Daily Park Report: July 22, 2026

EPCOT Ran Two Levels Hot on Wednesday — Then Its Ride Roster Fell Apart After Dark

EPCOT was the one park that broke from its own rhythm on Wednesday, July 22. A 17.5-minute median pushed it to a 5/10 — a full two crowd levels above its typical summer weekday, where a 3/10 and 15-minute waits are the norm. That’s the number worth planning around, because the other three parks all landed within a level of where they usually sit. Nothing exotic drove it: peak summer travel simply funneled more families toward the World Showcase side of the resort, and EPCOT felt it first thing, cresting at 11 AM with 30-minute medians before the heat thinned the walkways.

The weather stayed cooperative — a 96-degree high, mostly clear skies, barely a hundredth of an inch of rain all day. So the crowd read on EPCOT was demand, not shelter-seeking. That distinction matters when you’re deciding where to spend a summer morning.

How the four parks actually played

EPCOT’s morning surge is the headline, but the guest-facing problem there arrived after dinner, not at rope drop (more on that below). Waits peaked early precisely because guests rushed Test Track, Guardians, and Remy before the midday sun made the long walks miserable — a smart-crowd pattern that also front-loads the queues.

Magic Kingdom told a stranger story. A 16.4-minute median put it at a 7/10 on the percentile scale, yet its peak didn’t hit until 8 PM at 25 minutes — a nighttime build rather than a midday crush. The Fantasyland spinners ran hot all day: Under the Sea and Astro Orbiter both doubled their usual waits to 20 minutes, and Dumbo, Mad Tea Party, and the Magic Carpets all sat at 10 where they normally clear in five. Pirates of the Caribbean climbed to 25. None of these are headliner numbers, but stacked together they signal a park that stayed comfortably full into the evening.

Hollywood Studios was the calm one. A 33-minute median landed it at 4/10 — actually a touch below its own baseline — even with a noon peak near 50 minutes. For a park that usually punishes the unprepared, Wednesday was a forgiving day to tour. Animal Kingdom sat quietest of all against its norm, a 17-minute median that reads as light touring; comfortable walk-ups on most of the roster outside Everest.

Downtime hit EPCOT hardest — and at the worst possible hour

EPCOT’s evening roster took a beating. Remy’s Ratatouille Adventure was offline from 6:30 PM to just past 9 — two and a half hours of prime after-dinner touring gone from one of the park’s most-wanted rides. Journey Into Imagination With Figment was a mess all day, down in three separate stretches totaling nearly four hours. Test Track went down twice in the evening, and Living with the Land, Guardians, and the Seas each had their own gaps. If you built an EPCOT evening around headliners on Wednesday, you spent a lot of it improvising.

Magic Kingdom wasn’t spared either. Space Mountain was down over two hours starting at 4:29 PM, and Seven Dwarfs Mine Train broke three separate times across the day. Over at Animal Kingdom, Expedition Everest sat idle for an hour and a half in the early evening. The through-line: outdoor and high-throughput coasters struggled in the afternoon heat, and the fallout landed squarely on the dinner-hour crowd.

Today’s outlook: Thursday, July 23

First, an honest scorecard. Our engine badly missed EPCOT yesterday — it called a 2/10 and the park delivered a 5. It also had Hollywood Studios two levels too high. Magic Kingdom (off by one) and Animal Kingdom (a clean hit) fared better, but the best-park and avoid-park calls both missed. Fair to say Wednesday humbled the model.

For today, the engine flips the busiest park: Hollywood Studios is the one to avoid at 6/10, with expected waits near 39 minutes, buoyed by early entry and a mid-90s high. Magic Kingdom also lands at 6/10 around 22 minutes. EPCOT settles back to 4/10 (roughly 29 minutes), and Animal Kingdom is the best play at 4/10, about 24 minutes. Expect afternoon clouds and a one-in-three rain chance after 2 PM, so front-load the outdoor rides. Hit Animal Kingdom or EPCOT early, save Studios for late, and keep an indoor backup ready for the afternoon storm window.

EPCOT’s evening breakdowns are exactly the kind of thing you want to see coming, not discover in line. Lightning Brain’s live attraction feeds flag downtime as it happens — and now it’s in your pocket. Now available at lightningbrain.app and on the App Store!