There are times when Disney gets so busy you’re really better to just not go at all because you spend much of your time cranky about standing in lines or dealing with the other crazy visitors. So before you book your trip consider avoiding THESE times.
1. AVOID December 26 – 31. The week after Christmas is positively INSANE. I have literally seen Touring Plans.com update on their awesome application “Lines” that parks have been “closed”. What that basically means is that at some point in the day a park has reached its maximum capacity amount and Disney can no longer allow new guests to enter the park. Usually the park that closest earliest is Magic Kingdom. But seriously, do you really want to go down there during ANY time when a park could REACH CAPACITY?! According to disneybythenumbers.com Maximum Capacity for MK is 100,000 guests. That’s 100,000 guess in ONE PARK people! And once those people can no longer get into MK they go into the other parks. That sounds like a bad day to me. Mousesavers.com has a good “Christmas week survival guide” I suggest you read if you just HAVE to go during that week.
2. AVOID EASTER WEEK (starting the weekend Easter takes place and the week following). Obviously this week “floats” depending on the time of the year, but it’s the second most packed week each year. Yeah the weather might be a bit nicer, but Disney is going to up your costs for rooms, etc. In 2012 this date will be April 8th. Note that the FREE DINING offer STOPS on March 31. Why do you think that is? Cause they’re going to make BANK those next weeks, that’s why. Either people will leave early the week before and have the 3-day weekend of Easter on the back end of their trip, or they will start with the 3-day weekend and extend from there.
3. AVOID PRESIDENT’S DAY WEEKEND – In 2012″ this will be the 20th of February. Wow, that week seems to be missing from the FREE DINING promotion as well. Wonder why, hmmmm? Oh yeah, because everybody and their mama’s going to be coming to WDW and they don’t need to “entice” anybody to come. Busy weekend.
4. AVOID THANKSGIVING WEEK – Please Step away from the Thanksgiving Weekend trip, Por favor paso lejos de la excursion de un Dia de Accion. Let’s seeee. Thanksgiving 2012 is the 22nd of November. What does the FREE DINING list say Bob????
5. Do your BEST to avoid Spring Breaks – Pretty much the entire country takes a Spring Break sometime in March or April. We have done a Spring Break Trip before (ours are usually in late March) and it was he busiest I’ve EVER seen it. Now, I knew what I was doing so I followed my pattern and got out of the parks during the heat of the day, so it wasn’t quite as bad. But I experienced a lot more frustration with running in to people, people stopping to read maps in the middle of the walkways, basically just a lot more people being like that “Top 5 most annoying people in the parks” article I wrote for Chip and Co. It’s not consistent enough for Disney to withdraw their dining incentive, but it does get crazy.
So there you go, the 5 WORST times to book at trip to WDW! If you do it anyway, welll I told you so. 
@Melissa – we’ve gone 2nd week in October and had a good time and I would imagine the first two weeks of November are AMAZING! I have a friend who goes in January and she’s never seen a stand-by for anything longer than 20 minutes. The best week I ever went was the first week in May. Super!
@Marissa – As long as you have a PLAN you should be ok. The key is to know what ORDER to do rides in in order to avoid long waits. BE THERE AT PARK OPENING!!!!! Have a plan, know the correct order to do things, be there park opening, dont waste time looking for things (cars, strollers, etc) and you’ll be fine.
Sara, so glad you love the site. Your week shouldn’t be as bad as the next week will be. Touring plans has it listed as VERY light until Thursday, 22nd, when it jumps to a 9/10. But one of those days its like a 2/10!! So yeah, good time!