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r/WaltDisneyWorld•
_cluelessness_

Magic Bands -- Yay or Nay

Okay, so I just got back from Disney and while I was there I was able to use a MagicBand. They are stylish and useful. They also have accessories for it and everything.

But I have had mix feelings about it. It can be helpful in not forgetting your pass to get into the park, but at the moment you have to use one or the other or the system will get mixed up. So you have to use one consistently more than the other.

I can find it helpful in fastpasses where people who wake up late for a park can enjoy their favorite rides when they get there. But I don't like the fact they put fastpasses at nonsensical rides. You don't need one for the carousel, the Haunted Mansion, It's a Bug's Life, Pirates of the Caribbean, Spaceship Earth, the Tea Cups,and some shows.

I just think it is ridiculous to have some fastpasses for those kinds of things. Rides like Rockin Roller Coaster, Everest, the Safari ride, Space Mountain, Thunder Mountain, those rides I can see it working very well for. It was working so well where they had fastpasses already before the fastpass plus think came into play. It just seems like they are trying to control a lot of things.

I see how it can be useful, but there are some things they need to work out as well. It was kind of a hit or miss thing in trying to get into the park. Sometimes the band worked sometimes it doesn't. It is also nice to not carry around a ticket and being afraid to lose it.

But what do you think about the MagicBands and the FASTPASS Plus thing??

TL;DR MagicBands -- yes or no. Benefit or more trouble.

EDIT: I actually liked my Magic Band I just thought the way Disney was using it at the moment is really weird. I think after they are done testing the system or whatever they are doing with it will be improved a lot more than it is already.

Posted Jan 9, 2014, 2:09 AM UTC · edited

824
anaerobyte•

Just went a few months ago. All magic band all the time. So much easier than the old fast pass system. Schedule everything ahead time and don't worry about it.

Didn't use my card the entire time.

11
backfire103•

I hate the tiered rides system and the imposed limit of 3 per day. In addition you can only chose one park a day. I will say the fastpass for Fantastmic was pretty nice, but there was no reason to fix what wasn't broken. The old FP system let you get through so much more in a day. I hope Disney changes some of the limits on the passes once the old system is fully gone. Especially the tiered rides. Only getting to chose between Soarin and Test Track is complete and utter garbage.

7
tdt0005•

Wait, I knew you had to choose between Toy Story and Rockin' but this is the first I've heard about Test Track and Soarin. That's awful. I agree that the old system allows the assertive people the chance to do more in a day. This way will be less stressful, but to me it's fun running around getting the fastpasses when you can get a new one.

1
backfire103•

I just hope that once the paper passes are gone for good they do some adjustments on the limit of passes you can get and also get rid of the tier system. But especially the tier system.

1
tdt0005•

I agree. I see absolutely no reason for such a low limit. You could schedule 7 rides a day and it shouldn't be a problem. Disney would then have a very good idea about how many people will be in which parts of the park at what time and exactly how many people to expect on a ride. That can only be a good thing.

1
Gooruu•

I agree 100%, Just got back myself. I love the magic band concept and most of its functionality. My issue stems from the FP+ part. The tiered rides issue is just a pain, flat out sucks to choose between 2 rides that you certainly could have gotten fast passes for before. The 3 rides a day also is terrible considering you could get upwards of 5-6 previously. Worse than that, you can't get the same ride multiple times. At MK I used to enjoy using all my fast pass times for splash mountain and the occasional trip to tomorrow land for space mountain. Now I am stuck with each ride only one time. But the WORST of all is the fact that once you use a FP at one park you are locked into that park for the day. I had the misfortune of going to Epcot and since I had to choose between soarin and test track my passes were (soarin, mission space, and living with the land). So I got the the park early to get on test track, then I was able to run to soarin and only waited a few minutes and did the same with Mission space....about 10AM rolls around and I have done everything without a fast pass since it was early. Then i decided to use my fast pass for living with the land because waiting 20 mins for it seemed to annoy me. Later i went to a kiosk to ask about how to set up my remaining 2 rides for MK later that night, only to find out that since I used my band of the land I can't use FP+ at any other park....really sucks if u buy the park hopper

1
kmennig24•

I agree that you should be able to split them between parks, but I think FP+ will still actually help with park hopping as long as you don't use it in the first park. If you hit a park early and check out the major attractions with low wait times, then you can go to another park where your three FP+ are waiting.

2
ms784•

YAY! Was there in December and loved using the MagicBands. My card didn't leave my wallet and there were times when my wallet didn't leave my room. Park entry, fast pass plus, photo pass & room charging all worked flawlessly. I also really enjoyed the new reservations for Illuminations, parades and fireworks... you get front row seats without having to sit on a curb for 3 hours before the event. Also the interactive features with the band like on Test Track was really cool and I can't wait to see that expand to more attractions.

The one thing that didn't work flawlessly was the very buggy MyDisneyExperience App on my phone. Anything from incredibly sluggish speeds (on Disney's WiFi network) to the dreaded "there's been a 'blip' in the network" which rendered the app unusable. When I was able to properly use the App, things went well and I was able to change pre-selected fast pass to the times & attractions I wanted based on what I was doing in the park that day.

While the 3 ride per day limit is a bit of a pain, the ability to "reserve" rides like Soarin & Toy Story well in advance without having to show up at the park at rope drop and sprint to the fast pass machine makes up for it.

TL;DR MagicBands are awesome.

4
_cluelessness_OP•

I found the same problem with the app. It would always give my location in the wrong place or no where near a park. Plus, it wouldn't load the correct wait times for whatever park we were in for the day. It needs some updating in my opinion.

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ms784•

Yes, I was having location issues with the App as well. Compound that with the network/speed issues, it made the map portion of the app unusable as well. I found the map & "what's near me" feature really well put together & detailed, essentially eliminating the need for a paper map; unfortunately it was useless without the bandwidth necessary to load the map or know where I was.

In regards to the wait times, I found myself using TouringPlans.com's app instead to get the wait times.

1
chelsesque•

I went in October and loved my MagicBand. There were a few issues with the website and FastPass+, but I think they will eventually get worked out. I loved the convenience of them. I didn't use the FastPass+ much just because we were only there for 3 days and weren't super worried about it, but I think that it will eventually turn out to be a good system if they fix the program and maybe take away some of the strict limits they have right now.

But definitely a yes for the MagicBand. Made the trip a whole lot easier.

2
yeahhhhh7•

If you have a 3 year old child who can only go on "nonsensical rides", having a fastpass for them is probably pretty helpful.

2
Suziannie•

We recently took a 2 year old and it did help a lot to have a Fastpass for things like Spaceship Earth and Nemo. But for the most part we saved them for the "E ticket" rides so when we did the Parent Swap thing we were spending as little time as possible doing that.

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GarlicBreddit•

But I don't like the fact they put fastpasses at nonsensical rides. You don't need one for the carousel, the Haunted Mansion, It's a Bug's Life, Pirates of the Caribbean, Spaceship Earth, the Tea Cups,and some shows.

Sure, those rides are silly to use a fastpass on. You know that, I know that. Keep in mind your average, under-researched Disney vacationer doesn't necessarily know that. Le them make the mistakes of underutilizing the system.

Also, FP for these attractions keep crowd levels in Disney's control even more, which will never be a bad thing. Getting a FP for Splash Mountain? Disney will give you a 'bonus' FP for Pirates timed right after. They may be trying to lure more crowds towards Adventureland during the 3pm parade, but all it says to me is bonus FP! :)

Yay or nays aside, this is a billion-dollar project, created by some pretty smart people. They may know some things we Disney fans don't even know.

2
movieguy84•

It may seem to some people that those rides are a waste to use FP+ on, but for some during the busier times, that may be what they want to do, and it guarantees they get to do it. This system seems to be made more for those that can only come once in a while or even just once to WDW.

1
[deleted]•

[deleted]

1
[deleted]•

love the magic band, hate the FP+ limitations. Once they fix the 3 per day at only one park bs i think it'll be fantastic.

my issues with is the 3 per day at only one park is that after you use your first FP, it should come back to you so you can book something else. Once you can use your 3 across parks it will be better.

1
grumpyfan•

Neither Yay or Nay. I don't have any real issue with them, but I don't see a major benefit with them either.

1
bucki_fan•

I'm mostly pro-Magic Band for the simplicity that it offers, but I agree with all of the complaints listed on here: tiered FP, one park per day limitations, micromanaging my vacation, etc. With that said, opening up the app on my phone and changing fastpasses in the middle of my day was a huge bonus on more than one occasion. For instance, the line for Dumbo was 10 minutes during our FP window; so we cancelled them and set up a backstage meeting with Mickey a few hours later since we could see that the line was over an hour when we walked into the park.

I do have one major complaint to add though - reader accuracy/quality. Making sure that my Mickey head lines up exactly with the reader went from an inconvenience to annoying by the end of our week there in December. The concierge at our resort told us that many guests just keep the band in their pocket so they're not taking it off their wrist or contorting themselves to get the reader to work.

RFID technology has advanced to the point where the alignment shouldn't be an issue, and proximity should be the only thing that I need to worry about.

1
saveitforthetalkroom•

I've heard what helps is wearing it so that Mickey's head is facing out (instead of facing the wearer like a watch face). Think that's true? I'm heading to WDW Saturday morning and am pretty excited to try out my Magic Band.

1
bucki_fan•

That's what we did. You just have to go to the posts on whichever arm you have the band on to make them work.

So, if you have it on your left arm, go to where the reader post is on your left side. It will also be easier for you to use the readers at the registers and most likely your room door.

1
hollabackprod•

The new system is limiting compared to the legacy FP (e.g., tiering, max of 3 per day in a single park, etc.), but there is no avoiding it at this point.

1
Suziannie•

Personally I had no issues with either system in Dec and really liked the ability to reserve them in advance. The only thing I found irritating was putting in a PIN for each and every purchase. But that's not a huge issue in reality.

I am a bit puzzled at why they decided to make things like the Nemo ride at EPCOT a Fastpass+ but I did notice really low wait times the entire time we were there despite it being nearly shoulder to shoulder every day and night when walking around the park. So it's working to control the crowds I think.

I think that's the most important trade off though. A lot of the thought on this new program was to offload the wait times because the parks are very crowded at peak times. I really think it's helping. Even in the tiered parks. We had Fastpass+ for Mission Space, and a few things we could do as a family. But after we rode Living with the Land (no Fastpass and it was walk on at 5pm in the afternoon) we noticed Soarin was a 10 min wait-and we ended up waiting less than that even. Afterwards we went over to Test Track and the wait time was only 20 min. Still long-but not bad at all really. I think it's working.

I also think a lot of people are writing these changes off before they even try them out for themselves. So many people say "Only 3 Fastpasses! I'm not going!" but in reality 3 Fastpasses are great if wait times are controlled because Disney is actively controlling who's riding what rides.

1
OllieOlefin•

I just got back and have to say NAY. We had nothing but trouble with ours. Apparently our issues were the sort that are kind of rare but not wholly unique - in other words they've been known to happen but no one knows how to fix it.

In a nutshell, nothing talked to anything. So at various points my magic band would let me access the dining plan but not FastPass or park tickets, park tickets but not fast pass or point of sale, or nothing at all. I had to reset my pin a good dozen times. At one point they just gave up, rebuilt my reservation, and gave me cards for both the park and for the rooms. A lot of hours were spent each day trying to sort this out, and I managed by giving my 6 year-old purchasing authority on her magic band. Not ideal but it sort of worked.

TL:DR; Still some big kinks, no individual is equipped to manage all the pieces due to complexity

1
watershoejoe•

Good if you are staying in a Disney resort. You can go online and figure everything out before you set foot in the park. However, if you are staying off park they are a huge pain. You have to go to a kiosk and try to get the three attractions you want AFTER you enter the park. We were at all four parks at opening each day and the rides we wanted were either totally sold out or in the PM. Two days the fast passes ended up being essentially worthless and we did not use them. Next year I will defiantly book at least one night in the park in order to have access to the system ahead of time.

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