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Disneyland Max Pass + Child Swap!

Tosha Tingey • June 18, 2019

Tips & Tricks for combining the Max Pass and Child Swap! Plus a campground within walking distance!

If you haven’t been to Disneyland lately then well, you gotta go! So much has changed and that includes how the Fast Pass system works. I’ll go through and share all about the Max Pass, Disneyland app, and Child Swap.

Disneyland Max Pass

Max Pass is the new faster way to get Fast Passes and it’s in conjunction with your photo pass too. You can buy it with your tickets for $10 dollars per paying ticket (ages 3+) per day. Or $15 if you buy it separately. The Max Pass goes right along with your Disneyland app. It allows you to get Fast Passes all on the app, versus running to different rides as soon as your time is up. We’ve all been there right? Just me? #youngestchild It also works as a Photo Pass! So all of those pictures you would get taken by the Disney photographers and never see again? Now you get a digital copy almost instantly.
 One big change is the Fast Pass time window. Beforehand they wouldn’t care when you came as long as it was after the start time. But now the end time matters. So you have one hour to use your Fast Pass. If a ride closes during the time you have a Fast Pass it allows you to use it as a Fast Pass for any other ride.

Tips we learned: set a timer for when you can sign up for another Fast Pass. Set your QR code for your photo pass as your lock screen on your phone that way you don’t have to go digging for it every time you get a picture taken.

Disneyland App

This app should’ve happened FOREVER ago! These are 5 reasons why I love it:

1. Accurate wait times!
2. Shows all the places to eat and allows you to make reservations
3. Mobile pick up for snacks (Dole whip anyone?!)
4. Gives show times for all shows in BOTH parks
5. Works as a map. No more shuffling around a piece of paper.
6. It’s FREE

I added a bonus reason because I love the app so much.

Child Swap

Now if you’re like most people headed to the happiest place on earth you’ll be going there with little kiddos that don’t quite reach up to the height stick on the big rides. Two of our friends joined us at Disneyland and we are SO grateful they did. Not only did they add to the fun in every way, they also helped out with Addie during child swap. So here is how it works. Say you want to go on Guardians of the Galaxy Escape ride but your little nugget is too small for the ride. You have two options, either group A goes through the stand by line or goes through fast pass if you got a fast pass for the ride. You will only need two Fast pass though because then, group B comes with group A to the Cast Member at the entrance of the line and asks for a child swap while group A goes on the ride. The cast member will scan Group B’s park tickets that will give them a “Fast Pass” for an hour. So while group A is screaming their hearts out, Group B can go take the kiddo on another kid friendly ride and then once group A comes off then they take the kid and group B then goes and gets dropped in an elevator.
So a little hack we learned is that we could split up our Fast Passes so half of us would have a fast pass for Toy Story and the other for Soar’n Over California and then we get child swaps for the other half. Doing this, in combination with utilizing the MaxPass, we maybe waited in a standby line 4 or 5 times. And that was only if they were 20min or less. Plus, we saved time and both groups got to experience the little kid rides with Addie.

A great way to utilize the Max Pass with Child Swap is only having two people buy the Max Pass and using the Child swap passes for the other two people. It’s an easy way to save $30 bucks.

Where We Camped

I also wanted to share where we camped at Disneyland. We stayed at the Anahiam Harbor RV resort. It’s so close to Disneyland that we WALKED. You heard it right. WALKED to the park and back. Call us cheap but we didn’t want to pay for parking ($25 per day), the shuttle ($5 per person per day and stopped running at 9:30) or take an Uber ($6 dollars each way without a car seat)


The walk was about 7min heading there and 9min back (we walked much slower after a full day of walking. Haha) We also could watch the fireworks from our Airstream!


I would love to hear your Disney park tips below!

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