Disney World is a complicated place. If you think you can just buy tickets, book a room, and show up... I hate to inform you, but you probably are going to have a pretty crummy time. Disney takes a lot of advanced planning, especially if it's your first trip (or first time this decade as a lot has changed since 2019). If this blows your mind, check out our post on The Seasons of Disney for an overview of the best times to visit and our Basic overview of Resort Categories to give you a general overview of resort room categories.
It is near impossible these days to just walk up to a restaurant in Disney World and expect to be seated. Disney has two main categories of restaurant types, which are broken down even further into smaller subsets. There are also food carts and booths to complicate things even further.
This post is going to cover the "how-tos", not specific restaurant recommendations. Check out these post on our favorite Quick Service Restaurants, Table Service Restaurants, and Carts/Booths for recommendations on our favorite food spots.
Quick Service
Let's start with Quick Service (QS) restaurants. This category of food service will be more of your fast food/typical "theme park" food that are fast and budget friendly (for theme park standards). Think, overpriced chicken tinders, puffy pizza, and burgers. If you only stick to those options, you're going to think I'm crazy for saying that Disney has some of the most amazing food we've ever eaten. There are so many Quick Service options other than nuggies and burgers. However, QS is typically there to satisfy the kid palate, so you will find your kid friendly options here. Want some non-nuggie or vegan options? Check out our favorite QS restaurants at each park and Disney Springs. QS Restaurants can be found throughout the parks, water parks, Disney Springs, and all levels of resorts.
In the past, you would simply walk up to the window, order your food, pick up at a different window, and go sit down wherever you like, and eat. With the global pandemic of 2020, things have changed quite a bit (for the better in my opinion). To order at these restaurants, you *can* still walk in and place your order, however this is discouraged. With the rise of touch-less pay, Disney is highly encouraging mobile order at all QS restaurants from the My Disney Experience (MDE) app on your phone.
Limitations of this Mobile Order system of course require that you have a smart phone with a competent knowledge of of how to use it. It also requires guests to download and use the MDE app. It also makes it difficult for guests who want to pay with cash or those who have severe food allergies who need to specify cross-contact requirements with the chef. It's also near impossible to make substations or order a sandwich only option as apposed to a sandwich with side combo. Critics of this system also talk about how Disney is forcing you to be on your phone incessantly vs being present and not glued to your device.
First time guests may also not realize how early you actually need to place your order. By reading this, you are now in-the-know, and will be ahead of the average first time guest. If you want to eat lunch or dinner at a time typical of those meals, you need to order EARLY. During busy times, such as school holidays, you should place your order no later than 1 to 2 hours before you want to eat. Time slots are limited and fill up quickly. The menus are all available on the MDE app. Use your time while waiting in line to place your food order. The app will give you a list of pick up times that are available, starting with the first available. If you would like to schedule it for later in the day, click "more times" to see what is available later. When it is within 5 minutes of your scheduled pick-up time, and as long as you are with in a few feet of the restaurant, you'll get a notification to click "I'm here. Prepare my order". Clicking this will notify the kitchen to prepare your order. Once it's ready, you'll get another notification that your order is ready with an order number and instructions on which pick up window to use. Also, as the picture below indicates, always get the fake cheese sauce with your corn dog nuggets. Best $1 you will ever spend at Disney.
I really like the mobile order system. It's easy to navigate and saves a ton of time over having to wait in lines to order, wait on them to plate it, and pick it up. To save time and frustration ahead of your trip, check out menus and pricing before you go on MDE or the Disney World website. That way you can pick out restaurants ahead of time and know if it is something your family will all eat vs getting to Disney and having a meltdown because you kids are starving and you don't know where to eat. Trust us on this one. Pre-planning saves your sanity in the parks.
Food Carts/ Food Booths
While we are talking about Quick Service, I need to mention a subset of that. Sprinkled throughout Disney World, you will find small walk up windows and carts. You may miss them if you are not looking for them and don't know they are there. Some can be found on mobile order, while others you must walk up to the window and place your order and pay there. My very favorite is not even on any Disney map!!! The Spring Roll Cart is found at the entrance to Adventureland from the main hub entrance. Here you can find cheeseburger filled spring rolls. You're Welcome...
EPCOT Festival Booths
Chances are you will be at Disney when EPCOT is hosting an International Festival of some kind or another. Every month contains at least one Festival with a couple of months overlapping with two festivals. There are only a few weeks through the entire year that don't have a Festival occurring while they break down from one and set up for the next. Check out our Festival Guide for all of the festival details. During the Festivals, you will find food booths and carts set up through all of EPCOT. These are our favorite way to eat at EPCOT. These small tasting dishes offer you a chance to buy multiple dishes instead of eating one huge meal. They are all clearly marked on your Festival Passport and have large signage at the entrance to each booth.
Table Service
I know we have talked about a lot of different food options, but this is the second main category of foods as defined by Disney. Table Service (TS) Restaurants are sit down, waiter bring your food, need reservations type of places. This is the area where Disney really shines. Up front, I need to let you know that many of these restaurants book up quickly. Advance Dining Reservations (ADRs) are strongly recommended. ADRs should be made 60 days in advance on the MDE app or Disney World website. For extremely popular restaurants including all Character Meal Dining, plan on being awake and on the app just before reservations go-live for the day at 6am Eastern. If this sounds overwhelming to you, let me recommend using a FREE Disney travel agent like Jillian with Destination Dreaming Travels. She can wake up early and make your reservations for you!
TS Restaurants can be found throughout the parks, at Disney Springs, and at Moderate and Deluxe level Resorts. Don't force yourself to eat all of your meals inside of the parks. You'll be missing out on some amazing food found at the resort restaurants. Many are actually within walking distance (or a Monorail ride) of the parks. All four of the Deluxe Resorts in front of Magic Kingdom have amazing TS restaurants inside. We've been dying to have dinner at the new Steakhouse 71 at The Contemporary Resort, but we always seems to go at busy times and there is never anything available during dinner service.
The downside of TS meals are cost and time. TS meals will run you more than $30 per adult and more than $15 per child (and this is on the cheaper end, expect closer to $45 per adult and $20 for kids). Character Meals will run you $60 per adult and $35 per child! They are also quite time consuming. Your vacation time is precious and TS meals are long, lasting usually 1-2 hours from check in to paying your bill. You have to decide if you want to spend that time at a restaurant or riding rides.
Character Dining
A huge subset of TS restaurants is known as Character Meal Dining. As the name implies, during these meals you get to dine with select Disney characters right at your table. While the food may not be the best at these restaurants compared to many other TS Restaurants, the food has always been good. We've always preferred to do Character breakfasts rather than Dinner because, for one, breakfast is cheaper, and two... Mickey Waffles! Disney shut down all Character interaction, including dining, during 2020-2021. They have slowly been bringing back these Character meals. Make sure you check the MDE app for up to date Character Meal experience options. We are THRILLED that breakfast is finally returning to Garden Grill this month with Farmer Mickey. We will be there opening week and can't wait to bring you all of the details. We are still hopeful that Character Breakfast with Rapunzel and Flynn Rider and Ariel and Eric will will return at Trattoria al Forno.
The cost for buffet/character meals is non-negotiable. Even if your child only eats a handful of strawberries, half a Mickey Waffle, and nothing else, you will still have to pay the full price since you are paying for the experience (don't ask how we know...we just know). Remember that "kids" are people ages 3-9. Under 3 are free and 10 and up will be charged full adult price.
As you can imagine, having your favorite characters come right to you as you dine is a HUGE draw for many guests. It's not uncommon for reservations to be completely gone for these meals as soon as they area available (a perk of staying on property is that you can make your dining reservations for your entire stay 60 days before before your check in date for the entire stay! If you are off property, you must wait and do each day individually at the 60 day mark). Don't be discouraged if what you want is not available. Keep checking the app every day. People's plans change and have to cancel for different reasons.
Signature Dining
Ok. I'll be honest... I'm not a fan of super fancy foods. I prefer bar foods and a good steak over tiny pieces of fish on a plate pretending it was caught by King Triton himself or weird birds that shouldn't even be eaten by humans. However, I think I am in the minority here. Signature Dining at Disney is a HUGE draw. Some of the Signature Dining options aren't placed in that category because of the food though. They are placed in the Signature Category because of their locaton/ambience, such as Cinderella's Royal Table, where guests can dine INSIDE of Cinderella Castle (for $80/adult and $47/child! or the use of 2-Dining Plan credits.) Signature Restaurants offer incredibly fancy foods (except the character based ones) and cater to people who don't mind dropping a minimum $90+ per person for a meal (or use 2-meal credits on the Disney Dining Plan). I will acknowledge that eating inside of the Castle was really awesome. We have done it twice, and I don't for see it being in our plans any time soon. But I do think everyone should eat there at least once.
Disney does also have one AAA- Five Diamond Award winning restaurant, and they have won every year since 2020. The Dining Room at Victoria and Alberts is located at The Grand Floridian Resort. Prices for this dining experience start at $295 per person (yes, you read that correctly. It's two hundred and ninety five dollars) with wine pairings an extra $150 per person. This is not in my budget or even something I would feel comfortable doing. I'm just letting you know that you have the option if this is your type of food. If you would like to dine here, know that walk-ups are not accepted. You must make a reservation.
I hope this helps to give you a starting point when trying to plan your Walt Disney World Vacation. For help booking a room or Disney Vacation Package, check out Jillian with Destination Dreaming Travels. She's a FREE travel agent waiting to help you book your most magical vacation ever.
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