We’ll be staying at BW for a couple of days in early May. (So excited!) We plan to get to Epcot’s IG around 8:30 for a 9 am opening and then RD Soarin’. I’ve read that sometimes you don’t get to the ride until just after the first wave of folks from the main entrance, making it a 20-30 minute wait. I’m nervous about my 9:30 ADR for Garden Grill. Should I push it to later? If we make the ADR for, say, 10 am and then finish Soarin’ early, any chance that the restaurant would seat us early?
If you don’t mind getting up early try the Reservation Finder on this site to get a GG before the park opens reservation…between like 8 and 8:15. Then you will be right there and can do soarin just as park opens or be in line before it opens. That is one plan.
For 9:30 reservation I think it depends on where you are in the crowd. It might be tight or you could be just fine.
Thanks for the input, @bentshop72. My family wasn’t happy with all of the super-early mornings we did last trip, so I’m trying to keep the am as late as possible while taking advantage of RD. Plus, I doubt a PPO meal would work out for our group because DD is the world’s slowest eater. I doubt we’d make it out of there by 9 if we did an 8ish ADR. 
Maybe I’ll try to get an ADR for 9:45ish, if I can find one.
If you are able to “walk with purpose” from the International Gateway immediately when they open the gates, and you have no stroller to get rid of, you should be exiting Soarin’ around 9:30. It’s ok to be a few minutes late to Garden Grill, so I would honestly keep things as they are.
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We’ll be with my senior MIL and we will have a stroller, so… unfortunately, not so much. 
In that case I would try to move the ADR by 30 minutes or so, just to be on the safe side and let everyone take the time they need. You can check in at GG as soon as you’re done with Soarin’ even if you’re early. 
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When I called I was told they let you in 30 min prior to your reservation. I had a 9:20 which worked out perfect as we were able to beat the rope drop by a few crucial min and were the very first people on Frozen before our 9:20 at Akershus. With a 9:30 you’d basically be going right in with the rope drop crowd. Personally I liked being able to get into one popular ride before breakfast and then was able to take our time and not be rushed to leave. I then used FP for 10:30, 11:30 and 12:30.
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I’ve heard that people sometimes have trouble getting into the park for an early ADR from IG. (Doesn’t seem to be a problem from the main entryway.) Anyone know if that’s common or if I just heard from the one person who had trouble?
We did an 8AM Akershus PPO last summer entering through IG and had zero problems. Let us right in, hardly anyone there. Pretty much an ideal experience frankly - we loved the IG entry into Epcot.
For the OP, I’d just roll with the 9:30 ADR. Decent chance you make it on time and being 15 minutes late isn’t a big deal at all…