Thankfully or sadly, relying upon your viewpoint, we have been incorrect. After transferring over to Animal Kingdom in Summer time 2025, a welcome exchange we expected would ultimate till early 2026, Prolonged Night time Hours is returning to Magic Kingdom simply in time for Birthday party Season. Listed below are the main points, plus Walt Disney Global crowds observation, anticipated leisure schedules & park hours, and why this may well be a mistake.
Prolonged Night time Theme Park Hours is midnight counterpart to Early Theme Park Access. There are a number of variations, maximum particularly that visitors staying at Worth or Reasonable Inns don’t seem to be eligible for Prolonged Night time Hours. Nevertheless it’s no longer simply the most costly inns–you’ll be able to get monetary savings via renting DVC issues or staying on the Swolphin–the ones are each nice techniques to hack ExEH and benefit from the perk and a nicer hotel for a lower cost.
Prolonged Night time Theme Park Hours has two tiers of hotel eligibility, happens two nights a week, is at two parks, and runs for 2 hours. It’s typically Monday at EPCOT and Wednesday at Magic Kingdom. See our Technique Information Information for Prolonged Night time Hours at Walt Disney Global for extra fine details of the midnight Deluxe receive advantages.
For many who haven’t been following this saga, it at the start revolved round Walt Disney Global making a number of calendar adjustments to put the groundwork for the possible debut date of Disney Starlight Night time Parade. That came about by means of moving Fortunately Ever After later, blockading out Forged Contributors from Magic Kingdom, and transferring ExEH over to Animal Kingdom. Even sooner than that, the 3-Day, 3-Park Price ticket Deal except Magic Kingdom is a great instance of this forward-thinking crowd regulate effort. Ditto the new AP reservation rule.
We are saying laying the groundwork as a result of Starlight ended up lacking its previous goal and is now opening on July 20, 2025. So if anything else, Walt Disney Global may unblock CMs and repair ExEH at Animal Kingdom in July. The previous may nonetheless occur, however the latter is not likely for the reason that scheduling has been set.
Ultimate minute park hours extensions are commonplace, however no longer swapping ‘additional hours’ places. Judging via the reader response to our unique publish at the subject, I’m guessing few, if any, Walt Disney Global visitors can be dissatisfied via ExEH transferring again to MK for early to mid-July.
Talking of which, listed below are the dates when Animal Kingdom will host Prolonged Night time Hours:
- Wednesday, July 2, 2025
- Wednesday, July 9, 2025
- Wednesday, July 16, 2025
- Wednesday, July 23, 2025
- Wednesday, July 30, 2025
- Wednesday, August 6, 2025
Lately, Prolonged Night time Hours is scheduled from 6:00 pm to eight:00 pm at Animal Kingdom, beginning after the park closes for normal day visitors and finishing sooner than sundown. On the other hand, park hours extensions for July have no longer but came about, so those ExEH instances may shift to six:30 pm to eight:30 pm or possibly 7-9 pm, if we’re fortunate!
Rapid-forward to the following week and Magic Kingdom is once more web hosting Prolonged Night time Hours on Wednesday, August 13, 2025. The transfer has no longer but been introduced via Walt Disney Global, however you’ll be able to see the exchange by means of the My Disney Revel in app.
This can be a truly curious transfer, particularly since Mickey’s No longer So Horrifying Halloween Birthday party begins two days later, on Friday, August 15, 2025. Following that, there are 3 weekly MNSSHPs from the leap in August, that means that if Magic Kingdom continues to host Prolonged Night time Hours all the way through Birthday party Season, there might be 4 post-closing occasions maximum weeks at Magic Kingdom during the finish of the 12 months, and 5 occasions some weeks.
Having ExEH at Magic Kingdom any dates all the way through those weeks (together with August 20, 2025) can be a mistake. Which is strictly why Walt Disney Global in large part has have shyed away from this kind of scheduling all the way through previous Birthday party Seasons (see under). That is doubly true this 12 months given the exaggerated impact that the outlet of Starlight could have on attendance at Magic Kingdom all the way through Birthday party Season.
Lately, Prolonged Night time Hours is scheduled to happen from 10 pm till nighttime at Magic Kingdom on August 13, 2025. This will likely most definitely (confidently) shift to 11 pm to one am.
Magic Kingdom is recently indexed as being open from 9 am to ten pm day by day in July and August 2025. On the other hand, those are boilerplate hours. We’re absolutely anticipating 11 pm or (hands crossed) nighttime closures. If that’s no longer recently the plan, it’s a mistake.
I’m begging Walt Disney Global to ship some operations and PAC other folks over to Disneyland to look how they deal with Paint the Night time. No longer even a funny story–it could be critically really useful to be told from the professionals, and watch how they do issues.
The cause of transferring Prolonged Night time Hours from Magic Kingdom to Animal Kingdom because of Starlight comes right down to scheduling. As defined in our complete Information to Disney Starlight Parade’s Debut at Magic Kingdom, our perfect bet for the agenda is as follows:
- First Starlight Parade: 9 pm
- Fortunately Ever After: 10 pm
- 2nd Starlight Parade: 11 pm
- Park Remaining: 11 pm or nighttime
With the second one Starlight Night time Parade stepping off at 11 p.m., this necessarily quantities to a nighttime last for Magic Kingdom although the printed time finally ends up being 11 pm. After all, this assumes there are two nightly performances of Starlight, which isn’t a certain factor given Walt Disney Global’s penny-pinching techniques.
Once more assuming two nightly parades, it behooves Walt Disney Global to transport ExEH to Animal Kingdom for the remainder of the summer season to cut back the tension on Magic Kingdom operations. Simply seeking to run Starlight and set up common crowd drift goes to be a significant problem.
Anyway, it’ll be fascinating to look simply how lengthy Prolonged Night time Hours at Magic Kingdom lasts. Perhaps it’ll simply be one week, bouncing again to DAK or DHS as soon as Birthday party Season kicks into prime tools. By which case, what used to be the purpose? Looking to squeeze in a single date for the sake of visitor delight? If that is so, kudos to Disney.
The opposite is somewhat relating to–that Disney doesn’t truly know what to anticipate/what it’s doing with Starlight. That is one thing we’ve discussed in different posts, but it surely bears repeating: Walt Disney Global hasn’t hosted an evening parade in nearly a decade. One in every of my fears is that Walt Disney Global has misplaced such a lot institutional wisdom since then that they don’t understand how to deal with operational logistics for an evening parade. The COVID closure ended in numerous early retirements a number of the outdated guard who knew how issues labored, and Walt Disney Global nonetheless hasn’t absolutely recovered from that.
Whilst it is a worry, it used to be a minimum of reassuring that they moved ExEH clear of Magic Kingdom, made the Fortunately Ever After agenda exchange, and blocked out Forged Contributors. All of this demonstrates that Walt Disney Global does have a clue, and wouldn’t fumble issues once you have them proper at the start. So possibly it’ll leap over to Disney’s Hollywood Studios for the rest of August?
To that time, I nonetheless very strongly suspect there might be few Prolonged Night time Hours dates in Magic Kingdom from mid-August till the second one week of January 2026. Be aware that this isn’t but reliable–the whole lot past the primary two weeks of August 2025 is solely speculative at this level.
Usually, Disney’s Hollywood Studios and Animal Kingdom take over web hosting tasks from Magic Kingdom each and every 12 months in September or October. This happens on account of Birthday party Season, which starts in early August and kicks into prime tools in past due September.
This 12 months, the instances might be other with Starlight, which can motive upper crowds in Magic Kingdom on non-party nights even in August and September. We predict relatively remarkable attendance at MK on non-party nights from August thru December because of Starlight.
Usually, Prolonged Night time Hours strikes to Disney’s Hollywood Studios if Magic Kingdom has scheduling conflicts. Animal Kingdom is in most cases the backup to DHS, taking on if that park is web hosting events.
That typically occurs in November and December with the Jollywood Nights Christmas Birthday party. Now, it’s going on because of After Hours at Disney’s Hollywood Studios, which runs maximum Wednesday nights thru September 3, 2025.
In concept, DHS may take over ExEH beginning then for a few months. In truth, that might be more or less the standard cadence from the ultimate two years. The purpose of all that is that there are not any promises about which park(s) will host Prolonged Night time Hours after August 13, 2025. Smartly, except for EPCOT. That’s just about a certain factor barring the uncommon park buyout all the way through conference season. However as for the Wednesday ExEH, it is usually a mixture of DAK, DHS, or even the occasional MK.
It used to be a savvy transfer to shift Prolonged Night time Hours to Animal Kingdom that might assist redistribute crowds, making the opposite 3 parks somewhat much less busy and Animal Kingdom much less of a ghost the city on the tail finish of the day. From an function “larger excellent” viewpoint, my hope is that DAK hosts ExEH for all dates after August 13, 2025.
Selfishly and subjectively, I’m hoping Prolonged Night time Hours remains at Magic Kingdom. We’ve got DVC remains booked for 2 Wednesdays in August and September, and most definitely extra past that. Up to I revel in Animal Kingdom at night time (and I do!), I typically get my fill all the way through the vacation season when the park is most lovely, cooler, and closes after sundown nightly.
I do know Magic Kingdom might be busier on ExEH if it does host the development, however I will handle that. The possibility of being in Magic Kingdom till 1 am is beautiful interesting to me, in my opinion, if I are aware of it’s destructive to the larger visitor enjoy. That’s exactly why there used to be a little bit of ‘backlash’ to the DAK transfer–maximum readers right here perceive the ‘larger excellent’ attitude, however nonetheless selfishly need what’s perfect for their very own journeys. Can’t blame any individual for that!
Making plans a Walt Disney Global travel? Know about inns on our Walt Disney Global Resorts Critiques web page. For the place to consume, learn our Walt Disney Global Eating place Critiques. To economize on tickets or resolve which kind to shop for, learn our Guidelines for Saving Cash on Walt Disney Global Tickets publish. Our What to Pack for Disney Journeys publish takes a singular have a look at artful pieces to take. For what to do and when to do it, our Walt Disney Global Trip Guides will assist. For complete recommendation, the most productive position to start out is our Walt Disney Global Go back and forth Making plans Information for the whole lot you wish to have to understand!
YOUR THOUGHTS
Will you be profiting from Prolonged Night time Theme Park Hours at Magic Kingdom on August 13? Hope that MK continues to host ExEH all the way through Birthday party Season? Or do you view this from the ‘larger excellent’ viewpoint, being worried in regards to the monkey wrench that’ll be thrown into attendance traits if MK has a midnight tournament 4-5 nights a week? Do you compromise or disagree with our evaluation? Any questions we will allow you to resolution? Listening to your comments–even while you disagree with us–is each fascinating to us and useful to different readers, so please percentage your ideas under within the feedback!
Thankfully or sadly, relying upon your viewpoint, we have been incorrect. After transferring over to Animal Kingdom in Summer time 2025, a welcome exchange we expected would ultimate till early 2026, Prolonged Night time Hours is returning to Magic Kingdom simply in time for Birthday party Season. Listed below are the main points, plus Walt Disney Global crowds observation, anticipated leisure schedules & park hours, and why this may well be a mistake.
Prolonged Night time Theme Park Hours is midnight counterpart to Early Theme Park Access. There are a number of variations, maximum particularly that visitors staying at Worth or Reasonable Inns don’t seem to be eligible for Prolonged Night time Hours. Nevertheless it’s no longer simply the most costly inns–you’ll be able to get monetary savings via renting DVC issues or staying on the Swolphin–the ones are each nice techniques to hack ExEH and benefit from the perk and a nicer hotel for a lower cost.
Prolonged Night time Theme Park Hours has two tiers of hotel eligibility, happens two nights a week, is at two parks, and runs for 2 hours. It’s typically Monday at EPCOT and Wednesday at Magic Kingdom. See our Technique Information Information for Prolonged Night time Hours at Walt Disney Global for extra fine details of the midnight Deluxe receive advantages.
For many who haven’t been following this saga, it at the start revolved round Walt Disney Global making a number of calendar adjustments to put the groundwork for the possible debut date of Disney Starlight Night time Parade. That came about by means of moving Fortunately Ever After later, blockading out Forged Contributors from Magic Kingdom, and transferring ExEH over to Animal Kingdom. Even sooner than that, the 3-Day, 3-Park Price ticket Deal except Magic Kingdom is a great instance of this forward-thinking crowd regulate effort. Ditto the new AP reservation rule.
We are saying laying the groundwork as a result of Starlight ended up lacking its previous goal and is now opening on July 20, 2025. So if anything else, Walt Disney Global may unblock CMs and repair ExEH at Animal Kingdom in July. The previous may nonetheless occur, however the latter is not likely for the reason that scheduling has been set.
Ultimate minute park hours extensions are commonplace, however no longer swapping ‘additional hours’ places. Judging via the reader response to our unique publish at the subject, I’m guessing few, if any, Walt Disney Global visitors can be dissatisfied via ExEH transferring again to MK for early to mid-July.
Talking of which, listed below are the dates when Animal Kingdom will host Prolonged Night time Hours:
- Wednesday, July 2, 2025
- Wednesday, July 9, 2025
- Wednesday, July 16, 2025
- Wednesday, July 23, 2025
- Wednesday, July 30, 2025
- Wednesday, August 6, 2025
Lately, Prolonged Night time Hours is scheduled from 6:00 pm to eight:00 pm at Animal Kingdom, beginning after the park closes for normal day visitors and finishing sooner than sundown. On the other hand, park hours extensions for July have no longer but came about, so those ExEH instances may shift to six:30 pm to eight:30 pm or possibly 7-9 pm, if we’re fortunate!
Rapid-forward to the following week and Magic Kingdom is once more web hosting Prolonged Night time Hours on Wednesday, August 13, 2025. The transfer has no longer but been introduced via Walt Disney Global, however you’ll be able to see the exchange by means of the My Disney Revel in app.
This can be a truly curious transfer, particularly since Mickey’s No longer So Horrifying Halloween Birthday party begins two days later, on Friday, August 15, 2025. Following that, there are 3 weekly MNSSHPs from the leap in August, that means that if Magic Kingdom continues to host Prolonged Night time Hours all the way through Birthday party Season, there might be 4 post-closing occasions maximum weeks at Magic Kingdom during the finish of the 12 months, and 5 occasions some weeks.
Having ExEH at Magic Kingdom any dates all the way through those weeks (together with August 20, 2025) can be a mistake. Which is strictly why Walt Disney Global in large part has have shyed away from this kind of scheduling all the way through previous Birthday party Seasons (see under). That is doubly true this 12 months given the exaggerated impact that the outlet of Starlight could have on attendance at Magic Kingdom all the way through Birthday party Season.
Lately, Prolonged Night time Hours is scheduled to happen from 10 pm till nighttime at Magic Kingdom on August 13, 2025. This will likely most definitely (confidently) shift to 11 pm to one am.
Magic Kingdom is recently indexed as being open from 9 am to ten pm day by day in July and August 2025. On the other hand, those are boilerplate hours. We’re absolutely anticipating 11 pm or (hands crossed) nighttime closures. If that’s no longer recently the plan, it’s a mistake.
I’m begging Walt Disney Global to ship some operations and PAC other folks over to Disneyland to look how they deal with Paint the Night time. No longer even a funny story–it could be critically really useful to be told from the professionals, and watch how they do issues.
The cause of transferring Prolonged Night time Hours from Magic Kingdom to Animal Kingdom because of Starlight comes right down to scheduling. As defined in our complete Information to Disney Starlight Parade’s Debut at Magic Kingdom, our perfect bet for the agenda is as follows:
- First Starlight Parade: 9 pm
- Fortunately Ever After: 10 pm
- 2nd Starlight Parade: 11 pm
- Park Remaining: 11 pm or nighttime
With the second one Starlight Night time Parade stepping off at 11 p.m., this necessarily quantities to a nighttime last for Magic Kingdom although the printed time finally ends up being 11 pm. After all, this assumes there are two nightly performances of Starlight, which isn’t a certain factor given Walt Disney Global’s penny-pinching techniques.
Once more assuming two nightly parades, it behooves Walt Disney Global to transport ExEH to Animal Kingdom for the remainder of the summer season to cut back the tension on Magic Kingdom operations. Simply seeking to run Starlight and set up common crowd drift goes to be a significant problem.
Anyway, it’ll be fascinating to look simply how lengthy Prolonged Night time Hours at Magic Kingdom lasts. Perhaps it’ll simply be one week, bouncing again to DAK or DHS as soon as Birthday party Season kicks into prime tools. By which case, what used to be the purpose? Looking to squeeze in a single date for the sake of visitor delight? If that is so, kudos to Disney.
The opposite is somewhat relating to–that Disney doesn’t truly know what to anticipate/what it’s doing with Starlight. That is one thing we’ve discussed in different posts, but it surely bears repeating: Walt Disney Global hasn’t hosted an evening parade in nearly a decade. One in every of my fears is that Walt Disney Global has misplaced such a lot institutional wisdom since then that they don’t understand how to deal with operational logistics for an evening parade. The COVID closure ended in numerous early retirements a number of the outdated guard who knew how issues labored, and Walt Disney Global nonetheless hasn’t absolutely recovered from that.
Whilst it is a worry, it used to be a minimum of reassuring that they moved ExEH clear of Magic Kingdom, made the Fortunately Ever After agenda exchange, and blocked out Forged Contributors. All of this demonstrates that Walt Disney Global does have a clue, and wouldn’t fumble issues once you have them proper at the start. So possibly it’ll leap over to Disney’s Hollywood Studios for the rest of August?
To that time, I nonetheless very strongly suspect there might be few Prolonged Night time Hours dates in Magic Kingdom from mid-August till the second one week of January 2026. Be aware that this isn’t but reliable–the whole lot past the primary two weeks of August 2025 is solely speculative at this level.
Usually, Disney’s Hollywood Studios and Animal Kingdom take over web hosting tasks from Magic Kingdom each and every 12 months in September or October. This happens on account of Birthday party Season, which starts in early August and kicks into prime tools in past due September.
This 12 months, the instances might be other with Starlight, which can motive upper crowds in Magic Kingdom on non-party nights even in August and September. We predict relatively remarkable attendance at MK on non-party nights from August thru December because of Starlight.
Usually, Prolonged Night time Hours strikes to Disney’s Hollywood Studios if Magic Kingdom has scheduling conflicts. Animal Kingdom is in most cases the backup to DHS, taking on if that park is web hosting events.
That typically occurs in November and December with the Jollywood Nights Christmas Birthday party. Now, it’s going on because of After Hours at Disney’s Hollywood Studios, which runs maximum Wednesday nights thru September 3, 2025.
In concept, DHS may take over ExEH beginning then for a few months. In truth, that might be more or less the standard cadence from the ultimate two years. The purpose of all that is that there are not any promises about which park(s) will host Prolonged Night time Hours after August 13, 2025. Smartly, except for EPCOT. That’s just about a certain factor barring the uncommon park buyout all the way through conference season. However as for the Wednesday ExEH, it is usually a mixture of DAK, DHS, or even the occasional MK.
It used to be a savvy transfer to shift Prolonged Night time Hours to Animal Kingdom that might assist redistribute crowds, making the opposite 3 parks somewhat much less busy and Animal Kingdom much less of a ghost the city on the tail finish of the day. From an function “larger excellent” viewpoint, my hope is that DAK hosts ExEH for all dates after August 13, 2025.
Selfishly and subjectively, I’m hoping Prolonged Night time Hours remains at Magic Kingdom. We’ve got DVC remains booked for 2 Wednesdays in August and September, and most definitely extra past that. Up to I revel in Animal Kingdom at night time (and I do!), I typically get my fill all the way through the vacation season when the park is most lovely, cooler, and closes after sundown nightly.
I do know Magic Kingdom might be busier on ExEH if it does host the development, however I will handle that. The possibility of being in Magic Kingdom till 1 am is beautiful interesting to me, in my opinion, if I are aware of it’s destructive to the larger visitor enjoy. That’s exactly why there used to be a little bit of ‘backlash’ to the DAK transfer–maximum readers right here perceive the ‘larger excellent’ attitude, however nonetheless selfishly need what’s perfect for their very own journeys. Can’t blame any individual for that!
Making plans a Walt Disney Global travel? Know about inns on our Walt Disney Global Resorts Critiques web page. For the place to consume, learn our Walt Disney Global Eating place Critiques. To economize on tickets or resolve which kind to shop for, learn our Guidelines for Saving Cash on Walt Disney Global Tickets publish. Our What to Pack for Disney Journeys publish takes a singular have a look at artful pieces to take. For what to do and when to do it, our Walt Disney Global Trip Guides will assist. For complete recommendation, the most productive position to start out is our Walt Disney Global Go back and forth Making plans Information for the whole lot you wish to have to understand!
YOUR THOUGHTS
Will you be profiting from Prolonged Night time Theme Park Hours at Magic Kingdom on August 13? Hope that MK continues to host ExEH all the way through Birthday party Season? Or do you view this from the ‘larger excellent’ viewpoint, being worried in regards to the monkey wrench that’ll be thrown into attendance traits if MK has a midnight tournament 4-5 nights a week? Do you compromise or disagree with our evaluation? Any questions we will allow you to resolution? Listening to your comments–even while you disagree with us–is each fascinating to us and useful to different readers, so please percentage your ideas under within the feedback!
