I will hop on this thread with a question that I nearly asked on Tall Paul’s current trip report when people were debating whether DS is a waste of a time or a fun part of a WDW trip, but it didn’t feel appropriate to ask in his trip report. It fits better here - which Magic Band would you get?
I have a trip to WDW and Universal coming up in August with my family - me, DH, DD17 and DS17. We have had one previous trip, in August 2019, where we got free Magic Bands (the original style) with our WDW hotel stay. Because we live outside of the US, those Magic Bands were waiting for us when we checked in to the hotel. I am pretty sure those old ones are useless - dead batteries, but also linked to an old MDE account. I created a new MDE account with new email address for this trip out of frustration with Disney IT not being able to simply update my email address after multiple attempts, without appreciating that I’d “lose” those old Magic Bands.
For this trip, I bought our tickets through Attraction Tickets, a combined Universal and WDW ticket, and the WDW tickets include Memory Maker and Magic Bands for the 4 of us. But the Magic Bands need to be picked up at Planet Hollywood at DS. If it weren’t for that, I doubt we would make it to DS (we did not visit DS on our previous trip, either). We will not be renting a car, just using ride share or taxi straight from MCO to the Hard Rock at Universal and then ride share again to get to the Yacht Club for the Disney part of our trip. I am struggling with the logistics of getting to Planet Hollywood to pick up those Magic Bands. They will be Magic Band 2 (MB2), all 4 will be the same plain blue.
We will be at Universal from Sunday to Wednesday, and the Universal parks will be closing at 7 pm on Monday-Wednesday. So I have thought about getting a ride share from the Hard Rock to DS one of those evenings, picking up the MB2s, maybe checking out the Lego store and Jock Lindsay’s Hangar Bar, then ride share back to Hard Rock. I’m guessing that’ll cost about $20 each way, $40 total, to pick up 4 MB2. I could instead pre-order some solid coloured MB2, for $10/each = $40 total, and have them waiting for us to pick up at the Yacht Club on check-in. Or, I could pre-order MB+ for about $25/each = $100 total for solid coloured ones, and have those waiting for us at Yacht Club.
What would you do? Is DS interesting enough that we should give ourselves an evening there to pick up our “free” (cost of Uber) MB2 and absorb some atmosphere? Or would you just save yourself that hassle and pay $40 for MB2 to be picked up at the hotel? Or would you pay extra to get MB+ ? For context, we will probably not go back to Orlando any time in the next decade. If any Disney trip were to happen in the future it would be to Disneyland, because we are closer to California and we can combine Disneyland with visiting friends and possibly a work trip for DH. We haven’t been to Disneyland since 2016, when they had paper fast pass. I understand we could use MB+ there now, but is it essential? Also, DH thinks our chances of going to Disneyland any time in the next 5 years are basically zero. I am not so sure.
We do all have iPhones and will have Magic Mobile set up as a backup against lost bands, but I am most interested in trying to get as many of our ride photos as we can, so really that’s my priority - ease of use and reliability in terms of getting the ride and PhotoPass photos.
