Check the online calendar for park hours. The park opens at different times, depending on the time of the year and the day of the week. Date-specific tickets are required unless you have a Go Los Angeles pass (more on this below).
Buy Universal Studios Tickets
The best way to save on multiple parks, if you are not going to choose the Go Los Angeles sightseeing pass, is to build your own combo tickets by adding these tickets one at a time to your cart because they are all discounted!
You can also bundle your cheap tickets with 43 different hotels from budget to luxury in a vacation package. There are a lot of benefits to choosing nearby hotels, including skipping (hopefully) notorious L.A. traffic.
AAA members can save on one-day general admission tickets and VIP tickets when purchased in advance online at AAA.com/Universal or at participating AAA offices. The discounts may vary depending on which AAA club you belong to.
They also include discounts on friends and family tickets and 10-15% discounts at participating CityWalk locations. Gold passes include free General Parking and other in-park food, beverage, and merchandise discounts.
Katie Dillon is the managing editor of La Jolla Mom. She helps readers plan San Diego vacations through her hotel expertise (that stems from living in a Four Seasons hotel) and local connections. Readers have access to exclusive discounts on theme park tickets (like Disneyland and San Diego Zoo) and perks at luxury hotels worldwide through her. She also shares insider tips for visiting major cities worldwide like Hong Kong, London, Paris, and Shanghai that her family has either lived in or visits regularly (or both).
Discounted tickets are subject to applicable taxes and service fees. Discounts only available to valid AAA members. Tickets may not be resold or transferred for commercial use. Purchase limits and other restrictions apply. Ticket pricing, features, and availability subject to change without notice. Offer may not be combined with any other ticket offer, discount, or promotion. All offers, events, tickets, age ranges, services, attractions, and entertainment may be seasonal and are subject to change without notice. Discounts, products, and vendors are subject to change without notice. Other restrictions apply. AAA does not endorse any vendor and disclaims responsibility for any product, promotion, or content featured herein or on the AAA discounts website.
The number-one easiest way to save money and a heck of a lot of time is to purchase your theme-park tickets and Express Passes online before your trip. You can often save around 20% on multi-day tickets just by buying online, and even single-day admission occasionally has discounts when purchased ahead of time.
Also, as we mentioned, the ticket rules typically prohibit the transfer of ownership of your partially used tickets to another person or to a third-party vendor; if you do so, the person who ends up buying the remainder of your admission may not be able to use it.
The easiest way to buy tickets is through the Universal Studios Japan website, followed by Klook. This also includes the Express Pass. I do not recommend buying tickets at the ticket booths the day of your visit because you are wasting precious park time and risk tickets being sold out for the day.
With the high cost of Universal tickets, you definitely want to save money when you can. The good news is that there are 17 different ways that you can save money on your next Universal Studios Orlando vacation.
Get Away Today is one of my favorite authorized ticket resellers. I have many friends who have bought individual tickets or vacation packages through Get Away Today and they highly recommend the company for their professionalism and ability to save money on a theme park vacation.
One of the best ways for how to use Costco to save on Universal Studios tickets is to buy their vacation packages, which do have a discount and/or offer perks such as free breakfasts or gift cards.
Cheap Universal tickets can often be found in the gift card displays inside Publix. Halloween Horror Night discounts are common through Publix. Florida Resident tickets can sometimes be found at Publix, too.
Groupon is a surprising way to get discounted Universal tickets. In addition to saving money on the tickets, you could also earn Groupon Bucks which can then be put towards other purchases on the site.
You definitely want an authorized ticket reseller, because there are some shady websites out there that might be promising you cheap tickets and you will get to the park and find out that they are not valid.
You do not need to be a Universal Studios annual pass holder to get discounted tickets. If you know someone who has an Annual Pass, they can buy up to 6 multi-day tickets at up to 15% off the normal rate.
If you visit Universal Studios frequently throughout the year, you might want to consider having at least one member of your party have an Annual Pass. That way you can use the benefits, including discounts on tickets, hotels and food, by using the annual pass.
If you want free Universal tickets, you will need to swap time for the savings on the admission tickets. There are many time share destinations in Orlando. If you accept a time share presentation package, which often includes accommodations, you may receive free Universal tickets.
There are a variety of ways to get cheap Universal tickets to save money on your theme park vacation. Just spend a little time looking at these options online, or ask your employer about possible discounts. There is no reason to pay full price for a Universal Studios ticket again!
Before I take you through the best ways to find discount Universal Orlando tickets, you should know that the resort has 3 theme parks (with another one opening in the future) plus multiple hotels to choose from and the famous CityWalk.
In addition to Universal Orlando Resort and SeaWorld Entertainment tickets, Groupon helps you enjoy even more local attractions such as Fun Spot, Kennedy Space Center, and The Wheel at ICON Park for the low!
Many of the chain grocery stores, especially in the South, like Publix and Costco, offer discounted theme park tickets for places like Universal Studios, Islands of Adventure, and Volcano Bay.
You probably already know that you can use your Chase Ultimate Reward points at a fixed value to book flights, hotels, and even rental cars through Chase Travel, but you can also use them to book activities and select theme park tickets. Some people never use their Ultimate Reward points at a fixed value to book travel and only transfer them to hotel and airline partners, which is how we also use the majority of our points. However, the best redemption is the one you want to make your travel dreams a reality, not the one that gives you the best return per point. If visiting Universal Studios is on your family's travel wishlist, here is how you can use your Chase Ultimate Reward points to purchase those expensive Universal Studios theme park tickets.
To use Chase Ultimate Reward points to book Universal Studios tickets, log in to the Chase Ultimate Rewards travel site and enter the city of the theme park you wish to visit. Since we are interested in tickets to Universal Studios Orlando, we entered Orlando, Florida, as our destination and then selected the 'things to do' button.
There were many, many options presented, but we zeroed in on the 'theme park' filter and that dramatically dropped the number of results. One of the remaining options was indeed Universal Orlando theme park tickets. We are interested in one-day Park-to-Park tickets for this summer, and those tickets are available via the Chase Travel site using your Ultimate Reward points.
The price for three one-day Universal Park-to-Park tickets for our date via Chase Travel is $570.63 or 38.040 Ultimate Reward points redeemed at a value of 1.5 cents per point from the Sapphire Reserve.
To compare these tickets to the price available directly from Universal, which you should always do, it looks like the Chase price is a little higher at $570.62, compared to $543.15. This means your real value per point isn't quite 1.5 cents as you are paying a somewhat marked up price over buying direct, but that doesn't mean it is a bad deal. Keeping over $543 in your pockets while still getting the Universal tickets you want is absolutely a win, but be sure and do the math before deciding this is the best redemption for you.
The process would be roughly the same if you were looking for tickets to Universal Studios Hollywood, and there are various other theme park tickets available in the Chase Travel site including Legoland, Six Flags, SeaWorld, Disneyland, more.
Even a short trip to Universal Studios Orlando for a family of four can very, very easily cost into the four figures. However, if you scored a two-night stay at the on-site Loews Royal Pacific Hotel, that property conveys included Universal Express Pass tickets for all registered room occupants. If you secured a two-night stay at that property by purchasing this Daily Getaways Deal (sold out for this year), and then used your Chase Ultimate Rewards points to cover the theme park tickets, all the sudden what could be a budget-busting family vacation quickly comes into range.
LATEST UPDATE (Jan 2023): I am currently recommending that you buy your tickets from Klook. Other companies, such as Rakuten Travel Experiences, have stopped selling tickets (for different reasons). I will continue to review and update my recommendations based on how things change over the coming months.
It's no good deciding to come here in the morning, rocking up to try and get tickets or, more unlikely, an Express Pass. Sure, you could try that - but I wouldn't recommend it. (And this coming from someone whose travel ethos is to not over plan things.)
There are two main ticket types. Park entry tickets are called Studio Passes. Whereas Express Passes shorten the waiting time for attractions. You do not need both. The Studio Pass will get you in and give you access to all the rides and attractions.
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