The number of weeks has now turned to number of months in terms of Disney Parks being closed due to Covid-19. Fortunately, this week brought some good news and a few updates in terms of when the parks will reopen around the world. In this post, we’ll break down the latest news and go from Disney resort to resort giving the latest updates.

Before diving into the news, I will say that I’m going to include some speculation in this post. I do not have any inside information and am merely using some educated guesses when it comes to the parks, but I plan to intertwine that with facts that Disney has released. Let’s get to the news because no one clicked on this post to read my caveats. We’ll start across the world and with the biggest Disney news of the week!

Shanghai Disneyland

After just over 100 days of being closed, Shanghai Disneyland will be the first Disney theme park to reopen on May 11th. China has slowly reopened businesses and other public areas throughout the last few months and Disney’s newest park will be a part of that on Monday. Of course, this reopening will come with a whole new set of theme park standards that could become the new normal.

Among the new protocols Shanghai Disneyland will impose are mandatory face masks, a capacity of less than 30% the park’s maximum capacity, social distancing in queues and attractions, advanced screening upon entry and more sanitizing stations. It probably goes without saying that America and China are in different stages of this pandemic. Still, Shanghai Disneyland proves to be both hopeful and a look ahead when it comes to the American Disney Parks.

I would imagine that the safety precautions taken in Shanghai will be moved over to WDW and Disneyland when they open. Likewise, the timetable would make sense in American too with Shanghai being closed for just over 100 days and WDW and Disneyland at roughly half of that. Of course, it’s not a perfect comparison as no one knows what the future holds during this unprecedented time. But Shanghai does serve as an interesting template moving forward.

Hong Kong Disneyland

As far as timetables go, Hong Kong doesn’t seem far behind Shanghai. The city has few case numbers, meaning it has been in the reopening stages. While the park is closed until further notice, the Hong Kong Disneyland hotels have now started accepting reservations starting on May 15th. With this in mind, I would expect that the park will open in the next month with the same precautions that Shanghai Disneyland is using.

Walt Disney World

The other batch of news came out of Disney World. Florida has been among the first few states that are opening things up and that is proved true by Disney Springs opening on May 20th. Like everything else I’ve talked about, the shopping and dining area will take extra precautions including mandatory face masks.

Whether that speaks to the parks and hotels at Disney World opening sooner rather than later remains to be seen. The Florida governor has given Disney the autonomy to, more or less, decide when to open. Whether Disney will take that and use it independently from Disneyland remains to be seen. The resort has pushed back any new bookings until July 1st so I think it’s safe to assume that the parks will not be opening until (at least) then.

Disneyland, Disneyland Paris and Tokyo Disney Resort

These three resorts are all clumped together because there hasn’t been much in the way of news regarding them. All three are in a holding pattern as California, France and Japan are all under a more thorough lock down than the other areas before it. Like Disney World, Disneyland has pushed back bookings until July 1st. I could see all of these opening in mid to late summer but there has been no notable movement towards that over the last few weeks.

As is the new norm for these times, all of these situations are fluid and it’s impossible to predict what could come next week, much less the next few months. Shanghai Disneyland opening in a day is obviously a big step towards other parks opening and we remain hopeful that the rest of the parks will follow in a safe, responsible way.

Do you have any questions about the current status of the Disney Parks? Let us know in the comments below! Planning a trip to a Disney Resort? Check out our planning guides here! If you enjoy what you are reading here on Wandering in Disney please share this post with your friends, as well as like our social media pages. You can also subscribe to the blog via WordPress or email. All of those links are on the right side of this page. Thank you for reading, we really appreciate it!