This guide to March 2023 at Walt Disney World offers a free crowd calendar, weeks to visit & avoid, weather, ride refurbishments, and what’s new. All of this, plus info & tips for Magic Kingdom, EPCOT, Animal Kingdom, and Hollywood Studios. (Updated February 24, 2023.)
March 2023 will likely be a “tale of two seasons.” The beginning should be slow, with crowds subsiding after Presidents’ Day and Mardi Gras in late February 2023. Then later in March, colleges and many school systems in the country will take their spring break…and that means trips to Walt Disney World! If you’re somehow able to get past that (perhaps you’re an avid queue enthusiast, in which case 120-minute waits might be right up your alley), the month of March can otherwise be a good time to visit.
While it’s always above-average in terms of crowds, parts of March 2023 won’t be as bad for a couple of reasons. First, because Easter isn’t until April 9, 2023. This means schools that plan their Spring Breaks around the Easter holiday won’t be off for Spring Break in March. That’s the good news…
The bad news is that many K-12 schools and colleges in the United States do have their Spring Breaks in March. That includes many districts in Florida, including the two counties with the biggest impact on Walt Disney World crowds.
This is where our Spring Break 2023 Crowd Calendar for Walt Disney World comes into play. If you’re only concerned with congestion, wait times, and planning around dates to avoid–that has you covered. It details which weeks of spring break will be best and worst in both March and April 2023.
We’ll discuss the ramifications of Spring Break in the March 2023 crowd calendar section below. Here’s what else you need to know about the month at Walt Disney World, organized into convenient categories…
March Weather at Disney World
As far as the weather goes, March is the month when the weather starts to turn around and warm up. Temperatures rise over the course of the month, and although they are still on the cool side of mild, it’s usually quite comfortable. Sure, it can be abnormally cold or hot in March (definitely check the long term forecast before visiting as it really could be either), but you’re generally in for weather that’s almost ideal for touring the parks.
Lows at the beginning of the month are in the mid-50s and creep up towards the 60s by the end of the month. High temperatures range from 75 to 80 degrees. In looking at those numbers and the “comfortable” band on this page, you might think that it skews towards chilly. That can be true early in the morning and late at night, but keep in mind that you’ll be most active during the middle of the day when it’s warmest; personally, I prefer slightly cooler temperatures when I’m active, anyway.
The result is that I find March to be one of the better months of the year for weather in Florida, particularly towards the end of the month. At the beginning of the month you’re more likely to experience unseasonably cold weather, so I tend to avoid that. About the only downside to this mild weather is that it can make visiting water parks or spending much time in your resort hotel’s pool less appealing (or downright unappealing). This can be a bummer for those seeking a ‘tropical’ reprieve from winter in the North.
Being Michiganders, that’s exactly what my family wanted from our trips when I was growing up. I still remember an early March vacation during which my parents decided to stubbornly stick to our plans (I paint them as “stubborn” but the reality was probably that I was a bratty kid who insisted upon going) to visit Blizzard Beach. There was almost no one in the park, and we all spent the better park of the day wrapped in towels on our beach chairs.
I recall crossing the icebergs in Ski Patrol Training Camp and envisioning them as actual chunks of ice, which wasn’t that much of a stretch of the imagination at the time. I share all of this because you might not want to make concrete plans for the water parks or put too much weight in a hotel’s swimming pool when choosing a hotel or planning a March visit–you may not want to spend time at either.
March 2023 Disney World Special Events
Let’s start out with the nonpublic events in March 2023 that impact attendance at Walt Disney World. While there is no Beer Bong World Championship (let alone more unsavory events) held at the ESPN Wide World of Sports, there are youth events that can result in just as wild of crowds. There are two major cheerleading competitions, held March 10-12, 2023, that will boost attendance at the parks and occupancy at the hotels (usually the All Stars and Coronado Springs).
The actual impact of youth sporting events on crowd levels is debatable. If you end up at the same hotel as them or behind a large group of cheerleaders in line or in the same Haunted Mansion stretching room as them, your perception of them will likely be very different than someone who stays at a different hotel and only encounters small numbers of them in passing. We speak from experience (including that very specific Haunted Mansion example), and say that this is generally not something about which you should be concerned.
Speaking of athletic events, on a positive note, there is no runDisney race in March 2023. The Princess Half Marathon is in late February, and the Springtime Surprise is in mid-April. Neither have any impact on crowds in March.
Then there are the public events held during the month at Walt Disney World. The 2023 Epcot Flower & Garden Festival kicks off at the beginning of the month, running from March 1, 2023 until July 5, 2023. This will spike ‘feels like’ crowds at Epcot, as it’s a big draw for locals who show up specifically for the event–to see the floral displays, eat food, and buy merchandise. One thing they typically do not do, or do disproportionately less than tourists, is rides. As a result, congestion is higher but wait times often are not.
Regardless of whether you’re into gardening (I’m not) this is event has the park looking lovely. The flower tapestry by the Imagination pavilion, between Future World and World Showcase is incredibly picturesque, as are the many topiaries around the park. There’s much more than that, all of which you can read about in our Guide to Epcot International Flower & Garden Festival.
March 2023 is also the end of Walt Disney World’s 50th Anniversary “celebration.” Those are air quotes around celebration since it’s been an entirely underwhelming event. Regardless, this month is your last chance to see the two nighttime spectaculars that debuted for the festivities: Harmonious at EPCOT and the Disney Enchantment fireworks at Magic Kingdom.
We do not expect there to be any spike in crowds whatsoever of fans trying to see these nighttime spectaculars one last time. There also won’t be a rush of people taking ‘homecoming’ trips for Walt Disney World’s 50th. If anything, there will be a spike in early April 2023 for the triumphant return of Happily Ever After at Magic Kingdom. (EPCOT Forever will largely be met with indifference.)
Finally, there’s After Hours at Magic Kingdom and After Hours at Disney’s Hollywood Studios. These occur sporadically and, as the names suggest, are held after park closing. They have minimal impact on daytime crowd levels, but result in a slight bump in crowds during the evening ‘mix-in’ time. We do not recommend changing your plans because of After Hours at Magic Kingdom, but you might want to do DHS on a different evening. Normally, that park is great for lower wait times at the end of the night, albeit to a lesser degree on After Hours dates.
Park Hours for March 2023 are pretty good. Walt Disney World has quietly been extending these, with Magic Kingdom now closing later and the other 3 parks opening earlier as a result. Of course, there’s a reason for this: spring break attendance forecasts!
March REFURBISHMENTS & NEW ATTRACTIONS
In terms of attractions that will be closed during March 2023, check the Walt Disney World Refurbishment Schedule. Major rides have downtime scheduled, including both Splash Mountain (which is being reimagined into Tiana’s Bayou Adventure) and Rock ‘n’ Roller Coaster (which is down for multiple months).
Beyond ride closures, the construction project that will have the most noticeable impact on the guest experience is the massive reimagining at the front of Epcot. Several years after this started, the front of the park is still a sea of construction walls with a giant dirt pit in the middle. On the plus side, Remy’s Ratatouille Adventure, Space 220 Restaurant, Creations Shop, Club Cool, and Connections Cafe are all open.
EPCOT is also home to Guardians of the Galaxy: Cosmic Rewind, which is Walt Disney World’s biggest addition in the last few years. Experiencing the new ride is a bit complicated, so be sure to check out our How to Ride Guardians of the Galaxy: Cosmic Rewind & Virtual Queue Speed Strategy to improve your chances of success for joining the free virtual queue. (Note: this might end sometime in March 2023.)
Another alternative for Cosmic Rewind is buying line-skipping access via the Individual Lightning Lanes. Those posts explain the free and paid options, their pros & cons, and everything else you need to know. Suffice to say, do not just show up to EPCOT expecting to join the standby line–as there isn’t one.
Then there’s the next big addition to Walt Disney World: TRON Lightcycle Run, which will have previews throughout March 2023. Although the new roller coaster won’t officially open until April 4, these previews could have a minor impact on Magic Kingdom crowds during the first half of March 2023.
Beyond that, there are several attractions that have not yet opened and likely won’t until later in 2023. This includes Moana’s Journey of Water at Epcot, which will open in the second half of the year according to Disney. Other smaller scale additions are likely later in 2023.
Although not an attraction, Toy Story Roundup BBQ Restaurant will open in late March 2023. For an overview of what else is on the horizon this year, see What’s New & Next at Walt Disney World in 2023 & Beyond.
March 2023 DISNEY WORLD CROWD CALENDAR
We’ll start this free crowd calendar section with the same preface as other months—skip ahead a few paragraphs if you’ve already read it. Wondering why you don’t see a color-coded crowd calendar here? It’s because we don’t really trust them anymore and don’t think you should, either. If we just had a visual crowd calendar graphic here, many of you would only look at that and not read the accompanying explanation that covers what you might actually expect. That’d be doing you a disservice.
While they can be useful tools, crowd calendars are one small piece of a much larger puzzle. We no longer choose our own Disney travel dates based exclusively upon crowd calendars and we’d likewise discourage you from doing so. Crowd calendars are increasingly less reliable because of the way Disney manipulates attendance patterns, staffing, closures, and ride capacity.
Walt Disney World doesn’t release official attendance numbers, so crowd calendars utilize info like school schedules, airport traffic statistics, hotel pricing & occupancy, and other indicators as proxies for crowds. For years, this approach worked and made crowd calendars reliable. Walt Disney World attendance followed an identifiable pattern that tracked with the aforementioned proxies.
More recently, wait times don’t always reflect actual crowds because Disney has become adept and more sophisticated at manipulating both attendance and crowd flow. Think of this as the difference between the actual temperature and the “feels like” temperature, but with crowds. We can still actual crowd and attendance patterns, but not wait times. The latter are what most of you likely care about (the “feels like” crowds), but it’s more difficult to accurately forecast wait times via Walt Disney World crowd calendars.
Let’s start with the good news: early March 2023 should be a great time to visit because it’s a lull in crowds. That wasn’t the case last year. Mardi Gras at the beginning of the month, resulted in an influx of visitors from Louisiana and other areas of the South. Thankfully, that already happened this year and the Worst Week of Winter 2023 at Walt Disney World already occurred in February.
Instead of Presidents’ Day, Mardi Gras, and the early runDisney event being staggered, they all coincided. Bad for those who visited in late February, but good for those who opt for early March 2023! being s be one of the 5 worst weeks of 2023–right up there with Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Year’s, and the peak of spring break.
As such, our expectation is that the first week-plus of March 2023 will see moderate crowd levels. It’s likely that crowd levels range from around 5/10 to 8/10, with the average being in the 7/10 range. This means average wait times across the entirety of Walt Disney World of around 39 to 45 minutes.
Specifically, March 1-10, 2023 will see the lowest wait times and attendance of the month. That might sound high or not great, but it’s a sharp contrast to the aforementioned worst week of winter. That stretch saw 10/10 crowd levels and average wait times of 54 to 61 minutes. That’s a huge difference over the course of an entire day!
This is more or less normal, reflecting the lull between the popular Presidents’ Day and Mardi Gras holidays in late February and the start of Spring Break season in mid-March. Weekends will be busier, especially when the weather is nice.
Things will get significantly worse starting March 11, 2023. Both Osceola and Orange County, Florida are scheduled to have their Spring Breaks March 13-17, 2023. That alone will make that week plus the weekends before and after pretty busy.
In that, we forecast that March 11 through March 19, 2023 will be the busiest week of the quarter, and one of the worst 5 weeks of the entire year at Walt Disney World. Expect daily crowd levels of 9/10 or 10/10 at every park during this date range. Some of those 10/10 days will have particularly high wait times (not all 10/10 days are equally busy–that’s just the maximum crowd level).
It would not surprise us if that ends up being the peak of Spring Break crowds and the following weeks get progressively better. Normally, more out of state tourists would descend upon Florida and Walt Disney World in the final two weeks of the month.
However, it appears that more large school districts have spring breaks in the middle of the month. Nevertheless, expect 8/10 or 9/10 crowd days the last two two full weeks of March 2023, continuing into April 2023.
No matter when you’re visiting in March 2023, we’d advise leveraging Genie+ and Lightning Lanes to beat the crowds. Everything you need to know, including ride priorities, strategy for avoiding pitfalls, maximizing your time saved & ride count, and much more is covered in our Guide to Genie+ and Lightning Lanes at Walt Disney World.
March PRICING & DISCOUNTS
As a result of Spring Breaks being fairly common in March, you typically won’t find much in the way of exceptional promotions. With that said, there are currently a surprising number of deals available for Annual Passholders, Florida residents, and even the general public. See All Current Walt Disney World Discounts for specifics. Some of these are actually quite good.
However, “good” is a relative term when describing these discounts, as March is above average in terms of rack rates and ticket prices. Even a higher-than-normal percentage off an astronomical price is still a high price! For hotels, much of the month is peak season, which is exactly as expensive as it sounds. Only holiday pricing is worse. For tickets, the pricing is not as bad, but it’s still far from the off-season in terms of per-day pricing.
Overall, March is a tale of two months–but also a month on the rise. Normally, the last week of February/first week of March is one of the year’s “sweet spots” for planning a vacation. In fact, we love it so much that it’s one of the top weeks of the year on our rankings of Best & Worst Months to Visit Walt Disney World. Even with slightly elevated wait times, we once again expect that to be true in early March 2023!
There’s a reason that window ranks so highly despite the wait times not being super low. March typically offers pleasant weather, longer hours, and the start of the spring bloom with Flower & Garden Festival beginning. After that, March’s attractiveness deteriorates, but even later in the month, I still think the weather goes a long way to compensate for crowds.
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
Do you agree or disagree with our thoughts on March at Walt Disney World? Have you done Walt Disney World during Spring Break before? Do you think it’s a good or bad time to visit? Any questions? Hearing your feedback about your experiences is both interesting to us and helpful to other readers, so please share your thoughts or questions below in the comments!
