How to Make Disney World Room Requests + Free Printable!

Learn how to make Disney World room requests and get my free room request fax printable!

Since Disney World resorts are huge and spread out, where your room is located at your resort really matters.

You want a room that’s close to amenities and transportation. It’s also nice to have a good view from your room that’s NOT the parking lot.

Getting the best rooms at Disney World does take a little research and know-how, so read on to learn everything you need to know!

Booking Categories Vs. Room Requests

There are two approaches to getting the room you want at Disney World resorts: booking a guaranteed room category or putting in a room request before your visit.

Room categories mean rooms with guaranteed views or locations, such as those close to the amenities or with specific views.

Here are some common room categories at Disney World:

• Preferred (closer to lobby and amenities)
• Pool view 
• Fireworks view
• Water view

When you book a preferred room, you are guaranteed to have a room relatively close to the amenities at your resort. However, this comes at an additional cost. 

Sometimes I decide that it makes sense to spend extra money on a preferred room location or view.

Other times I decide to book a standard room and make a room request before check-in to hopefully get a room located where I want it (more on room requests in a minute!).

Consulting a map of your resort that shows the location of the different room types will help you make this decision.

I haven’t found one site that catalogs all of the available resort maps, so I suggest just searching the web for a map that shows the locations of the room types at your resort.

It is worthwhile to consult a map because certain room categories may not be in the ideal location for your travel party.

For example, the Royal Rooms at Port Orleans Riverside might appeal to your princess-crazed little one.

But consulting a map of room locations shows that these rooms are the farthest away from the amenities at the resort.

Spending 10-15 minutes walking just to get coffee in the morning might not appeal to everyone, so it is a great idea to check a map that shows a resort’s room locations while planning your trip.

If all of these choices make your head swim, I strongly suggest getting a free quote from my travel agent partner Siera with Destinations in Florida.

She can help you pick the right resort and room category for your family (at no cost to you!) and help you with all other aspects of planning your trip.

In addition to booking a specific room location or view, you can also make room requests prior to your visit.

You can request ground floor rooms, rooms with specific views, or rooms that are close to transportation, for example.

It is important to note that room requests are just that – requests – and Disney can NOT guarantee that they will be able to meet your request. I’ll show you how to make room requests in the next section.

However, if it is critical that you have a certain location or view during your vacation, I suggest looking into a way to book that guaranteed room type and not rely on a room request.

Prioritize Your Room Requests

Whether you have booked a preferred room or a standard room, I always suggest making a room request before your trip.

Even within the preferred room category, some locations will be better suited to your needs.

The next step is deciding what is most important to you in terms of room requests. This is important because the fewer requests you make the more likely they will be met!

I suggest narrowing it down to the TWO most important requests for your travel party.

At resorts with ground-floor rooms, I always request to be on the ground floor.

Since we use a stroller for our little one, it is so much easier not to have to wrestle it up and down an elevator every time we return to our room.

My other requests depend on the resort and the vacation. I often request to be close to transportation if we plan on going to the parks a lot.

When my sister and I stayed at Caribbean Beach on a resort-only trip with the kids, we requested to be as close to the pool as possible since we were going to spend most of our time there.

Other common requests are proximity to other members of your travel party, connecting rooms, being in a certain section of a resort, or having a certain room view that cannot be booked as a separate room category.

It may be hard, but narrowing down your room requests to your top two priorities will greatly increase the odds of getting your requests fulfilled.

When and How to Make Your Disney World Room Requests

There isn’t a consensus out there on the best way to place room requests at Disney resorts, so I will just share my strategy and my results.

First, the results: I have ALWAYS had all of my requests met on every trip I’ve made to Disney. I’ve heard lots of folks complain that they didn’t get their room requests met, so I guess I’m doing something right!

Three Ways To Make Disney World Room Requests

There are basically three ways to add room requests to your reservation:

• During the online check-in process
• By calling Disney and asking for the requests to be added to your reservation
• By faxing a room request directly to your resort’s room assigner (with a free online fax service because you likely don’t have a fax machine!)

Which strategy I use depends on the requests I want to make and what’s available in online check-in. 

And it’s also important to note that requests can not be guaranteed by Disney. They will be sure to let you know that requests are not guaranteed any time you make one!

Common Room Requests

Here are some common requests I make:

• Ground floor (especially when I have a stroller in tow)
• Close to transportation
• Close to pool
• A specific view (such as a fireworks view or water view)
• Connecting or adjoining rooms

Now if you want a specific view that is available as a room category, the only way to guarantee that you’ll get it is to book that specific room category. 

Next, I’ll explain my strategies for making room requests that actually work.

Add A Request During Online Check-in

When I complete the online check-in process (which is the same whether you booked your room with DVC points, directly with Disney, or with a travel agent), I always add my top priority room requests if they are available.

Each resort has its own options for requests during online check-in. Common options are specific buildings, specific views, ground floor, and an upper floor. If the requests I want to make are available, then I check them off and I’m done!

If they aren’t available, then I either call or fax Disney to add the requests to my reservation. 

How to Fax your Disney World Room Request

Many Disney World resorts accept room requests via fax. I have found this to be an especially effective way of getting my room requests met!

As an example, for our last stay in a Standard View Studio at Animal Kingdom Lodge, my top priorities were to be close to the lobby and have a partial view of a savanna.

Though rooms with full savanna views are a separate booking category, you can actually see animals from many standard view rooms at both Jambo House and Kidani Village. During online check-in, there was not an option to request a partial savanna view but “close to lobby” was an option, so I just chose that and made my other request in a fax. 

I personally have had great success with “faxing” my requests to the room assigner at my resort.

I upload my fax in a word document to the website FaxZero.com which then sends it off to my Disney resort (I find the fax number for my resort with a quick web search).

I aim to fax my room request about 7 days before my check-in date.

As you can see from my example above, I try to be as brief and cordial as possible. I also mention where I’m from and the fact that I am a repeat visitor because I figure it never hurts to make a personal connection.

Click here to download my fax template in a Microsoft Word document!

Important Note: Some resorts have stopped accepting room request faxes. The resorts that do NOT accept faxes are: 

• Beach Club Villas
• Boardwalk Inn/Villas
• Old Key West
• Saratoga Springs
• Wilderness Lodge & Villas

This past November I actually received a phone call from the room assigner at Pop Century a few days after I faxed my request.

She called to check if the room she assigned would work for us, and it was perfect. In my experience, you can trust that an actual person will see and address your room requests when you send them via fax.

If your resort doesn’t accept faxes or you’d rather call in your request, I’ll cover that next. 

Calling Disney To Add Your Request

A third way to add a room request to your reservation is to call Disney at 407-W-DISNEY. 

You will have to go through a series of questions before you talk to a person, which I find pretty annoying. When you finally speak with a cast member, be ready with your resort confirmation number. He or she will use this to pull up your reservation and add your requests. 

NOTE: I was recently unable to call and add a room request to a Disney resort reservation I made through Orbitz. I was trying to save time by calling but it ended up being a waste of time since they were unable to even add a room request to my reservation since it was booked with a third party. I had to fax my request anyway so I wish I had done that from the get-go!

General Disney World Room Request Advice

 

I try to be more general than specific in my requests. I don’t ask to be in a certain room or section of the resort – instead, I ask to be as close as possible to whatever is most important.

For our stay in a standard room at Caribbean Beach, I considered requesting one of the villages that are closest to the pool, but I instead decided to just request being as close to the pool as possible.

We ended up being placed in a preferred room, which is closest to the pool and normally costs an extra $40 per night.

I was glad I made my request as general as possible because I think it contributed to our magical upgrade!

I’ve been lucky to always get my room requests met, including getting connecting rooms, special views, and proximity to amenities and transportation. 

I believe this is mostly due to the fact that I do some background research, limit my requests, and submit my requests in the most effective way possible.

Any questions? Leave a comment below or join the discussion on my free private Facebook group!

Check out these related posts:

• Disney World Moderate Resorts: The Best & Worst
• Best & Worst of the Disney Value Resorts