The Sorcerer's Guide

Exploring the history, technology, and magic behind Disney parks

Disney parks are more than attractions - they are stories brought to life through imagination and engineering. They are designed to bring a sense of wonder, adventure, optimism, and happiness.

The Sorcerer's Guide explores the innovations and stories that shaped the Disney parks into what they are today. With the science of Imagineering, discarded ideas, and the history of theme park development, we cover the details that draw millions of visitors to Disney parks around the globe.

Whether you're a lifelong fan or visiting for the first tie, we want to help you see the parks in a new way.

Discover Disney History

We share stories behind the attractions, experiences, theming, and development of the Disney parks. Learn about:

  • The history of classic attractions
  • Experiences that were considered, but never built
  • How the Imagineers make decisions
  • The technology and engineering that creates the magic
  • The personalities that make these dreams realities

Our blog covers history, news and rumors about what's happening in the parks. Disney has a rich history of discarded concepts and unbuilt attractions, but a good idea never dies at Imagineering. We love looking at what they've thought about and seeing how it turns into new attractions - sometimes decades later. Our blog focuses on that Imagineering history, the science of theme parks, and what's new and exciting in the parks. You can click here to see our older posts.

RideRouter

RideRouter is our park planning tool. It uses machine learning and statistics (lots of math) to make predictions about what wait times in the parks are going to be. Then, you tell it what attractions you want to visit, and it jses artificial intelligence to find the best order for your visit. Its goal is to find the route that minimizes your total wait time. You can also make changes in the order to fit your needs and see how that affects the overall length of your day.

Crowd Calendars

We track queue times at Disneyland and Walt Disney World to make predictions about crowds in the parks. We track wait times at the parks every day, and make predictions about how long the lines will be in the future. The crowd ratings here are based on predictions about whether most rides will have wait times above or below their averages. That means that the Crowd Calendar represents how long you can expect to wait in line on each day. We rate the crowds on a scale of 1 to 10.

  • Disneyland Crowd Calendar for Current Month

    Disneyland

  • Walt Disney World Crowd Calendar for Current Month

    Walt Disney World

This approach does not tell you about how many people will be in the park - it tells you about how many people will be trying to ride rides. So if there's a special event (like fireworks in New Years Eve), the park may be packed with people, but we only give the park a high rating if all those people make the wait times longer than normal.

Park Overviews

These pages have overviews for each park at Disneyland and Walt Disney World: park introductions, comments on park quality, and wait times in some of the key attractions.

Why the Sorcerer's Guide?

The Sorcerer's Guide combines historical research, theme park analysis, and planning tools to help Disney fans appreciate and enjoy the parks. We mix a historical view point with data science, engineering, and psychology to understand why the parks are the way they are, and to deepen understanding of why so many people love them.

Popular Posts

LightningLane Premier Pass: Impact on Regular Guests

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Disney's new Lightning Lane Premier Pass for Walt Disney World  and Disneyland  is Disney's latest way to sell exclusivity. With a daily charge more than the price of a one-day ticket, this is a premium product for a premium price. While Disney's profits will love the new revenue stream, is it going to alienate even more guests? Even though Disney keeps building the narrative that it's expensive and confusing to visit, it's unlikely that standby lines will be noticeably longer because of the new product. Same Offerings, Higher Price Overall, the Premier Pass doesn't represent a new service being allocated to the park. The number of people that can ride each ride is essentially fixed. There are small variations based on breakdowns, guests taking extra time to load, or the number of ride vehicles being used. But the availability of a Lightning Lane Premier Pass does not  make a difference for that capacity. So, regardless of how many people buy the pass, the same ...
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Height Restrictions Translated to Age Ranges

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Height restrictions keep kids safe, but they can be frustrating. If you have ever taken kids to the parks, you know what I mean. Every cast member measures a little differently, so sometimes you make it all the way to the loading zone and then get turned away. Other times your kids are just slightly too short, and you wish they would have worn taller shoes. One of the most difficult things, in my mind, is planning trips and figuring out how long it will be ’till your kids can meet height restrictions. Especially when some can ride and some can’t, the younger ones want to know how much longer ’till they’ll be big enough. I don’t know any parents that have memorized a growth chart and can say, “My child will grow 1 inch in the next 9 months, so we should plan a trip then.” When we plan trips with our kids, we just keep measuring them and telling them to eat a bunch in hopes they’ll be tall enough for more rides. Fortunately, the CDC (Center for Disease Control) has released  data ...
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5 Fun Facts About Disneyland’s Opening

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It’s been 65 years since the Happiest Place on Earth opened to the world. To celebrate, here are 5 facts you may not know about Disneyland’s opening. If it failed, it would have become movie sets Disneyland was expensive to build, and Walt needed more money for it. Roy Disney was the company’s financial leader and was responsible for finding all the funding they needed.. To convince lenders to hand over more cash, Roy told them that the project was low risk. His story was that even if the park proved unpopular, the park could close to the public and turn into movie sets. Frontierland could be used for westerns, Adventureland for adventures, and Main Street for turn-of-the-century stories. I’m not sure what they could have used the Fantasyland circus tents for, though. July 17th was supposed to be a smaller party Disney sent invitations to a selected number of people for the grand opening festivities. The park was meant to open to the public on the next day, July 18th. However, some ind...
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