As you've probably learned by now, Walt Disney World vacations require lots of planning, and dining is no different. While the quick-service restaurants in the parks are always an option, most families visiting Disney World would like to have at least a few meals that aren't fast food. For that, we highly recommend making Advance Dining Reservations, or "ADRs" for short. With dinner shows, character meals, fine dining, buffets, deluxe views and everything in between ... yeah, it's safe to say you'll want to book an ADR or two for your next trip!
Overview of Disney World Dining Reservations
With four theme parks, Disney Springs and multiple resort hotels, Disney World offers more than 100 table-service restaurants to choose from! There's a wide variety of cuisine, restaurant styles and theming.
For some of you, dining at Disney World is a big-time affair. If you see your trip as a once-in-a-lifetime experience and want to pull out all the stops, you should consider making reservations for at least one character dining experience and a few table-service restaurants, maybe for one of the hard-to-get restaurants or even for a romantic night out while the tadpoles stay with a babysitter. If this sounds like you, you'll want to make reservations as early as possible and consider staying on-site, especially during the busiest times.
However, if fine dining or character dining is less of a priority, you don't need to lose too much sleep over Disney World dining reservations. Unless you are visiting during one of the busiest times of the year, you should be able to find a few table-service options much closer to your actual trip date (especially at EPCOT), or even while you're there. If you're fortunate enough to be visiting during the least-busy times of the year, you'll have even more last-minute choices. You can also now cancel up to two hours before your reservation, allowing more flexibility with changing plans. And keep in mind that Disney has tons of tasty quick-service options, as well. Even if you don't book any dining reservations, you'll never go hungry!
Planning Your Disney World Dining Reservations
All guests (even those staying off-site) can make Disney World dining reservations. Unlike some perks offered exclusively to those staying on-site at a Disney World hotel (such as the Early Theme Park Entry benefit), ADRs are available to all guests, regardless of where you're staying.
Park admission is required for in-park dining. Just to be clear, you must have valid theme park admission and a Disney Park Pass reservation at the location of your meal. So, if you're dining at the Jungle Skipper Canteen, you'll need to have the proper tickets and park reservations to enter Magic Kingdom for the date of your meal. If you're park hopping for a late lunch or dinner, you'll just need to have entered your first Disney Park Pass reservation before heading to your second park, as long as the dining reservation is after 2 p.m.
You can make Disney World dining reservations for your trip starting 60 days in advance. (In the past, this window had been 180 days.) No matter what time of year you’ll be visiting, we recommend making reservations as close as you can to the magical 60-day mark. For guests staying at a Walt Disney World Resort hotel (including Shades of Green), you’ll have 60 days in advance of your check-in day ... plus, you can make dining reservations for your entire stay, up to 10 days. This is quite an advantage if dining is a priority, especially during the busiest times, so you'll want to make sure you book your Disney World hotel room before the dining reservation window opens for your trip. Then you can book all of your days at once (Hop Tip: Start with the most in-demand restaurants on your list first when reserving).
It's not uncommon to find that the most popular restaurants, such as Cinderella's Royal Table and Be Our Guest, fill up quickly. The longer you wait, the less chance you’ll have of eating at one of your favorite restaurants or experiencing a dinner show. That said, there are still ways of snagging those last-minute reservations, which we'll discuss below.
If reservations are really important to you, make sure you have already planned which days you will be going to the parks before your 60-day reservation window opens. It is almost impossible to plan daily meals for your vacation without knowing where you’re going each day. You can use our Crowd Calendar to help you decide which parks to visit on which day. Keep in mind, reservations do sometimes start ahead of park opening hours, and you can get into the parks early. Sometimes you can also snag reservations close to or after the official park closure time, as well. (You'll find this is very common with Oga's Cantina in Star Wars: Galaxy's Edge, for instance.)
For those of you staying off-site, if you have a dining reservation in the park before it opens, you will be allowed in early (usually about 30 minutes before the start of your reservation). Look for cast members with signs for reservation check-in, or specially marked turnstiles. This can sometimes be a good strategy for getting a jump on popular attractions if the restaurant is further back in the park. Be Our Guest in Magic Kingdom, for example, offers early reservations and is right near two of the most popular attractions in the park: Seven Dwarfs Mine Train and Peter Pan's Flight.
Booking Your Disney World Dining Reservations
Make sure you have the latest version of the My Disney Experience app. Several new features are only supported on the latest version of the app, so update the app before your trip to take advantage of them. For example, when you arrive for a dining reservation, you can use Mobile Dine Check-In at select restaurants through the app. From a push notification or QR code, you'll be able to check in. Once your table is ready, you'll be notified to proceed to a specified location.
If, on the other hand, you did not get advance dining reservations and decide to eat at a participating table-service restaurant once you are there, you can use the app to add yourself to the Mobile Walk-Up List. You can scan a QR code in the restaurant lobby and proceed via the app. My Disney Experience is also where you can view menus for any restaurant and Mobile Order for quick-service restaurants.
Have your credit card ready when you make your Disney World dining reservations. Make sure you have a credit card ready before booking your dining reservations. You can also enter your credit card information in your My Disney Experience account in advance. Disney holds your reservation with a credit card guarantee, and if you do not show up to your reservation or cancel within two hours of your reservation, you will be charged $10 a person. Disney does not charge you in advance for your meal unless you are booking a dinner show (such as Hoop-Dee-Doo Revue) or dinner at Cinderella’s Royal Table inside Cinderella Castle.
Here's how to book Disney World dining reservations online: Log into your My Disney Experience account and under the Things to Do tab, click Make Reservations under Dining. The reservation window opens around 5:45 a.m. ET each day (the reservation hotline opens up at 7 a.m. ET). This will take you to another page that lists all of the restaurants on property. You’ll then enter the number of people in your party, date and time of day, and can filter your results by park, resort hotel or area (such as Disney Springs or Disney's BoardWalk). The search results will show which restaurants have availability that day. You can then click on the desired time and create your reservation. Voila!
Once you finish entering your details, your reservation should appear on your My Disney Experience account. You can make same-day reservations for restaurants if they’re available. If you need to cancel your dining reservation or change the number of people dining, you can do so on the website, so long as your reservation is not within two hours. At that point, visit Guest Relations in the parks or call the reservation hotline to modify your existing reservation.
Here's how to make a Disney World dining reservation on the My Disney Experience app: Click on the plus sign in a circle at the bottom of the screen, which will pop up with different options. Choose Check Dining Availability and enter the number of people in the party, date and time of day — as well as an option for "now" to see same-day, walk-up availability. You can also search for reservations in the app by experience or cuisine and location. Just like on the site, you can make same-day reservations for restaurants if they’re available.
Making Disney World dining reservations over the phone: Making an ADR over the phone should be used only when you do not have access to the app or website, or need to cancel a reservation within two hours leading up to it. To make or cancel a reservation over the phone, call 407-WDW-DINE and listen to each of the options.
Tips for Disney World Dining Reservations
You can now cancel your reservation up to two hours in advance. A recent update now allows guests to cancel dining reservations on the app up to two hours before with no penalty. If you cancel after that or do not show up, you will pay the cancellation fee of $10 per person. Previously, the window was 24 hours in advance. This feature is extra hopful for when plans change the day of.
Note that exclusions apply and certain dining experiences, such as Hoop-Dee-Doo Musical Revue, Victoria & Albert's and Monsieur Paul, have their own separate cancellation policies.
How to snag last-minute reservations: We like to think there is an art to snagging last-minute reservations, but sometimes it's just good old-fashioned luck. If we have a last-minute trip to Disney or we've waited to book dining reservations, we've had luck scoring popular restaurants. As soon as we've finalized our plans for which park we'll be at on which day, we start checking My Disney Experience periodically for the week or so leading up to our trip. This is when other guests are also finalizing their trip details, and sometimes end up deciding not to keep their dining reservations. You can sometimes grab day-of reservations as people cancel.
We recommend clicking on various times instead of only checking meal sections. So instead of only clicking on "lunch," we recommend clicking the 12 p.m. slot, then the 1 p.m. slot, and so on until something pops up.
We've also had luck obtaining same-day reservations by simply showing up and asking about availability. It never hurts. We've even been able to snag same-day reservations when there was rain. Because EPCOT has so many dining options, you can often find last-minute reservations for some of its restaurants.
The Mobile Dine Walk-up List is another option if you come across a participating restaurant. You can look for Mobile Dine Walk-up availability in the app. Scan a QR code in the restaurant lobby and add your party to the list.
If you want to dine at Disney Springs, also try Open Table. Many of the most popular restaurants at Disney Springs, such as The BOATHOUSE, Morimoto Asia and Raglan Road, offer additional reservation times on Open Table. So if you can't snag an ADR or the time you want isn't available in My Disney Experience, try Open Table.
Arrive on time. Disney is strategic with the way it schedules its reservations. Be sure to arrive on time, if not early, to make things easier for everyone! If your reservation is at the start of a dining period (some restaurants are only open for breakfast and dinner, with a break ending around 4 p.m.), there is likely to be a rush of new guests. We've also had good luck with checking in 15 minutes early and being sat fairly quickly.
So there you have it: our favorite tips for making Disney dining reservations. We want to hear YOUR favorite ADR spots in the comments. Have a question? Just ask. If you have tips we didn't mention, share them in the comments below.
Related: Our Complete Guide to Character Dining at Walt Disney World
Hoppy planning!
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