Hotel inside Disney World or Hotel near Disney World
Choosing a hotel for your magical vacation is the most important choice you’ll make. It’s the place where you’ll spend the most time. There are lots of choices when it comes to Orlando hotels. The first decision is whether to stay onsite (inside Disney World) or offsite.
Staying Onsite
We love staying at Disney Resorts. Our favorite is the Polynesian Resort. It’s just about as close to heaven as you can get, IMHO (read about IMHO, acronyms). When Disney opened the All Star Resorts it became affordable for almost anyone to stay on site. Disney even runs specials during the year where rooms are priced as low as $49.00 per night. You can’t beat that.
Some of the pros for staying onsite
- Mickey Mouse wake-up calls
- Disney 24 hours per day
- Free Disney Transportation
- Beautifully themes
- Disney labeled soap and shampoo
- Short commutes to the parks
- Package delivery to your room
- Charging privileges to your room
- Extra Magic Hour
- Guaranteed entry to the parks
Some cons of staying onsite
- Disney 24 hours a day
- Food cost
- Lack of restaurant choice
- Price
- Limited availability
- Lack of discounts
- Room
Staying at a hotel near Disney World
I did a search for a hotel close to Disney World today and came up with 438 choices. That’s incredible. That doesn’t even count rental houses, small mom-and-pop hotels, and non-participating hotels like Motel 6. It’s absolutely amazing how many accommodation choices you have in the Orlando area.
There are some real advantages to staying outside “The World”. You have greater access to restaurant choices, entertainment options (other than Disney), and you a wider variety of hotels to choose from. But with those advantages come some disadvantages. The commute from you hotel to the parks can be annoying.
Here are some of the pros of staying offsite
- More choices/options
- Easier access to more restaurants and more affordable restaurants
- Closer to shopping
- Not overwhelmed by all Disney all the time
- Better TV options (Disney hotels tend to put a lot of Disney stuff on)
- Can be cheaper
- More discounts available
- Frequent flyer mileage
Some of the cons of staying offsite
- I-4 (traffic)
- You don’t have access to Disney’s amenities (Extra Magic Hour, free parking, etc.)
- Not real sure of the quality of the hotel
- Long commute to and from the parks, not easy to slip out for a nap or emergency
- On very busy days, Disney closes the parks to outside guests
Conclusion
Given a choice we will stay in Disney hotels. The ambience, the cleanliness, the convenience, and everything else Disney does makes us want to come back. (We’ve stayed in the Pop Century twice.) When we stayed outside “The World” (before the Moderate and Value Resorts) we were jealous of the people that stayed in “those rich hotels”. We were usually to tired to do any other entertainment, and we usually ate in the parks.
Final Word
If you in Orlando to do Disney, stay with Disney. If you’re trying to see some of the other entertainment in Orlando, stay somewhere else.
No related posts.
