Disney Brings Back Guest Favorite That Many Have Missed

Disneyland fanatics planning to catch the 50th anniversary of the Main Street Electrical Parade or the Disneyland Forever fireworks spectacular, which both end on Sept. 1, enjoy the Halloween season at the park Sept. 2-Oct. 31 or maybe visit Disneyland for the holidays from Nov. 11- Jan. 8, might be shelling out a lot of money to visit the park or its sister venue California Adventure multiple times.

The price of a one-day ticket to a single Disneyland Resort theme park runs from $104 for an adult ($98 for a child) usually for a Wednesday visit to $164 for an adult (at least $150 for a child) for a Saturday. 

Disneyland Resort guests need to start saving early in the year, break out the credit card or take out a small loan to afford multiple days at Disney parks to see every holiday and special event. If they have an annual pass, they stand to save plenty depending on how many days in the year they plan to visit.

Unfortunately, new annual passes at Disney theme parks have been paused with no restart date set. However, existing passholders are in luck.

Disneyland Resort Guests Can Save Plenty With This Offer  

Disneyland Resort Magic Key annual passholders finally have some good news as the Happiest Place on Earth will open renewals of Magic Key annual passes on Aug. 18, but, again, no new sales will be offered yet.

Renewals start at $449 for the Imagine Key for certain Southern California residents and allows reservation-based admission to one or both theme parks on select days of the year, subject to availability of Magic Key allocated reservations. Passholders can hold up to two reservations at a time, and get 20% off Genie+ service, up to 10% off merchandise, 10% off select dining and 20% off parking in the Toy Story lot.

Enchant Key holders may renew for $699, which allows reservation-based admission to one or both theme parks on select days of the year, subject to availability of Magic Key allocated reservations. Passholders can hold up to four reservations at a time, and get 20% off Genie+ service, up to 10% off merchandise, 10% off select dining and 25% off parking in the Toy Story lot.

Believe Key holders may renew for $1,099, which allows reservation-based admission to one or both theme parks on most days of the year, subject to availability of Magic Key allocated reservations. Passholders can hold up to six reservations at a time, and get 20% off Genie+ service, up to 10% off merchandise, 10% off select dining and 50% off standard theme park parking in the Mickey & Friends Parking Structure, Pixar Pals Parking Structure and Toy Story lot. The pass also will soon allow unlimited Disney PhotoPass digital photo downloads.

Holders of the high-end Inspire Key can renew for $1,599 , which allows reservation-based admission to one or both theme parks on most days of the year, subject to availability of Magic Key allocated reservations. Passholders can hold up to six reservations at a time, and get 20% off Genie+ service, up to 20% off select merchandise, 15% off select dining and free standard theme park parking in the Mickey & Friends Parking Structure, Pixar Pals Parking Structure and Toy Story lot. The pass also will soon allow unlimited Disney PhotoPass digital photo downloads.

A check of the Disney World website annual pass page shows that new sales of annual passes remain paused, including its top-tier Incredi Pass, as well as the Sorcerer Pass, which is only offered to Disney Vacation Club members and Florida residents. It has also halted sales of the Pirate Pass, which only Florida residents can buy. Renewals for existing passholders have been available. 

Before the pandemic, Disney offered two types of passes, Florida and California resident passes and ones for people who live out of states. In those pre-covid days, Disney offered multiple tiers that had varying blackout dates.

The highest-end passes basically let you go to any park on any day, while the cheaper ones excluded various holidays, school vacations, and high-volume days.

Disney suspended annual pass sales during its pandemic closure and brought them back for a short time last year (with new tier names, higher prices, and more restrictions) but it paused those sales on all except its lowest-tier resident-only pass the only one available since roughly last Thanksgiving.

Reservations are Easy to Secure Early

Disney has been operating under a reservation system and limited capacity since it reopened after its pandemic closures. It paused annual passes because it only had so many reservations per day which must be spread between passholders, single-day ticket buyers, and families visiting on vacation.

The theme park company does not want to sell annual passes and then not have park reservations available for those passholders. It also does not want to tell a family that flew in from out of town that it can't visit the parks it planned to see over the course of a multi-day visit.

A check of the California Disneyland Resort's reservation system, which includes Disneyland and California Adventure, reveals that both California parks are sold out of reservations for Sept. 10, and California Adventure is sold out Sept. 17 and 24, but no other dates are sold out for reservations through Dec. 14. Disneyland Resort reservation system doesn't list any availability going forward from Dec. 15, though.  

Disney World's reservation system shows that all parks are available from Aug. 27 and on through the end of the year and into next year, except for Oct. 12 for some reason. From Aug. 16 through 26, some parks are available for reservations, except all are available Aug. 18.