Frozen Princess Meet and Greet in the Magic Kingdom: An Update
It’s been a few weeks now since the Frozen Princess meet and greet with Anna and Elsa began at Princess Fairytale Hall and there are lots of questions about how FastPass+ works for the attraction. First, a little about the venue itself. Princess Fairytale Hall opened in late 2013 to house the Magic Kingdom’s princess meet and greets.
Princess Fairytale Hall (PFH) sits behind the castle just across from the carousel. Until late April of this year, guests could visit Cinderella and a surprise princess guest on one side of the hall and Rapunzel and a surprise princess guest on the other. Rapunzel generally commanded higher wait times than Cinderella, but both princess meet and greets were eligible for FastPass+. On April 20, Anna and Elsa from Disney’s wildly popular movie, Frozen, began meeting and greeting with a surprise princess guest on one side of the hall and Rapunzel and Cinderella joined to meet on the other side.
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Using FastPass+ for the Frozen Meet and Greet
So what do you need to know about meeting Anna and Elsa? First, standby wait times have been pretty incredible since Anna and Elsa came to Walt Disney World. The princesses regularly command 4+ hour waits from attraction open to attraction close. FastPass Plus is available for Anna and Elsa. If you are a resort guest, you can begin booking at midnight sixty days out while Annual Passholders can begin booking thirty days out. So, if for instance you want to meet Anna and Elsa with FastPass+ on July 1, you can begin looking to see if FP+ is available at 12:00 a.m. Eastern time on May 2. For day guests, this window is only 30 days ahead of time. While some rumors have Anna and Elsa booked completely lately, I was able to to obtain a FastPass to meet them during the first day of my booking window without too much trouble. (the photo below was from the FastPass+ I got the first day they met at Magic Kingdom, just as an example).
It should be noted that sometimes it is much easier to make FastPass+ reservations through the website rather than through the app. If you’re having trouble getting what you want, start there. There has been mention of Anna and Elsa FastPasses getting “lost”, but as long as you’ve received confirmation in a screen like the one above, Disney Guest Relations will be able to find indication that your reservation existed in their system. If you’re very concerned, take a screen shot on your phone so that you can assist Guest Relations if something should happen. I had no problems with mine on opening day.
If you’re using FastPass+, you’ll go to the FastPass+ entrance at PFH and tap your bands or cards. You’ll proceed down what is essentially a back hallway (pictured below) and wait for just a few minutes before being shown into the meet and greet room. I waited for about 7 minutes and most guests using FP+ to see the Frozen girls report waiting ten minutes or less.
After your wait you’ll tap your bands a second time on the My Magic+ touch points, at which point you’ll be escorted into the meet and greet room where you may wait behind a couple of families to get to the princesses for your photos.
Elsa and Anna meet and greet with another princess friend. Though many times it’s Aurora, we’ve also seen Jasmine and others on occasion.
What if we can’t get FastPass+?
Due to the incredible popularity of the Frozen girls, FastPass+ can be hard to come by. If your options are limited to waiting standby, there are some things about the venue and the setup that may be helpful to know. First, running to the meet and greet from rope drop is not as beneficial as it can be from other rides. While Disney’s estimated wait times at attraction opening are often a good deal higher than the actual wait, the crowds trying to get to Princess Fairytale Hall when the park opens have been large. Next, unlike the wait at their former location in Epcot, a good deal of the wait at Princess Fairytale Hall is either under the shade of the canopy or inside in the air conditioned hall.
Anna and Elsa meet and greet during limited hours (currently 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. or thereabouts). Cast Members will close the line depending on the projected wait time and the ladies will meet everyone who has been told they will see Anna and Elsa. Be aware that later in the day you may be told that you cannot meet Anna and Elsa prior to their actual close time because of the duration of the standby wait. Alternate princesses take their places in the hall after Anna and Elsa exit for the day.
On a general note, if you use FastPass+ for both sets of princesses meeting and greeting at Princess Fairytale Hall, you will not see the reception hall that houses both the princess portraits and Cinderella’s glass slipper (pictured below). If you find that Cinderella and Rapunzel have a tolerable standby wait time, I suggest seeing them so that you can check out PFH.
Finally, the interior lighting at Princess Fairytale Hall is a bit of an odd package for a photo venue and pictures can sometimes turn out with a really red tint, even with the best of cameras. Even if you haven’t purchased a PhotoPass Package, let the PhotoPass photographer take plenty of photos and add them to your MagicBand or a PhotoPass card. While you may not purchase them, it’s great to have a backup in case your pictures don’t turn out the way you want them to.
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Here’s how I see that this could all be greatly improved. Now that everyone has the ability to utilize the Fastpass system with their park admission, perhaps Disney should restrict access to Anna and Elsa EXCLUSIVELY based on reservations for spots in line which could be tied to the Fastpass system.
Instead of leaving people no choice other than to stand in line for hours, they figure out what the greeting capacity is for a day, they open up that many slots for line entry using the Fastpass system. You come back in your 30 minute time window and then they could do something like what Southwest Airlines does when they call your boarding group. They could take that whole group inside and line them up in their reserved order. If your boarding group enters before you arrive, then unfortunately you’re out of luck. If I miss my plane, it isn’t coming back for me and I’m not getting my money back.
With this more narrow window to get in a significantly shorter line (30 minutes?), people could spend their time making magical memories for their children instead of trying to figure out what percentage of the substantial admission cost for their family was spent on standing in just one line. Because of the demand and the impact it would have on your ability to get the full benefit from the Fastpass system (if you got an end-of-day time slot, then you couldn’t book a 4th Fastpass until 3rd is used), they could treat the Anna & Elsa spaces separately and not count this reservation toward the 3-pass limit (like how reservations at “Be Our Guest” are handled). The fact that some families simply don’t know 30-60 days in advance that they’ll be coming makes booking THAT far out more unfair if there is ZERO standby option. Open up Anna and Elsa reservations something like 48 hours or a week in advance.
If Disney feels the need to give their resort guests advance opportunity like the extra 30 days they get now, then give them access to this system a few days in advance of the public (instead of 60 days). Perhaps a few resort guests would feel entitled enough and demand more. But, if they are told that’s what they get, it’s not like this one solitary thing is the make-or-break decision for a Disney vacation. If one person backs out, 10 more are ready to step up in their place. As for the people who decide same-day that they want to meet Anna & Elsa and can’t??? If I decide that I want to go to the Super Bowl 2 hours before it starts, nobody is going to cry for me because I waited until the last minute and all of the tickets are gone.
For several days now when I look for character timess in the my Disney experience app Anna & Elsa is shown as having a meet & greet at EPCOT in the afternoons. Is this a mistake?
It is a mistake. Anna and Elsa are currently only at Magic Kingdom. The app tends to have bugs like this.
Hello there. Do you know if everyone in the family need to “bip” the bracelet, or one is fine ? Another way to say it, if I got 3 fastpass+ of my child, husdband and myself, cant the grandparents come along ? Thanks !
Isabelle, everyone in the family has to tap their bands and all must have active FastPass+ allocations.
It’s annoying that they move character greetings out of the view of general visitor. I like to “cheat” and see the characters, but not actually “meet and greet”.
When they’re behind attraction walls, then you must wait in line just to get a glimpse of the characters.
We are planning to visit MK the week of June 9th. Every night I login to do the FastPass+ for that week to meet the Frozen princesses. I live in CST zone. Even when I login at 11:00 PM it says “Standby Available”. I have not had any luck booking the FastPass+ for meeting Elsa and Anna. Can anyone give me some tips. I also tried booking them by individuals vs. group. No luck. I have young kids and do not look forward to standing in line for 3-4 hours to meet them. Please advise.
Anu, unfortunately you’re seeing the results of a busy time of year and a very popular attraction. FastPass+ is “sold out” for this meet and greet and the best approach is to just keep checking when you can.
We’ve just come back from a visit to Disney World last week. We were unable to get fastpasses at all but figured we’d give it a shot at seeing them on our last full day at the resort. We were at the park before opening then walked swiftly to the meet and greet and were in line around 8.55 I think. It took us 4 1/2hrs to get to actually see the princesses. One of the major drawbacks with this exhibit having fast passes is that with the amount of people coming through on fast passes the actual standby queue sometimes doesn’t move for a good half hour or so. Unlike other rides there isn’t a steady feed from both fast pass and standby lines. As soon as there are any people with fast passes they were being shown straight through. It was 1.30 by the time we got through although they were fantastic and spent time interacting with my daughter she thoroughly enjoyed. I’ve heard a few people say surely the wait can’t be that long, but I can say from experience it is. Also there is nothing to do in that time, they could do with a screen showing the movie or something to keep all these little people entertained. One lady took her children one at a time into the Rapunzel and Cinderella exhibit while her husband waited with the other in line, which seemed a sensible idea. Disney have just so underestimated the demand and don’t expect to be able to find much in the way of merchandise there either.
As much as I get the frustrations people have about one member of a party holding a spot in line for a group while the others ride rides, this is exactly why I think it needs to be allowed. A family trip to Disney is supposed to be “magical.” A parent who is willing to stand in a 4-hour so their kids can meet adults in costumes does it for one reason, because they love their kids. Disney should be embracing the idea that families get their stake out their spot in line and let the kids enjoy the magic.
I just got back and I had two meet and greets with them….got them not long before we left which was 2 weeks ago…they take their time with you and meeting them as 2 adults they never went out of character…
oh and we walked right in not much of a wait at all
How did you get a fast pass only a few weeks before your visit? Was there a certain time of the day that you found openings?
Linda, I just kept checking. I don’t remember what time of day I got them. Apologies!
When I was there two weeks ago, they were very clear that your entire party needed to be present before getting in line. This is my most likely to cut down on one adult holding a place in line while another adult tours the park with the kids.
that’s great if they are implementing that!!
Can you please clarify the touring plan strategy you employ in the personalized plans. When optimizing, my plan says not to use my FP+ reservation for midmorning, but instead line up at rope drop and expect a 15 minute wait. Obviously that would work if we can be at the front of the line, but I have no hope of that being the case with the madness that is rope drop for now. Alternatively, when I did get at FP+ reservation worked into my plan, it said that I should expect to wait 35 minutes to see the princesses which seems quite high. I’m confused.
Just a note: Is it a 35 minute WAIT or is it telling you to expect the experience to taKE 35 minutes? Cause that would include wait and actually meeting the princesses.
It is the actual wait time column. (I should correct my comment that it says the wait is 15 minutes at rope drop. That was something I saw on Lines for an predicted wait time this past weekend.) My plans say:
Arrival with no FP+ reservation at 9:09am, wait 27 min, duration 10 min.
Arrival using a FP+ reservation at 10:48am, wait 35 min, duration 10 min.
This is 2 separate plans optimized differently for the same day.
Same thing on my plan with the 35 min wait using FP. Seems odd, but I’m not overly concerned even if it is accurate as 35 mins still beats 4hrs.
We’er seeing families waiting around 15-25 minutes when using Fastpass+ at Anna & Elsa. We’re implementing some new rules for the touring plans on Tuesday that should align the plans’ wait times with those numbers.
Thanks Len! We are approaching our 60 day window, so that helps.
Has this been done? As of Wednesday, my wait time still shows as 40 minutes.
I have been trying each day (30 days out – Annual Passholder) and no luck! There is no way I am standing in line for over 2-3 hours. I even tried Mike’s trick above, thank you! : )
I meant Andy! : )
From the very first day I was able to reserve Fastpasses (60 days out), I could not get this attraction for my group of 6. I even tried only reserving it for 2 people, and it still showed as unavailable. I wasn’t excited about spending hours in line, so I did a little research online and found this trick that worked for me. I had to go and make each reservation separately. So instead of trying to request 2 or more FPs, I had to individually request all 6 one at a time. I took the morning times that they gave me, then once all 6 were booked, went back and tried to edit the times. Not perfect, but I got them all within a 1 hr window. As a group, it only leaves us about a 10 min window where all 6 FPs will work, but its better than waiting 4+ hrs in standby!
There was initially an issue when the Fastpasses for A&E became available (on Easter Sunday when they officially moved to Magic Kingdom) where it seemed like only single Fastpasses were made available in the system in 5 minute increments. So, there was no possibility of getting a group all at the same time. I had to make my selections individually like you did. I grabbed what I could get and then was able to adjust times for our group of 6 so that we had a 15 minute overlapping window where we could all go in together. A few days later, they seemed to have corrected the programming and I was able to adjust a bit further with the availability that remained at that point to get a few of us with the same times so our shared-entry window is a bit wider now.
The FP+ booking window for annual passholders is 30 days unless the passholder also has a resort reservation.