In short, the Disney Dining Plan is very much not one-size-fits-all, and this post reflects that reality! The DDP is a prepaid meal plan offered at Walt Disney World so guests can budget their dining costs in advance and potentially save money. It provides guests with credits that can be redeemed for snacks, counter service meals, table service meals, or fine dining meals.
Gratuity is not included on the Disney Dining Plan, meaning guests need to pay that out of pocket. This is one way that the Disney Dining Plan actually catches people by surprise—even during Free Dining or when paid for in advance, tips can add up and be a considerable and sometimes unanticipated expense at the end of the trip.
We recommend monitoring your Disney Dining Plan usage—including credits issued and redeemed—via the My Disney Experience app. For counter service restaurants, we highly recommend using the Mobile Order feature in the My Disney Experience app to redeem your credits, too.
Walt Disney World has released the Full List of Restaurants on Disney Dining Plans , and there are currently participating locations along with a handful of conspicuous omissions. That list is now pretty close to final, but will likely see a few changes throughout the year as new restaurants open and are added.
The big restaurants that are missing from the Disney Dining Plan are Space and California Grill. The commonality is that both locations are immensely popular and both serve prix fixe menus. Both would likely be 2-credit Signature Restaurants, making them poor uses of credits.
Even so, not everything on every menu is eligible for the DDP. Walt Disney World guests purchasing a vacation package with a room and tickets through Disney are eligible to buy the Disney Dining Plan.
This means that if you want the DDP, you cannot save money by staying in off-site hotel or by purchasing discount Walt Disney World tickets through a Disney-authorized ticket seller. Disney Vacation Club members staying on points are also eligible to add-on the Disney Dining Plan, without the purchase of park tickets through Disney as many of them either have Annual Passes or prefer purchasing discounted tickets through authorized third parties.
You can also add-on the Disney Dining Plan when renting DVC points , which is a great way to save money on accommodations. It no longer includes a dessert. Also as of this date, a counter service meal may also consist of 3 snack items defined below in a single transaction.
For those guests on the Deluxe Disney Dining Plan unavailable for , this also includes an appetizer. The definition of a snack has been expanded to include any single serving side item, which means more items will now be considered snacks snacks were previously determined on a case-by-case basis with the DDP symbol the purple thing above denoting what was a snack.
A snack now includes every side item, hand-scooped ice cream, and many other items that previously did not qualify as snacks. Tax is always included, but guests pay for tips out of pocket.
Two-Credit Table Service Restaurants — Some dining experiences at Walt Disney World require 2 credits rather than just a single credit.
By and large, these are premium offerings, such as Signature Restaurants, Dinner Shows, Pizza Delivery, or Room Service Meal.
These are, across the board, a waste of DDP credits. Nevertheless, here are the options:. Fine Dining or Signature Restaurants — Experience an elegant Table-Service option with a wide selection of cuisines ranging from traditional African, Indian and Mediterranean to premium steaks and fresh seafood in Signature Restaurants, which are mostly the fine dining restaurants in Deluxe Resorts.
Dinner at Be Our Guest Restaurant — Be Our Guest Restaurant in Magic Kingdom requires 2 Table-Service meal credits to be exchanged for a single dining experience.
Hoop-Dee-Doo Musical Revue Dinner Show — Enjoy family-style dining with live entertainment at a themed dinner show. All dinner shows require advance reservations. Two Table-Service meals will be redeemed from the dining plan for each person dining at a dinner show experience. At the other end of the spectrum, grab a mediocre but large!
pizza to eat in your room from one of the Value Resorts. Neither option is as good as it sounds. Dining Packages — Packages that include reserved seating for a show, such as Fantasmic or the EPCOT festival concerts and Candlelight Processional, are typically included in the Disney Dining Plan.
Here are the official details about using the DDP for Fantasmic Dining Packages:. The Quick-Service Disney Dining Plan is the lowest tier of the DDP. This is the tier that is typically included with Free Dining at the Value and Moderate Resorts. That amounts to an increase of a couple dollars for adults and a decrease of a couple dollars for kids over the course of 3 years.
For the price difference between the plans, you can upgrade from the Free Quick Service Dining Plan to this plan at the Value Resorts. and a slight decrease for kids in This is the upgraded tier of the Disney Dining Plan, which is best for guests who want to do table service lunch and dinners, or breakfast breakfast and dinners every day of their vacation.
By default, no resort tier receives this for Free Dining, but you can pay the difference to upgrade to it. Those on the Deluxe Plan may officially mix their adult and child credits, meaning that child credits may be used for adult entrees.
You could get even less or even more value out of the Dining Plan, depending upon what you order. By analyzing pricing, we can reverse engineer an approximate value that Disney places on each meal type within the various DDPs. For the purposes of these calculations, we view the refillable mug as a throw-in, since its value could fluctuate widely depending upon length of stay.
Those numbers are updated to account for price increases and decreases on the Disney Dining Plan. The result is a slight increase in the value ascribed to snack and counter service credits, and a massive increase for table service credits.
By comparing those dollar amounts to online menus available for Walt Disney World, you can get a pretty good idea of whether the Disney Dining Plan is right for your family.
With those rough numbers, you can do the math for yourself and make an informed decision as to whether the DDP is right for you. Spoiler: unless you drink alcohol at almost every meal and order expensive entrees at nice restaurants but not 2-credit ones! or do a lot of character dinners but not breakfasts!
Frequent users of the Disney Dining Plan become pretty adept at getting more bang for their buck, as they know these strategies are the difference between saving hundreds of dollars with the Disney Dining Plan and losing hundreds of dollars with it.
With these posts, quick menu review, and some advance planning, first-time visitors to Walt Disney World can also make the most of the Dining Plan!
Typically, Free Dining is offered for select dates in August through December. The Free Dining promotion is incredibly popular with Disney fans. When Free Dining is available, you forfeit another discount that might be offered—like a room-only discount.
Before even booking the Disney Dining Plan, you should determine where you want to eat and secure Advance Dining Reservations ADRs.
It should be easy to see which Disney Dining Plan best suits your needs, or if the Dining Plan is even necessary. Even for many on-site Walt Disney World guests, the Dining Plan is not the best option.
Vegans and vegetarians also will not be well-suited by the Disney Dining Plan. The list goes on…. Savings — You can save on the Disney Dining Plan, but you have to be a certain type of eater and not waste any credits.
If you are a big eater who likes steak and would like to order it at every meal, you can save money with the Disney Dining Plan. This requires that everyone in your party is a big eater, and that all of you use all of your counter service and snack credits wisely.
See our Worst Snack Credit Uses on the Disney Dining Plan list for more on that. If your teens are human garbage disposals and the adults in your party love steak, the Dining Plan can offer some savings.
As soon as anyone in your party starts ordering chicken or pasta, those savings disappear to the point that you start losing money on the Disney Dining Plan.
No matter what they order, a vegetarian will lose money by using the Disney Dining Plan—without exception. With the addition of alcohol to the Disney Dining Plan, anyone who enjoys a drink or two per day will also come out ahead. Alcohol is the huge new wildcard to the Disney Dining Plan, and can really swing the pendulum of value.
The good news is that taking advantage of this value does not require drinking—this is all about snacking! We highly recommend stockpiling snack credits and using them during your Epcot days, as not only are these festival snacks a great use of credits, but the Epcot festivals are a ton of fun, and this is a way to avoid the sticker shock of paying out of pocket.
The Deluxe Dining Plan can be utilized well if you follow the strategy of eating breakfast or an early lunch at a Table Service restaurant character breakfasts are great for this and dinner at a Signature Table Service Restaurant, plus snacks whenever. The appetizer and tip were cut ages ago, and prices have increased.
However, the biggest of the price increases occurred a few years ago, and prices have not climbed much since then. It would seem that Walt Disney World has reached its price ceiling or close to it with the Disney Dining Plan.
Prices are only up slightly, and that has been true of previous years, too. Prior to that, there were some double-digit price spikes. This means that the relative value of the Dining Plan versus paying out of pocket actually has improved of late.
Same goes for choosing more expensive restaurants. This blog alone has at least 10 articles about the Disney Dining Plan, and we could probably have another couple dozen and still have people asking us questions. While Sarah and I are both big eaters, at times, the Dining Plan is just too much food.
There have been occasions when we otherwise would have eaten small counter service meals, but because we had the credits to use, we have eaten at Table Service restaurants. Not only did this result in over-consumption, but it also burned valuable vacation time.
If you have a short trip and want to experience as many attractions as possible, this is something to keep in mind. While you can get value out of the Disney Dining Plan, that savings requires sitting down for longer meals and eating a lot of food. Convenience — Many visitors argue that the Disney Dining Plan is about convenience.
We contend that it is not convenient. Hopefully none. A convoluted credit system cannot possibly be more convenient than the universal standard of paying money for a billed amount.
Budgeting — This is probably the most contentious point. In addition to supposedly being convenient, a lot of its fans advocate the Disney Dining Plan because it helps them stay on a budget and avoid thinking about money on vacation. Overspending might cause financial strain.
Disney Gift Cards before the trip. If you love filet mignon, but would shy away from ordering it upon seeing the menu price, the Disney Dining Plan might be for you. However, you might have some sticker shock when you see the nightly prices of the Dining Plan, in the first place….
Overall, whether the Disney Dining Plan is right for you is a personal decision based on a lot of variables. We estimate that for the majority of guests, it is not a good value.
If you use the Disney Dining Plan for your vacation, make sure you do your homework and plan accordingly! They get their commission from Disney, so none of the authorized key word planners will charge you for booking their trip and helping.
With regard to the Disney Dining Plan and restaurants in general, this article is just a jumping off point. Want more dining recommendations?
Check out our Walt Disney World Restaurant Reviews. For info on whether the DDP is right for you, read our Ultimate Guide to the Disney Dining Plan. For comprehensive vacation advice, the best place to start is our Walt Disney World Trip Planning Guide for everything you need to know!
What is your experience with the Disney Dining Plan? Thinking about buying the Disney Dining Plan once it becomes available?
Does the DDP work for you? Is it a bad fit for your family? Do you agree or disagree with our assessment? Any questions? Hearing your feedback—even when you disagree with us—is both interesting to us and helpful to other readers, so please share your thoughts below in the comments!
Do you know if that still works with the Disney dining plan. I just returned from Disney and asked a cast member about this new rule.
She did confirm that the unused meals can not be used as snack credits like before. If you dont use them, you loose them. I hope this helps. This is as of January, , but just like all other Disney things, it may change. Hi Tom! Thank you for the article.
It is extremely helpful as I am planning my first visit with my son in May. I think another factor, or at least the one I am seeing, is other deals with the dining plan.
That said, I did plan on using it for at least 2 character 2 credit meals. Note, the adults are both drinkers. Thank you!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Eileen: I agree with you. Tom you should definitely take note!
If you have kids between 3 and 9 only then this discount is actually a super good deal. When paying out of pocket, you show up where you want, order what you want, and pay for what you ordered.
Our experience with both paying out of pocket and with using the Disney Dining Plan has been that paying out of pocket is unquestionably more convenient. Any convenience of the Disney Dining Plan is illusory. More importantly, what about actual savings?
Based on my numbers, we clearly saved more money by not using the Disney Dining Plan and instead paying out of pocket and using Tables in Wonderland we would have saved more even without the Tables in Wonderland card. However, in fairness, those numbers are a bit misleading.
Honestly, we could have changed our style pretty easily without negatively affecting our experience and that would have made the gap between out of pocket and the Disney Dining Plan a bit smaller. Something that would have negatively affected our experience, but would also have decreased BOTH totals would have been to eat 2 additional counter service meals and 2 fewer table service meals.
Obviously, this would have decreased the Dining Plan total more than the out of pocket total since we had the unused counter service credits on the Dining Plan. In fact, my rough math shows that, had we done that, the totals would have been almost even.
My preference is eating whatever I want at any restaurant and dining at the two table service restaurants rather than adding 2 counter service restaurants to the plans, but the point remains. It was true on this one trip we took, but is definitely not always true, even for us.
This also shows that there is no single answer to the out of pocket versus Disney Dining Plan question in terms of savings. The results can substantially deviate based upon your personal dining reservations, plans, and eating habits. While my numbers illustrate this point, they offer little more than illustration, and are really little more than academic here.
The real point is that both paying out of pocket and using the Disney Dining Plan can each be viable options worthy of consideration. Walt Disney World almost always has discounts. Walt Disney World almost always offers discounts on vacations. Free Dining is one discount that Disney offers. It thus becomes a question of opportunity cost.
Do YOU save more money paying with free dining and a full priced room and tickets than you do with a room discount and paying out of pocket for food and with potentially discounted tickets?
This is more than the average daily amount that we spend on food, which is why we book the room-only discount at BoardWalk if both discounts are offered. If there were 2 more people staying in the room with us, that would tip the scale in favor of Free Dining.
I know everyone hates math, but the point, once again, is that you have to do the math for your circumstances to know for sure. Planning your dining is almost as important as booking your airfare. A lot of Walt Disney World restaurants book up months in advance, and the difference in experience between a good and a bad restaurant is like night and day.
We highly recommend reading some of our restaurant reviews and checking out menus online before before making your Advance Dining Reservations.
Planning a Walt Disney World trip? Learn about hotels on our Walt Disney World Hotels Reviews page. For where to eat, read our Walt Disney World Restaurant Reviews. To save money on tickets or determine which type to buy, read our Tips for Saving Money on Walt Disney World Tickets post.
Our What to Pack for Disney Trips post takes a unique look at clever items to take. For what to do and when to do it, our Walt Disney World Ride Guides will help.
For comprehensive advice, the best place to start is our Walt Disney World Trip Planning Guide for everything you need to know!
Do you typically use the Disney Dining Plan or do you pay out of pocket? What works best for you? Share your thoughts in the comments! Hi, i have just discovered your blog and i am using it every step of the way to plan our amazing WDW trip hopefully in We are all the way from Australia 🙂.
I am curious if you could shed some light on one thing for me please — the advice I have read is that you want to book restaurants days from your arrival to secure a table. That sort of works against any spontaneity of walking around the park on the day and choosing a restaurant we feel like dining at.
I want to know how much planning and research i need to do to secure the restaurants we might like. Thanks again, i absolutely adore your blog and I am taking all your advice on board to plan the perfect trip! Thank you for this comparison.
It really helped me a lot. Looking a planning another Disney trip. I will probally end up going with the meal plan even though we will probally not quite get our moneys worth.
proper examination should be apple to apples. majority of visitors are out of state, OR out of country, AND not part of DVC, or passholders. they arent eligible to purchase the wonderland table card.
thats not the same as buying anything you want. use NO discounts — — Other than what Disneys gives you for staying on-site. follow the Dining Plans rules, and buy the foods out of pocket correlating to the plan. then total your receipts against the cost of the Dining Plan, to see whos actually saving money.
then compare your receipts vs the cost of the QS plan. then you do this for Dining Plan. then you do this for Deluxe Plan. and could better show actual price differences of your purchases vs each of the Dining Plan. Good for YOU! Soda doesnt count since you have the refill Cup.
unless you want Shakes, Fraps, etc. I am not a huge eater and will definitely want some alcohol at some point during the day due to the nature of Disney World and spending the entire day there with my niece and nephew. My husband can definitely eat, but only if it is available to him.
I think your correct, forget the meal plan. stayed at the beach club once and it was a disappointment. I like to use the meal plan cost as a budget number for food though.
Your mileage may vary the children should be considerably less. The deluxe plan does include appetizers, and alcoholic beverages. Maybe that is new since you did this. Many people cannot get a Tables in wonderland card, or go 4 times a year, so we do not really mind planning out and getting reservations.
And do you totally not care about the mug at the resort? The way I see it when figuring out if it is worth doing or not you take the value of that and the snacks off first. I do know that we are not saving money on tips, but neither is anyone else.
You tip on the bill, and do not take off discounts anyway. I am just getting ready for my first trip where I stay at a resort, and my husband is going to want 2 non fast food meals each day.
Plus, if you do any of the special things like Morimoto Asia, and use a lot of you snacks at an Epcot festival like food and wine, well, I plan to check the totals at the end and see, but so for we are coming out way ahead.
Also, there is no reason not to finish out any meals you have left over before you leave by loading up on Disney snack items, so I see no reason to have any left over.
We are doing exactly what we want to do too. And all the sales tax is figured on the cost of the plan rather than the cost of the food we actually bought. Some of the things we really wanted, and I got are full now. Or you have to spend a lot of Tim waiting for a standby spot. I am not really big on planning a lot at Dwd I like to wake up and decide where I want to go.
I am sure I will find food. A few years ago I went with my daughter and the family a 12yo and 8 yo.
The schedule was harrowing. We were constantly watching the time have to get from animal kingdom to Epcot by 7 have to be at fast track at 8. All day every day it was a lot of work not my style!
Hi there, silly question. Can I choose to pay out of pocket even if I have the Dining Plan? For example, I want to save two of my table service credits for CRT, but a quick dinner grab at Mama Melrose, can I just pay out of pocket to save the credit?
I need to first plan everything to the millisecond, then see IF the dining plan is a good deal or not, THEN make the reservation, THEN hope that 6 months before coming, the availability of the restaurants and the vacation plan are compatible, THEN hope that 2 months before going, the availability for Fast Pass will be compatible with everything else…..
So confusing! How do you know when you will be hungry and what you will be close to so you can preplan? Our first time and making reservations without any of the above knowledge is crazy to me!
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