This is part fifteen in my blog series: Affordable Disney Vacations Step by Step. You can read the rest of the posts here.
I get many questions from people who are thinking about visiting Walt Disney World and want Disney World vacation tips and suggestions. Disney vacation planning can be very involved and confusing as well, so the goal of this series is to start at the beginning, and look at everything you need to think about, in the general order you need to think about it. Each week’s post will be numbered and link to all the others so that, when complete, you will have a guide with all the steps and information you need to plan your own Disney magic.
Up until now, in our Step-by-Step Planning Series, we have been talking about aspects of your vacation that need to be thought about as early in the process as possible, if you want to be able to have an affordable Disney vacation. Ideally, most of the previous steps should be researched, decided, and in many cases booked from 4-6 months before your vacation. If you are planning to travel during a high-traffic season, like the Christmas holidays, closer to 6 months is best.
From here on out, I’ll be talking about some other aspects of your vacation that are part of your vacation budget, but don’t have to be decided on quite so early.
Today’s post will deal with tickets, another major expenditure…which is why you want to make sure you are not spending more than you have to.:)
Basically, there are two parts to this discussion:
- Where you can get Disney parks tickets
- Where you should NOT buy Disney parks tickets
Let’s briefly discuss the first one:
You can purchase Disney World park passes through Disney, or through an authorized Disney ticket broker. Those are the only two avenues you should consider if you want to be confident that you are getting actual Disney park tickets.
If you are purchasing a Disney resort package, your tickets will be part of that package, so you are good to go! But if you are booking your room individually (no package) at a Disney resort, or staying off-site at a non-Disney hotel, vacation home, villa, or condo, then you will need to order theme park tickets.
You can do this through the Disney website. Or you can get Disney theme parks tickets from a broker. There are a number of reputable brokers that you can purchase tickets from safely, and save some money. Not huge amounts, but enough to make it worth it, especially if you will be staying for several days, and have a number of people in your party.
The company that I have personally used, and recommend highly is Undercover Tourist. Their prices are great, their service is even better, and they are completely reputable. I would not recommend them otherwise. And their website does a great job of breaking down the Magic Your Way ticket structure and that alone makes them pretty awesome. 🙂
As to where you should NOT buy Disney theme parks tickets? Well, every place else….
I really can’t emphasize this part enough. Be very, very careful here, as unfortunately, many, many people get burned every year trying to save money on tickets, only to find that their “tickets” were worthless.
So steer clear of eBay, Craigslist, or any website or seller that offers prices that seem too good to be true…because they probably are. Look at the fine print as well, and make sure you are not agreeing to sit through a lengthy timeshare presentation in order to get those tickets…unless you really want to lol.
If you want to learn more, you can a basic overview on the Discounted Tickets page. In addition, I discuss how to determine a reputable Disney ticket broker in this post. And to learn more about where you should not buy Disney tickets, you can read more in this post.
