Universal Orlando Resort’s Unlimited Express Pass

With only two days to experience Orlando’s Universal Studios, we had to make a choice of standing in line and not getting to do everything or paying more to get to the front of the line on rides, so we could get more done in less time. We loved the Unlimited Express Pass, here's why!

There are several ticket packages from 3 parks to 2 parks to 1 park tickets in any number of days. A 3-park ticket will get you in all three parks: Universal Studios, Islands of Adventure and Volcano Bay.  Two-park tickets gets you into Universal Studios and Islands of Adventure with 1-park tickets only getting you into one park. We ruled out Volcano Bay right away as water parks aren’t our thing, but they have some very cool virtual line features if you are interested!
Express Pass by itself gets you in the Express Pass line once for each ride that accepts it. If you stay in certain Universal resorts, you get this free as an add-on to your tickets. But skipping the line only once a ride wasn’t what we ultimately wanted, and we weren’t staying on site for this trip.

We looked up Express Unlimited Pass and knew we were sold on this ticket add-on. Express Unlimited Pass gets you in the Express Pass line as many times as you want for the rides that accept it. This includes the new rides that only accept Virtual Pass (more of that later). When you order this ticket, you must tell them the first day you plan to use it. They only issue a select amount of Express Unlimited Pass, so they need to know when they have reached their limit. The day you select also determines how much this will add to your cost. Depending on the season, it can be cheaper or more expensive.

We ordered our tickets to be will call making it easy to walk up to a kiosk and print our tickets. The tickets though are paper and can tear or get wet. I would suggest purchasing a lanyard with a clear pouch to allow each rider to scan it without having to take it in and out. You can purchase the lanyards before you go through security on City Walk, but also in almost any store in Universal.

With Express Unlimited Pass you don’t really need to plan the order of rides or run to them early in the morning to get in line. The first day we went in and rode what we wanted as we got to it and even rode it a second or third time before moving on to the next. You just walk up to the Express Pass line and scan your pass. Sometimes it is at the beginning of the line and sometimes you scan it later in line. The scanners are easy for the employees to move them around, so you never know when you might get scanned. 

The first day we rode over 18 rides from 9 am- 4pm. The longest line was Escape from Gringotts. It was a 20-minute wait and really no way around it because of the preshow and story building. There wasn’t really a line in the express lane as much as just having to wait for the elevator and watch safety videos.  They take your picture while in line to help control the line. We took our pictures the first time and skipped it the second time because we couldn’t get all five of us in the photo.

Minion Mayhem and Race Through New York Starring Jimmy Fallon are audience loading rides. Sometimes the lines get long for these, so we did go for Minion Mayhem as we entered the park. On one of them a person had problems with the seatbelt. To fix it they kept unlocking our row and having us relock them. Everyone had to wait until it is fixed, making it a slower loading ride. With Virtual Pass and Express Pass only on some rides, you don’t stand in line, but you may wait in an air-conditioned room that has seats and places to re-charge your electronics.

For more information on Universal Orlando Resort contact the Whitney World Travel team. It would be our pleasure to help you plan a spectacular vacation to Universal Orlando!

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