News D23: The Ultimate Disney Fan Event 2026 in Anaheim

[Vinnie Mac]

Perhaps you’re misremembering it?

There were no new announcements except for a couple of mundane things like a poorly placed hatbox ghost and a figment meet and greet, both of which didn’t debut until over a year later. They showed a video of Josh riding the Tron coaster and then announced it wouldn’t open until the next year. They ended the presentation by just kind of openly spitballing about some half baked ideas they had. It was bad.

The infamous blue sky segment cause they knew we were desperate for something, ANYTHING in the post-COVID landscape lol

 

[Gusey]

Exactly, each D23 had been different based on what they have/haven't announced in the past

• 2022 D23 - Mostly little updates on already ongoing projects, 2 rides worldwide announced (Avengers Multiverse and Tangled Teacups) and very small announcements (Hatbox Ghost, Figment meet and greet etc)
• 2023 Destination D23 - Mostly updates but also announcements like Test Track 3.0, Country Bear Musical Jamboree and bluesky update on Tropical Americas vs Moana/Zootopia
• 2024 D23 Expo - Majority large announcements on new projects that were finally able to be worked on due to various reasons (Covid recovery, parks reopening, actual budget to spend now)
• 2025 Destination D23 - No parks panel, few parks announcements spread through various panels (Castle repaint, Walt AA at CoP, Frozen opening at DAW)
• 2026 D23 Expo - Mostly updates on what's already been announced in 2024 & very vague announcements about the projects that are next (Figment, Spaceship Earth, Space Mountain at DLP, New Tomorrowland)

 

[ChewbaccaYourMum]

With D23 2026 having come and gone I wanted to put down in writing some of my, possibly naive, thoughts on opening timelines. Disney didn't really give us much to go on other than confirming COP late spring 2027 and Monstropolis (minus coaster) sometime in 2027. They didn't even reiterate that TA is opening next year, even though we have already been told that, which could be seen as a little concerning, I guess.

I gotta say, though, that nothing has really led me to believe that their original statement from D23 2024 of "everything shown will be open within the next 5 years" is still not happening. This is where my naive thoughts are probably coming in....

The big one is obviously Villains Land and a lot of people seem to think that it is still very far off, but I just don't think so. It's very clear that the original concept art is pretty much close to what we are still getting which means no major changes has really ever happened from those rumors. It's also quite clear those permits a while ago are pretty good based on the blurry images from the teaser of Imagineering Story 2. It's blurry, but you can still make out the buildings and it pretty much matches up to the permits. I think I remember reading a while ago from someone in the know (?) that we should start seeing steel rising for Piston end of this year, and I don't see why it wouldn't start happening for VL early-mid next year.

With all that said my speculation on the timelines for everything feels pretty much the same as my previous posts.

2027
Spring - COP
Summer - Monstropolis
Some time late Summer or after it - TA

2028
Spring - Door Coaster
Summer - Spaceship Earth? This one feels further along for some reason. (closing early 2027 I would guess?)
Late Fall/Winter - Piston Peak

2029
Summer - Figment. This one I think we will get info at D23 2028 for it for sure, with it closing 2027/2028 I would guess?
Late Fall/Winter - Villains Land. This has the chance to move to 2030 which would ruin the "5 years" claim by Disney, but we'll see. Based on what I was saying above, I don't feel like this would open any further than that.

I have no idea when to even think the Yeti will be fixed. I don't fully understand how that kind of work gets done so I would think the thought process and technicalities on how to do it are already done otherwise why even announce it haha??? So maybe next year?? Hopefully before D23 2028.

DISCLAIMER - These are just my thoughts and I'm sure everyone on this site knows I know nothing haha. I just wanted to make this post so I can come back to it in my history in the future and see if I was right!

 

[HMF]

Perhaps you’re misremembering it?

There were no new announcements except for a couple of mundane things like a poorly placed hatbox ghost and a figment meet and greet, both of which didn’t debut until over a year later. They showed a video of Josh riding the Tron coaster and then announced it wouldn’t open until the next year. They ended the presentation by just kind of openly spitballing about some half baked ideas they had. It was bad.

No, I mean this year's announcements were better.

 

[Rhinocerous]

The big one is obviously Villains Land and a lot of people seem to think that it is still very far off, but I just don't think so. It's very clear that the original concept art is pretty much close to what we are still getting which means no major changes has really ever happened from those rumors. It's also quite clear those permits a while ago are pretty good based on the blurry images from the teaser of Imagineering Story 2. It's blurry, but you can still make out the buildings and it pretty much matches up to the permits. I think I remember reading a while ago from someone in the know (?) that we should start seeing steel rising for Piston end of this year, and I don't see why it wouldn't start happening for VL early-mid next year.

The details announced at D23 do tend to suggest that there have not been huge changes, however the Imagineering Story footage does not guarantee that. We have no idea when that was filmed.

 

[ChewbaccaYourMum]

The details announced at D23 do tend to suggest that there have not been huge changes, however the Imagineering Story footage does not guarantee that. We have no idea when that was filmed.

That is a really good point!
I do still think that VL is much farther along than many of us have been led to believe and the permits filed a while ago with 'possible' building locations for not only this, but also PP, seem to have been a plan for a while, and coming to fruition at PP so why not in VL as well? Like I said, who's to say this can't start going vertical next year and open in 2-3 years after that?