10 Disneyland Tips and Tricks: How to Maximize Your Time & Budget

Disneyland is truly a magical place, for both adults and kids of all ages. Even if theme parks aren’t really your jam, I truly believe that all families should put Disney on their Bucket List at least once. With that said, it can be an expensive and overwhelming trip to plan. Take it from me: I can knock out an itinerary for a week in the rainforest like that, but planning Disneyland? Yikes.

So here are 10 practical, real life Disneyland tips and tricks for how to make the most of your time and money if you are planning a visit to the most magical place on earth.

Also, don’t miss this post breaking down exactly how much we spent at Disneyland here.

Tip #1: Stay close, but not IN the park

Choosing where to stay for your Disneyland visit might actually be the most important part of your trip planning. Unlike Disney World in Orlando, Disneyland doesn’t have the same “bubble”, requiring you to shell out a lot of money to have easy access to the park. There are tons of chain hotels within walking distance to the Disneyland Park entrance, which makes it much more budget friendly.

We choose to stay at the Hyatt Place Anaheim and found it to be the perfect spot. With rooms that sleep 6 and free breakfast, it was really the perfect place to stay for our Disneyland adventure. The best part? We were a 5 minute walk from the Toy Story parking lot, where we could go through security and hop on the free Disney buses, which took us directly to the entrance of the park.

Tip #2: Arrive early to beat the crowds

I get it, it’s tough to drag sleeping kiddos out of bed before the sun is up. But if you’re like me, you want to make the most of your time and money while you’re here. And that means getting to the park early before the bulk of the crowds arrive.

If you’ve done much Disney research, you may have heard the term “rope dropper”, which essentially means you arrive to the park before it opens and are in line when the entrance rope “drops”. We did this both days in Disneyland, and I 10/10 recommend it. No, we didn’t sprint to be the first in line on the most popular rides (which tons of people totally do!), but we did take full advantage of the lower crowds. I found that the park tends to get busy around 10-11am, and most of the rides had pretty short wait times before that. I’m talking, we walked right on to several rides.

If you’re wanting to maximize your time at Disneyland, definitely get there early and knock out some of the most popular rides before the wait times skyrocket.

Tip #3: Buy the Lightening Lanes

Oof. One more thing to make this trip even more expensive, right? Trust me, though. This is one of those non-negotiable purchases. Just consider the price of the Lightening Lanes part of the price of the ticket and buy them before you even arrive in the park. I would never do Disneyland (or World!) without purchasing Lightening Lanes, especially with kids.

Purchasing them allows you to cut the line for participating rides (which is about 80% of the rides in the park) one time during your day. You can book your first Lightening Lane once you scan into the park, and then you can book your next one 2-hours later, or after you scan into the ride you just booked, whichever one comes first. (Note: this is slightly different for Disney World)

There’s lots of ways to strategize the use of these, and I’m sure a quick search on YouTube will give you more ideas that you can imagine. However, we just used them for the rides we most wanted to do and didn’t worry about “stacking” them or saving them for later in the day when the crowds were bigger.

In fact, I feel like we got the most use out of them when we booked rides with a shorter wait time that had an immediate LL opening, because then we could book another LL as soon as we scanned into that ride. Even though the wait time was “only” 40 minutes – which is considered short in Disney time – we got to skip that line, ride the ride we wanted to go on, and immediately book another ride with a “short” wait time, and rinse and repeat.

Example: At 9:05, we booked at Lightening Lane for Pirates of the Caribbean for 9:10. We can enter the ride anytime between 9:10 and 10:10. The ride only had a 30 minute wait time, so other people might not see this as a good use of their Lightening Lane. However, we scanned into the ride at 9:10, immediately booked Big Thunder Mountain, which has a 40 minute wait, but a Lightening Lane available for 9:15. We go on Pirates, then head directly over to Big Thunder Mountain, essentially eliminating an hour of waiting in the “short” lines.

Please note, I am NOT a Lightening Lane expert. This is just what worked well for our family, and how I felt like we got to ride a bunch of rides with minimal waiting, because when your with small kids, even a 30 minute wait is a long time.

Tip #4: Get the stroller

Unless you have teens, I would highly recommend still using a stroller. My kids haven’t used a stroller in years, but I knew the amount of walking we would be doing during our 2 days at Disneyland would be tough on their little legs. There are tons of stroller rental options that you can have delivered right to your hotel, and these are great if you have babies or toddlers who will spend a lot of time in them, or nap in them.

However, if you have bigger kids like me, you don’t need a comfy place for them to nap. Just a spot for them to hop on and off when their legs need a little rest. We rented the plastic strollers from Disney both days, and they were perfect for bigger kids. These are essentially the same thing you would find at any zoo. They had plenty of room for my almost 10 year old to comfortably ride, plus storage to hold our bags, jackets and water bottles.

Pro tip: If there is rain in your forecast, grab one of these waterproof blankets and some clips to keep it dry.

Tip #5: Download the Disneyland App

Before you ever enter the park, make sure to download the Disneyland App onto your phone. You will use this as your map, your guide to wait times, booking Lightening Lanes, and mobile ordering all your food (which I highly recommend doing!).

Using your phone so much will definitely drain the battery, so I suggest bringing portable battery packs. These are the ones I use and love. It would be heartbreaking for your phone to die and you not be able to capture all those magical moments during your day.

Tip #6: Come prepared for all weather

Make sure to check the weather in Anaheim before your visit, and come prepared for whatever the day may bring. We had rain both days of our visit, and wore rain boots and rain jackets, and brought ponchos and umbrellas. We also had covers for our strollers, which kept kids and gear sitting in the stroller dry. Being prepared for the weather definitely made it more bearable, and saved us from having to buy very expensive ponchos in the park.

Tip #7: Bring your own snacks

Did you know you can bring your own food and drinks into the park? This is a huge money saver, considering a single bottle of water can cost nearly $5. Instead, pack reusable water bottles and find refill stations throughout the park (use your Disneyland app to easily locate them!).

Now you will most certainly want to purchase some of the fun Mickey-themed treats around the park (like the Mickey pretzels and ice cream bars!), but bringing in some of your own snacks will save you a ton of money. We were in the parks for 12 hours, 2 days in a row, and my kids ate an unlimited amount of snacks. Walking nearly 30,000 steps a day will work up quite the appetite! Thankfully, I stocked up our backpack before we went, so I was able to save our food budget the fun treats.

Our favorite snacks were Uncrustables, Mickey shaped Goldfish crackers, granola bars, and Dum Dum’s for waiting in line.

Tip #8: Save money and skip the Park Hoppers

I read a lot of tips before our visit that said Park Hoppers are a must at Disneyland. But holy cow- they would have basically doubled the price of our tickets! Disneyland and California Adventure are literally right next to each other, so I can see the plus of having the park hopper passes to go between the 2 parks.

We opted instead to spend the money on Lightening Lanes, and I was very happy with that decision. We found plenty to fill our day at both parks, and didn’t once find ourselves wishing we could hop over to the other park. If you’re trying to keep your costs down, definitely skip the Park Hopper passes, and just do 1 day at California Adventures, and 1-2 days at Disneyland (we did 1 and checked off everything on our must-see list!).

Tip #9: Don’t skip the Parades, Shows and Character Meets

Sure, the rides in Disneyland are a blast. But the parades and shows are some of the most magical parts of the park, especially for kids. Make sure to add at least one somewhere in your day. Not to mention, these are a much needed break to sit and rest for both kids and adults! We found several characters “pop up” on the Disneyland App map, and the lines were never very long. We waited less than 10 minutes to meet Mickey & Minnie- the perfect time to grab a snack.

Tip #10: Pick your must-do’s before you arrive

The parks are huge. There is so much to see and do, and no way to cram it all into a single day. We made a game plan the night before, and everyone picked out their top 2-3 things they wanted to see/do. We compiled a list, and those were the things we focused on during the day. It helped to focus on 15 items, rather than 100+ rides, characters, and shows, when we were trying to decide what to do next. And then at the end of the day, everyone got to do the things they wanted to do.

Just remember, no matter what, you will have a magical time. I hope these Disneyland tips and tricks help make your visit to the most magical place on earth feel less stressful and even more special.

Looking for more epic Southern California adventures? Check out our 4 Day Los Angeles Itinerary.