How Planning Your Disney World Vacation Before Your Children Turn 3 & 10 Years Old Can Save You Money
Throughout every calendar year, Disney World has many special offers that can help save you money. Even after your trip is booked, as new offers are announced, Travel By Pixie Dust will get these new offers applied to your package to save you money. While the type of offers and the time of year they will be released can be educatedly predicted, the exact dates and conditions of each offer are more unreliable. However, there is always one guaranteed way that your family can save money - plan your Disney World Vacation before your children turn 3 or 10 years old!
Now the purpose of this post isn’t to imply not to go to Disney World after these ages, but rather, if a Walt Disney World Vacation is on your family’s radar in the near future, and you have children that are turning 3 or 10 years of age, that you consider planning your magical vacation before these birthdays. Your children can still turn 3 or 10 years old during your stay provided their birthdays are not on your check-in day to enjoy these savings.
Before we dive into how much money you can save, it is important to note that almost every major airline allows children under the age of 2 to fly for free, but they are expected to be on a parents lap. As flight prices can vary and with so many different departing airport options, we are keeping the content strictly to savings on your Disney World Vacation, excluding flights.
The Components of a Disney World Vacation
There are 3 main components in most Disney World Vacations: accommodations, theme Park Tickets, and dining Plans. Below, we will examine the impact that children turning 3 and 10 years old can have on the cost of your vacation. For our calculations, we will use a very popular package - 7 nights, theme park tickets without park hopper and the Disney Dining Plan. We used a 7 day park ticket to keep everything consistent, however a 5 day ticket would likely suffice. (There is minimal extra cost between a 5 day and 7 day ticket.) The Disney Dining Plan provides 1 quick service meal, 1 table service meal, and 2 snacks per person (ages 3+) per day as well as a resort refillable mug (one per person ages 3+) that allows unlimited non-alcoholic drinks at Disney Resorts. 1 alcoholic beverage is included for adults ages 21+ with each quick service and table service meal (breakfast excluded).
Children Ages 3-9
Having a child turn 3 takes them from the infant category to the children category. Infants are free for almost everything at Disney World. There are no theme park tickets required and dining is free. The free dining can however be misleading as infants are expected to eat off of an adult’s plate.
Accommodations might not seem as an obvious factor in terms of cost savings, however, if you have a larger family, having an infant can allow you to select rooms with smaller maximum occupants. For instance, if you are travelling with 2 adults, 2 children, and an infant, you will have more room options available to you than you will if you were travelling with 2 adults and 3 children. Many studio rooms that sleep a maximum of 4 will allow for 1 or 2 infants to be in the room without counting towards the maximum capacity. Rooms that sleep 5 or more people are often more expensive than the comparable 4 person maximum room at the same resort.. In addition, not every value resort can accommodate travel parties greater than 4. This could result in you having to upgrade to a moderate resort or a suite at Disney’s Art of Animation that would be guaranteed to increase the cost of your vacation.
Theme Park Tickets are easily the biggest cost savings. There is very little cost difference between an adult theme park ticket and a children’s theme park ticket. In fact, in 2020 the difference was only $20.16 USD. The difference however between an infant that is free and a child that is not, is significant. A 7 day non-discounted children’s theme park ticket with admission to 1 park per day is $479.15 USD. (We selected a random day as the pricing changes daily but kept the date consistent.)
The Disney Dining Plans are also an added cost. As we mentioned earlier, infants are free but are expected to eat off of a parents plate. The Disney Dining Plan for 7 days for a child costs $213.64 USD. ($182.00 USD for the Quick Service Dining Plan & $332.57 USD for the Deluxe Dining Plan).
While the costs of accommodations are difficult for incorporate in a consistent, meaningful way, the costs of having to purchase theme park tickets and the Disney Dining Plan are not. It will cost your family an extra $692.79 USD per child than it would if they were infants.
Adults Ages 10+
No, that is not a typo - Adults ages 10+. While growing up may be optional according to Walt, in terms of costs, a child becomes an adult at age 10 at Walt Disney World. Now this may seem odd especially for a company like Disney, however as you will see below, the difference mainly is due to Disney expecting a 10 year old to eat more compared to a 3 year old.
In terms of accommodations, there next to no difference between having a child aged 3-9 and a 10 year old that is now deemed an adult. There are occasions where the cost of a room could be slightly higher for having more than 2 adults in a room, however this cost is very minimal.
Theme park tickets also have a very minimal extra cost for an adult over a child. For a 7 day non-discounted ticket, the price difference was only $20.16 USD.
Disney Dining Plans are where you will notice the largest difference in cost when considering a Walt Disney World Vacation. An adult Disney Dining Plan costs $546.14 USD compared to $213.64 USD for a child. That is an extra $332.50 USD. (Quick Service Dining plan is an extra $203.07 USD and the Deluxe Dining Plan is an extra $500.43 USD).
Combining the slight extra cost of theme park tickets with the Disney Dining Plan brings the total extra cost to $352.66 USD.
For Canadian travellers, having to pay approximately 1.35 CAN/USD exchange rate, these extra costs translate into your Disney World Vacation costing you over $900 CDN more per child compared to travelling when they are an infant and over $475 CDN per adult compared to travelling when they are a child. The savings only increase when you consider the possibility of having to select a studio room that sleeps 5, or upgrading to a suite. While Disney’s Art of Animation is the cheapest option for suites for larger families, it can often double the cost of your accommodations.
Depending on the size of your family, these savings can be significant, so if a Disney World Vacation is on your family’s radar in the near future, and you have children turning 3 or 10 years of age, help Travel By Pixie Dust help you to take advantage of guaranteed savings and let’s start planning your vacation now.