November and December are two of the busiest months of the year at Walt Disney World. School recesses, long weekends and full week breaks cause crowd levels to spike, and can catch guests by surprise. We’re anticipating dates with high wait times in Magic Kingdom, EPCOT, Animal Kingdom, and Hollywood Studios–the busiest since Easter!
We often refer to the holiday season as having roller coaster crowd levels, because these few months have low lows and high highs. Regardless of this and whether you visit during the valleys or peaks, be prepared for elevated wait times by historical standards–the ‘low lows’ may not be quite as uncrowded as you’re expecting.
The highs are driven by the obvious. People having time off work and school districts having student holidays, and wanting to visit Florida during one of the most pleasant times of year–and Walt Disney World during the best seasonal event. The lows are essentially the inverse of that–due to the proximity of the aforementioned breaks, families are less likely to pull their kids out of school to travel during those windows.
It’s a bit like the late summer off-season, which is right after school goes back into session but before fall break. The key difference being that those who aren’t beholden to school schedules have a much larger incentive to visit Walt Disney World during the lulls of November and December.
The other distinction is that there are some landmines or smaller holidays this time of year that sneak up on Walt Disney World planners. We’ve already discussed most of these at length in our November 2024 Crowd Calendar and December 2024 Crowd Calendars for Walt Disney World, so you should be familiar with the impact of Jersey Week or Veterans Day by this point (if not, they’re discussed again below).
In addition to those, there are some more under-discussed holidays that we want to cover that could move the needle on crowds, especially in the nearer term. Thankfully, these don’t change our underlying recommendations. In particular, our list of the 10 Best and 10 Worst Weeks to Visit Walt Disney World in 2024 to 2026 already identified November 4-11, 2024 as one of the worst weeks of the entire year.
Our previous analysis indicated that this is what happens when two or three “holidays” collide–if you count Jersey Week as a holiday. During the latter, approximately 73% of the Garden State descends upon Walt Disney World. Well, as it turns out, there are actually more like 5-6 “holidays” colliding here. Let’s discuss each and its potential impact on crowd levels…
runDisney Wine & Dine Half Marathon Weekend
In the last couple of years, runDisney events have not had the same impact on crowd levels as in previous years. This is presumably due to runners doing the events but not purchasing park tickets in greater numbers for whatever reason (price increases?). Maybe fewer runners now have Annual Passes?
Nevertheless, there is still a non-zero impact on crowd levels due to runDisney races. This is mostly felt before the marquee marathons (in this case, the Half Marathon on Sunday, November 3, 2024). It’s also disproportionately in Magic Kingdom and EPCOT. Consequently, we’d expect elevated crowds in both parks on the Saturday of race weekend.
By the Monday following the races, the effect from runDisney participants is negligible based on wait times data. There are still some stragglers, to be sure, but they are not a primary driver of crowds. The trend we’ve observed in the last two years is for the drop-off to start occuring the Sunday of race weekend. Of course, that’s not the only variable at play here.
Diwali
I’ll be honest with you: Diwali is a blind spot for me. To be clear, I know what Diwali is (the Festival of Lights), that it’s celebrated for 5 or 6 days, that it’s the most important festival of the year in India, and is celebrated by millions (if not a billion-plus) of Hindus and South Asians across the world. I also know that it has gained increasing prominence at both Walt Disney World and Disneyland–there’s gotta be a demographics reason for that.
What I don’t know is the degree to which Diwali moves the needle on crowds at Walt Disney World, if at all. It’s my understanding that a number of school districts with high concentrations of South Asian communities, particularly those in the Northeast, have a long weekend thanks to Diwali. This appears to be a growing movement, with Pennsylvania officially recognizing Diwali as a state holiday as of 2024.
How this will translate into crowds at Walt Disney World (if at all) is still unclear. Data from the past few years suggests that it doesn’t. Usually, the best predictor of present and future crowds is the past, but if this is a movement that is gaining momentum, that wouldn’t necessarily be true. It’s also true that 2024 won’t necessarily be indicative of a Diwali-fueled trend, as there are multiple factors at play this year.
Day of the Dead
Another of those is Day of the Dead, or Día de los Muertos. This is less of a blind spot for me, as I’m reasonably confident very few (if any) school districts in the United States have a long weekend due to Day of the Dead. Even the districts we watch in Southern California around Disneyland don’t have student holidays for Día de los Muertos (although many have de facto days off to watch the Dodgers parade).
Suffice to say, if SoCal schools don’t have Día de los Muertos off and there’s zero impact on Disneyland crowds, there’s no way random districts in Illinois or Missouri that feed into Walt Disney World crowds have it off. So there’s also no impact on Walt Disney World crowds. It’s possible a handful of families from Mexico take long weekend trips to Florida, but again, it’s not enough to move the needle on overall crowd levels.
Election Day
This is what inspired this otherwise belated post in the first place. In our discussion of why Lightning Lane Premier Pass prices spike on November 4, several readers pointed out that they state holidays for Election Day. Admittedly, I was skeptical of this at first, as not that many states offer days off for the election, and none of them are within reasonable driving distance of Walt Disney World. Even so, there are longer holiday breaks in November that are more desirable for trips to Walt Disney World.
Then one reader pointed out that many school districts have Election Day and the Monday beforehand off work, as schools are often used as polling places for ease and accessibility. As a result, many districts in the Midwest, Northeast–and possibly beyond–have long weekends. When you add days off for Diwali or, perhaps more importantly, the next entry on this list, that’s a potentially long break to visit Walt Disney World.
The problem here is that we don’t have good data on the impact (or lack thereof) of Election Day. The last presidential election was in 2020, and that was an anomaly for obvious reasons. The one prior to that was 2016, and that was a totally different era. Wait times were low the first full week of November in both years, but it would be foolish to view that as precedential. This year could be different.
Jersey Week
The New Jersey Education Association (NJEA) convention on November 7-8, 2024 is what gives rise to the infamous Jersey Week. Although this holiday continues to catch fans by surprise, as does the outsized impact of “only” one state having a break, this is already baked into our crowd calendar. It’s a big driver behind our prediction that November 4-11, 2024 is one of the worst weeks of the year.
Jersey Week is usually a big driver of crowds during the first week of November, and it shouldn’t be any different this year. For some of you, it might stretch credulity that a single state–and one geographically fairly far from Florida–could have such a significant impact on crowds. I don’t know what to tell you other than: it does.
Crowds in the coming week being elevated due to Jersey Week is hardly a bold or new prediction. The annual teachers’ convention has had a significant impact for as long as I can remember. I’ve been in the parks for many Jersey Weeks, have chatted with many guests from the Garden State, and even departed MCO last year with the Jersey Week wave. (My one criticism of Jerseyites is that they don’t rep Devils jerseys in high numbers. “You gotta support the team!” ~Puddy)
Veterans Day
The major nationwide holiday on the horizon is Veterans Day, which falls on Monday, November 11, 2024. This is the week after the above entries, but it being a long weekend starting on Friday for some school districts means it’ll cause higher crowds that coincide with Jersey Week (etc.) on November 8-10, 2024.
Veterans Day is always a “sneaky” holiday for crowds at Walt Disney World. It’s under-discussed, but a surprisingly high number of government workers, students, and others do have the day off. We’ve been warning about Veterans Day crowds for years, as it has been almost on par with Thanksgiving some years. It’s a long weekend that can have an outsized impact on crowd levels.
We’ve mentioned this countless times, but that’s an increasingly popular long weekend at Walt Disney World, and the bulk of the busy days will actually occur before Veterans Day itself–especially with the holiday happening on a Monday this year. Seriously, Veterans Day is easily one of the busiest holiday weekends of the year, far surpassing Memorial Day, Fourth of July, and Labor Day.
Of course, it’s not the only big holiday during November and December, but I doubt any Walt Disney World fans would doubt that Thanksgiving, Christmas, or New Year’s Eve are busy stretches. Along with Columbus Day (also one of the worst weekends/weeks), Veterans Day sneaks up on a lot of people!
Busiest Days at WDW During This Window
Given the unprecedented timing of these various events and holidays, and how they overlap, it’s potentially worthwhile to look at signals from Walt Disney World as to their attendance forecasts. Unfortunately, I’m not sure how instructive that is, given that Disney is sending mixed messages.
If we look at Lightning Lane Premier Pass prices, Walt Disney World believes the worst crowds will be November 4, 6-7, 9-10.
Lightning Lane Multi-Pass pricing tells a different story. I’m not even sure what that story is, because costs are all over the place. The one constant is November 10, 2024. Two other days that are almost consistent are November 8-9, so it would seem that LLMP pricing analysts anticipate the Veterans Day long weekend being busiest.
Extensions to park hours more or less corroborate this, as Walt Disney World has the longest hours from November 7 to 11, 2024.
For whatever it’s worth, this is more or less what we believe. Even though we forecast November 4-11, 2024 to be one of the 10 worst weeks of the year, our expectation was that crowds would be backloaded due to Veterans Day. That Jersey Week would balloon numbers all week long, but that the weekend would be busiest.
Saturday being the peak of the holiday weekend makes sense, and is the one commonality if you align the aforementioned prices with park hours extensions. Saturday is also the lone day when Magic Kingdom has the rare midnight closure. If you asked me a few months ago to pick the busiest day, it would’ve been Saturday.
However, I also can’t help but wonder whether Walt Disney World is leaning a tad too much on historical data. Normally, Saturday would not be the busiest day of a holiday week, or even a long weekend. Veterans Day being observed on a Monday instead of Friday (like last year) could mean that Sunday doesn’t fall off as much as normal and that Saturday isn’t as busy.
I also can’t help but wonder whether both Walt Disney World and this website haven’t given appropriate weight to the current long weekend due to Election Day, etc. I expected it to be a non-factor as that’s been the case in previous years, but now I’m not so sure whether past precedent reflects present reality. If a high number of guests are doing full weeklong vacations instead of long weekends, the busiest days should be Monday and Tuesday (based on trends for other weeklong holidays).
The “problem” in trying to assess crowd levels at this point is that this isn’t a weeklong break or holiday weekend…it’s both. Some guests will be taking a full vacation and others will be taking a quick getaway. It boils down to the distribution of each that matters. Suffice to say, it’ll be interesting to see which days are busiest. It’s difficult to predict given the countervailing factors and lack of reliable past precedent.
It’s unlikely that Jersey Week/Election Day/Veterans Day/etc. crowd levels surpass Easter, but this week-plus almost certainly will surpass Columbus Day/Indigenous Peoples’ Day/Fall Break. Even though the two weeks are usually neck and neck, the hurricane threw a monkey wrench into attendance trends this year and, presumably, caused a lot of cancellations.
One of the weeks in November will almost certainly be the busiest week since Spring Break. That’s because pretty much every single week since Easter has underperformed in 2024. The months of May through October have all been down year-over-year, as has almost every single week within that stretch.
For November 4-11, 2024 to be the busiest week since spring break, all it would need to do is have an average wait time of 36 minutes or higher. That’s only a 5/10 crowd level. Only a couple of weeks since April have averaged 35-minute crowds; most have struggled just to hit the 30-minute mark. The comps are pretty favorable and easy to beat–Jersey Week (etc.) should be able to do it.
Now let’s talk beating the crowds. The added hours we mentioned above are incredibly advantageous–especially the earlier opening times since most travelers don’t want to do the early wake-up call on vacation.
Choosing the optimal days to do each park, especially Disney’s Hollywood Studios and Magic Kingdom–and then taking advantage of Early Entry at both parks–is huge. Do not underestimate Early Entry, or visiting those parks on days that are likely to be less crowded. It’s a similar story with DHS or Animal Kingdom in the evenings.
By simply arriving early or staying late at every park, you can beat the worst of the midday crowds. (Of course, that’s “simple” in theory but more difficult in practice, especially if you have small children. That’s a big reason why wait times are lower first thing in the morning and later in the evenings.) Beyond that, be sure to also check out our Walt Disney World Itineraries for plans of attack.
It’s entirely possible to beat bad crowds by utilizing Lightning Lane Multi-Pass, Early Entry, Extended Evening Hours, rope drop, etc. We cover the best & worst approach for each park in Best Time-Saving Strategies for Walt Disney World. If you’re only going to read one planning post, make it that.
There are great ways to beat the crowds–even on busy days–without buying Lightning Lane Multi-Pass (LLMP) or Single Pass (LLSP). We don’t buy line-skipping services most of the time, and find we’re able to do just fine so long as we’re up early or out late–ideally both!
Speaking of which, we have a comprehensive Guide to Lightning Lanes at Walt Disney World for those who want to thoroughly master paid FastPass. Weeks like this, it’s definitely a good option for Magic Kingdom, Hollywood Studios, and maybe EPCOT. (We seldom recommend LLMP at Animal Kingdom, and that remains true.)
Overall, that’s about what you can expect to experience during mid-November 2024 at Walt Disney World. How things unfold over the next couple of weeks really depends upon how many Northeast and Midwest tourists have time off from school or work for Election Day and other holidays before Veterans Day. Those are the unknowns–everything else here is fairly priced-in.
Years of wait times and on-the-ground experience tells us that Jersey Week and Veterans Day are huge holidays, which is precisely why November 4-11, 2024 makes the worst weeks list. The unanswered question is whether the other holidays and days off can make this window go from bad to worse, or redistribute daily crowds within it. No one can predict this with a high degree of confidence, which would seemingly extend to even Walt Disney World, as their own attendance ‘signals’ are contradictory.
In the end, we wouldn’t necessarily avoid the upcoming week if you have a school-aged child and have no better options outside of the even bigger holiday breaks in the final quarter of the year. Even as we’re warning about the upcoming window, there should be little doubt that the weeks of Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Year’s Even will be much worse than Veterans Day/Jersey Week/etc. They always are.
For comprehensive tips for planning your Christmas-time trip to Walt Disney World, check out our Ultimate Guide to Christmas at Walt Disney World. For Walt Disney World trip planning tips and comprehensive advice, make sure to read our Walt Disney World Trip Planning Guide and related articles.
YOUR THOUGHTS
Have you visited Walt Disney World during this ‘sneaky’ window in mid-November in the past? What did you think of the crowds? Are you visiting this year? Do you have Election Day or any of the above holidays off work or school? Anything else we missed that could impact crowds in November 2024? Do you agree or disagree with anything in our crowd forecast for Walt Disney World? Any questions we can help you answer? Hearing your feedback–even when you disagree with us–is both interesting to us and helpful to other readers, so please share your thoughts below in the comments!
