Last updated on December 27th, 2021 at 10:27 pm
So you’ve decided, you’re going to Walt Disney World! Do you know where to start when it comes to planning for your 2022 Disney trip?
Trips to Walt Disney World are a little different than vacations at the beach. You can play your trip by ear, but you won’t get nearly as much out of it as if you spent a little time planning it out. You don’t want to be stuck without a park reservation, or any idea what you’re going to do for dinner!
For me, planning the trip is half the fun and builds up the excitement for when you go! But I know not everyone is like that, so I’ve put together everything I know and have learned planning Disney World vacations over the past 10 years.
Let me do most of the leg work for you!
Covered in this post:
- Time of the Year to Visit
- The Weather
- Using Touring Plans
- Picking Your Hotel
- Buying Park Tickets
- Picking Park Days
- Using a Disney Travel Planner
The first place to start when planning your 2022 Disney trip, is when you’re going to go! There’s a couple of things to take into consideration when initially planning dates for your vacation.
Time of the Year for Your 2022 Disney Trip
If you have school-aged children, you have less options for when you want to visit if you aren’t planning on pulling your kids out of school.
Any time schools aren’t in session will naturally be busier at Walt Disney World. You may have a harder time getting on every ride, and coveted dining reservations, but you’ll still have an amazing time!
Any major holiday, like Christmas or New Year, Spring Break, or the summer when kids are out of school will be busier.
If you’re not beholden to school schedules (like we are right now with a toddler!), you can pick a less busy time to visit.
We’ve loved visiting in November before Thanksgiving, and in April, where crowds have been lower than average.
The Weather
Another thing to take into consideration when planning your 2022 Disney trip is the weather.
Orlando weather can range from relatively mild during the winter, to scorching hot and stormy during the summer.
If you don’t have any issues with hot weather, you can plan your trip just about any time! But keep in mind, during the summer it’s very likely you’ll get caught in a quick rain storm, nearly every day.
In my family, I remember one hot summer vacation when my mom had to spend an extended amount of time sitting in the Penguin House at a zoo because she was experiencing some heat sickness. So, we’re not always the best in hot weather.
Although you can pick a time where you think there will be good weather, just know it will likely change.
Our last trip was mid-February and anticipated the weather would be in the 70’s. But for most of the time it actually ended up being in the 90’s almost every day, and one freak day in the 50’s.
We’ll make sure you’re prepared once we start planning our outfits and packing!
Touring Plans
The first place I started planning for my 2022 Disney trip (and where I start for any Disney trip), is TouringPlans.com.
Touring Plans is an amazing subscription service I’ve been using since 2012, and helps you plan the ultimate Disney vacation. A subscription for Walt Disney World is just $17.95, with options to add on Disneyland, Disney Cruise Line or Universal Studios for a nominal additional cost.
If you’re going to Disney World during a busy time, I would highly recommend using Touring Plans! Personally, I use Touring Plans no matter the time we’re going!
We’ll get more into the park and ride planning features Touring Plans offers later on in this series, but for now we’ll start with the Disney World 2022 Crowd Calendar.
Using historical data, and I’m assuming Pixie Dust, Touring Plans is able to magically predict how busy each park will be daily on a scale from 1-10, and an overall Disney World Resort crowd level.
If you’re open to visiting anytime, use the Disney World 2022 crowd calendar to find a period of time with low crowd levels that works with your schedule.
Not as flexible for when you can visit? Use Touring Plans to pick the less busy parks to visit each day of your trip. And use the Touring Plans feature to make sure you hit every ride!
So now we have an idea when your 2022 Disney trip is going to be, we can decide where you’re going to stay!
Picking Your Hotel
I personally recommend staying at a Walt Disney World Resort hotel for the convenience factor throughout your whole vacation.
Easy transportation to the parks, extra time in the parks (when this perk returns), and an overall magical experience.
Quick story – I love collecting hotel pens and was bummed on our last trip when they stopped putting them in the rooms (although I totally understand why!). My husband asked the Concierge if he could get a pen for his pen-collecting wife, and the Concierge was happy to oblige!
Disney World also ups the convenience factor when you have a child by having roll-away cribs, pack-and-plays and bed rails available to get delivered to your room.
First, let’s narrow down your hotel search by your price range. Disney World hotels fall into the following categories:
- Deluxe Villa Resort Hotels
- Deluxe Resort Hotels
- Moderate Resort Hotels
- Value Resort Hotels
The time of year you’re planning on visiting will make a difference in how much your hotel room is going to cost.
Here’s what you should consider and keep in mind as you’re picking a hotel room –
- Proximity to the parks
- How close do you want to be to any of the parks? Or are you not concerned about being in close proximity?
- Transportation
- Do you want to walk, take a bus, boat or skyliner (or a combination) to get to where you want to go?
- Room size/group size
- Do you have a large group that will need more than one room? Will someone be ok sleeping on a pullout? Will you need a crib?
- Time spent in the room
- Will you be in the parks at rope drop and not coming back until late, late at night? Or are you coming back to your room in the middle of the day for a nap or a dip in the pool?
- Dining availability
- Would you prefer quick options for food, or sit-down restaurants?
One more thing to keep in mind, if you book your hotel rooms and later on there’s an amazing deal, call Disney so you can get that deal! It’s better to book your hotel room now, instead of waiting for a deal later on!
Deluxe Villa Resort Hotels
- Disney’s Riviera Resort
- Disney’s Polynesian Villas & Bungalows
- Copper Creek Villas & Cabins at Disney’s Wilderness Lodge
- Boulder Ridge Villas at Disney’s Wilderness Lodge
- Disney’s BoardWalk Villas
- Disney’s Saratoga Springs Resort & Spa
- Disney’s Animal Kingdom Villas – Jambo House
- Disney’s Animal Kingdom Villas – Kidani Village
- Bay Lake Tower at Disney’s Contemporary Resort
- The Villas at Disney’s Grand Floridian Resort & Spa
- Disney’s Beach Club Villas
- Disney’s Old Key West Resort
Deluxe villas are available at a long list of Disney World resorts and offer multi-room accommodations and fully-equipped kitchens or kitchenettes.
Of these resorts, the Riviera is on the Skyliner, so you can easily get to Epcot and Hollywood Studios!
Deluxe Resort Hotels
Magic Kingdom Monorail Resorts –
These resorts are a short walk or a monorail ride away from the Magic Kingdom, and you’re going to pay a premium for these hotel rooms. Other parks and Disney Springs are accessible by bus.
There’s special areas around each of the resorts where you can watch the fireworks over the Magic Kingdom, and the music is piped in directly from the park!
Most rooms in this group of hotels sleep between 3 and 6 people, with options to rent 1 or 2-bedroom suites.
Fun fact! My parents stayed at the Polynesian back in 1980 for their Honeymoon!
Magic Kingdom Resort Area –
The Magic Kingdom is available by water taxi, and the other parts and Disney Springs are accessible by bus!
There’s also fun activities like boat rentals and fishing!
Epcot Resort Area –
This group of resorts is all within walking distance of Epcot and Hollywood Studios. Plus, close to the Skyliner!
Hollywood Studios is a bit of a walk (20-ish minutes), but is also accessible by water taxi.
Magic Kingdom, Animal Kingdom and Disney Springs are all just a bus ride away.
All three resorts (plus the Swan and Dolphin) are within walking distance of each other, so you can visit Beaches and Cream at the Beach Club, or the pizza takeout window at the BoardWalk!
We like to rent Disney Vacation Club Points (which we’ll cover later), and stay at the BoardWalk. We LOVE the proximity to Epcot and Hollywood Studios, the food, and Abracadabar!
Animal Kingdom Resort Area –
This resort is the closest to Animal Kingdom via a bus ride, and the farthest away from the other parks and Disney Springs.
Animal Kingdom resorts have the Savannah where you can watch free-roaming animals, and AMAZING dining options!
Deluxe resorts will have a couple options for food – usually a quick service option and at least one sit-down restaurant.
Moderate Resort Hotels
- Disney’s Coronado Springs Resort
- Disney’s Port Orleans Resort – Riverside
- Disney’s Port Orleans Resort – French Quarter
- Disney’s Caribbean Beach Resort
- The Cabins at Disney’s Fort Wilderness Resort
This group of resorts isn’t within walking distance of a park, but some do have boats!
Grab a boat at the Cabins at Fort Wilderness to the Magic Kingdom or the Contemporary.
Port Orleans resorts have a water taxi to Disney Springs!
All of the resorts offer bus service to the parks and Disney Springs.
Some of these resorts will offer a sit-down restaurant, but for the most part they have quick service and cafeterias available for dining.
The majority of rooms at these resorts will sleep up to 4 guests.
Value Resort Hotels
- Disney’s Art of Animation Resort
- Disney’s All-Star Music Resort
- Disney’s All-Star Sports Resort
- Disney’s All-Star Movies Resort
- Disney’s Pop Century Resort
If you’re planning on being in the parks all day and night, and just need a place to sleep, the value resort hotels are right up your alley!
The All-Star resorts all have bus service to the parks and Disney Springs.
While Art of Animation and Pop Century are on the Skyliner route, so you can get to Epcot and Hollywood Studios! Keep in mind because of the transportation availability, and because they have family suites that can accommodate a bigger group, the rate is going to be higher than at the All-Star resorts.
These resorts all have great theming, so you’re still going to have a magical Disney World experience!
There’s no sit-down restaurants at these resorts, but there are cafeterias at each so you have plenty of options for food.
Select Deluxe Hotels
The Swan and Dolphin hotels are located on the same Epcot Resort loop with the Yacht Club, Beach Club and BoardWalk Inn, but they’re not official Disney World Resorts.
The have some of the same amenities like transportation to the parks, and ability to make advance reservations (when they’re available). However guests don’t receive complimentary Magic Bands (that will also be discontinued for Disney Resort guests soon), the ability to charge items back to your room, and access to Disney’s Magical Express bus service (which will also be discontinued for Disney Resort guests starting 1/1/22).
These are some beautiful hotels, with an amazing location, for far less than the other resorts in the same area.
Renting Disney Vacation Club Points for your 2022 Disney Vacation
One last option for your Disney World Resort stay is renting Disney Vacation Club Points.
The Disney Vacation Club (or DVC) is a flexible timeshare program at Disney Resorts and other locations around the world.
DVC members enroll in the program by paying an upfront fee, and yearly dues. Every year, members get points to spend at their “home” resort, or other resorts across the property or world.
When members aren’t able to use their points, they’ll sometimes work through a company like David’s Vacation Club Rentals to sell their points.
Working through David’s Vacation Club Rentals, you select the dates of your visit and your desired resort and see what points are available for purchase.
This is the method we use for our rooms at the BoardWalk Inn, and we’re able to get a studio suite for way less than if we went right through Disney! Think somewhere in the $300-range instead of $600-700!
It’s a great way to stay at Deluxe Resorts for less!
A couple things to know however – you’re going to be signing a contract to purchase these points from the owner via David’s Vacation Club Rentals. Once you sign this contract, there’s no moving/changing dates or canceling.
Just make sure your plans are set before going through with this option!
This is what we’re planning on doing for our 2022 Disney trip!
Buying Tickets and Picking Park Days
Park Tickets
So you have your dates planned, and hotel rooms booked for your 2022 Disney trip. Now it’s time to buy your park tickets!
Some companies offer Walt Disney World ticket discounts, so find out if you can get a deal!
Mike’s company does offer discounted tickets, but they’re for “visit anytime” park passes. We’ve found the tickets for the specific timeframe we’re going for are usually cheaper.
There’s a couple different types of tickets you can purchase:
- Standard Theme Park Day Ticket
- Visit one park per day
- Can buy tickets for anywhere between 1-10 days
- Water Park and Sports Option
- Pick one park per day, and enjoy a certain number of days at a Water Park or sports-related activity
- Park Hopper Option
- After visiting your initial park for the day, after 2pm hop to any other park with availability
- Park Hopper Plus Option
- In addition to park hopping, visit a certain number of days at a Water Park or sports-related activity
What you’ll notice is as you get into adding more and more days, the price to add on an additional day gets smaller and smaller.
So depending on when you visit, the difference between a 6-day and a 7-day park ticket per person could be as low as $25.
Picking Park Days
If you haven’t been to Walt Disney World recently, something new for your 2022 Disney trip will be selecting park days.
As of now, gone are the days when you could pick what park you wanted to visit on a whim and hop from park to park.
Going back to using Touring Plans, take a look at the crowd levels for the time you’re going to be visiting and pick which parks you’d like to visit.
You can pick the park with the lowest crowd level per day, or if that doesn’t work with your plans, make sure you use a Touring Plan for each of the days you visit!
As soon as you know what parks you want to visit on which days, and you’ve purchased your tickets, make your park reservations! Because once those spots are gone, they’re gone!
On your park days, once you’ve visited the first park you made a reservation for, you can visit another park after 2pm! Just make sure you find out the park you want to visit next still has capacity!
Using a Disney Travel Planner
Last but not least, if you don’t even know where to start, use a Disney Travel Planner! They are 100% FREE for you to use!
They’re available to help you book hotel rooms, get park tickets and reservations, and as you get closer to your trip, help get dining reservations!
Check out Ears and Cheers Travel LLC to get started planning your 2022 Disney trip with some help!
Get all of these tips, and more, in The Harper Girls Walt Disney World Planning Guide! Over 70 printer-friendly pages of information, including planning checklists, fun things to do in Disney (for free!), budget tips, resort and park info, and more!
Purchase the guide here, or sign up for our newsletter and get a code for 20% off!
Other Disney World Planning Posts –
How to Plan a Trip for a Large Group in Disney