Magical Express is a wonderful, free service that Disney offers to its customers who are staying at a Disney resort. It’s one of my favorite benefits to staying on Disney property. But I know some people ask me how to use Magical Express, so I figured I’d explain it here! The Magical Express is a bus service that will pick you up at the Orlando International Airport and bring you right to your Disney hotel. It will also bring you from your hotel back to the airport at the end of your vacation. Another great bonus? They’ll take care of your luggage too. Just put the magical express tag on your bags when you drop them off in your home airport and you don’t have to worry about them anymore. Disney will pick them up in Orlando and bring them directly to your hotel room!
Sign up for Magical Express.
If you have your flight information when you book your Disney hotel you can choose to add on Magical Express right when you book. You just need to provide your airline, flight number, and arrival/departure times. If you book your flight after the hotel you can always call to add it on later, or give your information to your travel agent and they can set it up for you.
Receive your packet in the mail.
Usually about 2-3 weeks before you leave you’ll get an envelope with your Magical Express information in it. This will have the luggage tags, a letter explaining how everything works, and a map of the airport to show you where to go when you arrive in Orlando.
Put your tags on your bags.
Attach the yellow Magical Express luggage tags to your bags. You don’t even have to go to luggage claim once you land if you do this, you can get right on board the Magical Express! But make sure you pack anything essential in your carry on – it can take up to 4 hours after you land for them to deliver your bags to the room.
Your first glimpse of Disney World from the Magical Express!
When you land, go to the Magical Express area.
Make sure you have either your magic band or the ticket they sent you in the mail for Magical Express. The area is located on the B side of the terminal – just follow signs for “B” and take the escalators or elevator all the way down to the bottom level.
Get on the bus!
Once you check in they will direct you to which line you need to get on for your resort. Many of the buses do combined resort stops, so your bus will probably be going to several locations. Once on board it takes anywhere from 30-60 minutes to get to Disney depending on traffic.
Once on board they show info on Disney World, shorts, and entertaining videos like the “Diaper Dans”!
The Magical Express will then bring you right to your resort! If your room is ready you can check in (though keep in mind that your luggage will probably not be there yet if you used the Magical Express tags). If your room isn’t ready yet you can head right to the parks and know that your luggage will be waiting for you when you get back!
Thanks for explaining this! I am using it when I go to WDW and was still a bit confused on how the luggage thing worked!
Hopefully I made it a little clearer for you, Adriana! I feels really odd at first to just leave the airport without your bags but they always magically appear in your room!
I’m getting down to the wire and writing my plan down (lol) Does the bus leave right away after checking in? Or is there time for a restroom break and catch up? AHHHH.
Basically the buses leave on a pretty continuous schedule and you don’t have an assigned time, you just hop on the next one when you get there. So if you need to take a little time for the bathroom or whatever you’ll be fine!
Okay awesome! That eases my gitters!
Such an awesome service! I love that they get your bags from baggage claim, but it’s good to know how long it takes to get them in your room. Great info!
It really is so convenient not having to lug everything around! As long as you’re prepared with some stuff in a carry-on you’re good to go!
Sounds like a great service-I’ll have to bookmark this post for when we go to Disney!
I hope you find it useful when you eventually take a Disney trip!
This is an amazing service. I love posts like this that help people with their travels 🙂
Thanks! I was actually inspired to write this post by a friend who is a Disneyland regular but had never been to WDW – she described feeling confused and overwhelmed by the Magical Express, so I thought this might be something that would be helpful to others 🙂
Disney seems to have every detail covered! I live in Florida so we always drive to the parks, but if I was coming from out of state, I would definitely take advantage of this!
They really do – they want to make sure they have you all taken care of!
This sounds like a great service! I’m semi-local so I always drive over, but I’d definitely take advantage of this if I wasn’t!
Yeah, if I was in driving distance I would be driving over all the time 😉
we’re planning a trip to disney world so this was helpful.
How exciting! I’m glad this post could be of use to you. If you have any other questions about anything just let me know!
I’ve always wanted to do this! We’re hoping next time we come visit, to stay on property and for sure try this out! It seems like it would make things so much easier.
I personally hate driving so I love being able to do this instead of renting a car! Though when it takes you back to the airport we refer to it as the “tragical express”.