New Summer 2026 WDW Discounts

Disney just released a bunch of new discounts for summer visits.  I don’t often talk about discounts here but one of these caught my eye and I wanted to do a deeper dive into it.  We’ll talk about what discounts are available and whether one (or more) of these is a good deal.

 

First, these “summer” deals cover roughly May through September.  There are some slight differences in the dates but that should give you a rough idea of what we’re looking at.  Check Disneyworld.com for more specifics if you need them.  These all relate to the “Cool Kids’ Summer”, an amorphous term that Disney started using last year.

 

It is not unusual for Disney to release discounts for the summer season, as these are typically the slowest months on the Disney calendar in general.  This might not always have been the case, but it certainly is now, as more events are spread throughout the calendar and (more importantly), people don’t want to travel in the summer to avoid the worst of the relentless Florida heat.  But if you’re going during this time, there are deals to be had.

 

Disney often releases “room only” discounts and those are part of this deal.  For any guest, you can save up to 30% off select Disney resort hotels from May 1 through October 4.  That deal is sweetened if you’re a Florida resident (up to 35%) off and sweetened further if you are an annual passholder (up to 40%).  Essentially, this is the same discount, just scaled up depending on your situation.

 

I tend to focus on the general discounts more (in this case, up to 30% off) because I’m neither a Florida resident or an AP holder.  The deal I’m going to talk about in more depth is certainly for the general public, because it combines both a hotel stay and park tickets, something that an AP would not need.  So keep that in mind when I start throwing out numbers.

 

The newest and most intriguing deal in addition to the above is the “buy four, get two free” deal.  This deal is for the dates of May 26 through September 15, slightly different from the above (it starts the day after Memorial Day, for one).  I truly don’t remember seeing a deal like this before and it got me wondering whether it was indeed a better deal than the room only discounts above.  This is basically what it sounds like – if you buy a four day, four night package (room and park tickets), you get two days free for both the resort AND park tickets.  Very interesting …

 

Like most Disney deals (and price changes in general), there is almost no way to compare apples to apples since resort and park ticket prices differ throughout the year, not to mention the various levels of resort available.  I just picked one example here to see if I could get the numbers to work.  My working theory was that this discount wasn’t all that it seemed, mostly because park ticket prices get lower the longer the duration (in other words, a one day ticket is expensive, but a six day ticket is cheaper per day, since the longer you go, the cheaper each additional day is).  I wanted to test out whether this was correct.

 

My example was this – a six night stay, June 14-20, 2026 (seven days, six nights) at Coronado Springs (a standard village room) with six day park tickets (one park per day, not hoppers).  The park tickets were adult tickets, which in Disney terms if for anyone ten years old and above.  As I said above, there are so many permutations you can make out of this so I tried to just pick something “middle of the road” here.  Since Coronado is a moderate tier resort, the “room only” discount for this week would be 25%, not 30% (which is reserved for deluxe resorts essentially).  Keep this in mind for our comparison later.

 

Using this discount, I found that a package consisting of the resort stay and park tickets would come to $3,998.32.  Without the discount, this same package comes to $5,138.36.  That’s a 29% discount!  That actually came out to a better percentage than I had thought because unlike park tickets, the hotel price nightly is the same each day (give or take – weekends cost more, etc).  Good start!

 

But obviously that’s not what we’re comparing here, because if you’re looking to book with a discount, you wouldn’t pay the whole rack rate.  If you took this same package and applied the room only discount that is available, the package comes to $4,569.31.  That’s still 14% better with the buy four, get two deal. 

 

But wait, there’s more!  Let’s assume you don’t want to purchase a package, but simply want to take advantage of the room only discount and purchase your park tickets from an authorized reseller like Undercover Tourist.  In THAT case, the room would cost $1,416.69 and the tickets (thanks to a promotion on UT happening right now) would cost $2,630.88, for a total of $4,049.57.

 

That number is basically a break even with the buy four get two deal.  But still, that deal comes out looking good, considering we’re comparing it to two separate deals at the same time.  Some people don’t want the complication of buying from a reseller and would just rather buy everything through Disney.  This also gives you flexibility in case you wanted to make any kind of changes to the reservation, which isn’t as easy to do once you have tickets purchased elsewhere.

 

The other place the buy four get two package comes out ahead is if you are purchasing the Disney Dining Plan.  You need to have a package purchased through Disney if you are adding the dining plan.  Whether that plan is a good deal or not is again up to the individual purchasing it.  I can say however that there is a hidden benefit here as well if you have young children (under ten).

 

There is a separate discount available through Disney where kids eat free all summer.  If you purchase an adult dining plan, the kids’ dining plan (ages 3-9) is free.  This can be used in addition to the buy four get two deal.  The kids’ dining plan is obviously a lot cheaper than the adult version, but if, say, you were two adults with two young kids, this can be a great way to save on their meals while taking advantage of a better discount than Disney has often put out in recent years.

 

My initial theory appears to be incorrect in this case – this IS a good deal, even if it’s not for everyone.  I’m guessing that Disney is seeing soft occupancy numbers and is working hard to entice people to come visit to pump up those numbers.  This also has the sneaky benefit of keeping guests within the “Disney bubble” for six or more days, instead of, say, using some of their vacation time to visit Universal.  Perhaps that’s why we’re seeing this deal for the first time that I can remember.