Disney World Just Changed Again. What Does It Mean?

The Walt Disney Company is proceeding full steam ahead in its quest to reshape theme park visits.

The latest change involves the removal of virtual queues at two popular attractions.

Walt Disney Company

This move comes on the heels of the introduction of Lightning Lane Premier Pass, the changes to Lightning Lane itself, and more.

Frankly, our heads are swimming as Disney keeps flooding the zone with theme park tweaks.

Walt Disney Company

For those of you struggling to keep up, you’re definitely not alone.

Disney World just changed again. What does it mean? Let’s try to piece together the new park visit puzzle.

What Now?

Photo: Pexel.com

You sound tired and frustrated. I get it. Keeping up with Disney changes has become a full-time job.

Technically, it’s MY full-time job. So, I’ll try to tell you what’s going on.

Photo: Disney World

Let’s start with the Tron change and go from there. On September 9^th, 2024, Tron Lightcycle / Run switched to a standby queue.

At that point, the already-disrupted Magic Kingdom itineraries of old completely collapsed.

Photo: Disney

To be fair, they were already on thin ice after a few other recent changes.

Before then, management had mercy-killed Disney Genie+, rebooting it into Lightning Lane Multi Pass.

Photo: Disney

Meanwhile, Lightning Lane Single Pass gained a new, clearer identity/brand.

Individually, all these moves made sense. In totality, they absolutely eviscerated all existing theme park strategies.

Lightning Lane

Suddenly, guests could book Lightning Lane reservations up to a week in advance, and they could just stand in line for Tron.

Since Tron qualified as Disney’s roller coaster/thrill ride alpha, its switch to a standby queue fundamentally altered the park.

Photo: Tron Lightcycle/Run

Guests prioritized Tron more than anything else, as demonstrated by its average wait times in the two-hour range.

Somehow, Disney wasn’t done yet, as it introduced the new Lightning Lane Premier Pass.

TRON Lightcycle / Run

This service is something I severely underestimated, as its demand struck me as limited.

I believed that about 50 sellouts ago and have since reconsidered. Disney has had the Midas Touch with this stuff.

Photo: Disney

Now, the company has persuaded hundreds of people to skip the longer lines in exchange for a few hundred dollars in cash.

Notably, Lightning Lane Multi Pass doesn’t appear to be selling as well, at least as far as we can tell.

Photo: Disney

This version hasn’t sold out since the first week of 2025. So, people are employing the “in for a penny, in for a pound” thought.

What Does This All Mean?

Image: The Healthy Mouse

Therein lies the rub. Over the past four months, guests have changed their Rope Drop AND Lightning Lane patterns.

Also, attraction wait times have shuffled, and that process is only getting started.

Tiana

As of February 25^th, 2025, Tiana’s Bayou Adventure will no longer employ a virtual queue.

Similarly, Guardians of the Galaxy: Cosmic Rewind is dropping its virtual queue as well, a long overdue move.

So, as of that date, Walt Disney World won’t offer any virtual queues for a while.

I presume that will change when Test Track 3.0 debuts, but that’s sheer speculation.

Photo: Disney

Disney may have dropped virtual queues altogether. It’s just too soon to say for sure.

Still, the various changes should dramatically impact your overall approach to Disney park visits. Let’s quickly discuss how.

Early Theme Park Entry/Rope Drop

These are two sides of the same coin, but the underlying premise applies to both.

Disney rewards early birds at its parks. When you participate in Rope Drop, you’re among the first to enter a given park.

Magic Kingdom Empty Rope Drop Early June 2023

Even better, when you utilize the Early Theme Park Entry amenity for guests staying at Disney hotels, you ARE the first to enter a park.

Disney opens its parks 30 minutes early for Early Theme Park Entry, and Cosmic Rewind now participates in this activity.

So, you should know what to do. On EPCOT days, you should start at Cosmic Rewind.

Thanks to Early Theme Park Entry, you have a decent chance of experiencing the attraction before the park officially opens.

Photo Credit: @bioreconstruct on Twitter

Similarly, as long as you’re early for Rope Drop, the same statement applies.

You WILL wait longer than if you’d done Early Theme Park Entry.

That’s the opportunity cost for not staying at an official Disney resort. The company provides a competitive advantage to guests paying more.

What I’m saying also applies to Tron Lightcycle / Run and Tiana’s Bayou Adventure.

(Olga Thompson, Photographer)

Here’s where you should pay close attention if you’re not staying onsite.

Tron and Tiana do NOT open for Early Theme Park Entry, which is a bad break for guests at official Disney hotels.

Photo: Disney

For everyone doing Rope Drop, it’s a godsend, though. You should pick one of these rides and rush there when the park opens.

Obviously, you cannot do both, which makes the decision challenging.

(Olga Thompson, Photographer)

Since we don’t know the average wait time for Tiana’s Bayou Adventure, I’m merely speculating here.

Still, Tron typically averages a two-hour wait, partially due to its throughput limitations.

Growing crowds

I cannot conceive of Tiana taking so long. Therefore, you should pick Tron, all things being equal.

Shuffled Wait Times

And that brings us to the other part of the conversation, the one that’s currently unknown.

Disney just reshuffled the deck with its wait times. Whenever an attraction gets removed, a rebalancing occurs.

Photo: Disney Parks Blog

Similarly, when Disney adds any new attraction, even something like Country Bear Musical Jamboree, new park tendencies form.

So, you can imagine what something like Tiana or Cosmic Rewind will do to the crowd behaviors at Magic Kingdom and EPCOT.

Test Track Reimagination in EPCOT

I suspect the introduction of Cosmic Rewind will actually help EPCOT guests in one vital way.

This park has lacked a strong third option since Test Track closed.

Test Track in EPCOT

The arrival of this roller coaster as a standby attraction should reduce some demand for Frozen Ever After and Remy’s Ratatouille Adventure.

Right now, both require an hour-long wait on average. Hopefully, they’ll slide a bit after this.

At Magic Kingdom, the picture isn’t as clear. While Tiana is an attraction with massive throughput, it won’t matter much overall.

Since this park hosts such a large volume of high-quality rides, even Tiana switching to standby shouldn’t impact anything much.

I reserve the right to be as wrong about this as I was with Premier Pass, though. We’ll find out soon enough.

I’ll start tracking the impact with MickeyBlog’s average wait times articles in March.

Pay attention to them to learn more about the evolving nature of Disney World traffic patterns.

Until then, I hope the above information gets your wheels turning about how to take advantage of all the recent park changes.

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Feature Photo: Disney