The best way to save money on a Walt Disney World Annual Pass is a method called price or “ticket bridging” from regular admission. This guide explains how the technique works, official policy, problems you might encounter, and the discount you’ll receive from upgrading to an AP. (Updated May 10, 2025.)
In order to price or ticket bridge, you’ll want to start by purchasing the Walt Disney World park ticket with the deepest discount from an authorized third party reseller. What this means is that you can purchase discounted tickets via our friends at Get Away Today, and then convert those standard discounted tickets to an AP.
We keep our Tips for Saving Money on Walt Disney World Tickets post updated with what’s currently the best deal at the top of the post. Saving money in this first step is important because you receive the face value of this ticket, not what you paid for it, when upgrading.
In the process of ticket bridging, you’re credited for the full gate price value of the regular Walt Disney World park ticket. This “bridges” the gap (hence the name) between what you paid and the ticket’s current value. You then pay out of pocket for the difference between your ticket’s current value and the cost of a Walt Disney World Annual Pass.
The next step is going to a Guest Services window with your unused or partially used (despite what you might read, it makes no difference) ticket, and requesting to upgrade it to an Annual Pass, with the value applied towards your Annual Pass. The reason we recommend Guest Services is that this is a fairly uncommon request, and Guest Services is where you’re most likely to find a Cast Member with experience in price bridging.
If, for some reason, the Cast Member at Guest Services is unable to price bridge at the current (full) gate price of your Walt Disney World ticket, ask if a supervisor can assist. Don’t get confrontational or say, “but the internet told me this works!” Neither will get you anywhere. For many Cast Members, the internet is a verboten place of tomfoolery and lies about 5th gates and monorail expansion. Failing that, try again at a different window.
You can also ticket bridge by calling (407) 939-7277 and going through the exact same process. And unsurprisingly, you might have exactly the same results. Sometimes it’ll work, sometimes it won’t. Other options are using the Annual Passholder Help Form to email Walt Disney World’s dedicated Help Team or contacting DVC Member Services if you’re a Disney Vacation Club Member.
Failing all else, the best in-person location for any of this stuff is Guest Services at Disney Springs. We’ve found that whenever we have a complex question or problem, just cutting to the chase and going to Disney Springs is the best option. In our experience, the Cast Members there are often the most seasoned and knowledgeable, and they usually have more time to figure out issues–and greater willingness to take your question ‘up the food chain’ if they don’t know the answer. At the parks, there seems to be more of a desire to keep things moving, which might mean more of a rushed resolution. Your mileage may vary.
May 10, 2025 Update: This guide was originally written several years ago, and to the best of my knowledge, has remained 100% accurate for all of these years and thus hasn’t really been in need of an update. However, I’ve recently received a few questions about ticket bridging and had to do a deeper dive into the topic for Magic Keys at Disneyland, which led me to do some investigating at Walt Disney World.
The internet has been sending a lot of mixed messaging about whether ticket bridging still works at Walt Disney World. To settle things once and for all (or at least until the next policy change), I dug into the fine print of the official Walt Disney World Annual Pass terms & conditions. The following two paragraphs contain Walt Disney World’s official rules for upgrading from single and multi-day tickets to Annual Passes:
UPGRADES: Upgrades may be available from time to time or at no time, as determined in Disney’s discretion. A guest wishing to upgrade to a Pass from another form of eligible Walt Disney World® Resort theme park admission media must upgrade on the same day in which the original form of theme park admission media is valid, and must choose a Pass of equal or greater value than the retail price of the original theme park admission media when it was purchased. The difference in prices must be paid in full at the time of the upgrade.
If an upgrade to a Pass is made from a multi-day ticket, the Pass will be backdated to begin on the first day that such ticket was used. If an upgrade to a Pass is made from a lower level Pass, the new Pass will have the same expiration date as the original Pass. Each guest wishing to upgrade their theme park admission media to a Pass must be present at the time of the upgrade transaction. Fully used ticket media, partially used and expired ticket media, complimentary ticket media, special event ticket media, water park ticket media and ticket media stating its ineligibility for an upgrade may not be upgraded to a Pass. Upgrades are subject to Pass availability as determined by Disney, and additional restrictions and rules. Downgrades are not allowed.
Do you want to know the mildly amusing or frustrating thing, depending upon your perspective? The policies for Walt Disney World and Disneyland are almost identical, save for a couple of verbiage changes, capitalization differences, and one added sentence. The sentence in question? The very first one: “Upgrades may be available from time to time or at no time, as determined in Disney’s discretion.”
Whereas upgrades are so standardized at Disneyland that the whole process is streamlined via a button in the app, the same is only sometimes true with Walt Disney World tickets. (At least, that’s what this official page claims. The title of the page is “Upgrade your Florida Resident Ticket to an Annual Pass,” so it would stand to reason that it’s unique to that ticket type, but the actual text suggests it’s more expansive.)
To the best of my recollection, I’ve never seen this button in the My Disney Experience app, but then again, I don’t often have regular Walt Disney World tickets loaded in there.
Anyway, the bottom line is that Walt Disney World’s official policy on bridging regular tickets to Annual Passes is “if we feel like it.”
This pretty much tracks with online reports and, frankly, explains a lot! From my experience with this process over the last decade-plus is that it more comes down to getting an experienced Cast Member who knows how to bridge, because it doesn’t seem to be a straightforward process, and who is willing to do it.
That basically means it’s the luck of the draw with a dash of whether the Cast Member likes the “cut of your jib” thrown in for good measure. Speaking from firsthand experience, we’ve always found that Sarah has a higher success rate at stuff like this than me, unless the Cast Member is an older woman, in which case, I outperform. So, uh, good luck!
Another weird quirk in this whole system is that the Cast Member doing the ticket bridging is seemingly doing the math on the upgrade when you’re upgrading from a third party ticket. Meaning that you really, really should double-check their numbers before you proceed with the transaction. None of this is automated, for whatever reason.
It only works this way with third party tickets, not those purchased directly from Walt Disney World. While all tickets are capable of being upgraded if you pay the difference, those tickets purchased directly from Disney receive credit for the gate price of the ticket at the time the ticket was purchased.
By contrast, third party tickets are credited the current gate price of the ticket at the time of the upgrade. This is a known loophole in Disney’s system and I’m not sure why. Perhaps there’s some sort of breakdown in the feedback loop with the third party sale or some other, unknown reason why full, current price is credited. Whatever the case, it’s a “known issue” that benefits the consumer.
Variations of price bridging have been around for at least 15 years, and this loophole has yet to be closed. (Let’s call it a “Disney Hack” since loophole has a negative connotation…) I doubt this blog post will change that as this info has been widely available via forums and other sites for a while.
I remember using the technique–albeit not in the exact manner–in the early days of Free Dining to upgrade tickets (back in 2008 or 2009), and the same principles are being applied here. Theoretically, you could “invest” in park tickets now that you’ll use to upgrade to Annual Passes years down the road and watch the value of your tickets climb.
It would basically be like investing in GOOGL at its IPO and cashing out today. Well, maybe not that good of an investment, but ticket price increases have way outpaced inflation. However, we don’t recommend this as a long-term plan because there’s no telling when Disney revise this policy.
A few final notes:
- You will receive a credit for the current gate price after-tax when upgrading. Make sure to confirm this amount before completing the upgrade transaction.
- You can use price bridging on Annual Pass renewals.
- You can use price bridging on Disney Vacation Club-discounted Annual Passes.
- You can use price bridging on other, more expensive tickets that aren’t Annual Passes.
That should about cover it in terms of pricing bridging your discounted Walt Disney World tickets to…discounted Annual Passes! It’s a nice way to save a bit more money that you can then put towards Vinylmation or novelty hats–you know, the necessities.
Planning a Walt Disney World trip? Learn about hotels on our Walt Disney World Hotels Reviews page. For where to eat, read our Walt Disney World Restaurant Reviews. To save money on tickets or determine which type to buy, read our Tips for Saving Money on Walt Disney World Tickets post. Our What to Pack for Disney Trips post takes a unique look at clever items to take. For what to do and when to do it, our Walt Disney World Ride Guides will help. For comprehensive advice, the best place to start is our Walt Disney World Trip Planning Guide for everything you need to know!
Your Thoughts
Do you have any questions about price or ticket bridging? Have you tried it before? Any problems price bridging? Successes? Wish this technique were called “WDW Ticket Trojan Horsing” instead? Agree or disagree with our advice about ticket bridging? Share any questions, tips, or additional thoughts you have in the comments!
