idea what to expect and that was a big help. My observations are that during the day the app wait times are a hair fast but at night they may be a hair slow so it all works out in the end. Again its only been 2 days so my sample size is minuscule in the grand scheme of things. Plus I am not waiting in a ton of lines with long waits, just doesn’t seem like you have to if you did the work prior and got the right FPs and are willing to not ride stuff at peak times.
Funny thing is I only booked 2 fastpasses for 7dmt as I thought it might be too fast for the kids (3 & 5) but after they got off both were like that was awesome lets go again!. I was like you have to be kidding me, I can’t get anymore fastpasses for this one guys. Last night they wanted to go again so we waited til the fireworks started and only waited 21 minutes (sign said 40, app I think was 32 BTW). When I got back to the room I was searching for around an hour and after moving other FPs around I snagged one for monday & tuesday so they are good to go. We have ecpot tomorrow and HS on sunday so I wont be trying any plans out but will be checking and submitting APP wait times throughout the day. Will keep you guys posted.
2 Likes