The Little Mermaid Musical Adventure is a stage show at Walt Disney World’s Hollywood Studios. Residing in Animation Courtyard, the show tells Ariel’s story through a blend of live actors, puppets and projections. Typically, The Little Mermaid Musical Adventure has a runtime of just under 20 minutes and shows every 40 minutes but check for showtimes in the Disney World app. In this post, we’ll review the stage show and where it fits into a Hollywood Studios day.

Disney World debuted two new shows at Hollywood Studios to kick off the 2025 summer. One was a brand new show called Disney Villains: Unfairly Ever After. The other was a reimagined Little Mermaid show; an update on a park mainstay that had been around since 1992. Voyage of the Little Mermaid remained closed after the COVID reopening and was effectively replaced with this new version.

The bones of that show are still the same. Little Mermaid Musical Adventure is in the same theater, uses a mix of puppets and live actors and has an aggressive daily showtime schedule. But stage shows aren’t meant to last 30 years and the original iteration badly needed a refresh. Thankfully, the new show delivered.

I’m guessing you saw the title of this post so you already know what I think of The Little Mermaid Musical Adventure – I loved it! To be fair, the ‘Best Show in Hollywood Studios’ moniker is not much to live up to. Indiana Jones Epic Stunt Spectacular is fun but very long in the tooth. Same goes for Beauty and the Beast – Live on Stage except that’s less fun. I saw Villains: Unfairly Ever After before The Little Mermaid and that did not leave me optimistic. This show takes guests under the sea while blowing everything else out of the water. If I was a newspaper headline writer in the 90’s, that would have been the title of this post.

Speaking of Disney Villains: Unfairly Ever After, The Little Mermaid Musical Adventure has a similar start to it. Both rely on animated projections to setup the show. King Triton and Ariel’s sisters lead the way into seeing the underwater princess. Frankly, the setup to the show is the worst part. The look of the animation really throws me off, feeling very AI-esque to me. There’s no depth to that starting animation and the colors feel gimmicky. This lasts for less than a minute before we see a human actor but it did have me concerned.

Once Ariel shows up, Little Mermaid Musical Adventure takes off. For much of the show, our main character is in a clever stage prop that makes her mermaid self look like she’s floating through the water. It’s not overly complicated but is well done, which is a nice encapsulation of the whole show. While legless, Ariel interacts with puppets, King Triton (who is always projected), and a few humans. It’s all convincing.

She also sings! Most of the show, if you couldn’t tell by the name, is based around different musical numbers. ‘Part of Your World’, ‘Under the Sea’, and ‘Kiss the Girl’ are all highlights. From what I could tell in multiple viewings, most of the singing is live which is always my preference over prerecorded. Everything sounds surprisingly good, and they may have tricked me! Like many theme park shows, the story is truncated and probably wouldn’t suffice if this wasn’t a retelling of one of the most seen animated movies ever. That didn’t bother me though, as guests are mainly there to take in fun, live renditions of memorable Alan Menken songs.

Puppets are an absolute highlight of The Little Mermaid Musical Adventure. This will be a little more hit and miss for guests but it absolutely worked for me. Sebastian, Flounder and several other animals take their form in puppets. The puppeteer is always incredibly well hidden, to the point where I barely saw any of them. While I didn’t like the opening projections, the puppets go from physical to digital seamlessly in the heart of the show and it’s expertly done. This hits a climactic note in ‘Under the Sea’.

Puppetry gives the show heart and a warm nostalgia. There’s so much more character and life in the puppets than what we see in the Villains show where humans are interacting with pre-recorded projections. I should mention that this is Wandering in Disney coded. I always prefer physical sets and figures over projections, whether that’s on a ride or show.

The biggest figure in the show is the giant Ursula puppet brought out for a few different scenes. I was a little surprised to see how divisive this was after watching the show a few times. When I was in attendance (I stay away from any spoilers that I can), I thought Ursula looked incredible. I guess your mileage may vary here but seeing this giant creation out on the stage was a thrill, feeling like another throwback to the yesteryear of Disney entertainment.

Little Mermaid Musical Adventure is largely based around the musical numbers but there is a final battle scene that’s impressively staged. Different effects give a vignette feeling to the final scene. I don’t want to spoil too much on how it looks but found the battle to be a successful bow on top of the package.

As for the theater itself, the proscenium arch has been redone and looks beautiful; not distracting but appealing. The inside queue area is a letdown as there’s not much in there. On the bright side, it is inside!

Guests wanting to see the show should arrive 10 minutes early, if not more depending on how busy the park day is. For us, this is a must-do inside of Hollywood Studios and the theater provides a nice break from whatever extreme weather is going on around you. If you’re spending a full day in the park, we recommend going to see this in the early afternoon.

The Little Mermaid Musical Adventure avoids some of the pitfalls of recent Disney entertainment. This isn’t a glorified character greeting or dressed up 3D movie. Instead the show succeeds with fantastic songs, fun choreography and physical sets that blend into projections. There’s been so many instances of Disney theme park entertainment trying to do too much or going for technology over substance. The Little Mermaid Musical Adventure knows what it’s good at and sticks to that, making the show one of the very best in all of Walt Disney World.

What do you think of The Little Mermaid Musical Adventure? Let us know your thoughts or any questions you might have in the comments below. Planning a trip to Walt Disney World? Check out our Disney World Trip Planning Guide to help you out. Looking for discount tickets? Check out this site! 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!