Reviews of Disney Dining Plan
Reviewed by Anonymous Review Date: 10/05/2019
Rating: (1) Not Recommended
All good till system goes down
Pros:
Disney winsCons:
Disney winsReviewed by Wanda Review Date: 08/18/2015
Rating: (1) Recommended
Was at WDW last week. My husband prices out the cost of the dining plan and what we eat. It costs us about $600 less without it. However, we used to get it in the past. Way too much food. I was very observant of this plan. First, due to the 9 and under rule, the amount served to 10, 11, and up year olds is just wasteful. I must have watched a ton of food be thrown away last week. Also, Disney has the healthy kids meal on the menu so I guess if a child is over 9 yrs old Disney does not think they need to eat healthy. I watched a girl of about 11 at Prime Time eat one piece of her four pieced fried chicken meal, and two bites of her huge sundae. The rest went in the trash. Such a shame. I saw this happen many times. I think if the parents want to be in the plan, the kids should not be forced to be on it just because they are in the same room. Food is so expensive there, and also, the dining plan is so expensive that it goes to waste. Half the women waste half their food. We order what we want and usually not dessert or appetizer because the amount of food in an entree is usually more than enough, and I love to eat.
Pros:
Way to much food and wastefulCons:
Everything from what I saw and readReviewed by Rfren Review Date: 04/05/2013
Rating: (2) Not Recommended
We vacationed at WDW the week of March 25th 2013 and paid full price for the Disney Dining Plan. The kids enjoyed the character meals, but that was the only thing we liked about the meal plan. For breakfast, it's basically the same food wherever you eat (especially buffet style). There is not a good variety of choices for the kids and There is way too much food, in fact we didn't use up all of our counter service meals and were unable to get compensated for them. You get the refillable drink mugs with the dining plan, but still get a beverage with each meal...what a waste if you are dining at the resort.
Pros:
Character MealsCons:
Way too much foodReviewed by momof3inMadisonAL Review Date: 02/16/2013
Rating: (2) Recommended
We got DDP for a week long vacation in Feb. We have had TiW over the past year but like the (perceived) convenience of having everything prepared and we were planning several TS. For breakfast we had Akershus, Tusker House. Lunch we had Mama Melrose Fantasmic package, Tony's. Dinner we had Ohana, WCC. It was not convenient. Being a party of 6, we were in 2 rooms at Pop so instead of having all the credits together, they were split. (my card had 3 kids with it but DH only had his credits.) When my DH card didn't work, they had to rebook everything and ended up giving us 7 credits too many. We didn't want to spend what wasn't ours but it made it difficult to remember whose card to charge meals on. When we ordered, we had to use multiple cards. It was a complete pain. Went to concierge at start of trip to see if they could be combined but were told, "no".
We didn't save any money. We had too much to eat. I hate that they got rid of the appetizer/salad but I get a dessert with every meal. The desserts are not always great and we didn't always eat them. I would rather have an option for salad or let kids get fruit for "dessert" (true at some places but not BOG).think we will stick to paying oop from now on.
Pros:
Don't have to worry about price of mealsCons:
Limited choices, increased costReviewed by SusanD Review Date: 06/13/2019
Rating: (3) Not Recommended
We have found it is too much food for an individual meal and not worth the overall price.
Pros:
Prepaid mealsCons:
Too much food and too expensiveReviewed by mcmouse Review Date: 03/31/2015
Rating: (3) Not Recommended
First off let me say that this is the first time in all our years visiting WDW that we haven't purchased a dining plan of some sort. We did like the convenience of not having to worry about how much money we were spending as the plan is pre-paid. You get plenty of good food to eat, but many times we said to ourselves "We never eat this much food at home. We could probably split some of these meals and at times skip a meal altogether." There were 2 of us traveling this year. Well we decided to not purchase a dining plan for this visit and see how we made out. We saved every receipt and did the math. We did eat at several sit down restaurants and on those days we ate lightly for our other meals. We never felt hungry or like we had eaten too much either...just right. We purchased 2 refillable mugs for length of stay at our resort. That cost us $35.98. We will rethink that on our next trip. Those mugs were figured in on our tally with the food we purchased. We found that we SAVED $478.00 by buying our own food instead of purchasing the dining plan. We stayed at WDW for 10 nights. We would have had to pay $1212.80 to purchase the dining plan. (2 people) No brainer for us. Had the dining plan been free we would have considered it, but we were offered the choice of a free dining plan or a percentage off our resort stay so we chose the percentage off. Glad we did. That's the route we'll take again if possible. When we started buying the dining plan years ago it was like $32.00. The cost has gotten way out of control and not possible for families with children who are planning a longer stay. Do your math before you buy it.
Pros:
lots of foodCons:
priceReviewed by Aquila163 Review Date: 08/15/2013
Rating: (3) Recommended
We got the dining plan for free in 2010. We had to make reservations months in advance to get a sit down restaurant every day of our trip. Then we had to be in the park where that reservation was every day. We used park hopper on two days to make meals. The amount of planning was nuts and I'm a disney planning nut. You must make the reservations well in advance because when they give out the dinning plan for free the table service reservations are used up by people that would otherwise go to counter service meals more. Last trip we ate what we really wanted for our ten day trip plus ate at Biergarten, House of Blues and Rain Forest plus all the counter service we felt like when we wanted to. The bottom line was we beat the counter service dining plan price by $75 and ate at three table service restaurants. It's not a money saver unless you normally eat ALOT and don't eat appetizers and do eat dessert. I'm sure many people eat more that DW and I do, it's not a money saver. If you can afford it, it is a convenience at best. Disney is so good at making money that international companies pay them for business training. They are not putting out the dinning plan if they don't financially benefit from it.
Pros:
Only if you eat alot anywayCons:
Unless you eat alot anyway is a looserReviewed by MeIAm Review Date: 01/04/2014
Rating: (4) Not Recommended
I think the DDP could work well for people staying in hotel rooms where they have to buy all their meals in the restaurants, however, if you will be eating breakfasts in your room and some meals off grounds, or you brought some meal items with you then the Plan would not work out for you financially.
We were at Disney checking in after dinner on a Friday and out on Mon. Cost would be $351 for 3 nights for 2 adults. We ate on property, brought cereal, bought milk on property and spent about $125 on the food we wanted to get.
We didn't gain any weight this trip because we didn't overeat, which can be a concern when you've already paid for two desserts a day, and buy the most expensive items because you want to get your money's worth out of the Plan.
I have tried to make the numbers work for us but just can't. Making ADRs can be a pain but need to be done and then you are tied to them.
I would recommend, if price is a concern, to check menus and see if it works for you. The convenience may be worth whatever the price.
Pros:
ease if in a hotel roomCons:
cost, cost, planning ahead, costReviewed by Injector Review Date: 02/18/2017
Rating: (5) Not Recommended
I gave the plan a 5 because there were good things and there were bad things about the plan. The good thing was convience only activating the key pad and putting in your pass code. The bad thing was way to much food and the time to use the table service part of the plan. I don't care to spend this much on park tickets to sit at a table. There was 2 of us. We paid $800 for the plan for 6 days. We did eat more than we paid for the plan. I wrote on each receipt the cost of the meal. With the plan you are almost forced to eat to get what you paid for the plan. I would not recommend the plan. Our son, daughter in law and 3 kids took the plan. Between all of us there was a lot of food wasted. We ate many desserts that we would not normally order. Yes food is very expensive in WDW, but if I were not on the plan I think I would have only spent half as much.
Pros:
ConvienceCons:
Need to use table serviceReviewed by mochridh Review Date: 11/18/2014
Rating: (5) Not Recommended
The first time we went to Disney World in 2008, the Dining Plan was different and we loved it.
Back then, we had the choice between appetizer or dessert and as I am not a big dessert fan, the option was very appreciated. It also included a gratuity, but we always tipped more on top of it.
We also noticed that the restos were waaay emptier than they now are.
Since then, we've become incredibly disenchanted with the DDP and will give Tables in Wonderland a go in a few weeks (DVC members). Being that we would rather share an appetizer and I enjoy a glass of wine with my meal, our calculations (on a detailed spreadsheet based on our usual trends) show that we will not be spending more for TIW, may even save some $$, but will enjoy flexibility and not feel pressured into cramming in 48 snacks because we paid for them.
If more people dumped DDP, they would likely revamp it to make it more attractive.
