Downtown Disney, located at the Walt Disney World Resort, is full of dining, entertainment and shopping opportunities. Entertainment at Downtown Disney area takes place throughout the day and into the night with a wide array of acrobatic artistry, art, theater, live music, special events, boat rentals and fountains for children to play in. Admission and parking are complimentary. Downtown Disney is comprised of three sections: West Side, Pleasure Island, and Marketplace. There is no admission charge to any of the Downtown Disney areas.

DTD Map | West Side | Pleasure Island | Marketplace | Additional Information

WEST SIDE

Entertainment:

• AMC Pleasure Island 24 Theatres Complex
  This theater complex features stadium seating and state-of-the-art surround sound. Both regular and Imax movies are shown here. If you're going, Buy Your Movie Tickets Online Now and Skip the Lines! Use zip code 32830 to see movie schedules and find tickets for this theater.
  
  
• Cirque du Soleil - La Nouba (Watch a Clip; Order Tickets)
  La Nouba is a mesmerizing and extraordinary avant-garde circus spectacle performed at an exceptional theater built especially for Cirque du Soleil. This must-see show features opulent sets, brilliant choreography, theatrical lighting and provocative music, along with a mix of mesmerizing high wire and flying trapezes, stunning acro-gymnastic performances and other dynamic displays of coordination and strength. Cirque du Soleil shows take place Tuesday through Saturday, 6:00 p.m. and 9:00 p.m.
  
  
• DisneyQuest - A 5-story, indoor, interactive theme park. Tickets cost $36.21 for children (ages 3-9) and $42.60 for adults. Hours of operation are:
  Sunday - Thursday: 11:30 a.m. to 10:00 p.m.
  Friday - Saturday: 11:30 a.m. to 11:00 p.m.
  
  
• House of Blues (Entertainment Schedule)
  Sunday Gospel Brunch is served at House of Blues where the menu boasts delicious Southern cuisine to be enjoyed while the best regional and national gospel groups perform.
  
  
• Characters of Flight (Photos)
  Guests can now get a birds-eye view of Downtown Disney at 400 ft. The 72-foot-diameter tethered balloon can lift up to 30 Guests at a time on a six-minute “flight” and launches from Downtown Disney West Side seven days a week, weather permitting. Balloon rides costs $16 for adults and $10 for children (ages 3-9). Scheduled hours of operation are:
  Sunday - Thursday 10:30 a.m. to 11 p.m.
  Friday & Saturday 10:30 a.m. to 12 a.m.
  
  

Dining:

• Bongos Cuban Café - features nightly entertainment
• Food Quest - located in Disney Quest
• Forty Thirst Street
• House of Blues- - features nightly entertainment
• Planet Hollywood
• Wetzel's Pretzels
• Wolfgang Puck Cafe

Shopping:

• Cirque du Soleil Boutique
• Disney's Candy Cauldron: Sweet Treats Featuring a Show Kitchen
• DisneyQuest Emporium: Disney Merchandise
• House of Blues Company Store: Original Folk Art, Eclectic Music, Funky threads, Hard-to-Find Books
• Hoypolo: Glass, Carved Wood and Ceramic Art
• LittleMissMatched: Everything is missmatched (in a coordinated sort of way), socks, gloves, PJs, bedding, accessories and more
• Mickey's Groove: Disney Character Merchandise
• Magic Masters: Secrets of This Top-Secret Craft and Mesmerizing Magic Demonstrations
• Magnatron Magnetz: Kitschy to Classy and Uniquely Collectible Magnets
• Planet Hollywood on Location: Logo Merchandise and Movie-Themed Souvenirs.
• Sosa Family Cigars: The Finest in Fresh, Hand-Rolled Cigars
• Pop Gallery: Original Artwork
• Sunglass Icon: The Hottest and Trendiest Styles

West Side Shopping Hours: 10:30am - 11:00 pm (Sunday - Thursday)
West Side Shopping Hours: 10:30am - 12:00am (Friday and Saturday)
West Side Dining & Entertainment Hours: 11:00am - 2:00am (Daily)
(Note: Hours may vary.)

PLEASURE ISLAND

Pleasure Island clubs closed their doors on September 27, 2008 to make way for a re-imagined Downtown Disney.

Entertainment:
Downtown Disney has introduced Celebrate Tonight! This high-energy street party focuses on what Guests are celebrating. DJs engage Guests to join in with stilt walkers and party crew for group dances and sing-alongs to celebrate birthdays, anniversaries, family gatherings, or whatever Guests want to celebrate – all while spinning the latest and greatest party hits. Located in the West End Plaza of Pleasure Island, Celebrate Tonight! runs from 5 -11 p.m. Sundays through Thursdays and 6 p.m. to midnight Fridays and Saturdays.

Dining

• Cookes of Dublin
• Fulton's Crab House
• Portobello Yacht Club
• Raglan Road - features nightly entertainment
• T-REX Cafe
• Paradiso 37 - A high-energy restaurant and bar featuring delectable North-, South- and Central-American cuisine and nightly entertainment. The lakeside eatery's menu features offerings representing 37 countries of the Americas, plus an international wine bar, 37 varieties of tequila and 10 signature frozen margaritas!

Shopping

• Curl by Sammy Duvall - High End Surf Shop
• Fuego by Sosa Cigars - Enjoy Tobacco Products in an Intimate Lounge Setting
• Orlando Harley-Davidson - Logo Shirts, Gifts and Collectibles

Pleasure Island Shopping Hours: 10:30am - 11:00pm (Sunday - Thursday)
Pleasure Island Shopping Hours: 10:30am - 12:00am (Friday & Saturday)
Pleasure Island Dining : 11:00 am - 2:00am (Daily)
(Note: Hours may vary.)

MARKETPLACE

Photos

Entertainment:

• Captain Jack's Marina
  This dock located adjacent to Village Lake, is the place to rent watercraft of all types. Sea Rayers for one or two persons can be rented by the half hour or hour, as well as Canopy Boats for up to 8 people and Pontoon Boats for up to 10 people. Specialty cruises and Bass Fishing Excursions are also available from this location. You must be 18 or over and present a valid driver's license to drive or rent boats. Advance reservations can be made by calling 407-WDW-PLAY.
• Classic Carousel
  This beautiful carousel was handcrafted in Italy and features, 2 carriages, 19 horses and a spinning tea cup. The carousel plays music and is illuminated at night. Guest must either be 42 inches to ride alone or be accompanied by an adult.
• Marketplace Waterside Stage
  The place for live entertainment, this dock side stage is home for Disney's Magical Music Days.

Dining

• Cap'n Jack's Restaurant
• Earl Of Sandwich Restaurant
• Ghirardelli Soda Fountain & Chocolate Shop
• McDonald's
• Rainforest Cafe
• Wetzel's Pretzels Express
• Wolfgang Puck Express

Shopping

• Arribas Brothers: Crystal specialty shop; See craftsmen at work
  
  
• Art of Disney: High-quality art portraying Disney characters and reasonably priced poster reproductions of Magic Kingdom attractions.
  
  
• Basin: Products for Bath and Body such as homemade soap, bath salts, facial masks & more
  
  
• Disney's Days of Christmas: Whimsical and collectible Disney ornaments, stockings & decorations
  
  
• Disney's Design a Tee: Features 8 Touch-Screen Kiosks to Design Your Own T-shirts
  
  
• Disney's Pin Traders: Buy or swap pins with other guest and cast members
  
  
• Disney's Wonderful World of Memories: Photo albums, Stunning Stationery and Scrapbook Materials; also look for the new Create Your Own Ears Hat Boutique.
  
  
• Goofy's Candy Co.: With a Party Room for celebrating birthdays and an interactive show kitchen
  
  
• Image Capture: Have your picture taken against Disney backgrounds from Lion King, Beauty & the Beast, Disney princesses and more
  
  
• LEGO Imagination Center: Features an outdoor Play Zone with giant Lego creations, along with every imaginable Lego toy. This is a great place for photo opportunities.
  
  
• Mickey's Mart: Everything is ten dollars and under including tee-shirts and surprise grab bags.
  
  
• Mickey's Pantry: Everything for your culinary aspirations
  
  
• Once Upon a Toy: Fill a box with Mr. Potato Head body and parts for one price or build your own Lightsaber; every Disney themed toy imaginable
  
  
• Pooh's Corner: A friendly forest setting with Winnie the Pooh merchandise; look for a special area called Disney Tails where you will find everything to pamper your pet from personalized items to leashes, treats, collars and bowls. Note: Rumor is that Disney Tails may be being phased out.
  
  
• Rainforest Cafe Shop: Unique Toys, Souvenir Gifts and Clothing
  
  
• Tren-D: A clothing and novel accessories store described as "Minnie Gets Funky", geared to women in the 18-to-35 range. You'll find embroidered handbags, jeweled sunglasses or chandeliers, and hip furnishings.
  
  
• T-Rex Prehistoric Family Adventure: Pan for treasures or shop for prehistoric gifts in this Dino-Store.
  
  
• Team Mickey Athletic Club: Disney Themed Sportswear for Every Sport; NASCAR and authentic ESPN sporting goods; you can even get a custom made bat personalized with your name.
  
  
• World of Disney Store: The Largest Disney Character Merchandise Store Anywhere! Divided into Disney-themed merchandise rooms, each tells stories based on classic Disney films
• Adventures Room - Discover a secret hideout where you can fill your own treasure chest or pirate skull with booty, or create your own pirate hat. Come face-to-face with the amazing Audio-Animatronic pirate Rusty Blade and his talking parrot, Pollyanna, and play the latest in Disney interactive video games.
• Bibbidi Bobbidi Boutique - A magical salon owned by the Fairy Godmother and operated by Fairy Godmothers-in-training where young princesses can purchase such options as hair up-do, nail polish, make-up, and a total package including Disney princess costume and photos
• Bird Room - Women's apparel and accessories
• Carnival Room - Children's bath and body line, sleepwear, dolls, snowglobes
• Enchanted Dining Room - Items for the kitchen, candy, gourmet foods
• Exotic Animal Room - Men's clothing, boxers, ties and accesories
• Great Hall - Disney souvenirs, character tee-shirts and sweat shirts
• Magic Room - Adult sleepwear, slippers and bath and body items
• Map Room - Stationery, software, CDs, magnets, keychains, figurines, photo albums
• Princess Room - Create, try on and play dress up, surrounded by magnificent murals of Disney princesses, princes and their castles! Build your own wand and fill your own jewelry box, or purchase your own make-up kit.
• Snow White Room - Infant & toddler wear and accessories, bedding and plush toys
• Rotunda - Logo merchandise from the 4 Disney theme parks
• Villains Room - Jewelry, watches, trading pins, clocks, collectibles and more
• Assorted Kiosks - featuring balloons, hair wraps, pick-a-pearl, create-your-own keepsakes, caricature artist, personalized Christmas ornaments and more

Marketplace Shopping Hours: 9:30am - 11:pm (Sunday - Thursday)
Marketplace Shopping Hours: 9:30am - 11:30pm (Friday and Saturday)
Marketplace Dining & Entertainment Hours: 8:00am - 1:00 am (Daily)
(Note: Hours may vary.)

Guest Services

Guest Services at Downtown Disney area is located in Disney Marketplace. Services include guidebooks for guests with disabilities, distribution of handheld captioning devices, wheelchair, ECV & stroller rentals. Hours are from 8:30 a.m. to 11 p.m. on Sunday - Thursday and 8:30 a.m. to 11:30 p.m. Friday and Saturday.

ECV, Wheelchair & Stroller Rentals

ECVs, wheelchairs and strollers are available for rent at the Guest Relations building in Downtown Disney Marketplace. The ECV rental fee of $45.00 per day. The wheelchair rental fee is $10.00 per day. The fee to rent a stroller is $15 per day for a single-passenger stroller (double strollers are not available). All Downtown Disney rentals include a $100 refundable credit card deposit is required per unit rented at the Downtown Disney area. The rented unit must be returned to the original rental location to receive a credit card deposit refund.

Automated Teller Machines (ATM) & Credit Cards

An ATM presented by Chase can be found:
• Near the House of Blues restaurant
• Near the Wetzel's Pretzels restaurant
• Inside the World of Disney Store
• Near the Once Upon a Toy shop

Visa, American Express, Diners Club Card, Discover, JCB International, AND MasterCard are accepted at Downtown Disney stores. Guests with charging privledges can also use their "Key to the World" room key. Traveler's checks and cash are also accepted.

Merchandise Shipment

For guests staying at a Disney Resort hotel, purchases made at Downtown Disney shops can be delivered to the Guest's room prior to checkout. Purchases made at Downtown Disney shops can also be shipped home via UPS or FedEx.

Bus Transportation, Driving & Parking

Transportation to and from the Downtown Disney area is complimentary and offered as one of the benefits to Guests staying at a Disney Resort hotel. There are two bus stops at Downtown Disney, one at Marketplace and the other at Pleasure Island. Bus service is no longer offered to the West Side. The last bus of the evening departs from the Pleasure Island bus stop until 2:15 a.m.

For Park Guests choosing to drive to Downtown Disney, complimentary self-parking is also available. Valet parking is also available for $10. To see a map with directions to Downtown Disney, click here.

Downtown Disney Ferryboat Schedule

Downtown Disney Water Taxi Service - 10:30 a.m. - 11:30 p.m.
Dock-to-dock service for Marketplace, Pleasure Island, and West Side. Runs every 15 minutes until 4:30 p.m. and every 10 minutes thereafter until closing. Look for Red flags and signs.

Disney's Port Orleans Resort - 10:30 a.m. - 11:30 p.m.
Departs Market Place Dock every every 20 minutes until 4:30 p.m. and every 10 minutes thereafter until closing. Look for Yellow flags and signs.

Disney's Old Key West Resort - 10:30 a.m. - 11:30 p.m.
Departs Pleasure Island Dock every 20 minutes throughout the day and evening. Look for Green flags and signs.

Saratoga Springs Resort (& Treehouse Villas beginning 6/1) - 10:30 a.m. - 11:30 p.m.
Departs Pleasure Island Dock every 20 minutes throughout the day and evening. Look for Blue flags and signs.

Other Useful Information

• Proper dress is required at Downtown Disney area. Shirt and shoes must be worn at all times.
• With the exception of service dogs for Guests with disabilities, pets are not permitted in the Downtown Disney area.
• Baby changing stations are located in the restrooms.

For additional Downtown Disney information, call 407-WDW-2NITE.

TheMouseForLess Tips

My family LOVES Downtown Disney. My kids are older now (11 and 14) and would just as soon go to DTD than to any of the parks!

The one thing we do on every trip is to eat at Rainforest Cafe. Yes, it's crowded and a bit over-priced on the food, but we ate there on our first trip and we have on every trip since. We drive to Disney, so we usually get there a day or so before we have to check in at Disney...Rainforest Cafe is our way of "welcoming" ourselves to our vacation! (One hint...check here for souviners...you can usually find some pretty good bargains. They offer a lot of sales).

If you are on Disney's Dining Plan, be sure to check out Wolfgang Puck Express. Great food, but a bit pricy....becomes a really good deal on the dining plan, as it is a counter service credit!

As for the best time to go...when the parks are open, during the week, there seems to be less crowds. In the evenings the stores can be wall-to-wall people. During the day, it isn't nearly as crowded. We always go during the day for our shopping, but we like to spend at least one evening as well, just for the general atmosphere. Grab a snack at Goofy's and sit outside and people watch. I can't think of many other places I would rather be!

Our favorite stores are World of Disney for general souvenir shopping, Goofy's Candy Company (spend your snack credits here...great stuff for the trip home), and my absolute favorite is Disney's Days of Christmas....I could spend hours here! The Lego Store is one that has kind of moved from our favorite list...again, with my kids being older we don't spend quite as much time here, but when they were younger we put our time in for sure! ~ Stephanie R.

Ohh we love spending some time in DTD - if we have MYW ticket plusses usually combined with a trip to Disney Quest.

Places to Eat: the Earl of Sandwich is a favourite. The choice is great and they are pretty filling. We love to grab a table - inside or out depends on the heat - and take the weight off for a while. Its easy to chill out here and build up the strength for more shopping. And of course you can grab an ice cream at Ghiradelis for dessert - yummy.

Shopping: Christmas shoppe is a must. But you have to have a contingency plan for DH and kids :O) I can spend hours in here just looking and trying to decide which is really hard so I have to be able to send off DH to elsewhere because he is not quite as thrilled as I am. So I send him to the Pin Traders store.

World of Disney is great for just about everything but its huge and you will lose your other half so have a plan on where and what time to meet - unless of course you both have cells. Make sure you have your camera its a good place to take photos in all those huge hats that they sell. Mr Potato Head stand is also in here and seems to have different items to other stores. You can buy the box but if there is just one or two peices you need they do sell them to you separately.

LEGO statues - of course you have to take those pictures. And if you have kids and they need a break there is a play area were they can lose themselves for a while.

Weather: You know that between the two sides - market place and west side there is not much shelter sooo if it looks like rain make sure you take those poncho's with you in the bag. ~ Wendy H.

We love Downtown Disney, and no trip to the World is complete without a stop there! There is something for everyone, and if you have a day with no park tickets, we have no trouble spending the better part of a day here.

If we go down without annual passes, and have a party to go to, knowing we can get into MK at 4 PM, we get up and dressed at a leisurely pace and head to DTD right around 9 or 9:30, as things are opening up. This is our favorite time to go, because you can get a parking space! You'll find that in the evening or over the weekend, parking here can be as challenging as pulling your kidney through your nose ;-)

The kids LOVE the Lego playground - even the 7 year old, who I thought was getting too old for Legos. She loves to build and race cars, walk around the different Lego stations to see what the pieces are, and she could easily spend an hour or more here, without exaggeration. The little one - 3 years old - plays on the playground itself, doing the slide, hiding in the house, etc.

When they have completely exhausted their mother, we head over to The World of Disney store. Far and away the best store anywhere on the planet, you can spend a LONG time brow beating your husband (oops! Did I post that outloud??) into making more room in the car for the ride home so you can buy more Mickey stuff. Seriously, there is something here for everyone, and even the littlest among you will enjoy just gazing upwards at the fabulously themed store.

My favorite shop in DTD is the Christmas shop, and while Jim usually takes the girls to check out pins or ride the carousel, I spend more time than I should admiring each and every ornament. We have a tradition of picking up one stuffed animal to add to our collection on our annual holiday trek to the World, and I make sure I check out each and every item here to make sure I find just the perfect plush character. Oh, who am I kidding - I know that the Radko ornaments are not stuffed, but I have to handle them all anyway - you can't not look at everything here!

One of the best bargains on Disney property is the Earl of Sandwich in DTD, and we almost always head here for lunch. Two people can easily split a sandwich here, and my daughter loves the Earl's Lemonade - a blend of Earl Grey tea and lemonade. Thank goodness for the fridge and microwave at the DVC properties, because I always come back with leftovers from lunch here.

We make one final stop at Basin on every trip. I often grab one of the premade gift baskets to keep in my closet at home for last minute hostess gifts or teacher gifts, and we always buy the chamomile soap for our youngest daughter, who has sensitive skin. If it's a warm day and we have free time, the girls make a few passes through the fountain to get soaking wet!

If we're coming here for an evening of browsing, we love Raglan Road for dinner - especially the live entertainment; and there's nothing like a little dessert at Ghiradelli :)

The one not so hidden gem - our kids will stand for 30 minutes waiting to be spit on by Stitch outside of the World of Disney shop - they love it, and it's so much fun to watch!

DTD is a must see on our WDW vacations! ~ Anna S

Updated July 27, 2009