Understanding the Disney Dining Plan (A Complete Guide)

If you’re planning a Walt Disney World vacation, you’ve probably heard mention of the Disney Dining Plan, Free Dining, or even worse, well-meant advice that left you feeling confused! It’s understandable. Dining is one of many planning aspects that can quickly become overwhelming as you work to iron out the details.

We hear it all the time. From “Don’t do the dining plan, it’s too much food!” to “Oh, you have to do it; everything is taken care of ahead of time,” everyone has an opinion. Having an opinion is okay. Both of these opinions are reasonable and true. But are they helpful to you? Probably not.

I mention it often and cannot stress enough that the saying “to each their own” is true in most walks of life, especially vacation planning. We focus primarily on the resort hotels at Disney World, and the question I get almost every day is, what is your favorite resort? If you’ve been reading this site or have met me in the parks, you know the answer. My response is always, well, Disney’s Beach Club is my favorite resort, but I rank Animal Kingdom Lodge as number one on Resorts Gal because it’s such a unique offering unlike anywhere else.

I started Resorts Gal because I had vast experience and information to share that others would find helpful. But I’ve learned that while we are all alike in many aspects, we each have unique desires, likes, and dislikes. So, I hope this guide will provide you with an objective view of the Disney Dining Plan so that you can discern whether or not it works for your family without all the confusion.

That said, I do have one strong opinion about the dining plan. If you’re on a tight budget, you’ll want to come up with other creative solutions to maximize your dining expenses. The Disney Dining Plan is probably not for you. We discuss this more in our guide to creating a budget for Disney World. For the rest of you, let’s delve into a further exploration of the dining plan, step-by-step.

Step One: An Introduction to Disney’s Dining Plan

If you’ve ever been on a cruise or to an all-inclusive resort, you’ve probably experienced the amenity of having your dining included with the total cost. The Disney Dining Plan is the same idea, except it’s more of a package upgrade or an add-on you pay for ahead of time.

Additionally, there is such a thing as free dining. Free dining is a special promotion that’s offered from time to time. In exchange for a dining package, you pay the full price of the hotel + tickets. So you won’t get a discount on your stay (you’ll pay full price) but a dining package is included.

One big caveat: The Dining Plan doesn’t cover every meal, so you will still have to pay for some meals out of pocket. We’ll get into the details a little later. For now, you need to know that the Dining Plan can be purchased anytime and that Free Dining is a special promotion offered occasionally. Now, we’ll look at the two types of dining plans.

Step Two: Learning the Types of Disney Dining Plans

You can choose from two dining plans: the Disney Quick-Service Dining Plan and the Disney Dining Plan. The quick-service dining plan is designed for families who won’t spend much time at table-service restaurants. You can dine at the time of your choosing at most quick-service restaurants. Meanwhile, if you’re on the Disney Dining Plan, you’ll have a mix of quick-service and table-service restaurants. We’ll look at the meal credits for both options below.

The Disney Quick-Service Dining Plan

If you choose the Disney Quick-Service Dining Plan, you’ll receive the following:

• 2 Quick-Service Meals (per night of your stay)
• 1 Snack or Nonalcoholic Beverage (per night of your stay)
• 1 Resort-Refillable Mug (per person)

There are some stipulations regarding these meal credits. For example, if you book a 7-day vacation, you’ll receive six nights’ worth of credits per person. So, for seven days (six nights), each person will receive a total of twelve (12) quick-service meals and six (6) snacks or nonalcoholic beverages.

Beverages are included with each quick-service meal credit, so you don’t have to worry about purchasing a separate beverage. Guests who are old enough (21 years or older with ID) can select an alcoholic beverage for their drink where available at quick service restaurants.

Children between the ages of 3 and 9 must order from the kids’ meal menus where available. Each person will also receive a refillable mug that can be used at any Disney Resort Hotel quick service refill station. Mugs cannot be refilled in the theme parks.

The Disney Dining Plan

If you choose the Disney Dining Plan, you’ll receive the following:

• 1 Quick-Service Meal (per night of your stay)
• 1 Table-Service Meal (per night of your stay)
• 1 Snack or Nonalcoholic Drink (per night of your stay)
• 1 Resort-Refillable Drink Mug (per person)

Like the quick-service dining plan, there are a few stipulations. Again, these plans are based on the number of nights of your stay. So, for a seven-day vacation (six nights), you’ll receive six (6) quick-service meal credits, six (6) table-service meal credits, and six (6) snack credits (or nonalcoholic beverages) per person.

Beverages are included for each quick service and table service meal credit. As mentioned above, guests who are old enough (21 years or older with ID) can select an alcoholic beverage for their drink, which is available at quick service and table service restaurants.

• If you use a table service credit at breakfast, you get an entree and a choice of drink (including an alcoholic beverage, to those applicable).
• Table service credits at brunch, lunch, or dinner include the choice of an entree, dessert, and beverage (including an alcoholic beverage, to those applicable).
• If you dine at a buffet, the buffet counts as the entree and dessert (you still get the extra beverage).

If you decide to go this route, we have a separate list of snacks, beverages, and other items you can order on the dining plan. For example, you can order a premium beverage like hot chocolate, milkshakes, or fresh smoothies as your beverage if desired. For many, this is an “extra” that you only enjoyed because of the dining plan, where you might not order one if you were paying out-of-pocket.

Some of the most common snacks are an ice cream novelty like Mickey-shaped ice cream sandwiches or a single serving of items like popcorn or fruit. (On their website, Disney states that items in the hotel gift shops, like a jar of peanut butter or a box of doughnuts, do not count as a snack credit.)

Step Three: How to Use the Disney Dining Plan

Using the Dining Plan is pretty simple. Cast members are well-versed and can typically answer any questions you might have. So don’t be afraid to ask should you need assistance. Our experience has been that they will often point out what you’re missing, especially at quick-service restaurants.

To use your meal credits, you will present your hotel reservation, MagicBand, MagicMobile pass (on your phone), or Keys to the World card. However, it is important to note that you do not have a limit on how many credits you can use per day. So, if you use too many credits, you could run out. But more often, we hear of guests with extra snack credits who frantically try to find something to purchase at the hotel gift shop on the way to the airport. (The Walker’s Shortbread cookies are pretty good if you can smuggle them into your suitcase. Just don’t get the chocolate-coated ones because they might melt.)

If you’re on the Disney Dining Plan, you also need to know that gratuities are not included. So when you receive your check at the end of a table-service meal, you’ll need to add the tip. In most cases, you can add the tip to the check, and it will be charged to your hotel room. But if you did not add a credit card to your room, you will need to have a separate way to take care of the bill.

If you’re unfamiliar with dining at Disney World, an 18% gratuity is automatically added to parties of six or more. Gratuities are included in the price of the meal at Cinderella’s Royal Table and Hoop Dee Doo Revue.

Step Four: Keeping Track of Usage on the Dining Plans

You can keep track of your dining plan credits in a couple of ways. Most will want to use the My Disney Experience app. Open the app and select the “My Resort Hotel” section. Then select “Check Dining Plan” to review your credits. Here, you will see the total and types of credits you have left.

You can also check your dining receipts. They list your remaining credits at the bottom. Or, if you prefer, you can stop at the hotel desk or guest relations, and a cast member can help you.

It does not matter how you redeem your snacks or meals. If you miss a few snacks or a meal credit one day, they will roll over to the next day and continue to do so until they’ve been used. However, they expire if you haven’t used your credits by midnight of your checkout day. So, it’s important to check on these things throughout your trip. You wouldn’t want to reach the last day with eight snack credits. At an average of $5.00 per snack, that’s $40.00!

Consideration Point: I want to pause here to mention that this is an excellent consideration point if you’re still trying to discern whether or not a Disney Dining Plan is worth it. If you’re the type of person who eats a snack like clockwork every day at 3:00 p.m., you’re probably going to continue that habit on vacation and will use your snack credits. But if you or your group rarely snacks, it might not register with you to remember to get a snack every day. Or if you don’t space them out appropriately, you might get too full before a big meal like dinner that includes an entree, beverage, and dessert. (This is more in reference to the Disney Dining Plan, not the quick-service plan.)

You might have noticed on our spreadsheet that select character meals (not all), signature restaurants, and dinner shows cost two (2) credits. These meals are going to be the more expensive options. For instance, lunch and dinner at Akershus Royal Banquet Hall are two dining credits. So, if you have a family of four who dines at Akershus for dinner, you’ll use eight dining credits, which is the equivalent of eight meals. (At a one-credit meal, you would only redeem four credits, the equivalent of four meals.)

This would mean you spent two nights of dinner on one character meal, so you would have to pay out-of-pocket at some point to make up for the splurge. Some people do this by skipping a meal or table service in exchange for a cheaper quick service option.

Consideration Point: This brings us to another pause in the learning process. If you’re dead set on breaking even or beating the plan’s price, you’ll spend a ton of time researching scenarios. Not only that, but your schedule will likely reflect these details in a way that might not benefit your touring plans. For example:

No one wants to go out of the way to have lunch at the Mexico Pavilion quick service, so mom and dad can order this one margarita that will put them $2.80 under budget for the day! Dad will probably bust Mom’s bubble and order a draft beer that costs $5.00 less anyway. If that margarita doesn’t kick in, she will spend the rest of her day figuring out how to make up for it!

While this is a slightly humorous scenario, it’s also serious. In a recent conversation, a friend told me she thought “you had to go to these certain places and order specific things” to beat the dining plan. It was just what she had learned from researching for her family’s vacation. But for me, it made me think about her mindset and the overload of information she had consumed to potentially save a couple of dollars.

I get it. You are paying a lot to visit Walt Disney World, and it feels good when you think you have come out ahead. But when you’re there in the moment, it might not be feasible to accommodate the information overload floating around in your head.

Step Seven: Dessert Every Night (Is it Too Much?)

While we already mentioned it, I wanted to address the “dining plan is too much food” complaint. It is a lot of food. When you dine at a table service restaurant for brunch, lunch, or dinner, you get the following:

• 1 Entree
• 1 Dessert
• 1 Nonalcoholic Beverage (or Alcoholic Beverage, for Guests 21 and older)

Let’s go back to that family of four with two adults and two children. If you planned 4-5 nights of table service restaurants back to back, would you, as adults, order a glass of wine or cocktail, an entree, and dessert at every meal? Would your children be allowed to order a milkshake, a kids’ meal, and then a dessert? I cannot answer this for you. But I know for my family, it’s few and far between when we splurge on a meal with a lot of extras. If you’re not used to eating this way, you will feel it. This is another important consideration point. However, if you cruise often and look forward to these kinds of meals, you might love the dining plan. But if your go-to dinner throughout the week is soup and salad, you might have difficulty trying to make room for all the extras.

Step Eight: Cost Analysis and Value

When considering the cost of the Disney Quick Service Dining Plan and The Disney Dining Plan, you might want to run a few numbers. We’ve done the math and have broken down the daily average cost of each plan.

*Disney notes on its website that children ages 3-9 can save up to 20% on the dining plan. Most character meals (not all) cost one table service credit and start at $30.00 per meal, so you can see the value in this instance. If you have children and plan to do several character meals, this is another consideration point. See our Disney World Character Dining Guide for a breakdown of the cost and credits for each character meal.

Step Nine: Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

Here are a few frequently asked questions about the Disney Dining Plan.

What is DDP? DDP stands for Disney Dining Plan.

Can you place mobile orders with the dining plan? You can use quick service and snack credits to make mobile orders from quick service restaurants, and you can use table service credits to make mobile orders from table service locations at select Disney Resort Hotels.

Do you need dining reservations on the Disney Dining Plan? Yes, commonly referred to as ADRs, Disney strongly recommends that guests have advanced dining reservations. Most restaurants take walk-ups based on availability, but it’s rare to secure a table last minute at a sought-after dining experience. We discuss reservations in detail in our Ultimate Disney World Dining Guide.

Does the Disney Dining Plan include drinks? Yes, we’ve touched on this a good bit. But every meal credit comes with a regular drink like soda. Guests who are old enough can upgrade to alcohol where it’s available. Most counter-service restaurants (except for Magic Kingdom) have some sort of beer, wine, or specialty cocktail on the menu. You will also receive a refillable mug that you can use at any of the Disney World Resorts quick service locations. However, you will have to purchase soft drinks, bottled water, juice, etc, in the parks, or you can redeem a snack credit for them.

Can you use the Disney Dining Plan for in-room dining? Unfortunately, Disney’s Grand Floridian Resort and Spa is the only hotel currently offering room service. (You can order room service here for the expensive cost of two table service credits.)

Can you use snack credits at the Epcot Festivals throughout the year? Yes, select items from the festival booths will be indicated with the purple DDP logo.

Can you get extras like magical star glow cubes with the dining plan? While you can order various drinks (like fresh smoothies, milkshakes, and premium hot chocolate) with the dining plan, you cannot order drinks that come with merchandise (think bottle straps, bottle toppers, a souvenir container, etc.).

Step Ten: How Do You Purchase a Dining Plan?

We use a Disney travel agent for booking our hotel stays. A travel agent can provide detailed pricing and quotes for both dining plans. But if you want to run the preliminary numbers, you can do so on Disney’s website.

After selecting a hotel and tickets, you will see an option to “add a dining plan.” You’ll select that option, and both dining plans will appear. Your subtotal (without the dining plan) will remain in the top right corner of the screen. At the bottom, you’ll see a subtotal with the costs of both dining plans. Here’s an example from Disney’s website.

Conclusion

We hope this guide has given you a complete overview of the dining plans. There is a good deal of information to consume. But as you probably know by now, beginning to plan a Walt Disney World vacation is like taking on a second job or picking up a new hobby. You’ll spend months trying to make sure everything goes according to plan.

We try to make things simple with our step-by-step guides. Here’s a roadmap of our process:

• Start Here: A Step-by-Step Guide to Planning Your Walt Disney World Vacation
• Take Our Quiz to Find the Perfect Disney Resort For You!
• Learn How To Create a Budget For Disney World
• Learn Your Disney Transportation Options

In the Comments

Did you find this Disney Dining Plan guide helpful? Did it answer your questions? Are you still having trouble deciding whether or not the dining plan will work for your group? Let us know your struggles, thoughts, or opinions. We love to hear from our readers, and your feedback helps immensely.