Theme Park Scope

I’ll admit my first reaction to “AI-powered vacation planning” was a healthy dose of skepticism.

My second reaction, after actually reading through what this thing does, was a lot more curious. Let’s get into everything that’s been confirmed!

Walt Disney World will soon begin testing a new vacation planning experience on DisneyWorld.com, developed in partnership with Google Cloud, built around AI-powered tools meant to make researching and booking a trip less of a chore. This isn’t a full website overhaul; it’s a beta test, and a fairly limited one at that, but the feature list is genuinely substantial.

One of the bigger practical changes: guests will be able to search by month or season instead of the current back-and-forth of checking individual dates one at a time to compare rates. A new pricing and availability calendar is being built alongside this, specifically designed to show whether shifting your dates by a few days could save money or open up room availability you didn’t know existed. If you’ve ever manually clicked through a week’s worth of dates trying to find the cheapest combination, this is aimed squarely at you.

This is the feature that actually got my attention. Instead of filtering resorts by category and scrolling through results, guests will be able to search using specific interests (a favorite character, a particular room style, or even a description of their ideal pool) and let the AI tool recommend resorts based on that input.

Disney shared one demo example that’s a pretty good illustration of how this is supposed to work: a family planning their first Walt Disney World trip mentioned that their son loved The Lion King and that they wanted a good pool with easy park access. The tool responded by suggesting Disney’s Art of Animation Resort, specifically pointing to its Lion King family suites, along with supporting details about the resort itself. That’s a meaningfully different experience than scrolling through 30-plus resort listings hoping something jumps out.

Guests will also be able to pull up resorts side by side, comparing things like transportation options, dining, nearby parks, and resort-specific benefits, then ask follow-up questions about specifics — walking access to EPCOT, dining variety, or how the pools stack up against each other. And look, if you’re comparing anything to the Beach Club’s pool specifically, that’s just not a fair fight! Some things don’t need an AI tool to settle.

A few more features will round out the experience:

• A map view showing resort locations and rates, useful for anyone deciding based on proximity to a specific park rather than just price
• Shareable planning links, letting one person price out a vacation and send a link to family or friends so everyone can look at the same options together instead of relaying details back and forth
• A built-in check during the booking process to flag whether a better offer is currently available, rather than guests needing to separately hunt down every active discount themselves

Disney has been specific that AI is being applied selectively here, used to align resort features with what a guest is actually searching for, rather than running the entire planning experience through AI from end to end. The initial beta is also scoped narrowly: it covers resorts, tickets, and vacation packages, and does not currently include Lightning Lane selections or dining reservations.

This beta is launching to a very limited, randomly selected group of guests in the U.S. and Canada to start, with Disney planning to expand access in phases based on feedback from that initial group. So even if this excites you, there’s a real chance you won’t see it on your account right away…and if you do get selected, expect it to still be a work in progress rather than a finished product.

Just as important: the existing booking tools aren’t going anywhere. The standard DisneyWorld.com search and booking flow, travel advisors, and the Disney Call Center all remain fully available, unchanged, for anyone who isn’t selected for the beta or simply prefers the way things work now. If you’d rather have an actual person walk you through resort options, room categories, and current discounts instead of describing your ideal pool to a chatbot, that option isn’t disappearing — working with a travel advisor like Adventure Awaits Travel Company remains free and gives you a human who already knows the resort lineup inside and out.

This tool didn’t come out of nowhere; it’s the latest piece of a broader digital experience overhaul Disney’s been rolling out throughout 2026. Earlier this year, Disney CEO Josh D’Amaro told investors during a Q2 earnings call that the company is using AI specifically to “reduce the complexities around planning and booking a trip” and tailor the experience to what guests want most. Since then, Disney has already tested an AI-generated search summary tool internally with Cast Members, redesigned the DisneyWorld.com homepage to cut its total number of links by roughly 40%, and rolled out Spanish-language support across the Walt Disney World and Disneyland apps. Seen in that context, this new planning experience looks less like an isolated experiment and more like the next visible step in a plan Disney’s been building toward for months.

We’ll keep tracking this rollout as Disney expands beta access and adds features, so check back with Theme Park Scope for updates as more guests get their hands on it.