Universal Studios FL Express Pass review

By dealing with disney - September 06, 2018

My thoughts on Universal Studios Express Pass

The Express Pass is an add on feature available for purchase that acts like a fast pass to majority of attractions. Depending on the season, depends on if I would recommend it. We were touring in middle of summer with slightly higher crowd levels. I did decide to purchase, mainly to avoid the extreme heat as much as possible. The lines were not terrible. I could have waited approximately 30-45 minutes per ride in height of crowd level and still would have been able to accomplish majority of park. Using the express pass, I feel my family was able to do everything we wanted to do (some things twice) within 5 hours. We could have done more and stayed longer, but we were ready to go. This trip was to be an easy trip, not pushing ourselves through the parks. The most extreme line belonged to Kong which was totally not worth it! Just IMO... We waited 40 minutes with the express pass..

Many rides we went on had such little stand by wait times. We didn't really need the pass. On the more popular rides did it really come in handy. Again, we could have been ok without app but it was worth the ease of touring with it. It was less stressful just having it in hand.

The express pass works slightly different than Disney's. If you see a wait time on an attraction that allows the Express Pass, divide the time in half and that will be your wait for the express pass line.

The cost is pretty hefty, basically doubles the cost of your park ticket to add. The price varies per season and time frame purchased. They do sell limited amount, once sold out, they are gone.

Two options in the express pass. You can get the regular express pass which offers 1 pass per allowed attraction within day purchased for. The other is the unlimited express pass. This pass allows multi pass use on any allowed attraction within date purchased for.

One fun fact, If you stay at a deluxe Universal Resort, the unlimited express pass is complimentary in your package! This can be a GREAT deal especially with many family members. The cost of deluxe is usually under the cost of the express pass. It is a win/win; deluxe stay and express passes!!

Now, if it was off season or cooler weather, I would probably pass on the purchase of the express pass. I would be able to enjoy the park longer.

Of course, if you purchase the single use express pass, it is slightly cheaper than the unlimited one.
In using this pass, ride an attraction if it has a small wait without using your pass. This way, you can come back to it and ride it again once the crowds build up.

I did notice some scanners for the express pass have facial scans to make sure you belong to the scanned pass. One trick around this, there is usually an employee there as well scanning cards. Have one person hold all the passes, they typically just scan all the passes and let you go without questioning ownership of card. We did this some since my youngest refused to ride some rides.

We bought the single use pass since the unlimited had already sold out. Even though we bought single use, they let us use the pass multiple times for same attraction. We mixed up our passes since my daughter refused to ride most rides. I used her pass with one already used. I am not sure if that is why they let us pass, or their system wasn't working properly or if they just didn't care?

Many parks do offer rider swap. If you buy the single pass and have a family member not riding, use rider swap and now you(majority of party) just got to ride twice.