Extended Evening Hours returns to Animal Kingdom in Summer 2025 at Walt Disney World in what is probably a switch away from Magic Kingdom through (at least) January 2026. This post shares date(s), details, and strategy for taking advantage of the on-site perk for guests staying at higher-end hotels.
For those who are new to Walt Disney World vacation planning, Extended Evening Theme Park Hours is nighttime counterpart to Early Theme Park Entry. There are several differences, most notably that guests staying at Value or Moderate Resorts are not eligible for Extended Evening Hours. But it’s not just the most expensive resorts–you can save money by renting DVC points or staying at the Swolphin and still be eligible if you want to hack ExEH (and you should!)
Extended Evening Theme Park Hours has two types of resort eligibility, occurs two nights per week, is at two parks, and runs for two hours. It’s usually Monday at EPCOT and Wednesday at Magic Kingdom. See our Strategy Guide Guide for Extended Evening Hours at Walt Disney World for more ins and outs of the nighttime Deluxe benefit.
Walt Disney World has updated the calendar reflecting that Extended Evening Hours will move from Magic Kingdom to Animal Kingdom on Wednesdays, starting with July 2, 2025. The following Wednesday, July 9, 2025, Extended Evening Hours is again in Animal Kingdom as opposed to Magic Kingdom.
The move has not yet been announced by Walt Disney World, but you can see the change via the My Disney Experience app. July 9, 2025 is currently the latest the calendar goes, so any discussion of dates beyond then should be treated as speculative. However, with two consecutive weeks in Animal Kingdom, this is almost certainly not an anomaly due to Independence Day.
Instead, it’s likely a purposeful schedule change due to Disney Starlight Night Parade and one that will likely apply for the remainder of summer. As we’ve previously discussed, Walt Disney World has made several calendar changes strongly suggesting the debut date of Disney Starlight Night Parade!
The reason for moving Extended Evening Hours from Magic Kingdom to Animal Kingdom due to Starlight comes down to scheduling. Based on historical precedent, our best guess for the schedule is as follows:
- First Starlight Parade: 9 pm
- Happily Ever After: 10 pm
- Second Starlight Parade: 11 pm
- Park Closing: 11 pm or midnight
With the second Starlight Night Parade stepping off at 11 p.m., this essentially amounts to a midnight closing for Magic Kingdom even if the published time ends up being 11 pm. It thus behooves Walt Disney World to move ExEH to Animal Kingdom for the rest of the summer to reduce the strain on Magic Kingdom operations. Just trying to run Starlight and manage regular crowd flow is going to be a major challenge.
If Extended Evening Hours moves away from Magic Kingdom for the summer, it’ll probably stay that way until the second week of January 2026. Note that this is not yet official–everything beyond the first two weeks of July 2025 is purely speculative at this point.
With that said, Disney’s Hollywood Studios and Animal Kingdom have taken over hosting duties from Magic Kingdom each year in September or October. This occurs because of Party Season, which begins in early August and kicks into high gear in late September.
This year, the circumstances will be different with Starlight, which will cause higher crowds in Magic Kingdom on non-party nights even in August and September. Consequently, even if Magic Kingdom does somehow end up with more ExEH in late July or early August, it’ll probably lose them again by mid-August. (This practical reality is probably part of why Walt Disney World is shifting Extended Evening Hours in July, and will leave them there until early 2026–easier from a continuity and guest confusion perspective.)
Normally, Extended Evening Hours moves to Disney’s Hollywood Studios if Magic Kingdom has scheduling conflicts. Animal Kingdom is typically the backup to DHS, taking over if that park is hosting parties.
That usually happens in November and December with the Jollywood Nights Christmas Party. Now, it’s occurring due to After Hours at Disney’s Hollywood Studios, which runs most Wednesday nights through September 3, 2025.
In theory, DHS could take over ExEH starting then for a couple of months. In fact, that would be roughly the normal cadence from the last two years. The point of all this is that there are no guarantees that Animal Kingdom will host Extended Evening Hours interrupted from July 2025 through January 2026. It could be a mix of DAK and DHS. We do think it’s unlikely Magic Kingdom will have more than 4-5 more dates all of this year, and I’d bet on zero.
It’s actually an incredibly savvy move to shift Extended Evening Hours to Animal Kingdom. That should help redistribute crowds, making the other three parks slightly less busy and Animal Kingdom less of a ghost town at the tail end of the day.
Even so, part of me hopes to be wrong about this. I still fondly remember midnight closings during Summer Nightastic, then 3 hours of evening Extra Magic Hours afterwards. Yes, that’s correct–Magic Kingdom used to be open until 3 a.m. on some nights for all on-site guests. And that was during the Great Recession, when attendance was much lower!
While I had no delusions of 3 a.m. closings in Summer 2025, I was holding out hope for 2 a.m. with Extended Evening Hours. Even if that doesn’t happen–and it appears that it will not–I hope Magic Kingdom does at least some midnight closings. Especially on weekends, there will clearly be the demand for this with the second Starlight stepping off at 11 p.m.
This is not to complain about Extended Evening Hours at Animal Kingdom. To the contrary, we love DAK after dark. That usually does not happen during summer season due to later sunsets, so it’s a win from that perspective. Pandora – World of Avatar looks great at night, and takes on a totally different atmosphere that’s surprisingly serene.
Whether Extended Evening Hours at Animal Kingdom ends up being “good” or “bad” really depends upon crowd levels and weather. If it’s really hot during the day, more people will take midday breaks and attend ExEH. We often see the worst crowds for Extended Evening Hours at Magic Kingdom and EPCOT not during the busiest times of the year, but during the hottest. Even as summer crowds have decreased as a whole, ExEH crowds have worsened. Expect this to hold true at DAK, too.
Animal Kingdom has another issue, which is its inability to absorb crowds. This is always true, which is why there’s a ‘tipping point’ when DAK goes from totally manageable to insanely crowded, without much of a moderately busy in-between. Such is the nature of a limited ride roster. With hotter weather incentivizing more uptake of ExEH, this could happen at Animal Kingdom this summer. Or perhaps enough people will Park Hop to Magic Kingdom every night to see Starlight that crowds will still be light during ExEH at DAK.
As far as strategy goes, Avatar Flight of Passage is the main substantive draw of Extended Evening Hours at Animal Kingdom. Experiencing it with a minimal wait is a huge selling point of the perk; guests will undoubtedly recognize this, seeing ExEH as an alternative to paying for Lightning Lane Single Pass.
Due to this, Flight of Passage will be busy at the start of Extended Evening Hours. Based on our past experience during special events and evenings at Animal Kingdom, our advice would be to save Flight of Passage until the end of the night. We’ve done events during which Flight of Passage posts a 60-90 minute wait at the start and is a walk-on towards the end.
As odd as this might sound, there’s a good reason for the fall-off: Flight of Passage’s pre-show. If you’ve only experienced the attraction a handful of times, the awkward and rambling pre-show might strike you as mildly annoying. Try experiencing that same pre-show 4 consecutive times and you’ll find it interminably long and bordering on torture (talk about the ultimate first-world hyperbole, but still).
This is precisely why the line will drop off sharply for Avatar Flight of Passage during the course of Extended Evening Hours. People will get their fill at the beginning of the event, and not do it again either due to the long line they encountered the first time, the long pre-show, or both.
Accordingly, the best approach to Extended Evening Hours at Animal Kingdom is starting in Asia and doing Expedition Everest, potentially repeatedly. The total ride experience there is significantly shorter and it should be a similar story with the line. You could probably do Expedition Everest a few times in short order if your body is up to it.
From there, doing Dinosaur makes sense before ending the night in Pandora – World of Avatar where you should be able to knock out both Na’vi River Journey and Avatar Flight of Passage with minimal waits.
Our rationale for this strategy is that everyone is going to head to Pandora first. It’s the main draw, and why 95% of people are going to attend Extended Evening Hours at Animal Kingdom. Not only will ExEH guests flock to Pandora, but day guests will still be there at the start.
After about an hour, day guests will be long gone, and Extended Evening Hours guests will also start to move on to other areas of Animal Kingdom. The last 30 minutes or so, you should have Pandora pretty much to yourself. Not only will you be able to enjoy the attractions with minimal wait, but you can enjoy the ambiance of Pandora at night devoid of crowds.
I love the physical environment of Pandora, and it’s even better at night. Obviously, a big part of this is the lighting. But the ambiance is also much more convincing–truly like an alien planet being reclaimed by nature. The soundscape in Pandora is also top notch, elevating that landscape even further. The vibes are immaculate, as the kids say.
Honestly, that is the upside of Extended Evening Hours at Animal Kingdom from our perspective. While I consider Animal Kingdom to be the weakest of the 4 parks at night, that is very much a relative term–even the “weakest” in this case is still fantastic, and incredibly underrated. Just walking around Animal Kingdom at night is incredibly satisfying, albeit a bit spooky in low crowds.
It’s not just the moody atmosphere, it’s the serene sounds and just general peacefulness of the park. If you’ve only done DAK during hot days, you will have a totally fresh perspective on it–noticing details you’ve never seen before and leaving with a newfound appreciation for the park. I promise!
The biggest downside to Extended Evening Hours at Animal Kingdom is that there’s only so much to do–pretty much just the rides, and there aren’t many of those. Kilimanjaro Safaris, Festival of the Lion King, Finding Nemo: Big Blue & Beyond, or Feathered Friends in Flight, all of which currently end operations in the late afternoon.
Accordingly, we’d recommend arriving a few hours early, and allocating that time to other attractions, stage shows, and atmospheric entertainment that won’t be open or performed during Extended Evening Hours. During the event, you’re necessarily going to be repeating attractions, as so few are open.
On the plus side, it should make for a great opportunity to say goodbye to DINOSAUR. And, for those of you who have asked me how to get your own empty Time Rover on-ride photo, the last ~30 minutes of ExEH is a pretty good answer!
Ultimately, Extended Evening Hours at Animal Kingdom is an event that leaves me conflicted. On the one hand, I prefer nighttime in the other 3 parks, and I also favor ExEH in both Disney’s Hollywood Studios and Magic Kingdom from a practical perspective given the ride rosters in each of those parks.
Animal Kingdom is incredible at night–criminally underrated once you consider the park’s normal closing time outside of a few months of the year. It’s a real shame that so few Walt Disney World guests experience Animal Kingdom in the evening, as the entire park takes on a different vibe–especially Pandora – World of Avatar. More than anything else, this really just makes me wish Animal Kingdom had a (good) nighttime spectacular and larger ride roster so people stayed late here on regular days.
Planning a Walt Disney World trip? Learn about hotels on our Walt Disney World Hotels Reviews page. For where to eat, read our Walt Disney World Restaurant Reviews. To save money on tickets or determine which type to buy, read our Tips for Saving Money on Walt Disney World Tickets post. Our What to Pack for Disney Trips post takes a unique look at clever items to take. For what to do and when to do it, our Walt Disney World Ride Guides will help. For comprehensive advice, the best place to start is our Walt Disney World Trip Planning Guide for everything you need to know!
YOUR THOUGHTS
Will you be taking advantage of Extended Evening Theme Park Hours at Disney’s Animal Kingdom? Disappointed about the lack of ExEH at Magic Kingdom in July and potentially through early 2026? Hoping more Extended Evening Hours dates are offered at DAK, or would you like to see it shift to DHS in September? Do you agree or disagree with our assessment? Any questions we can help you answer? Hearing your feedback–even when you disagree with us–is both interesting to us and helpful to other readers, so please share your thoughts below in the comments!