Hello, Denise, and welcome to planDisney. I bet you are getting so excited for your upcoming Walt Disney World vacation.
Denise, at this time you do still need to make
park pass reservations for the foreseeable future to visit the Walt Disney World Theme Parks. There has not been any announcements about if or when this program might go away. Before you purchase your theme park tickets, I highly encourage you to check out the
Walt Disney World Theme Park availability calendar. This is going to show you what theme parks are available for the dates you'd like to visit. The calendar is broken down into three categories - Guests with resort stays, Guests with theme park tickets only and Annual Passholders. Be sure you are looking at the one that most pertains to you as they do have different availabilities. Once you've checked the calendar, you can go ahead and purchase your tickets and link them to your MyDisneyExperience account. Then, you'll need to head over to the park pass reservation website to make your selections. You'll log in to your account, select your travel party, a date on the calendar and then the theme park. If all goes well you'll be taken to a confirmation page and you can make another selection for a different day.
If you have the
park hopper tickets, you still need to make park pass reservations for the initial theme park you are planning to visit. Then, on the day of, you'll need to scan in and enter that theme park before continuing on to other ones later in the day. The sort of "activates" the park hopper feature. Park hopping hours now start at 2:00 p.m. and last until each park closes in the evening. After 2:00 p.m. you are able to visit any or all of the Walt Disney World Theme Parks with your park hopper that you would like. There is no need to make additional park pass reservations each day. To make park hopping a little bit more convenient at this time, complimentary park-to-park bus transportation is being provided.
I'd recommend making your park pass reservations for August as soon as possible. Sometimes dates on the calendar can fill up pretty quickly. If you have any other questions before your trip, stop back by and
ask me. I'm happy to help. Have fun!