The Wall Street Journal recently published an article about the increasing costs of visiting Disney World and Disneyland. When Walt Disney was initially developing the parks, he envisioned an “affordable playground for families, where visitors could imagine themselves entering the dreamlike world of Disney’s animated movies.”
Magic Kingdom
However, price increases and the reduction of complimentary services like the Magical Express and FastPass+ have made a Disney vacation out of reach for many people.
In late 2023, Disney World and Disneyland surveyed guests and found that there had been a downturn in guests who were planning return trips. While park attendance has grown slightly, it only increased by 1% in the fiscal year ending in September, compared to a 6% growth for the same time in the prior year.
Sleeping Beauty Castle in Disneyland
With the rising costs, it can be challenging for middle-class families to fit a Disney vacation into their budget. It quickly becomes a very expensive vacation when you start accounting for transportation, accommodations, tickets, add-ons, food, and souvenirs.
Hollywood Studios
In fact, the WSJ article highlights a family that was only able to afford Disney World due to a generous inheritance. The family stated that “there’s no way we could afford this from our savings alone.” As well, according to a survey by LendingTree, it was found that 45% of those who visited Disney with children went into debt to afford the trip.
Animal Kingdom
Although for many, the cost of a trip to Disney World is still worth it for the experience and memories, more and more people are feeling priced out by the increasing costs or simply don’t think the parks are worth the cost anymore.
EPCOT
However, Disney argues that its theme parks “are within financial reach for middle-class families and that it offers a range of price offerings for different products, as well as year-round promotions, to keep it that way.”
Disney California Adventure
If families are hoping to travel to Disney on a budget, they should take advantage of slower seasons with lower prices and consider which aspects of their vacation are most important. They could opt for off-site hotels or value resorts, skip purchasing the Lightning Lane services, and take advantage of discounts offered by Disney.
Magic Kingdom
In response to the Wall Street Journal article about increasing prices, Disney recently posted a blog post about the various Disney parks offers that visitors can take advantage of. The post highlights deals at Disney World, such as free water park admission, free dining plan, and hotel offers. At Disneyland, you can take advantage of a special kids ticket offer, Southern California resident ticket offers, and hotel offers.
Disney Springs
If you are looking for even more ways to save on your 2025 Disney World trip, make sure you check out our video that has new ways to save money:
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We have been a Disney family forever. My husband was there when Disney World first opened. My first trip was in 1977, but I was there for the opening of Epcot. We are annual passholders. However, with the ever increasing prices of passes and the cost for lightening lanes, it is beginning to look like we may not be able to afford to feed our love of Disney for much longer. We are seniors, both still working, and we love to ESCAPE the realities of the every day grind by going to Disney World. Money is becoming tighter for us and we both fear the day when we can no longer afford to go to the parks. Disney needs to consider these facts and especially the cost for Seniors. We love to enjoy the parks alone, as couples, or seeing the joy in the eyes of our grandchildren! We are being priced out of the Magic!
We first visited Disney World from the UK 1991 and many times since and found it good value.
I must say our 2024 Disney vacation was eye watering expensive, even being careful with our budget. We will not be returning any time soon, it’s just so expensive.
I think if Disney pricing increases much further they will be shooting them selves in the foot!! Attendance figures will probably fall, people just can’t afford these prices.
Gone are the days when this was a great good value vacation.
We’ve realized that it just isn’t worth it for us anymore.
I’m mobility disabled. Yes, I can sit in my chair in line, so the disability services change isn’t a big deal, but as my condition progresses, I can no longer get in and out of most of the rides. Disney has no pricing options for this kind of situation, and that’s a shame, because we tend to stay at their hotels, eat at their restaurants and spend freely on special experiences. They could still make a huge profit from our visit if they had a less pricey entry option for those who can’t go on the rides.
It wouldn’t be difficult to offer options like this, for people who can only ride a few attractions. They’re doing so much with the app and magic bands already, it would be fairly easy to go back to ride tickets, virtually, of course. The infrastructure is already there. It would also ease the lines for rides. Those who can ride everything do their best to ride everything in one day to justify the price of an entry ticket to themselves. It’s crazy.
Disney needs to think about this, do some surveys, and figure out how to price it. It’s not only doable, it could result in a bigger profit and less time waiting in lines. If any of the Disney staff pay attention to this page, they’re welcome to contact me; I can detail them on how it would work and how they could squeeze the biggest profit out of it.
Our family has decided that our upcoming trip will be our last trip to Disney. Everything has gotten way too expensive for us. We want to take our daughter one last time and that’s it. It’s just not worth the cost anymore.
What a tone deaf reply from Disney
The Disney company is full of crap saying that they are in the margin of middle class people. Offering discounts for certain times of the year, most of it is during the busiest time of year. They are not fooling anyone. I can’t wait to see just how much the big wigs made in 2024. I’m sure they’re not feeling the price squeeze.
We sacrifice a lot to go to WDW once per year. We eat quick service meals often kids meals. No alcohol or instagram snacks. We do NOT get sucked into Disney Marketing. No Loungeflys no popcorn buckets or Minnie ears. Stay in value resorts. That being said this year it’s only 2 days at WDW and 4 days at Universal.
The cost-cutting has certainly made Disney’s bottom line more attractive to the executives. It’s running a lot of legacy families right out the front gate.
Anyone else remember the talking trash can? It was a small piece of Disney magic. Like Magical Express, package delivery, free fastpasses,….bean counters at Disney decided the Return on Investment wasn’t worth it.
Hey, has anyone heard, Universal is up to something across town? Maybe that’s worth a look.
I agree with Coral and Stephen. SOOOO expensive. Disney can argue all they want and they can offer discounts that are really NOT discounts, but it is getting hard to justify the expense for a trip to Disney World, when you can spend LESS money on a more adventurous vacation. We won’t be going back for awhile as we are enjoying trips to Yellowstone, Grand Canyon, Alaska, etc., at this time. We may consider a visit in 2026 IF prices don’t continue to rise faster than inflation at Disney. I do think these continuous price hikes will come back to haunt Disney and that doesn’t make me happy, it makes me sad.
Continue to vote with your wallet, people. That’s the only way to get your point across to Disney.
Also, there are soooooo many wonderful places to vacation in that are NOT a theme park. Beautiful places. Relaxing places, Family-oriented places. Memory-inducing places. Enjoy them all.
Everyone on this post is still going to WDW. ? Disney knows people will complain. But they also know people will continue to flood in. The article suggests going during going during slower seasons?again got me laughing. As any AP holder will tell you, there really aren’t ’slow seasons’ anymore. We go several times a month basically every month and it’s never slow unless it’s just an odd random day. But the day after that odd day it’s packed again. I do feel bad for families these days. It is outrageous to pay what Disney makes families pay. But it is a business. DFB has had so many articles on this topic over the years and it’s always the same complaints in the comments. Nothing is going to change folks. For every family that threatens to never go back 10 more families will go. I will say, what you folks pay for your trip that causes you to go into debt you could take your family to so many other beautiful places and create REAL lasting memories. And that’s another thing, why complain about the fact that you had to go into debt just to go to Disney when you don’t have to go. That’s your choice and you know what it’s going to cost you. I never spend money if I don’t WANT to when it comes to vacations. I accept the cost and don’t mind spending it if this is what our family wants to do and budgets for it. It’s our choice. Folks going to Disney is a Choice, not a requirement.
The millionaires that wrote this reply are out of touch, as millionaires often are, with the real world. Anybody that gets a $10,000,000 plus raise (Bob Iger) has no idea what life is like for normal people.
I’ve gone to WDW every other year since 1988. I think my trip last year will be my last unless big changes are made. The price increases announced this week are insane considering how much construction is going on & how many rides will be closed. Management’s attitude is just adding fuel to the fire. They care nothing about loyal customers. The only people who matter are the shareholders. Enough is enough.
The cost of going to a specific park should be adjusted for what is/isn’t available.
The cost of everything outside of the parks (hotels, food, etc ..) is outrageous & not worth the cost. We haven’t stayed on property in years & our visits to WDW are fewer & fewer.
I love visiting Disney,but definitely wouldn’t get into debt to visit
So a 4-day stay, with 4 day tickets for 4 people, one room in a value resort, no dining plan, no memory maker, no lightning lanes, no airfare, no transpo from the airport, the last week in February (hardly peak), is almost $4,000 after taxes. I am a pretty consistent Disney defender on many points, but I’m surprised Disney still gets people to make choices like that. But I think that their recent decisions demonstrate pretty transparently that their only goal is to cater to the most affluent guests. I think it’s one thing to be that obvious, and it’s another to try to deny that it’s true. I wouldn’t go on the vacation I described above. There’s too many other things that would be better for the money.
Kate mentioned the only thing that matters is the shareholders. Well, no, apparently the average shareholder doesn’t matter either. I’m one of those thousands of shareholders, and I think the prices are ridiculous as they stand. I’d rather get less in dividends and actually be able to afford to go to the parks that I own a little piece of!
They need to get more creative in the pricing. It’s no longer affordable for any but the very rich to handle this “one size fits all” pricing scheme. There needs to be variety.
No, Jesse, you are mistaken when you say that all of the commenters are still going to WDW. I, like Kate, used to go every other year. But no more. Why do you say I am still going? I am taking a nice Alaska trip this year instead of my usual trip to Disney. so Princess Cruise Lines and the wonderful state of Alaska will enjoy my tourist dollars this year. And Yellowstone and the Grand Tetons enjoyed them last year.
I do agree it is a choice to go to Disney, and I choose NOT to go, but I feel bad for families who would like to take their young children to experience Disney World and can no longer afford it.