Get to Know: Your Disney Cruise Line Key to the World Card

Key to the World Cards are largely a thing of the past at Walt Disney World. Most WDW resort guests now use a MagicBand as the primary vehicle for their vacation transactions. But Key to the World Cards (KTTWC) are still issued to all guests on Disney Cruise Line voyages; they are an important aspect of your DCL sailing and should be kept with you at all times.

DCL cast members will issue every member of your party a KTTWC as you check in at the port. You will need it many times throughout your trip. EVERY time you enter or exit the ship, you’ll be required to tap your KTTWC onto a reader; this applies to children as well as adults. The card also serves as your stateroom key. You can use it to charge purchases (in the shops, at the bars, etc.) on the ship. The card will identify you to the kids’ club and photography staff, and more.

On the Dream and the Fantasy, you can also use your KTTWC in a slot by your stateroom door to turn on the electricity, though any similar-size plastic card will also work.

Aside from these many useful functions, your Key to the World Card contains helpful information about your cruise.

The first line just beneath the Disney Cruise Line logo lists the dates of your cruise. The second line lists the name of your ship, and next to that is a letter A for “adult” or M for “minor.”

The rest of that line may be blank or, if you’ve purchased land transfers from Disney, it will list a letter indicating what type of transfer you’ve paid for: P means “port,” R means “resort” (if you’ve booked a combination cruise–WDW vacation), and A means “airport.” Sometimes combinations of letters are used: for example, PA indicates a port-to-airport transfer.

The next two lines display your name and your Castaway Club status.

The two lines after that list your dining schedule. The first of these lines shows the time of your nightly dinner seating and the number of your assigned table, in the photo above you can see that I had the later dinner seating (8:15) and dined at table number 82.

Below the dinner time is a series of letters, one for each night of your cruise, representing the first letter of the name of one of the ship’s three rotational restaurants. For example, the five-letter code ERAER indicates a five-night cruise on the Dream: E signifies Enchanted Garden, R is the Dream’s Royal Palace, and A is for Animator’s Palate.

The large letter on the lower left (here it’s an “F”) shows your assigned station for the mandatory lifeboat drill (muster) at the beginning of the sailing. Follow signs to your assigned letter station to check in for muster.

At the bottom of the card you’ll see a lone number (here it’s “92”). This number indicates which check-in window you used at the port. As a guest, you’ll have no need to use this number, but it might help DCL staff if there was a problem with your paperwork during check-in.

What you won’t find on your card is your stateroom number–after all, you wouldn’t want anyone picking up your card to know where it could be used!

If you lose your stateroom card, or if you lock it in your stateroom for safekeeping (oops!), simply go to Guest Relations to have your old card deactivated and a new card issued. At the end of the voyage, you won’t turn in your Key to the World Card, and so it can make a great souvenir to remember all those cruises that you’ve taken.