Staying on property at Universal

[iheartdisney]

I need opinions about staying on property at Universal. My sons will be 10 and 11 at the time of our WDW trip and have never been to Universal. My daughter and I have been to Universal, but were unimpressed with everything BUT the Harry Potter section. We're guessing our sons/her brothers will feel the same.

Is it worth it to stay one night at a Universal hotel for the benefit of early park entry and "fast passes" if we're going to primarily spend our time in one park, purely for the Harry Potter experience? Or, should we just add an extra day to our WDW resort reservation and just pick a day within our WDW trip to drive to Universal?

Any and all opinions are appreciated!

[MizMissy]

Generally, I always recommend staying on property at Universal - express pass benefit is amazing and I love the hotels. However, if you are going in with such a negative attitude, why not save money on the hotel and tickets and just skip Universal?
Or, maybe wait until Diagon Alley is finished and you can have more HP to experience if that is all you are interested in.

[Maggie T]

We have stayed on Uni. Property 3 times and enjoyed it. Stayed at the HR 2 and Porto. 1. Line cuts was a plus. Just remember you are not staying at Disney and the help is different. Its your choice but if you go I would go to Uni.first before you would go to Disney . That's the way we did it and things worked out nice. You don't compare the 2 parks as much.

[MargaretMessler]

Depending on when you are vacationing, it might not be worth the hastle of switching hotels to do one night. For instance, I went twice during what was considered "value" and probably "low moderate" time for WDW this year and we didn't wait more than 20 minutes for anything, including HP.

If you were going during a busy time, possibly it would be worth the hotel night.

[NJGIRL]

I need opinions about staying on property at Universal. My sons will be 10 and 11 at the time of our WDW trip and have never been to Universal. My daughter and I have been to Universal, but were unimpressed with everything BUT the Harry Potter section. We're guessing our sons/her brothers will feel the same.

Is it worth it to stay one night at a Universal hotel for the benefit of early park entry and "fast passes" if we're going to primarily spend our time in one park, purely for the Harry Potter experience? Or, should we just add an extra day to our WDW resort reservation and just pick a day within our WDW trip to drive to Universal?

Any and all opinions are appreciated!

My opinion is No, don't go to Universal at all. If you were unimpressed and think the rest of your family will feel the same way I can't understand why you would even consider going again. A day in any park is costly, so save your money and spend it were your family will enjoy it the most.

[LVT]

We did the 1 night and 2 days of 2 park tickets. It was worth it for the on-site hotel express pass. The kids are old enough to do any rides and can repeat easily due to the hotel pass. Harry Potter's ride is fun. The lines vanished by 4pm and we rode over and over.
You don't know until you try it.