The Best Time-Saving Strategy for Genie+ at Disney’s Hollywood Studios

This is our final post on the Best Time-Saving Strategy for Genie+.  Click the hyperlink to read the Magic Kingdom, Animal Kingdom, or EPCOT posts.  We looked at every way you could’ve obtained Genie+ reservations for each of the last 485+ days at Disney’s Hollywood Studios-  close to 4 million possibilities each day. Here’s a cheat sheet with the best Genie+ strategies we found for every crowd level. 

One of our 2024 goals is to improve the Genie+ recommendations made by our touring plan software. The first couple of tasks in that project are to:

1. Benchmark where we’re at now
2. Identify the “best” set of Genie+ recommendations so we know when we’re done.

That second task requires a lot of historical data on Genie+ return times and a lot of computer time to crunch the numbers. The result of doing all that ended up being a really simple “Genie+ Cheat Sheet” that showed the best sequence of Genie+ reservations to get at any time of year.

This post describes how we created those cheat sheets for Disney’s Hollywood Studios theme park. The cheat sheet is below.

Analyzing Historical Genie+ Return Times for Disney’s Hollywood Studios

Since Genie+ rolled out, we’ve collected just under 15,000,000 Genie+ return times from My Disney Experience from every attraction, every few minutes, every day of every year. Based on this data, we know how often Genie+ reservations sell out and when they run out. A Genie+ reservation can sell out if all reservations are claimed or an attraction closes before the park closes. Disney’s Hollywood Studios has 14 attractions that are part of the Genie+ system. Four of the attractions are show: Beauty and the Beast Live on Stage, Disney Junior Play & Dance!, For the First Time in Forever: A Frozen Sing-Along Celebration, and Indiana Jones Epic Stunt Spectacular. For this analysis, we exclude the shows since they typically do not make good use of Genie+.

This table shows the percentage of days Genie+ reservations sold out, and if they sell out, the earliest you can expect them to sell out. Many of the attractions sell out even on low-crowd level days. 

We can also use the data to create “what if” scenarios. For example, if you booked a Genie+ reservation for Millennium Falcon: Smugglers Run at 8:32 a.m. on March 15, 2024, your return time would have started at 8:50 p.m. Since the return time is less than two hours after obtaining the Genie+ reservation, you can get another Genie+ reservation after you tap into the second touch point; let’s assume that it is 9:06. The table below shows what Genie+ reservations were available for at 9:06. (Rock ‘n’ Roller Coaster Starring Aerosmith was closed on March 15.)

With the Genie+ date, we can see what would’ve happened for any sequence of Genie+ reservations for any day since Genie+ started. So that’s what we did. 

Simulation Design

Disney’s Hollywood Studios typically has 10 Genie+ attractions. When 10 attractions are operating, there are 3,628,800 different ways to obtain Genie+ reservations. Each of those different ways is called a permutation. Not all of the permutations are possible due to attractions that sell out.

Our design helped us answer two questions:

1. What are the best attractions for using Genie+ at Disney’s Hollywood Studios?
2. In what order should I get those Genie+ reservations to save the most time in line?

Simulation and Analysis

Our analysis considered all Genie+ attractions for every day since January 1, 2023. We adhered to Disney’s rules for obtaining the next Genie+ reservation for each permutation, and we simulated what would’ve happened for every permutation for each of the last 485+ days.

The simulation starts at 7:00 a.m. with the first attraction. We then select the next attraction two hours after the park opens or 15 minutes after the return time, whichever is sooner. This process is repeated for each step, waiting two hours or 15 minutes after the return time.

To calculate how much time we saved using Genie+, we added up the posted wait time at the attractions at the Genie+ return time we got.  That gives us a “time saved” score.

That “time saved” score is an estimate. We know you’ll still have to spend a few minutes in Lightning Lane before experiencing the attraction, and we know Disney’s posted wait times are often wrong. Our approach allows us to compare the relative “time saved” scores for every Genie+ permutation for every day.

A higher “time saved” score indicates a better sequence of attractions. To compare multiple days, we normalize the “time saved” score by dividing all scores by the maximum value for all permutations on that day.

Results: The Best Genie+ Picks at Disney’s Hollywood Studios for Any Crowd Level

After simulating all possible Genie+ permutations for Disney’s Hollywood Studios, here is how many minutes in line a Genie+ reservation could save at various crowd levels:
The chart shows Rock ‘n’ Roller Coaster Starring Aerosmith and Slinky Dog Dash are the most useful Genie+ reservations.

The next question we had to answer was, “If these are the most useful Genie+ attractions, which order should we select them?” To answer this question, we looked at all the permutations and computed the average normalized “time saved” score to rank the best first and second attractions.

Pick Your Hollywood Studios Genie+ Attractions in This Order

Below are the best first steps when selecting Gene+ attractions. The list includes the top three attractions. A higher-ranked attraction will save more time overall. Skip any attraction that:

• Isn’t available
• Has a return time that doesn’t fit into your day
• Or that you’re not interested in experiencing

The Best First Genie+ Selection at Disney’s Hollywood Studios

Since Slinky Dog Dash typically sells out before the park opens, your only chance to get a Genie+ reservation is as your first step. Rock ‘n’ Roller Coaster Starring Aerosmith saves a lot of time but is not a top choice for crowd levels under 8. The reason for this is that Genie+ reservations are available for most of the day.

The Best Second Genie+ Selection at Disney’s Hollywood Studios

The best second attraction sets up the rest of your day to maximize getting the most Genie+ attractions with the highest time-saved score.

The Best Remaining Genie+ Selection at Disney’s Hollywood Studios

Once you’ve picked your first two attractions, use Disney’s Hollywood Studios Genie+ cheat sheet to select your remaining attractions for the rest of the day. This Cheat Sheet ranks the Genie+ choices that consistently lead to the least time waiting in line on a typical day at the crowd levels shown.

This wraps up The Best Time-Saving Strategy for Genie+ series. Below are links to the post that covers the other parks.

• The Best Time-Saving Strategy for Genie+ at the Magic Kingdom
• The Best Time-Saving Strategy for Genie+ at Epcot
• The Best Time-Saving Strategy for Genie+ at Disney’s Animal Kingdom