Theme Park Report Shows Disney’s Animal Kingdom And Almost All Walt Disney World Park Attendance Up In 2017
Each and every single year, the Themed Entertainment Association (TEA) and AECOM publish their attendance report to show just how the theme parks around the world are doing attendance-wise. On Thursday, the 2017 report was issued to show just how the parks did last year and something happened that had never taken place before. Thanks in large part to the opening of Pandora – The World of Avatar, Disney’s Animal Kingdom beat out Epcot in attendance for a calendar year.
2017 was a good year for the Disney Parks as the majority of them around the world saw an increase in attendance. This is a big change from the year before, but not every single one of those at Walt Disney World saw things go up, but Disney’s Hollywood Studios hopes to change that in the coming years.
Also, the two water parks at Walt Disney World also saw a decrease in attendance, but that was to be expected. With Volcano Bay opening at the Universal Orlando Resort, some competition had finally shown up in Central Florida.
The official report from Themed Entertainment Association shows that Disney’s Animal Kingdom not only saw a simple increase in attendance but a big one. Pandora helped bring in 15.3 percent more guests in 2017 than in 2016.
Here are the top 20 most visited theme parks in 2017 and the increase percentage from 2016:
1.) Magic Kingdom: 0.3 percent increase
2.) Disneyland: 2 percent increase
3.) Tokyo Disneyland: 0.4 percent increase
4.) Universal Studios Japan: 3 percent increase
5.) Tokyo DisneySea: 0.3 percent increase
6.) Disney’s Animal Kingdom: 15.3 percent increase
7.) Epcot: 4.2 percent increase
8.) Shanghai Disneyland: 96.4 percent
9.) Disney’s Hollywood Studios: 0.5 percent decrease
10.) Universal Studios Orlando: 2 percent increase
11.) Chimelong Ocean Kingdom: 15.5 percent increase
12.) Disneyland Paris: 15 percent increase
13.) Disney California Adventure: 3 percent increase
14.) Island of Adventure: 2 percent increase
15.) Universal Studios Hollywood: 12 percent increase
16.) Lotte World: 17.6 percent decrease
17.) Everland: 9.5 percent decrease
18.) Hong Kong Disneyland: 1.6 percent increase
19.) Nagashime Spa Land: 1.4 percent increase
20.) Ocean Park: 3.3 percent decrease
As is evident, Disney’s Hollywood Studios is the only major Disney park that saw a decrease in attendance in 2017 even though it was a small one. That is expected to change with the opening of Toy Story Land on June 30, 2018, and Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge opening sometime in 2019.
Attendance for Blizzard Beach was down seven percent in 2017 while Typhoon Lagoon was down five percent.
Universal Studios also has something to be happy about as they saw increases in attendance at all of its parks around the world.
This theme park attendance report is very important to all of the companies who are looking to stay on top of their game. Knowing these numbers helps them determine if they need to pick it up a bit or how much they need to do to stay at the very top of the list. Walt Disney World has the distinct honor of seeing four parks in the top 10, and with all of the projects nearing completion, they are likely to stay there.
