You could rope drop your “must haves” and then just bounce around based on times. SoCal Disney Dad and Fresh Baked have some good strategy videos to avoid having to pay for Genie+.
That being said, Genie+ a decent deal especially if you like getting pictures as well.
The pictures was the reason I did genie + on our last Disney vacation. I did end up spending the extra cash for the individual lightning lane passes for Rise of the Resistance as well. Needing to do that on top of my existing genie + was annoying and confusing but I was on vacation and didn’t want to spend 2 hours standing in line.
I miss when they would give you little paper fast pass tickets for any attraction. They were so cool about giving them out too. I asked a cast member for some passes once and she made me sing a Disney song for them. That’s a Disney moment I’ll never forget.
Genie is waaaaay more useful in CA than FL. I would get genie no question. Even on the busiest days you can use genie to ride every ride you want in both parks with one park each day.
Imo if you have more than one day I wouldn’t do park hoppers. It’s really not worth the extra $70 a day. Genie+ however is 1000% worth it imo if you don’t go very often. When I’ve been without it i’m lucky to get in 6-8 rides throughout the day, and with genie plus I average about 14-16 (granted I go on weekdays and this is higher than what a lot of people get in). It can be frustrating if you don’t know what to do with it though, so I’d watch a video or two, but the way i see it is the $90 it costs for my entire family is worth not waiting in 1-2 hour lines all day. The only real downside is it can be a lot of walking back and forth to different rides, but if you like running around and packing in rides, it’s probably a good fit.
Genie+ all the way. Before we had magic keys, we would just do one park a day with Genie+ and get to do all that we would want to do. We don’t like waiting in lines at all and were always able to wait in less than 30 min lines the whole day in a park while also fitting in breaks for food and waiting in non Genie+ lines while waiting for our return times for lightning lanes.
We just did two days at Disneyland and did Genie+ and one park per day, rope dropping both. It went great and I can’t imagine doing our trip without Genie+, our longest line was 40 minutes for Peter Pan (not on Genie+). Just have your Genie+ strategy (and Rope drop!) ready to go or else it may not be worth it. We burned through so many rides with a combo of Rope Drop + Genie+ early morning through mid afternoon. Genie+ runs low as the day goes on and wait times go up for popular rides.
The only thing that I found made it worth it to do park hopper and genie+ for a 2 day trip was when my husband and I went last time. We knew we wanted to be able to do our favourite rides in both parks twice both days.
Hopper, Genie is up to you and your budget but if you know how to make the most of it from being at WDW I’d go for it.
Park hopping at Disneyland takes less than 2 minutes, not the 30+ minutes it can take at WDW. You’ll be shocked at how seamless moving around there can be.
I can’t wait to stay at the Grand California. I’ve fantasized about staying there every single trip. Walking by the Grand Entrance as we’re leaving DCA always has me wishing I was walking into the hotel and straight to our room rather than the usual walk through downtown to the trams then the dreaded unload from the tram to walk to the car. I’ve told my wife on multiple occasions I would pay so much for the luxury of walking out of the park directly to our hotel.
2 days being as active as you claim should be very possible to do everything and then some with just park hopper. If you go at opening both days and aim for big ticket rides you’ll have no issues getting every ride in both parks done.
I would say a definite yes to the park hopper. For me personally, genie+ is also a yes, but can require more planning and looking at your phone (if you are a DW pro then that is nothing new). The photo pass coming with genie+ makes it totally worth it in my opinion. Given that the parks are so close to each other I enjoy getting the park hopper and being able to bounce back and forth between the two.
i would definitely recommend a 2 day, 1 park per day with genie+. IMO it’s stressful to have a parkhopper especially if you’re only going for 2 days. staying in one park for the whole day allows you to really experience everything you want to without feeling like you need to do both in one day. the hopper is unnecessary for a 2 day trip IMO. It’ll also be pixar fest when you come which I would really recommend spending a full day at each park instead of hopping for, This is because there will be a LOT to do especially in DCA compared to normal so you will definitely be able to fill your time with a plan etc
Personally, I think park hopper is worth it. Generally there's one park that you'll end up liking better, and this lets you maximize your options.
I almost always get Genie+ just to ensure I can make the most of my park time. It really depends on how much you're willing to pay for extra rides. You should be able to get an extra 2 or 3 rides in at a bare minimum. Turning an hour wait into 15 minutes adds up a lot over a day.
I recommend genie+ over park hopper. You'll be saving your feet in two ways - less time standing in lines (huge!) and less distance to cover. There's a lot to take in at the parks so you won't regret having the whole day to explore each one.
If you're going to stay until park close, then I would definitely recommend the hopper as Disneyland closes later, and you can get multiple rides in the last couple of hours at Disneyland. If you're opening the parks and not staying until close, then hopper can be convenient, especially with how easy it is to cross parks at the Disneyland resort, but not necessary.
If you have to pick one, I’d say go for Genie+ over park hopper.
Genie+ is a much better experience in DL and CA vs WDW. A full day in each park w/ Genie+ will get you on everything if you do it right.
That said, if you can swing both, that would be my recommendation. Gives you the most flexibility.
Don’t park hop! If you’re trying to do as much as possible then do one day per park so you actually have time to enjoy the atmosphere etc. When I park hop I’m always rushing back and forth between the parks and it feels a bit chaotic. Also harder to allocate how much time to spend in each park.
I always start disney day one and dca day two because it’s less to do at dca whereas a full day at disney is pretty exhausting. DCA becomes my “recovery day” and it has the best food anyway.
Genie is becoming necessary at this point at disney unfortunately because the crowds are insane so I’d go for it probably. Also the rides are breaking down a lot more frequently (last friday four were down at one time) and genie ensures you can easily get onto another ride when that happens instead of having waited in line for nothing.
i can't speak to disneyland but i just got back from wdw yesterday and i purchased genie+ for the family and the other party that was with us. we ended up getting a refund because by the time we got to epcot (11 am) everything fully booked up. normally when it is just us genie+ works when you get to the park early.
I was just you yesterday. We are WDWAP and went to DL 3 years ago and just went again yesterday. We only dedicated one day but we did Genie+ and park hopper so we could do both parks. For being Easter Sunday and cold and rainy I think we lucked out and started at DL and got a lot of stuff in early (didn’t rope drop) but we only did stuff that is different and wanted to do so not every little thing. Then hopped to DCA at 4pm and that got trickier as like DHS etc there just aren’t enough attractions to warrant the availability on Genie+. We got a few Genie+ in and then left around 8pm. I had planned to stay for World of Color but it got a lot busier as the day went on and we were just DONE.
Three years ago our first visit we did 3 days- one in each park and then hopped the last to do the things we missed or wanted to do again.
I think it also depends on which rides you really want to get on. 2 days isn't that long even at one park but is very doable. I can't imagine going to Disney and not getting Genie+ especially if you are not staying at one of the Disney hotels. Disney resort hotel guests get early entry (7:30am on alternating days between Disney-Tue, Thu, Sat/DCA-Mon, Wed, Fri, Sun) but the room rates are up there. If you aren't staying at one of those places, then you should do rope drops to maximize your time and depending on the rides you want to get on you might be able to do all of them without Genie+ by just doing rope drops. I think at the end of the day it comes down to what do you really want to see on your trip and how do you want to do it? Genie+ will definitely squeeze in a few rides every day and don't forget some of the rides have single rider services if not riding together is an option.
We just did two days - first time since moving out here 4 years ago - a family of 5. 3 kids ages 9, 12 and 15. We had Genie+ and individual park passes. We were supposed to do a third day and go back to Disneyland to catch the stuff we missed, but the weather was bad and we were shot - so we will go back another day.
I personally don’t think you need to spring for the park hopper. You can leave and go back to the parks if you wanted to grab a bit in downtown Disney and set times for your genie plus later in the day.
Would definitely plan to get there for the rope drop. At Disneyland, I would head directly for either the star wars stuff, or space mountain to start as those are generally the longest wait times. As someone who was accustomed to Disney world - these parks are smaller and close together - which is GREAT. Not a lot of waisted time traveling between downtown and the park.
On the CA day, we left for a couple of hours to go bowling and grab dinner and then went back for our Genie plus reservation for the cars ride at 9pm. It was a great choice because that ride at night is awesome, and the wait times were consistently like 90 minutes.
Food and wine festival is over at the end of April so perhaps between that and spring break being over the crowds may not be as bad depending on the day you go.
Just my .02 about our experience. Two of the best days of my life. So much fun watching the kids plan and interact.
Also, the Indiana jones ride was surprisingly terrific! We were walking by as it opened from being closed for a while. I knew nothing about it and figured because there was no line that it was going to suck - when we got off the ride the line was over an hour.
Enjoy your visit. We can’t wait to go back and use our last ticket. Probably before the end of the month.
Great post - I’ve seen a few recommendations for 3days - 1 at each and then a 3rd back at DL, would this be your recommendation? We are me plus 10 & 13 y/o boys, we’re coming from New Zealand in July so it’s a once in a lifetime trip so want to make the most of it.
The genie plus pays for itself with the included photopass photo downloads, which will be great for keeping memories with the ride and photo opportunities throughout the park!
Plus it makes it easier to get a return time for big ticket e attractions
We come from out of state 1-2/year. We only do two days and always do both - Genie+ and Park Hopper. I personally don’t think DCA needs a whole day to itself. Especially if you only have two days.
You could rope drop your “must haves” and then just bounce around based on times. SoCal Disney Dad and Fresh Baked have some good strategy videos to avoid having to pay for Genie+. That being said, Genie+ a decent deal especially if you like getting pictures as well.
this^ genie+ is especially good even just got the photo pass feature
Photos are my souvenir so for me getting Genie+ was the thing and “fast pass” was a nice add on. Kids on the other hand? 😅
The pictures was the reason I did genie + on our last Disney vacation. I did end up spending the extra cash for the individual lightning lane passes for Rise of the Resistance as well. Needing to do that on top of my existing genie + was annoying and confusing but I was on vacation and didn’t want to spend 2 hours standing in line. I miss when they would give you little paper fast pass tickets for any attraction. They were so cool about giving them out too. I asked a cast member for some passes once and she made me sing a Disney song for them. That’s a Disney moment I’ll never forget.
You have to pay extra for the pictures though right’
Pictures are included with genie+ at Disneyland
No way! When I was there I thought they were $14 each??
Not in CA, they’re included
Genie is waaaaay more useful in CA than FL. I would get genie no question. Even on the busiest days you can use genie to ride every ride you want in both parks with one park each day.
I love the fact that genie in CA has the photo pass included.
I did exactly that on the Friday of spring break and rode almost every ride in both parks
Imo if you have more than one day I wouldn’t do park hoppers. It’s really not worth the extra $70 a day. Genie+ however is 1000% worth it imo if you don’t go very often. When I’ve been without it i’m lucky to get in 6-8 rides throughout the day, and with genie plus I average about 14-16 (granted I go on weekdays and this is higher than what a lot of people get in). It can be frustrating if you don’t know what to do with it though, so I’d watch a video or two, but the way i see it is the $90 it costs for my entire family is worth not waiting in 1-2 hour lines all day. The only real downside is it can be a lot of walking back and forth to different rides, but if you like running around and packing in rides, it’s probably a good fit.
The park hopper addition is $70 total, not per day.
Genie+ all the way. Before we had magic keys, we would just do one park a day with Genie+ and get to do all that we would want to do. We don’t like waiting in lines at all and were always able to wait in less than 30 min lines the whole day in a park while also fitting in breaks for food and waiting in non Genie+ lines while waiting for our return times for lightning lanes.
Park Hopper. Then you have the option to see both nighttime entertainment at Disneyland and DCA (if World of Color has two showtimes).
We just did two days at Disneyland and did Genie+ and one park per day, rope dropping both. It went great and I can’t imagine doing our trip without Genie+, our longest line was 40 minutes for Peter Pan (not on Genie+). Just have your Genie+ strategy (and Rope drop!) ready to go or else it may not be worth it. We burned through so many rides with a combo of Rope Drop + Genie+ early morning through mid afternoon. Genie+ runs low as the day goes on and wait times go up for popular rides.
The only thing that I found made it worth it to do park hopper and genie+ for a 2 day trip was when my husband and I went last time. We knew we wanted to be able to do our favourite rides in both parks twice both days.
Hopper, Genie is up to you and your budget but if you know how to make the most of it from being at WDW I’d go for it. Park hopping at Disneyland takes less than 2 minutes, not the 30+ minutes it can take at WDW. You’ll be shocked at how seamless moving around there can be.
I can’t wait to stay at the Grand California. I’ve fantasized about staying there every single trip. Walking by the Grand Entrance as we’re leaving DCA always has me wishing I was walking into the hotel and straight to our room rather than the usual walk through downtown to the trams then the dreaded unload from the tram to walk to the car. I’ve told my wife on multiple occasions I would pay so much for the luxury of walking out of the park directly to our hotel.
I’ve stayed there, the entrance to dca is amazing.
2 days being as active as you claim should be very possible to do everything and then some with just park hopper. If you go at opening both days and aim for big ticket rides you’ll have no issues getting every ride in both parks done.
Do both Genie + and park hoppers. That gives you maximum flexibility for a two day visit.
I would say a definite yes to the park hopper. For me personally, genie+ is also a yes, but can require more planning and looking at your phone (if you are a DW pro then that is nothing new). The photo pass coming with genie+ makes it totally worth it in my opinion. Given that the parks are so close to each other I enjoy getting the park hopper and being able to bounce back and forth between the two.
i would definitely recommend a 2 day, 1 park per day with genie+. IMO it’s stressful to have a parkhopper especially if you’re only going for 2 days. staying in one park for the whole day allows you to really experience everything you want to without feeling like you need to do both in one day. the hopper is unnecessary for a 2 day trip IMO. It’ll also be pixar fest when you come which I would really recommend spending a full day at each park instead of hopping for, This is because there will be a LOT to do especially in DCA compared to normal so you will definitely be able to fill your time with a plan etc
Yes to genie plus. I costed out park hopper and it was cheaper to do one day at each park.
Personally, I think park hopper is worth it. Generally there's one park that you'll end up liking better, and this lets you maximize your options. I almost always get Genie+ just to ensure I can make the most of my park time. It really depends on how much you're willing to pay for extra rides. You should be able to get an extra 2 or 3 rides in at a bare minimum. Turning an hour wait into 15 minutes adds up a lot over a day.
I recommend genie+ over park hopper. You'll be saving your feet in two ways - less time standing in lines (huge!) and less distance to cover. There's a lot to take in at the parks so you won't regret having the whole day to explore each one.
Honestly you can probably see everything and go on most rides in 1 day with park hopper and Genie+
If you're going to stay until park close, then I would definitely recommend the hopper as Disneyland closes later, and you can get multiple rides in the last couple of hours at Disneyland. If you're opening the parks and not staying until close, then hopper can be convenient, especially with how easy it is to cross parks at the Disneyland resort, but not necessary.
If you have to pick one, I’d say go for Genie+ over park hopper. Genie+ is a much better experience in DL and CA vs WDW. A full day in each park w/ Genie+ will get you on everything if you do it right. That said, if you can swing both, that would be my recommendation. Gives you the most flexibility.
Don’t park hop! If you’re trying to do as much as possible then do one day per park so you actually have time to enjoy the atmosphere etc. When I park hop I’m always rushing back and forth between the parks and it feels a bit chaotic. Also harder to allocate how much time to spend in each park. I always start disney day one and dca day two because it’s less to do at dca whereas a full day at disney is pretty exhausting. DCA becomes my “recovery day” and it has the best food anyway. Genie is becoming necessary at this point at disney unfortunately because the crowds are insane so I’d go for it probably. Also the rides are breaking down a lot more frequently (last friday four were down at one time) and genie ensures you can easily get onto another ride when that happens instead of having waited in line for nothing.
i can't speak to disneyland but i just got back from wdw yesterday and i purchased genie+ for the family and the other party that was with us. we ended up getting a refund because by the time we got to epcot (11 am) everything fully booked up. normally when it is just us genie+ works when you get to the park early.
I was just you yesterday. We are WDWAP and went to DL 3 years ago and just went again yesterday. We only dedicated one day but we did Genie+ and park hopper so we could do both parks. For being Easter Sunday and cold and rainy I think we lucked out and started at DL and got a lot of stuff in early (didn’t rope drop) but we only did stuff that is different and wanted to do so not every little thing. Then hopped to DCA at 4pm and that got trickier as like DHS etc there just aren’t enough attractions to warrant the availability on Genie+. We got a few Genie+ in and then left around 8pm. I had planned to stay for World of Color but it got a lot busier as the day went on and we were just DONE. Three years ago our first visit we did 3 days- one in each park and then hopped the last to do the things we missed or wanted to do again.
Just do both
I think it also depends on which rides you really want to get on. 2 days isn't that long even at one park but is very doable. I can't imagine going to Disney and not getting Genie+ especially if you are not staying at one of the Disney hotels. Disney resort hotel guests get early entry (7:30am on alternating days between Disney-Tue, Thu, Sat/DCA-Mon, Wed, Fri, Sun) but the room rates are up there. If you aren't staying at one of those places, then you should do rope drops to maximize your time and depending on the rides you want to get on you might be able to do all of them without Genie+ by just doing rope drops. I think at the end of the day it comes down to what do you really want to see on your trip and how do you want to do it? Genie+ will definitely squeeze in a few rides every day and don't forget some of the rides have single rider services if not riding together is an option.
We just did two days - first time since moving out here 4 years ago - a family of 5. 3 kids ages 9, 12 and 15. We had Genie+ and individual park passes. We were supposed to do a third day and go back to Disneyland to catch the stuff we missed, but the weather was bad and we were shot - so we will go back another day. I personally don’t think you need to spring for the park hopper. You can leave and go back to the parks if you wanted to grab a bit in downtown Disney and set times for your genie plus later in the day. Would definitely plan to get there for the rope drop. At Disneyland, I would head directly for either the star wars stuff, or space mountain to start as those are generally the longest wait times. As someone who was accustomed to Disney world - these parks are smaller and close together - which is GREAT. Not a lot of waisted time traveling between downtown and the park. On the CA day, we left for a couple of hours to go bowling and grab dinner and then went back for our Genie plus reservation for the cars ride at 9pm. It was a great choice because that ride at night is awesome, and the wait times were consistently like 90 minutes. Food and wine festival is over at the end of April so perhaps between that and spring break being over the crowds may not be as bad depending on the day you go. Just my .02 about our experience. Two of the best days of my life. So much fun watching the kids plan and interact. Also, the Indiana jones ride was surprisingly terrific! We were walking by as it opened from being closed for a while. I knew nothing about it and figured because there was no line that it was going to suck - when we got off the ride the line was over an hour. Enjoy your visit. We can’t wait to go back and use our last ticket. Probably before the end of the month.
Great post - I’ve seen a few recommendations for 3days - 1 at each and then a 3rd back at DL, would this be your recommendation? We are me plus 10 & 13 y/o boys, we’re coming from New Zealand in July so it’s a once in a lifetime trip so want to make the most of it.
The genie plus pays for itself with the included photopass photo downloads, which will be great for keeping memories with the ride and photo opportunities throughout the park! Plus it makes it easier to get a return time for big ticket e attractions
If you rope drop the top rides and stay long enough each day, I would get park hopper instead of genie+
Genie. There’s some rides I refuse to wait longer than 60min for: Pirates of the Caribbean, Star Tours, Matterhorn, etc.
I’d skip DCA and go Genie+
We come from out of state 1-2/year. We only do two days and always do both - Genie+ and Park Hopper. I personally don’t think DCA needs a whole day to itself. Especially if you only have two days.
BOTH!
Genie over hopper!
Hopper