This One Simple Tip Can Save Money on your Entire Universal Orlando Vacation

Sue Winter — Mon, 09 May 2016 23:39:28 +0000

Visitors to Universal Orlando Resort can save hundreds on even a short vacation with just one thing: a Universal Orlando annual pass. Even for a two-day trip it might pay for you to purchase a pass. Annual passholders receive discounts on hotels, additional park tickets, and more – all of which can add up to a lot of savings.

November 2018 Note from Maven: Click here for an updated post and podcast episode about how to use an annual pass to save money on your Universal Orlando vacation!

Since original posting of this article, Universal has adjusted annual pass prices and added a fourth pass option. Even with these changes, an annual pass may still save you money on your Universal Orlando vacation. As always, please do your own math to determine what’s best for your family. Get an updated analysis about using an annual pass to save on your vacation here.

If you’ve read my post, 33 Things to Know Before You Visit Universal Orlando, you’ll know that besides getting to the park early, my top tip is to stay on-site at a Universal Express Pass hotel. (If you have no idea what I’m talking about or why I advise this, take a minute to read that post first. We’ll wait here…)

Of course it’s not cheap to stay at one of the Universal Orlando Resort hotels, especially those that offer free Express Passes to guests – the Portofino Bay Hotel, Royal Pacific, and Hard Rock Orlando. But annual passholders qualify for discounts that can knock up to 30% off advertised room rates.

Before I go any further, let me note that I don’t sell Universal annual passes, nor do I receive anything from Universal for telling you about this. (Although if Universal wants to comp me some tickets or something that would be great. Hint, hint). This is a tip I first learned from the Unofficial Guide to Universal Orlando. I think it’s brilliant, and it has worked for me.

One annual pass is all it takes

To get the discounts, only one person in your party needs to have an annual pass. And in fact, another benefit with the pass is that you can buy discounted tickets for the rest of your party. Annual passholders receive a 10% discount on up to 6 multi-day park admission tickets (note that these are single-park admission tickets).

You don’t need to have your annual pass yet to see and book the annual passholder rate

To get the annual passholder discount you’ll have to show your pass when you check in, but you don’t need it to make the booking. So you can make your hotel reservation now and buy the pass before you go.

Anyone can find out the annual passholder hotel rate. On the Universal Orlando hotels reservation page, just type APH into the “code” box. Then hit search. The next page will list the hotels and their rates – if an annual passholder discount is available you’ll see it.

Note that here the Portofino Bay shows an Annual Passholders Rate, but the Hard Rock Hotel does not.

Not every hotel will always have a discount, and Universal doesn’t always free up these discounts very far in advance.

If you’re planning your trip for a date that isn’t yet showing an APH discount, here’s my advice. Book the hotel of your choice now for the dates you want. This way you know you have a room. Then check back as your date gets closer, at some point the APH code should work. If you want to take advantage of this discount, make a new reservation using the APH code and cancel the original one.

The Math – How does this pencil out?

So, is the cost of an annual pass always worth it to get the other discounts? The short answer is it depends, but in a lot of cases it’s totally worth it. I’ll try to keep the geekiness to a minimum here, but at the bottom of this post you’ll find the spreadsheet I created to analyze the numbers.

Keeping it simple, in most cases if you’re staying on site for more than 2 nights and buying park-to-park tickets for 3 days it’s probably worth it to get a Universal Orlando annual pass.Click To Tweet

For a family of 4 visiting Universal Orlando in July of 2016, based on rates I found in May, buying just one annual pass netted a savings of over $300. This is assuming a 3 night stay at Portofino Bay hotel – the least expensive of the Express Pass hotels for those dates, and the purchase of one non-Florida-resident Preferred-level annual pass, and three 3-day park-to-park tickets.

Here’s the numbers:

(If you’re wondering what Universal considers an adult, children are ages 3-9, and their tickets are $10 less than adult tickets).

In fact, this family would probably save even more since the Preferred annual pass also includes shopping and dining discounts in the parks and at Citywalk.

A few notes about Universal Orlando annual passes

There are three levels of annual pass at Universal Orlando. I recommend purchasing the least expensive pass that will provide the discounts you need.

The cheapest pass option is the Power pass. This pass can work for you, and it is a great deal – only $30 more than buying a 3-day park-to-park ticket. BUT the Power Pass will not give you admission to both parks during most of the summer. The Power Pass has blockout dates – you can see the calendar at Universal’s site here.

If you’re lucky enough to travel outside these blockout dates, it will probably pay to get the Power pass even if you’re only staying at Universal for one or two nights.

The next level up is the Preferred pass. The Preferred pass has no blockout dates, so even if you travel in the height of the summer season or during the holidays you’ll have full park access. This pass costs more than the preferred pass, but as you can see in the numbers above, it can be totally worth it to get one.

Unless you’re a local, I don’t recommend the Premier-level pass. The extra benefits are mostly parking and mid-week special event access.

Speaking of being local, all the prices and assumptions I’m making here are that you’re a non-Florida resident visiting Universal Orlando for a few days. Florida residents, you lucky dogs, I’m sure an annual pass is almost always the right choice for you.

Are you planning a return trip to Universal Orlando in the next two years? Get a pass!

Obviously an annual pass makes a lot of sense if you’ll be visiting the Universal Orlando parks multiple times in the same year. But one of the biggest perks of the Universal annual pass is the renewal rate.

Universal annual passes renew at a big discount over the initial price. Here are the current (May 2016) purchase and renewal prices for Universal Orlando non-Florida resident annual passes:

Power Pass – purchase for $259.99, renew for $185.99

Preferred Pass – purchase for $344.99, renew for $259.99

For perspective, a 3-day park-to-park ticket currently sells for $229.99. And of course when you renew your pass you continue to have the APH hotel discount and any other associated savings.

When should everyone in your party get a pass?

In fact, especially if the Power pass works with your vacation schedule, you may wish to buy a pass for everyone in your party. It will cost a bit more than your park ticket this year, but if you renew for next year and visit again you will save money on tickets.

Purchase pass for 259.99 + $185.99 renewal = $445.98

Purchase a 3-day ticket this year for $229.99 + $229.99 for next year’s ticket = 459.98

And then you’ll have to go back, since you’ve got an annual pass!

The Spreadsheet

As promised, here’s the spreadsheet I used to analyze some sample rates. It’s big, so you’ll have to scroll to see it all. Or you can click where it says “download” to view it full-size.

Along the right side you’ll see the discounted hotel rates, and the ticket and pass prices. Along the left are some samples of savings for a family of four. In these examples, I chose the least expensive Express Pass hotel for the specified dates, and the least expensive pass that would give full park admission for the same dates.

Download

Of course the hotel rates change all the time, and ticket and pass prices change too. Here’s where you can find all this information in real time on Universal Orlando Resort’s website:

Universal Orlando Resort hotel reservations: https://www.universalorlando.com/Hotels/Theme-Park-Hotels.aspx

Universal Orlando theme park tickets: https://www.universalorlando.com/Theme-Park-Tickets/General-Admission.aspx

Universal Orlando non-Florida resident annual passes: https://www.universalorlando.com/Theme-Park-Tickets/Annual-Passes/Non-FL-Annual-Passes.aspx

Have you used an annual pass to save money at Universal Orlando? Comment below and let me know how it worked for you.