Customize the Genie Tip Board for Convenience and Speed
If you’re visiting Disney World, using the free Disney Genie and Tip Board features is useful even if you don’t purchase Genie+. Refreshing wait times and scrolling can be a hassle, but pinning your favorites to the top makes Genie easier to use in the parks. I’ll walk through this setup and show you how it can make it faster to book Lightning Lanes or check wait times. (Last updated/republished May 24, 2023)
For reading ease, some less important screenshots have been collapsed under a link. Click where indicated if you’d like to see these screens, and you can click any displayed image to make it larger. Select below to go directly to individual sections.
Customizing Disney Genie
Reaping the Benefits
Setting up Park Hopping in Disney Genie
Frequently Asked Questions
For info about how to make Lightning Lane reservations, see our separate walkthrough. This article is only about how to set up Genie in the My Disney Experience app so that you can use it like a pro while you’re touring. Unlike the paid Genie+ add-on, these features are free and anyone can use them.
If you have park tickets and you haven’t made reservations yet, you can practice by making a park reservation for the current day (if one is available) and walking through the setup. If your ticket doesn’t need a reservation, you can just practice away! This will not use up your ticket admission if you don’t enter the park.
Customizing Genie
Start by finding the “Get Started” card, which might show on the app’s home screen. You can definitely find it by clicking the hamburger menu and going to your “My Genie Day” tab. If your ticket needs a park reservation, then make sure you have one before getting started.
You’ll pass through some startup screens to select the date and park and choose who will be touring with you. (Screenshot) If your ticket requires a park reservation, then your reserved park is selected by default, and if you don’t have a park reservation you won’t be able to proceed. If your ticket doesn’t need a park reservation, you’ll select the park of your choice. Next, you’ll arrive at the “My Top Picks” screen. The Attractions are the most obvious, but you can also select Entertainment and Dining.
After making your top picks, you’ll come to a second set of screens where you can personalize based on your interests. (Screenshot) These can be helpful when Genie makes recommendations, but they aren’t as critical as the Top Picks. They’re most useful if it’s your first visit.
Next, select whether you’d like to see height or accessibility requirements. I’ll show you later how these choices affect the display when you’re touring. And Disney is always happy to take your money, so if you’re setting up for the current day you can buy Individual Lightning Lanes and Genie+.
After the last screen, you’ll come back to either My Genie Day or the Tip Board.
Reaping the Benefits
As you’re touring in the park, your Top Picks will be right at the top of your Tip Board. This makes it easy to see the wait times and forecasts for the rides you’re most interested in. Drag and pull from the top of the screen to refresh the wait times and Lightning Lane windows.
If you’re making Lightning Lane selections, this can help you keep track of the return windows. (Or to be the fastest finger if you’re making the first one of the day). For 7 a.m. booking speed, pin only the attraction you want to reserve so that it will be right at the top.
Your favorites are also pinned on the Dining tab. For Quick Service, you’ll see the Mobile Order window and can click to order food. Table Service restaurants show the next available reservation, or you may see the button to join the Walk Up Waitlist if they are full.
I like to adjust the list as I’m touring to remove things I’ve already done and don’t want to track anymore. Clicking “Edit Selections” will bring you right back to the Top Picks screens and you can make changes. Clicking “Change Park” lets you see the Tip Board for a different park.
You’ll see your Lightning Lane or dining reservations on the “My Day” screen, along with Genie’s picks. We don’t recommend taking Genie’s suggestions as a touring plan, because we find it’s not very efficient. But your selections during setup affect what you see on this screen, including reminders about time-sensitive things like mobile orders. In particular, the accessibility settings affect how the cards appear – see the screenshot below for comparison. And if you’re new to the parks, selections from the “My Interests” screen might help Genie to find you cool stuff you would have overlooked.
If you’d like to completely redo your Genie setup, select “Edit My Selections” or “Change Day” from the top of the My Day screen. This lets you change the members of your party, the accessibility settings, and everything else you chose when you did the initial setup.
Unfortunately, you can’t use this to select a different park from the one you have a reservation at. But you can set up a second park for hopping if you click in the right place.
Setting Up Park Hopping in Genie
If you’ve set up one park then you might notice that if you change the park from the Tip Board you won’t see the option to edit your selections. If you’re park hopping, how do you make picks in Genie for a second park on the same day?
Note: you don’t need to customize Genie for a second park in order to book Lightning Lanes and dining in that park, just like you don’t need to customize it at all for your first park. It just makes it more convenient to use.
If you’d like to set up Genie for park hopping, scroll down on the “My Genie Day” tab until you see the option to “Plan for your next park”. Select it, and you’ll be asked for your start and end time, then led through a familiar set of screens.
When you’re finished, your Genie Day tab will show recommendations for both parks, and when you change the Tip Board to your second park you’ll see your Top Picks are pinned.
Frequently Asked Questions
Do I need to customize Genie to make Lightning Lane reservations?
No, you don’t. It just makes it more convenient because it’s easier to find the attractions you want to book without scrolling.
How do I change my Top Picks on the Tip Board?
Select “Edit Selections” from the top of the Tip Board. This allows you to change just your top picks, whereas making the same selection from the “My Day” tab forces you to redo the entire setup.
How do I redo my whole Genie setup?
Select “Edit Selections” from the top of the “My Day” tab.
How do I see the Tip Board for a different park?
At the top of the Tip Board, select “Change Park” right under the park icon and the date. This change is “sticky”; Genie will remember it until you change it back even if you close the app and relaunch it.
How do I pin attractions for a park that I hopped to?
Scroll down on your “My Genie Day” tab until you see an option to “Plan for your next day”. Click here and set up your next park.
After I choose a park, why does it say that nobody is eligible?
You can only select the park you have made a Park Pass reservation for. If you see this after selecting “Plan for your next park”, then it means that park hopping is not available with your ticket.
How do I buy Genie+?
Look for a banner at the top of the Tip Board, or a card on your “My Day” tab.
Can I set up Genie for a future date?
Yes. Within the next week or so, you can set up Genie for any day that you have a park reservation.
How do I make Lightning Lane or Individual Lightning Lane reservations?
What’s your favorite tip for customizing Genie? Let us know in the comments!
(Originally published August 17, 2022)
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I know this is an older post, but I’ve been searching for days. I accidentally clicked “plan your next park” on a day that I do not plan to park hop and now it’s showing suggestions for a day that I do not want. Is there a way to undo this. My planning OCD is going crazy.
Hi Andrea, I have bad news – as far as I know, there’s not much you can do. I tried re-doing my selections for the first park – which should wipe those out and let you start over – but it didn’t wipe my entire day, just the first park. I even tried cancelling my Park Reservation but that didn’t work either. The best I was able to do was to go back to the Park Hopper selection and re-select the park I had chosen for hopping the first time, then move the slider for the time-selection all the way to the right to make the time as short as possible. That reduced the number of suggestions I had, but it still didn’t get rid of them.
Hopefully Disney will make it possible to remove the 2nd park suggestions in the future; I saw someone else writing about this exact same problem the other day.
The ability to see my top picks on the screen tip board does not appear to be a thing anymore. I’ve tried on two separate phones. Can you confirm this change?
Hi Elizabeth, I tested today and my Top Picks are pinned on the top of the screen as usual. Disney did update the app last week to add the ability to modify Lightning Lane reservations, so I would suggest checking to make sure you have the most current version of the app. Sometimes version differences can appear in weird ways. If you’re still having difficulty, I suggest contacting Disney to find out what’s going on. Good luck!
We use the same account, so that explains it. Thanks, Jennifer!
I don’t understand your answer to Denise. When I make top picks on my Disney phone app, my wife’s phone app changes to the same as mine. My top picks automatically change when she changes hers. Or were you and Denise talking about something different and I’m misunderstanding?
Hi Dave, I think you may be talking about the same thing that Denise and I were talking about, but what you see is not what we saw when we tested this yesterday.
Question: Are you and your wife logging into each phone with the same MDE account, or do you have separate accounts? If you’re logging in with the same account I would expect to see what you saw – that is, the picks are for the *account*, not the device. We tested with different MDE accounts, so if you were using a single account that could explain the difference between what we saw and what you see.
Can others in my travel party see my “My Top Picks” list in My Genie Day if I’ve selected them during setup? If so, how? If not, what is the purpose of choosing our travel party during the initial setup? Thanks in advance for clearing this up for us!
Hi Denise, we did a quick test today to double-check and the answer is no – each person sets up their own Genie day and they won’t see each other’s top picks. In a way this makes sense – if a group goes to the parks together and then splits up for a time, everyone can track their own stuff.
What choosing your travel party buys you is convenience. Whoever you’ve selected in your travel party will be selected automatically if you’re buying Genie+ or an ILL. You don’t have to buy/book for everyone who is selected, but it does make it a bit faster.
If you’re touring with a very large party, this matters more because the most you can book in a single LL or ILL reservation is 10. So if you have 20 people, it may be easier to split into 2 parties and have one person in each party manage the bookings.
The Disney app allows users to pin “top picks” to the top of the Tip Board.
Has any thought been given to having a similar feature on the Touring Plans app for the parks?
Hi Dave – this is a great suggestion. I think right now all eyes are focused on getting Lightning Lane recommendations working in touring plans (we’re close), but I’ve passed this on to the team.
Looks like you can customize the next park. I had this at bottom of My Genie Day this morning while setting up my boards for an upcoming trip:
Plan for Your Next Park
Tell Disney Genie What You’d Like to Do ›
Hi John – it never fails, you write something about MDE and it changes. 🙂 I’ll confirm that it’s actually asking you about another park the same day (instead of just telling you that you can set up a day in the future) and then try to grab some screenshots. Thanks for the headsup!
Quick follow-up — apparently this has been there for a while and I just flubbed it. Oops. Thanks for catching this error, much appreciated!
I’m sure this is an OCD question, but given that these things can only be tried for real on the Disney app after a person has actually reserved a park (which is like baptism by fire), is there any way Touring Plans can come up with a simulation of the Disney process so subscribers can practice customizing the tip board, “buying” Individual Lighting Lanes, and booking Genie+s?
Hi Dave,
This is an interesting idea that I’ll pass along. But I think there might be both IP-type and too-much-other-stuff-to-do type challenges, so I’m absolutely not making any promises other than passing it along.
I do have a suggestion though: you can use your tickets to “practice” with Genie in advance of your visit. Just make a reservation for a day in the near future, walk through the setup, check it out a bit, and then cancel the park reservation. It won’t help you practice booking Lightning Lanes, but the rest of it should work, and you can also (if you like) practice with the virtual queues this way. This may not work for package tickets because there is some funky stuff about their linkage to the hotel reservation (it might work, I just don’t know), but it should work for all other ticket types.
You can also see the Tip Board to check wait times etc. and get familiar with it even without a park reservation. It’s not quite the same as really being there, but as a fellow person with a tinge of OCD, every little bit helps. 🙂
I have done this and find it feels like my stuff is ignored in favor of other suggestions. The thing that drives me the most crazy about it is that My Genie day, all day long, is adding dining to my list, sometimes showing things only a couple hours apart. I really would like an option to say I do not want to dine or only show me the specific dining I pick but not there unless you know of a way.
Hi Edgar, Yes, the Genie suggestions can be kind of random and not terribly helpful. Here’s what I would suggest – and apologies if it overlaps with what you’ve tried.
I find that Genie inserts the fewest suggestions for “My Day” if I only make selections on the Top Picks screens and not on the My Interest screens – that’s one of the reasons I didn’t really highlight those screens here. So if you selected anything on the “My Interest” screen to say that you prefer table service dining, or prefer quick service dining — I would try not doing that, and see how it works.
I think My Genie Day can be useful for first-time visitors who don’t know the parks at all. But for myself, I pretty much just live on the Tip Board for touring and I think that’s probably the best move for most people who are familiar with the parks.