Extra Magic Hours

[PJean710]

I am trying to plan my ADR's for my February trip and would like to know if anyone knows the actual closing times of the parks for the Evening EMH's?

 

[Monty]

Officially "up to" three hours after the posted Park closing time. The "up to" is seemingly just in case something really weird happens, because I don't think it's ever been anything less.

So, for example, if the hours posted say the park closes at 11PM, EMH extends that to 2AM...

 

[a2grafix]

Here's a list of upcoming morning and evening magic hours at the Walt Disney World parks, but the list only goes up through the end of May 2008.

There are additional FAQs about Extra Magic Hours about the benefits and what is open, but there are no times listed of how many hours the EMHs are open for, but a good rule is what MontyMon said above ^^^^^.

Hope this helps you. :wave:

 

[Jeff456]

I am aware that this is not part of the question but i would like to ask another, should i steer clear of the parks when they have morning or evening extra magic hours or both? In the evening with EMH will it be much quieter during a busy period such as presidents week?

 

[CAPTAIN HOOK]

should i steer clear of the parks when they have morning or evening extra magic hours or both?

A park with morning EMH hours will attract all the Disney resort guests, therefore when the park opens to the public it will already be busy. The question is, do resort guests then go elsewhere knowing that park is busy or do they remain hoping that non resort guests stay away :hammer:

The evening is simpler - resort guests that have visited other parks during the days will move to the EMH park towards late afternoon thus making the EMH park busy,

 

[Philo]

I am aware that this is not part of the question but i would like to ask another, should i steer clear of the parks when they have morning or evening extra magic hours or both? In the evening with EMH will it be much quieter during a busy period such as presidents week?

Like hook said. I'm not 100% on this but I'm pretty sure that it's a good idea to use the morning hours because fewer people actually get up and make it to the parks in time. About 1.00pm ish, a park with evening hours starts to get busier right through till the official closing time when it drops a bit (after the night time show) and gets quieter as the night goes on.

I'm not sure how many people will be out at 2.00am so it is a good opportunity to get on the normally crowded rides.

It's worth remembering that only select rides are open during magic hours.

 

[Monty]

I am aware that this is not part of the question but i would like to ask another, should i steer clear of the parks when they have morning or evening extra magic hours or both? In the evening with EMH will it be much quieter during a busy period such as presidents week?

If you have hopper tickets, steer clear during the day and take advantage of EMH when it's on. The time around regular park closing can be great for EMH, get your wristbands as early as you can and ride as many rides as possible at that point. A lot of folks will have waited until the last minute to get their wristbands and will be turned away from rides until they get them. The first hour or so after the park closes to regular guests, ride lines can get pretty long when it's busy, relax and walk around. See stuff you might normally not even notice. Then later the crowds start to thin and lines get shorter...

All the above is based on my own experiences, it may or may not work like that when you're there :shrug:

 

[H20Babie]

What MontyMon said! And it applies during spring break too. Last March/April, we stayed at both MK and Epcot's EMH. We got our wristbands an hour before official closing and then grabbed something to eat. I remember at Epcot that when Illuminations started, we walked onto Soarin' three times in a row (even though the posted wait time was something like 210 minutes). Then after the fireworks, the lines picked up again for a bit but by 11 pm, it was pretty much walk on. Same with MK. MK "closed" at 11 pm, but we stayed until 2 am! It was sooo much fun at night with everything lit up. We were pretty much running through the park riding everything that was open. Even my 6 yo DS had a blast -- but I think he was more excited that he had stayed up "all night". We only "closed" a park once, but it is the main memory that everyone still talks about.

 

[hadlicksr]

Something else I had heard and tried this last trip in November was that the park with PM EMH is typically less crowded the following day. There was an instance where MGM was PM EMH and then AM EMH the next day, but we didn't go the next day to confirm that. The rest of the times we felt it was pretty accurate.