Is The Disney Dining Plan Worth It NOW?

The Disney Dining Plan is BACK! It’s been a few years since we’ve been able to use this prepaid dining plan around Disney World so today we are giving you the full lesson! Join Emma as she explores the new Dining Plan, what it is, how to use it and if we think it’s worth it! 

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Disney World has finally brought back the Dining Plan but is it worth it now I’m trying to film but do you have any advice do you think it’s going okay thank you the Disney Dining Plan is back but is it worth it now we are going to find

Out if it’s a waste of your money or if it’s really a great addition to your Disney World vacation let’s find out the Disney Dining Plan is back baby it’s been a few years since we’ve been able to use this prepaid dining plant around Disney World So today we’re going to

Find out the full lesson of what it is what to expect when you’re using it and if we think it’s worth it because spoiler it might not be and also as we’re starting today I do have on the cutest little style shirt I really love it it says here for the snacks and

Honestly I don’t really always love those shirts but I think this one is super cute if you want to see more outfits just like it you can go check out all your style right now on Instagram so what is the Disney Dining Plan if you don’t know this is

Essentially a service that lets you kind of prepay for some of your food in Disney World now it used to be a lot bigger it was a really huge thing it’s been gone since the pandemic but it’s finally back starting literally today so let’s kind of talk about what it is and

What you can expect from it so the Disney daming plan is actually an optional add-on package to your Disney World vacation package lets you prepaid for meals and snacks but it’s really something that Resort guests are able to do and non-resort guests cannot do so essentially there are going to be two

Plans the first is going to be your standard Disney Dining Plan and then the other one is going to be your Quick Service Disney Dining Plan so in that standard Disney dining plan everyone in the travel party is going to get one table service meal per night one quick

Service meal per night and a snack SL non-alcoholic beverage drink per night with a part of their package and each person actually gets one Resort refillable mug and drink meals and snacks can be redeemed at any time of the day so it’s really pretty flexible in that area beverages are included with

Your meal it actually can be a non-alcoholic beverage or an alcoholic beverage if you’re 21 of course now restrictions do apply it’s going to depend on the restaurant which alcoholic beverages they they have available to you now the cost of this plan is going to be 9428 per adult or if you’re

Getting the kid version it’s going to be$ 26.69 per person again that’s kids ages 3 to 9 this is going to be a price added on top of your Disney vacation when you’re checking out on My Disney Experience you also have the Quick Service Disney Dining Plan so with this

Dining Plan you’re actually going to get everyone in your party two quick service meals per day and a snack or non-alcoholic drink per day and of course you you get those refillable mugs too the same rules for beverages apply uh as the table service but this one is

Going to be a little bit cheaper this one is 5701 per adult and 2383 per child now because these plans pre pay your food um it’s actually pretty nice it’s convenient but is it worth it we’re testing it I actually have a reporter with me today we have

Two Disney Dining Plan so we can put it a little bit extra to the test and see if it’s you know worth it how does the Dining Plan work well let’s get into it we’re about to test it and we’re going to find out um basically you’re going to

Be prepaying your food that is the whole point of the Dining Plan is you can just kind of prepaid for some of your meals so that way you don’t have to do it when you’re here in Disney World and worry about that credit card bill on your way

Home which is frankly what I do a lot so for each night of your reservation and depending on how many nights you’re staying you’re going to be allotted a number of credits so it’s a table service credit a quick service credit a snack credit credits it’s like one

Credit is one snack that’s kind of the vibe it’s very simple and fairly straightforward your credits are going to be allotted to your number of nights not days so for a 6 night 7 Days stay you’re going to take that number that you’re staying the nights and you’re

Going to times that you know by your credit so you’re going to do six nights not 7 days and it’s important to note you can’t just do this for part of your trip it is all or nothing baby if you’re going to be here for six nights you’re

Getting six nights of Dining Plan so what you’re going to do to use these credits is actually pretty simple you’re going to take your magic band or your Disney Resort IDE deed you’re going to go to a restaurant a kios anywhere that you’re going to get your snacks or your

Dining or your credit and then you’re just going to tap and it’s going to take it off and then you’re going to open your app and boom you’re going to see that it was gone it’s really super simple now you are going to need a PIN

Number that you’re going to set up in the My Disney Experience app luckily I did remember mine and you’re going to need to remember yours so make it something that you can easily remember now one thing that is really really really important to note is you’re actually going to have access to your

Credits until midnight on the day that you check out so even when once you’ve left your Resort if you still have some credits make sure to use them or you’re going to lose them one thing I used to do is when we were kids and we would use

The Dining Plan if we had any leftover snack credits we would get a lot of those prepackaged kind of mini cookies or mini snacks and take them on the airplane with us cuz we’ve already paid for them so you might as well use that credit now to start using your Dining

Plan it’s actually going to happen on your day of check in and you can check in even well before 3 you can do it in person or on the app and as soon as you’re checked in you are good to go and you can start seeing those credits on on

The My Disney Experience app and start using them right away even if your room isn’t ready so for example today my room isn’t ready until 3:00 but I did come for breakfast to Garden Grill which is where we’re going to head now so to keep talking about how the Dining Plan works

And what that’s going to look like for you we are actually here at Garden Grill for breakfast to put it to the test for that table service credit which I just like going to Garden Grill so overall this is a big win experiment and fun Dining if you do want to see a full review of Garden Grill it’s up on the channel right now and we have full coverage up there I did go ahead and grab a snack while I was walking around um after we’ve just had our breakfast I know but

I want to test it all out and see how it works so I did end up going to lay all and anything under 650 there is considered a snack so I got this fun little apricot pastry so now that we’ve had our character meal which is actually

A pretty decent bang for year buug so I would it was 47 for breakfast and 62 for din din over at Garden Grill I got to use one table service credit for that so if you’re wondering how do you keep track of your credits this is actually

Really really easy and I have really enjoyed figuring this out because I was worried it would be a little bit more complicated but it’s truly not so what you’re going to do is you’re going to go into your My Disney Experience app and you’re going to hit your hotel resort

You’re going to scroll down and then you’re going to see a little button that says Dining Plan it’s right below where your room number should be and then you’re just going to click that and it’s going to tell you what is left and what’s available it’s really nice

Because the credit balance is kind of helped you have an idea of what it looks like um after you’ve had that first meal or after you’ve had that first snack what is left they also show you your history so that way if you don’t know quite what you’ve done or you can’t

Remember like when did I use that snack it shows that history there if anything is wrong do not stress out that is an easy fix what you’re going to do is you’re just going to go to guest relations and they’re going to take good care of you because if you have your

History and you know what you’ve already had or if some something you know you’ve paid for and it’s just not showing up give it a little bit of time but guest relations they’re really going to help you if you’re still at the restaurant and you notice something’s weird just

Talk to your server for me when I first um was checking out he tapped he took a phone tapped my van while I was sitting at the table I typed in my pen and then it looked a little wonky to me at first cuz when he brought the receipt out for

Me to add a tip on my card it showed the prices of the meal and I was scared that I was paying for it rather than using a table service and he said no don’t wor just write your gratuiti and then what you’re going to do is I’m going to take

It back I’m going to take off the Dining Plan and then the gratuiti will add to your card separately any of the cast members at your Resort can help you do that when it comes to Quick Services I did go ahead and ask some cast members some questions so that way you guys

Don’t have to now you can take a table service credit and you can turn it into a quick service credit so if you know that you don’t want to go to a table service or you just didn’t have enough you can use it instead of sitting down

You use it at a quick service now I don’t really recommend that that if you paid for the table service it’s more expensive you might as well get as much money as you can but if you realize like you’re not feeling your best you just don’t want to go to that table service

Cancel it and you can use it for a quick service at your Resort or wherever you’re at whatever is convenient for you and whatever you’re comfortable doing again not really my recommendation but it’s your trip and if that’s what you want that’s what you should do what

About kids on the Dining Plan what does that look like kids under the age of two do not need a park ticket if you didn’t already know and so because of that they’re also not going to need the Dining Plan either they can just kind of pick off your plate they cannot get

Their own plate but they can just kind of pick and they don’t need the Dining Plan that’s not required at buffets all kids under three can actually eat off of your plate and they can have their own plate um and then at all other restaurants not Buffet they can eat off

Of your plate as well so they also don’t require that Dining Plan now some people actually do want to add on a Dining Plan for their kiddos they might just eat more they just want to make sure that they get that food now what I will say

Is to buy the dining plant as we’ve already talked about buy it through that vacation package which means that you’re going to have to buy tickets for your little one as well so for that kiddo under two you don’t really want to buy that Dining Plan because that means you

Would have to buy them a park ticket as well and then it’s just going to get a little bit crazier again kiddos under two just let them eat off your plate it’s just probably not the best financial decision unless you know that your kid absolutely needs a full meal

And that’s totally for you to decide but definitely not recommended on our end another thing I will say is if you want your kiddos to have your own meals you probably are better off just paying for it out of pocket um that’s going to make a lot more

Financial sense right now the Disney Dining Plan is a little bit expensive for what you’re getting but when it comes to kids who don’t eat a ton because of their age definitely just consider paying out of pocket another thing that I did ask about is can you

Buy a kids meal with your adults Quick Service Dining Plan the answer to that so far from what I’ve heard from cast members is no you cannot the system has it set up to different ways a kids’s Quick Service meal and adult’s Quick Service meal they are not the same and

So for right now according to the cast I talk to you cannot switch those credits however that being said it’s day one you should always if that’s something you really really want to do you just would rather have a kids meal make sure to ask a cast member before you’re checking out

They can help you out and that could change even if that’s not 100% accurate in a week that could change Disney is always changing especially after day one of things so just make sure to ask before you do anything okay so we made our way over to the Magic Kingdom resort

Area so we’re going to grab our Resort mugs and we’re going to talk about pros and cons how easy it is is things that maybe have changed since the last time you might have used it and if you should grab it for your next vacation so I am

Actually doing a little bit of an experiment right here to see if I can get my Resort mug out of resort that I am not staying at I think the answer is going to be yes but we’re going to find out because I technically not staying here at Grand Floridian despite my

Wishes okay so you can get it at not your official Resort which makes complete sense it’s just on your Dining Plan it’s not necessarily per Resort and they have the same Resort mugs across the different Resorts I really really like this because if you’re anything like me and you’re doing the park before

You go to your Resort it’s really nice to know that if you get thirsty and you really want to Coke you get on the Montreal and just go to Grand Floridian get one that you’ve already paid for with a mug you’ve already paid for and

Then go back and not waste your money or your snack credits on a Coke or a soda so really really excited about this you also can use this um for your coffees and things in the morning when they have the self- served joffre coffees I know

They do that at um a lot of the big Quick Service dining locations for breakfast so that’s very very nice it’s just a great way to save money and I personally love collecting these I have a ridiculous amount of these and my husband will be disappointed when I

Bring home another but you know what I’m thrilled I’m super excited to have it so now that we have our drink which I would also like to say this was also super easy to grab it was the exact same situation with the snack and with the table service I just tapped my magic

Band I typed in my pen and then it was handled and it was done and it’s there on the app let’s let’s talk about which plan you should buy the Quick Service Dining Plan is really going to be for those families who a majority of your meals are just quick Services you don’t

Really eat table Services you might do one but you might not it’s just kind of how the diet rolls you know that you’re going to eat a quick service for almost every meal quick service plan is going to be the one for you a good example of

Just like how to kind of Encompass how many meals you’re getting if if you’re doing a four night Disney stay you’re going to get eight Quick Service meals I think that that’s worth it I know that I would eat it you get four snacks you’re going to get one res

Fillable Resort mug a day and that’s per person so I think that that’s really really worth it and just honestly for the convenience the second option is that table service the standard dining plan this one is for those families who you’re going to eat at at least one

Table service probably more if you’re anything like me and my crew and we’re here and we’re spending a lot of money we love having table service we love doing brunches and breakfast and lunch and dinner anytime we can because that’s something that we really like and value

So this would make sense for people who want to do that and who want to do all of the different table service restaurants if you do a four night stay you’re going to get your refillable Resort mug four snacks and then four of those table service credits I think that

That’s really worth it I’m making sure to include totals here mainly because you can use the Dining Plan as freely as you want to so if you only want to do if you want to do a breakfast in the morning and a dinner at night and then

Do Quick Service the rest of your time you can I mean it’s completely flexible it’s better to focus on the total of your credits rather than going day by day so that way your plans can match what you value now one of the reasons we did come over to Grand Floridian rather

Than just going straight to our Resort is because I want to find out how the new Dining Plan is going to impact lounges because supposedly it will and I am very interested in than that and Enchanted Rose is one of our favorites so I think let’s head upstairs and find

Out what we can about how the lounges are going to be involved in the Disney Dining Plan now one thing I do like actually really value and we’ll kind of go into a little bit more discussion on this later but one thing I really like about the Dining Plan is just the

Convenience of it now it’s really hard because it is more expensive per person per day and frankly you’re not always going to get your money’s worth there’s going to be times when you’re losing your money if you don’t play as smart um and honestly I don’t even know at this

Point if you can get your money’s worth that’s what we’re doing for figuring it out we’re finding it out together but sometimes it’s not always about getting every single dime out of it sometimes it’s just about knowing that you don’t have a big credit card bill when you go

Home and I think to me I really really value that I value the convenience it’s almost more of like an all-inclusive experience which I like okay so the lounges being an addition to the Disney Dining Plan is a new addition so I came up here to the enchanted Rose to check

It out and I actually talked with some cast members to kind of see what this was going to look like so it’s actually the same menu as it was before no new menu for the Disney Dining Plan here and basically you’re going to get what they consider an appetizer as an entree so

The examples that the cast members gave me is that you would get like a cheeseboard as your entree you do not get an appetizer or a dessert like you do with other meals and unfortunately you don’t get any of those specialty beverages as your alcoholic beverage so

Basically if you use it at one of the lounges at least at Enchanted rows in particular you’re going get one of the normal appetizers that they’re going to count as an entree and one of the more simple drinks as like wine beer or he did even like explain like a vodka soda

Could be included but none of their specialty drinks which is what we really really love here they actually urged me not to use it and I think that that I’m going to urge you to do the same if you have a table service meal go somewhere where you can get the full shebang

Appetizers a nice glass of wine nice alcoholic beverage and a good on trade that isn’t just a cheeseboard or a small thing of fries really if you’re trying to expand your money maybe consider skipping the lounge or just paying for the lounge out of pocket which is what I

Probably will still do anyways cuz I’m here and why waste a good trip here so that being said this is one of those examples of before you commit to a snack or before you commit to you know sitting down at a table service do your research before you sit down at Lounge ask

Questions because at the end of the day if you want to make sure that you’re maximizing what you’re paying for ask questions it’s your money you should never worry about asking questions I know I ask an absurd amount of questions all the time cuz I want to know and I

Want to make sure I’m getting my biggest bank for my bug and really stretching my money as far as it will go now I did ask them is this all lounges and they did say they cannot be 100% certain things can fluctuate but for now to their understanding this is almost every

Lounge is going to be set up this way so a few of those reminders that you probably want to keep in mind if you’re going to be using your things here in wal Disney World is at those Quick Service restaurants most outdoor carts and actually some of the merchandise

Locations snacks are going to include a few different things that maybe I haven’t said explicitly yet so that’s why I’m reminding you it’s going to be things like frozen ice cream Popsicles or like a fruit bar two scoops of hand scooped ice cream interesting popcorn

Scoop in a single serving box a piece of whole fruit a single serving bag of snacks which like I was telling you earlier we would grab those on our way out if we had snacks left over uh you can get 20 oz bottles of like Coca-Cola or danani but we really don’t recommend

That you have your Resort refillable mug don’t really waste it unless you just really trying to get rid of those snack credits which I do understand you can also find the 20 oz Fountain sodas are going to count as a snack coffee hot chocolate hot tea milk juice or even a

Cup of soup you can also talk about toppings add-ons sauces so like a side of cheese at Casey’s corner is going to kind of work as a um an example of that now I’m total transparency I think those are not the best use of your snacks if

You are maximizing your budget we highly recommend considering paying out of pocket for a lot of that stuff because a whole piece of fruit is like a few dollars and you can also get some snacks for $8 so there’s just a a give and take there’s some balance there if you want

An idea of the best snacks to buy you can check out all.net the website we have tons of stuff on the blog tons of recommendations and a lot of it is written down in a list for you so that way it’s a lot easier than us just

Reading a list to you right now now another thing to remember is that a few items are not included in the DDP Quick Service Dining Plan it’s going to be items that are more than a single serving like a box of duts or even like a jar of peanut butter uh items like

Popcorn or drinks that are served in the souvenir containers so like the specialty figment popcorn buckets you know that cause some chaos that’s not going to work for you um items that are kind of considered merchandise so like Globe cubes bottle straps bottle topper stuff like that is not included as well

As special dining events offered at table Service locations if it’s a specialty dining offer it’s not going to count and I hate to be the one to tell you okay we finally made it back to our room and while we’re here I do want to just give a quick shout out to Mei

Travel one of our travel Partners if you ever need help when you’re planning your Disney vacation they are the best and they’re actually why we got to do this today so it was really cool and we really appreciate that from them another thing that we really love about them is

They are actually hosting a dessert party on February 10th and some of us are going to be there and maybe you could be there and maybe then we could be there all together it’s going to be at Epcot and we are very excited and if you want more information about that you

Can find that in the link in the description below one thing I do want to talk about a little bit is how did the Dining Plan change so this is one thing that if you’ve used it in the past there are a few changes uh one of the main

Ones that we already talked about is that lounges are now included although we don’t necessarily know that that’s the best bang for your bug if that’s something that you’re prioritizing on your trip and you’re curious about that is included now um another one is that there are some character dining meals

That are actually going to cost two credits instead of one which is really not our favorite news um just because that means it might not be as good of a deal as it was in the past so in the past when the Dining Plan was around the

First time there were already some that cost two dining credits uh table service credits rather than one and it was things like signature dining Cinderella’s Royal table Be Our Guest things like that that were a little bit nicer a little bit more of an exciting experience uh they did cost two with

This time back around 2024 the Dining Plan the two restaurants that were added to that list is acrus over an Epcot which that really stinks because that was a good kind of bang for your buck and then storybook dining where you can see Snow White and her dwarves and the

Evil queen and they’re going to require two credits now it’s just not going to be as good of a deal as it was in the past but really not much that we can do about it however you can be aware of it and choose if you want to use those

Meals with your credits so another major change that we’ve seen is that there used to be a lot more dining plans we’ve talked about today there are only two there used to be four dining plan options there’s only two so really not as much variety not as many options and

For now the biggest change that we’ve seen so far is really just the pricing if in 2020 before the pandemic the standard Dining Plan was about $78 and some change and now it’s about $94 and some change so definitely a big price increase there um so the Quick Service

Dining Plan right now is about $57 in the past it was about $55 is um so that one is not as big of a jump so overall do we think that it’s worth it Quincy do you think it’s worth it no the answer is sometimes no and that’s

What’s hard about this is she’s kind of right but not completely right so why know Quincy tell us about it I’ve never dining planned in my life if you don’t want to be told where you should eat while you’re on your vacation you should not get it because

The list is not that long there’s a very limited amount of restaurants on there and what if you want to eat outside of that list the Dining Plan will restrict you and if you want good options for a smaller cost I think my head’s cut

Off and if you want good options for a smaller cost you shouldn’t get it because the Dining Plan to make the most of it you have to be really really smart to really save money with it when instead you could just budget smart and spend a lot less money than you would on

The dining plan if your kids are older than 10 but don’t eat like at if your kids older than 10 they have to get the adult credit and sometimes they can’t eat that much and it’s not worth it and then it’s not worth it boom

Unless you want to eat the rest of their meal that’s fair if you don’t drink alcohol it’s also probably not worth the upch charge surprisingly there’s some yeses though I can’t you please don’t play Lion of love right now for my favorite movie Euro Vision Song Contest I’m

Trying to tell them if the Dining Plan is worth it and we can’t talk about LMT right now saw be the queen I need so one of the things that we kind of already touched on but I think is yes is if you want more of an all-inclusive

Trip kind of feeling and Vibe you should probably consider doing this having everything prepaid and just not having to worry about paying for things when you’re here or seeing your credit card bill when you get home it is just a nice kind of perk that does feel all-inclusive and maybe you get your

Money worth out of it and maybe you don’t but for you it’s really just mainly about not worrying about it once you are here that is going to be a yes for you if you love character dining this is also a great yes character dining can get really really expensive

Especially if you go to those nicer ones like Cinderella’s royya table but if you have a lot of the table service credits and you want to use them for that that’s going to be the best bang for your buck and you’re really going to start kind of stretching your dime on the table

Surface together I want another reason you might want to say yes is that alcohol is a plus on your trip so like for example this morning we got to have a bloody Mary with our breakfast and we didn’t have to pay anything extra

For it but for us we got a $16 drink and some people maybe would have gotten just an ice water or a Coke if you’re not drinking so I think if you like alcohol it’s just kind of a nice plus up to your trip definitely consider getting the

Dining Plan because that’s one less thing to worry about of course it’s not unlimited it’s just one but I also think some people just want one and my Bloody Mary was nice and singular and that’s all I needed another reason to grab the Dining Plan is that you love Resort mugs

If you’re like me and you just really like having that option and being able to use the resort mug and have unlimited drinks in that way and also just kind of have a little souvenir I think it’s really nice if you drink a lot of soda

It’s kind of worth it I’ve gotten the resort mugs and I don’t even have the dining plan in the past so I really like having the resort mugs and finally if you get a free DDP promotional dining offer which is actually being offered right now if you are a Disney plus

Subscriber and you have a Disney Plus account from January 3rd Disney plus started offering the free Dining Plan non- discounted 4 day four night stay um a Walt Disney World package it includes your room hotel and you get the free Dining Plan it’s for arrivals from July

1st through September 30th if you get the free Dining Plan onto your room for subscribing to Disney plus absolutely why would you not take it if it’s not an upcharge to you yes you should get it that’s it that’s the Dining Plan and frankly it is for some people and it

Isn’t for others and if that’s you I hope you enjoy it and also if it’s not for you I hope you enjoy that as well if you guys like this video go ahead and like And subscribe now go check out the changes to Walt Disney World in 2024 I’ll see you there