Disneyland announced today that the Haunted Mansion Holiday will return to Disneyland, beginning July 29, 2024. The announcement read, “Just in time for the Halloween Time and Holiday seasons at the Disneyland Resort, the attraction will don décor inspired by “Tim Burton’s The Nightmare Before Christmas.” At the center of the “frightful fête’s ballroom” scene is the gingerbread house, with an all-new design for this year.”
We’ve previously shared that the outdoor queue of the Haunted Mansion is currently closed for an extensive renovation to add more space, new theming and a new gift shop near the exit. Due to the ongoing construction, and to help reduce foot traffic in an area which is doubly impacted by construction around the Haunted Mansion and the complete closure of Critter Country, Disneyland will use a virtual queue to manage access to Haunted Mansion Holiday. At least one member of your party will need to have the Disneyland mobile app installed to use the virtual queue, and we’ll go over the step-by-step below.
As was the case with Rise of the Resistance in the pre-Lightning Lane era, Disneyland will open the virtual queue for Haunted Mansion Holiday twice each day. The first opportunity will be at 7:00 a.m., and is only for visitors who made a park reservation to start their day at Disneyland. You do not need to be inside a theme park to join the earlier virtual queue.
A second window opens at Noon, to give visitors who may be park hopping after starting their day at Disney California Adventure a chance to get on the ride. Note that your entire party must already have entered a theme park before Noon to join the second virtual queue, though you don’t need to still be physically in the park to join.
Either way, you want to link the tickets for your entire travel party well before you try to enter the virtual queue. This is an important step if you want your entire party in the same boarding group once the virtual queue opens, and will allow each person to try request a boarding group for the entire party. (We should note that Disney warns visitors not to do this, saying “If multiple people in your party try to join the virtual queue simultaneously, that may inhibit your ability to join a group.”)
As soon as the virtual queue opens, your designated person will select “Virtual Queues” on the home screen of the Disneyland app, then select “Haunted Mansion Holiday.” The user will select their party from a list of people to whom they are already linked in the Disneyland smartphone app, then choose to add their party to the boarding group. The app gives you your assigned boarding group, and lets you monitor the status of boarding groups.
As always, you can only enter the virtual queue once per day. You can be in no more than two virtual queues at the same time – either one ride and one show (like World of Color), or two shows. At the moment, virtual queue is only in use for World of Color and Haunted Mansion Holiday, so there shouldn’t be any conflict.
