Disney has announced a new way to skip the lines at its parks. But depending on where you go and when, you might have to spend over $400 a day per person to take advantage of the new Lightning Lane Premier Pass.
On Wednesday, Disney announced its plans to roll out a new tier of Lightning Lane, a pre-existing program that lets visitors pay extra to skip the lines for certain rides in Disney World and Disneyland. Previously, Lightning Lane Multi Passes, which let you skip the line on multiple rides, cost $32 a day per person, though the price could increase for various reasons. These passes forced guests to select a time to arrive for their “line skip,” which could cause problems if you were late. This newly announced tier of line skipping, Premier Pass, does away with that restriction, but at a steep cost.
As spotted by GameSpot, the new “Premier” pass—which will be available later this month—will cost up to $450 a day per person at Disney World. The price varies depending on the park and when you go, with Disney saying that the highest prices will be found on a “limited number of days over peak travel periods.”
Here are the prices for each park, but keep in mind that you still need to buy a ticket to the park, and at Disney World, only folks staying in Disney World hotels on property will be eligible to buy these new, limited passes.
- Disney’s Animal Kingdom: $129 to $199
- EPCOT: $169 to $249
- Disney’s Hollywood Studios: $269 to $349
- Magic Kingdom: $329 to $449
Meanwhile, at Disneyland, the Premier pass will cost $400 per person until December 31. In 2025, the pass will drop to $300 to $400 a day per person, based on what dates you visit.
In 2023, Disney CEO Bob Iger said that the massive company had been “too aggressive” about increasing prices at the parks and wanted to make them more “accessible.” This, uh, doesn’t seem like a good way to do that. And sure, you can argue that people don’t need to buy these passes, that they can just wait in line, but ride queues can get quite long and waiting sucks. Besides, the big appeal of Disney World and Disneyland is the rides! And making it more expensive to actually enjoy them seems like the opposite of making your parks more accessible to more people.
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