It has become a common trend for Epic Universe to go from 1/10 crowd levels followed to 9/10 crowds on back-to-back days, with wait times doubling overnight. Universal’s new park has great days to visit & awful ones to avoid; this explains the big differences and shares a list of dates to target in late 2025 & 2026 to assist in planning upcoming trips.
One of the points we keep stressing is that Epic Universe’s opening season has been a wild ride. Universal’s new park has had sky-high wait times and crowd levels, but also rock bottom attendance and days with lots of walk-on lines and. There have been some absolute operational meltdowns, along with bona fide ‘best days ever.’
The good news is that we’ve been watching closely since the tail end of summer, and a very clear pattern has emerged. It’s not an anomaly or outlier at this point. There’s a sharp contrast in good vs. bad dates to visit Epic Universe, and this day-to-day swing in crowd levels is shockingly common and predictable.
As a warning before we get going, this does not always work; weather and ride reliability remain wildcards. You could set yourself up for success by choosing the best date, but still get unlucky due to other variables.
Epic Universe’s opening year has been a low capacity and inefficiency story, and not one of overwhelming demand. The park is hitting high crowd levels with relatively low attendance. There’s potential for things to get much worse if Epic Universe doesn’t find its footing on ride throughput.
We already know dates around Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Year’s Eve have sold out or will sell out. There are likewise days in the next couple of months that are detached from holidays but still selling out.
As an example to underscore this daily divergence, there were two recent days that had 29 minute average waits and 70 minute average waits. To put these numbers into perspective, Walt Disney World’s two busiest days since 2019 have been 71 and 70 minute waits–both came during the weeks of New Year’s (early 2020 and late 2023).
On the same dates that Epic Universe had 29 minute and 71 minute waits, Walt Disney World’s average wait times were 23 minutes and 20 minutes, respectively. To further illustrate the divide, Walt Disney World has seen monthly averages of around 30 minutes since summer, whereas Epic Universe has been in the 55 to 63 minute range. All of those numbers are averages, not peaks.
It’s also worth noting that before Epic Universe had that 29 minute and 70 minute day-to-day spread in wait times, there was a similar lull. That’s the day I shared in My Excellent Epic Universe Experience.
As discussed there, I targeted that day over two months in advance turned out to be the least-busy day at Epic Universe since opening weekend (up until that point–it was since surpassed), with a 32 minute average wait time and 1/10 crowd level.
More recently, Epic Universe had a 39 minute average wait time and 2/10 crowd level on November 9, 2025. This was over what should have been a busy holiday weekend (and was one at Walt Disney World and the rest of Universal Orlando.)
The very next day, that spiked to 71 minutes and 9/10 crowd levels. On Veterans Day, crowd levels dropped again. That’s now the third consecutive mid-tier holiday that has been less busy than the day before it.
Point being, this is predictable–at least, to a degree. In fact, most of what you’re going to read here we’ve already covered to some extent in other posts. We’ve been consistent in our advice, and also transparent in the limitations in our recommendations.
In response to previous Epic Universe crowd avoidance recommendations, we’ve received reader pushback. Apparently, our advice does not align with that of other crowd calendar resources. As just one illustrative example, here’s what one of the top-ranked Epic Universe recommends:
- Avoid weekends (especially Saturdays)
- Avoid holidays (including Labor Day)
- For the least crowded days, visit midweek (especially Tuesday through Thursday)
I hate to call out other resources, as I’ve been wrong plenty of times, but these recommendations are–quite literally–the exact opposite of correct.
Here’s a rundown of reality at Epic Universe:
- The three busiest days of the week at Epic Universe are Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday
- Weekends are consistently the least busy two days of the week (especially Sundays)
- Labor Day was the slowest day at Epic Universe since May 25th
- Mid-tier holidays are the biggest exception to the above, and cause the day before them to be busier (even Sundays)
These are not new developments. We’ve been covering them since mid-June when first publishing our Epic Universe Crowd Calendar. Even at that point, the first two trends had started to emerge, and the underlying rationale was logical and comprehensible for anyone who understands bigger picture Florida guest dynamics. Labor Day hasn’t been a busy holiday in years.
To this resource’s credit, they did correctly call summer being busy. Predictions around Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Year’s Eve being packed will likewise almost certainly pan out.
The problem is that many resources have predicated their predictions on the existing theme parks in Central Florida, especially Universal Studios Florida and Islands of Adventure. That might seem like a correct approach at first blush and it does result in correcting calling tourist trends that revolve around school breaks. But it misses a lot.
The problem is that Epic Universe is a totally different beast. It’s like modeling your zoo for genetically-engineered dinosaurs after a petting zoo for bunnies and baby goats. You’ll get the easy stuff like enclosures and sidewalks right. But we’ve all seen that movie and know how it ends.
I’ve been incredibly lucky with Epic Universe, and have had nothing but great days. This is probably a big part of why I love Universal Orlando’s third gate so much, as my experiences have been unequivocally positive. To be sure, I have encountered some friction, but being flexible and quickly pivoting when problems arise has helped me avoid disaster on several occasions.
Despite this, I’m quick to plug our rundown of Why You Should Skip Epic Universe. Our advice for the majority of tourists is to stay on the sidelines and wait until Epic Universe improves its operations and efficiency.
Among other things, one of the major points raised in that article is “Ride Breakdowns & Downtime.” This continues to be the overriding issue with Epic Universe, as the new park continues to be a veritable roller coaster of daily downtime–and that’s reflected in crowd levels and average wait times.
I set myself up for success by picking a great day with my most recent visit to Epic Universe. I also got very lucky. The weather was favorable as the rain held off, and aside from two attractions, there wasn’t a whole lot of downtime. This took a good day of week selection and made it a great date.
Things could’ve easily gone the other direction. It could’ve been a stormy day and more rides could’ve had prolonged breakdowns, ballooning wait times (and the overall crowd level) at those attractions that were operational. The following day could’ve been smiled upon by the theme park weather and ride reliability gods, and ended up being better despite the on paper stats up to that point.
All of this is worth underscoring because you can do everything to set yourself up for success with Epic Universe–choosing the right dates, leveraging the savviest strategy, etc–and still have a negative experience due to the unpredictability of it all. Such is the nature of the beast with a new theme park.
As previously noted, the two days of the week with the lowest average wait times over the last few months have been Saturdays (#2) and Sundays (#1, by far). Friday is third-lowest. The easiest explanation for this is that Epic Universe single-day tickets are most expensive on weekends, so budget-conscious tourists are seeking out less expensive dates.
There’s less consistency for Mondays through Thursdays, and not enough data points to draw definitive conclusions. Statistically, Wednesdays and Thursdays have been worst since opening. More recently, we’ve seen Tuesday emerge as the busiest day several weeks. This dynamic could be a byproduct of tourists starting out their weeks at Walt Disney World, visiting a couple parks there, then doing Epic Universe. Or starting out at Universal’s legacy parks.
To that point, the rest of Universal Orlando is busiest on Fridays, Saturdays and Mondays, followed by Sundays. This is fueled largely by locals and Annual Passholders over the weekends, and then tourists being most inclined to visit on Mondays. Midweek is the absolute best time to visit the other parks, with average wait times bottoming out on Wednesdays.
This makes sense for the rest of Universal Orlando or Walt Disney World! Floridians work on weekdays, making weekends their best time to visit the other parks for Annual Passholders.
There’s only one little problem with extrapolating from this that the new park will follow a similar trendline: Epic Universe doesn’t have Annual Passes! Epic Universe also does not have meaningful Florida resident ticket deals, which are another strong driver of weekend attendance at the rest of Universal Orlando and Walt Disney World.
Many locals have already gotten their “fix” of Epic Universe and are waiting for Annual Passes or aggressive ticket deals. The result has been a similar dynamic as we saw at Walt Disney World when AP sales were suspended for so long (it still exists to this day, but isn’t as exaggerated).
One thing to note is that as soon as Annual Pass sales or Florida resident ticket deals start for Epic Universe, this dynamic flips. Saturday and Sunday will become the busiest days of the weekend. Moreover, there are exceptions to all of the above when weather rears its ugly head. Nothing throws a monkey wrench into Epic Universe wait times like a stormy day!
Best Dates to Visit Epic Universe in Late 2025
- November 15-16, 2025
- November 29-30, 2025*
- December 6-7, 2025
- December 13-14, 2025
November 29-30 is the backside of Thanksgiving, which is always less busy in the parks than people expect. Tourists arrive early and usually head home by the weekend after. Again, I wouldn’t seek out November 29th if I were a local or had flexibility, but November 30th gets the green light regardless.
If you’re visiting during our favorite week of the year at Walt Disney World, we would strongly recommend starting at Epic Universe and doing that day if at all possible. It overrides WDW crowd recommendations.
All of the desirable dates deeper into December 2026 are currently sold out, making those (obviously) undesirable.
If you already have multi-day tickets for those date ranges (or availability opens back up–as often happens), the least-bad options should be December 20-21, 2025. It should be a similar story with January 3-4, 2026.
These are not enthusiastic recommendations. They are, as suggested above, the ‘making lemonade out of lemons’ options. I wouldn’t visit Epic Universe on any of those dates, but that’s not helpful if you already have a trip planned.
Best Dates to Visit Epic Universe in Early 2026
- January 10-11, 2026
- January 19, 2026*
- January 24-25, 2026
- January 31, 2026
- February 1, 2026
- February 7-8, 2026
- February 22, 2026
- February 28, 2026
- March 1, 2026
- March 7-8, 2026
- April 11-12, 2026
- April 18-19, 2026
- April 25-26, 2026
- May 2-3, 2026
- May 9-10, 2026
- May 16-17, 2026
The asterisked date in January 2026 is the backside of the MLK Day holiday weekend. This playing with fire to some degree, but we have decent data suggesting that this Monday will be better than the Sunday before it.
Epic Universe’s underperformance on recent holiday weekends reinforces this. I wouldn’t plan a visit around this advice if I were a local, but if I were already heading down for these dates and needed to pick within this range, those are the dates I’d choose.
In general, these recommendations become lower confidence the further out we go. There are so many moving parts when it comes to Epic Universe that predicting crowd levels is very difficult. In particular, Epic Universe is going to have park hopping and less restrictive ticketing rules starting in 2026. This should not materially impact day of the week trends (which, again, are driven by locals), but it might! We’re in unprecedented territory.
Another thing that makes me especially weary about Winter 2026 is that this has become an increasingly popular time to visit for theme park fans, with crowds and occupancy from January through March increasing at both Walt Disney World and Universal increasing in recent years.
On top of that, we’ve heard from many readers who are “waiting out” the opening year crowds and targeting their first visits in Winter 2026. Anecdotes are obviously not data, but it’s incredibly common for major new theme park additions to have this type of dynamic–an initial lull due to fears of crowds, followed by an influx of demand. If the opening season wait times of Epic Universe do turn out to be a “lull” (attendance has not been high relative to theoretical capacity), we are in for a world of hurt in 2026!
As for the days to avoid, honestly, the rest of them is what I’m most inclined to say. But if, for whatever reason, I absolutely couldn’t do Epic Universe on a weekend, I’d be inclined to go Friday. If that weren’t possible, Monday is the date I’d choose.
Just to reiterate again, Wednesdays and Thursdays are the worst days to visit. This is statistically speaking, which means we’re smoothing data out over a long duration. In looking more closely, midweek is all over the place. There have been stretches recently when Tuesday is worse than the two days that follow, and it appears to be “catching up” to Wednesdays and Thursdays.
The thing is, you aren’t visiting on a statistical average of all weeks. You’re visiting on an actual date, in the real world. So if I had to do a Tuesday through Thursday for whatever reason, I’d wait until the absolute last minute to make a decision and then decide on the basis of the weather forecast, minimizing my exposure to rain (although a good early afternoon downpour works wonders at clearing out Epic Universe–shockingly so).
Honestly though, I just wouldn’t visit midweek. I’m only going on Sundays from here on out until APs go on sale or aggressive Florida resident ticket deals roll out. From my perspective, the park has too many problems to visit on a non-weekend. To each their own on that, though.
Looking further into the future, if planning a trip later in 2026 or 2027, I’d target all of the same dates on our Best & Worst Weeks to Visit Walt Disney World in 2025 & 2026. That’s a mix of quantitative and qualitative, and the latter arguably matters more at Epic Universe than Walt Disney World.
Use that best & worst weeks advice to target timeframes for your Walt Disney World and/or Universal Orlando vacation, and then use the above day of week recommendations to narrow your visit dates to Epic Universe.
We would strongly recommend prioritizing Epic Universe when choosing which park to visit. It should be the overriding factor, as there’s far more variance for Epic Universe than any other park at either resort.
As mentioned above, timeframes to target include the week after Thanksgiving, mid-January, before winter break, early spring, and post-Easter 2026 are all appealing. Basically, the dates with the highest likelihood of lowest attendance and best weather.
While I’m planning more solo research trips to Epic Universe throughout the year, our big family vacation will happen in January or February. Weather is the deciding factor for us–but my mild concern with dates deeper into next year is the increased likelihood of Annual Passes or Florida resident ticket deals, which would exacerbate crowd issues dramatically.
Need trip planning tips and comprehensive advice for your visit to Central Florida? Make sure to read our Universal Orlando Planning Guide for everything about Islands of Adventure and Universal Studios Florida. Also check out our Walt Disney World Vacation Planning Guide for everything about those parks, resorts, restaurants, and so much more. For regular updates, news & rumors, a heads up when discounts are released, and much more, sign up for our FREE email newsletter!
YOUR THOUGHTS
Have you visited Epic Universe since summer ended? What did you think of wait times and crowds? Experience any operational meltdowns due to breakdowns or weather? Is it possible or probable that Epic Universe actually has even crowds this holiday season, or throughout next year once park hopping is allowed and visit restrictions are removed? Will you visit Epic Universe in 2026, or will you wait for crowds to settle down (in theory)? Agree or disagree with our assessment? Any questions? We love hearing from readers, so please share any other thoughts or questions you have in the comments below!