Walt Disney World has revealed showtimes for Starlight: Dream the Night Away at Magic Kingdom for the upcoming Christmas season after a lengthy delay in adding them to the Magic Kingdom calendar. This shares dates & details, plus why we’re surprised by these showtimes, and predictions of performance times based on past precedent and castle-area congestion.
Let’s start with the current nighttime entertainment schedule for now through November 1, 2025:
- Starlight Parade: 8 pm
- Happily Ever After: 9 pm
- Starlight Parade: 10 pm
- Park Closing: 10 pm
This has been the schedule for a little while. The showtimes started as 9/10/11 pm in the summer, then shifted forward 30 minutes, and then another 30 minutes to the current schedule.
Walt Disney World has had a lot of “Starlight Schedule Shenanigans” and we’ve been documenting them here on DTB since summer. This has basically consisted of Walt Disney World posting showtimes, those showtimes being wrong, us pointing out that they were probably wrong, the showtimes being removed, [lengthy delay], new correct showtimes being posted. Variations of that have occurred more than once since Starlight started this summer.
The reason we’ve been able to correctly predict Starlight showtimes was that this isn’t Walt Disney World’s first rodeo with a night parade. It might feel like it is since it’s been so long, but one was shown a decade ago. It’s true! All our “predictions” have been is looking up the schedule from 2015.
What we’ve noticed is that Walt Disney World is pretty much doing the same thing. They keep acting like they’re going to switch things up…only to pull from the playbook from the last time Main Street Electrical Parade ran. Which is the smart thing to do! No need to reinvent the wheel. There was a reason for this approach a decade ago.
It was on that basis that we predicted the following showtimes starting November 2, 2025:
- Starlight Parade: 7 pm
- Happily Ever After: 8 pm
- Starlight Parade: 9 pm
- Park Closing: 10 pm
Well, either our run of correct predictions is coming to an end, or Walt Disney World has (once again) posted an incorrect schedule. Here’s what they have on the official calendar starting November 2, 2025:
- Starlight Parade: 8 pm
- Happily Ever After: 9 pm
- Starlight Parade: 10 pm
- Park Closing: 10 pm
This is the schedule for nights through at least November 22, 2025 when Magic Kingdom does not close early for Mickey’s Very Merry Christmas Party.
As you can see, that’s the exact same schedule as the current one. It’s also consistent with the Happily Ever After showtimes that have been posted for a while now. Something feels different this time. We’re guessing this showtime schedule is correct.
Our assumption was that Walt Disney World had waited so long to post Starlight hours for November 2nd and beyond because Daylight Saving Time ends on Sunday, November 2, 2025. That didn’t seem coincidental!
Anyone who is familiar with the Farmers’ Almanac or whatever knows that sunset times change, moving earlier in the fall and winter. This usually triggers showtime changes for the Magic Kingdom fireworks. Usually as in every single year. Last year, it meant Happily Ever After moving forward to 8:30 pm (this actually happened in late October, as sunset times had already moved forward). One week later, Happily Ever After moved forward to 8 pm and stayed in that time slot until DST started again in March.
If we went back in time to November 3, 2015, we’d see showtimes of 7 pm and 9 pm for Main Street Electrical Parade and 8 pm for Wishes. I was sure that Walt Disney World would do the same thing this year with Starlight.
There’s good reason why that was the entertainment cadence a decade ago, and it makes even more sense in 2025 to revert to that schedule.
This is (was?) Walt Disney World’s preferred schedule, as it allows families with kids who can’t stay out late the chance to see nighttime entertainment, and also helps clear out the park earlier. The only reason they had later showtimes over the summer was because sunset dictated it.
Equally as important, it’s my understanding that the schedule cannot be condensed any further, as 60 minutes is about the minimum possible buffer between the parade and fireworks showtimes. (I’ve heard this from several entertainment Cast Members, and it’s been corroborated by delays in the start of one showtime having a ripple effect on subsequent performances.)
If anything, I wouldn’t have been surprised if Magic Kingdom increased the gap to 90 minutes when having the earlier sunset time to use to its advantage.
Something like 7 pm, 8:30 pm, and 10 pm. Or maybe 7, 8, and 9:30 pm. The gap that matters most is between Happily Ever After and the second Starlight, at least from a congestion and crowd flow perspective.
This is something we’ve documented recently in Avoiding Magic Kingdom’s Evening Exodus, as we’ve heard multiple reports of chaotic conditions in the Central Plaza between Happily Ever After and the second Starlight.
The best explanation for Walt Disney World not moving showtimes earlier might be that an 8 pm showtime for Happily Ever After might induce even more demand for the fireworks, in turn exacerbating the exodus.
That would be a fair explanation! If this were a conscious decision on that basis, it would make perfect sense. I’d still wonder why they didn’t increase the spread between showtimes as further mitigation, though.
Walt Disney World has already confirmed that Starlight will only be presented on non-party nights during Mickey’s Very Merry Christmas Party dates. This means that, for example, Starlight will not be performed at all on December 18-19, etc.
This is 100% normal and that will not change. The result of that is more guests cramming into Magic Kingdom on nights when Starlight and Happily Ever After are shown, such as November 12 or December 10, 2025.
Those are two of several ‘red flag’ dates to avoid that are covered in our list of the Best & Worst Dates to Do Magic Kingdom in 2025. If you do visit on those or other red flag dates, we’d highly recommend avoiding the Central Plaza in front of Cinderella Castle–especially if you have small children, elderly or disabled adults in your party.
On a positive note, there are two nightly showtimes of Starlight through at least November 22, 2025. This is what the schedule should be during Party Season–and throughout the entirety of 2026, for that matter–but Walt Disney World can rarely resist a good ole fashioned cost-cut, so it’s nice to have confirmation.
Otherwise, it’ll be interesting to see whether the Starlight Night Parade and Happily Ever After showtimes change deeper into November or December. While I can potentially see the wisdom of a later fireworks time, I question whether that decision was made purposefully in the first place (or if they just extended the current schedule cadence). Moreover, if the goal is to mitigate crowding and congestion, using the longer runway provided by the earlier sunset for a 90 minute gap between performances makes more sense. We’ll keep you posted!
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YOUR THOUGHTS
What do you think about Walt Disney World adding showtimes for Starlight in November 2025? Surprised that it’s not a 7/8/9 or 7/8:30/10 schedule? Why do you think WDW stuck with the status quo for showtimes? Have you experienced the evening exodus at Magic Kingdom this month (October 2025)? Think the worst is still to come in November and December? Agree or disagree with our assessment? Any questions we can help you answer? Hearing your feedback–even when you disagree with us–is both interesting to us and helpful to other readers, so please share your thoughts below in the comments!
