How to Use Tokyo Disney Premier Access

Using Premier Access at Tokyo Disney Resort lets you jump the queues at some rides – but, it can be a bit tricky to work out, especially if you bought your tickets from a third party such as Klook. So, here’s what you need to know to get on all the fun rides as fast as possible…

Article by Helen Foster. Disclosure: Some links in this post are affiliate links. See our Affiliate Disclosure.

This post is updated if significant changes occur in the parks, and is checked at least once a year to ensure everything is up to date. The last check was in January 2026.

What Is Premier Access?

It’s kind of Disney’s equivalent of USJ’s Express Pass – but instead of buying one higher-priced pass for lots of rides, you buy a separate, lower-priced pass for individual rides. Once you have the pass, you go in a separate ride entrance that lets you bypass most of the queue.

There are three attractions at Tokyo Disneyland with Premier Access, including the incredibly popular The Enchanted Tale of Beauty and the Beast and eight at Disneysea, of which Anna and Elsa’s Frozen Journey, Soaring: Fantastic Flight and Toy Story Mania are the most popular.

For more specific details on Premier Access, like exactly what other rides/shows are included and exact costs, check out our guide to using all the optional extras at Tokyo Disney which explains this in more detail.

This post is more for the logistics of actually using Premier Access as it does confuse people. So, let’s get down to the steps.

When Can You Buy Premier Access

This is the first thing that confuses people, as it’s different from the US Disney Parks Genie system.

There, you book things in advance, but at Tokyo Disney Resort, unless you have a Disney Vacation package, you can only buy Premier Access passes once you have actually entered the park on the day of your trip.

Try and click the option before, and you’ll get a message telling you ‘nope’ – but as soon as you’ve scanned your ticket into the gate, you’ll see the option to buy.

---

Top Tip

Tokyo Disney Resort doesn’t have Wi-Fi throughout the park, only by the front gate. So, if you’re going to try to buy Premier Access passes once you’re away from the main gate, you’re going to need to have your own way to connect to the internet—be that from a Japanese SIM card, a portable Wi-Fi device, or an eSim service like Ubigi.

Make sure you have this set up before you enter the park.

You can order all three from Klook – I’ve used them before for SIM cards, and they’ve always worked really well.

Have a look at costs and options here.

On this trip, I swapped to an eSim (see why below) via Ubigi and was also super impressed.

See more about Ubigi here.

If you’re a bit confused about what to use, have a look at our post comparing the options for getting online in Japan

---

What to Do Before You Enter the Park

The exact process of using Premier Access is very slightly different depending on whether you bought your tickets directly via the Disney Resort App or via a third-party like Klook or Get Your Guide.

I’ll start with what to do if you bought via Klook or GYG, as that’s the one that most confuses people.

How to Use Premier Access if You Bought Your Tickets from Klook/GYG

To use Premier Access at Tokyo Disney Resort, you need to have your tickets scanned into the Tokyo Disney Resort app. You can do this in advance.

Step One: Download the App

First up, download the Tokyo Disney Resort App and set up your account.

You’ll need this app anyway to buy your Premier Access tickets and access the park map and wait times, so it’s good to get it all set up.

Step Two: Scan Your Tickets

Now, find the scan code icon.

If you don’t see this, tap the house symbol on the app and swipe the screen up to where you see your name. It should be under that, next to another box that says ‘park tickets’.

When you do this, the screen will switch to a scanning screen. Now, use your camera (you might need to give the app permission to use it) and point it at the Park ticket so that the QR code is placed inside the frame.

You’ll then get some terms and conditions to approve to tap OK

The scanned park ticket will now be displayed in the “Park Tickets” section of the app’s home screen. From this point, you’re good to start ‘shopping’.

---

Top Tip

If you bought third-party tickets on your phone, you might wonder how to scan them in. The answer is to photograph your tickets on another device, scan the QR code from the picture, or print them and then scan them.

I’d advise printing them anyway, as the internet at the gate can be a bit slow. If you’ve got a backup paper copy, you’re not stuck worrying if your online version fails. Disney also strongly suggests carrying a paper copy of the ticket, just in case you have any issues.

---

Using Premier Access if You Bought Tickets From Disney

Then your tickets are already in the app, and you don’t need to do anything in advance.

Once You Get Into The Park

From now on, the process will be the same wherever you bought your tickets.

Step One: Click the Stars

Once you get into the park, you’re ready to buy your first Premier Access pass – go into the app and click the 3 stars next to the home symbol.

You can do this in the queue for your first ride; it doesn’t have to be done the second you get in (unless you want to get one for Anna and Elsa’s Frozen Journey, in which case it should be the first thing you do as you get in the gate, as this can sell out by 9 am).

This will bring up three options along the bottom: Standby Pass, Entry Request, and Buy Premier Access. Click the Buy Premier Access button.

Step Two: Pick Your Ride

Choose the ride you want to buy a Premier Access pass for.

You’ll see the current wait time, the price of the Premier Access pass, and any height requirement for the ride.

Step Three: Pick Your Time

After you’ve picked the ride, you’ll now see options for when the Premier Access passes are available, so pick the one you want (see our advice on picking times below).

Step Four: Get Your Credit Card Ready

I already had my credit card lodged with the Disney Resort App, so I was a bit surprised when I had to enter my details again, so be prepared to do some typing.

At this point, the reason I booked an eSim on this trip became clear. When I tried to buy the pass, my credit card company sent me an authorisation code via text – without that, I wouldn’t have been able to proceed.

Because I had an eSim, though, my home phone/text number was still working (I’d booked a super cheap roaming package from my cell provider just to get these texts). Make sure you have a system in place to receive any authorisation messages from your bank.

I had to repeat this step every time I bought a pass – but, I think you can set it to cover multiple purchases (I only spotted that today!).

Step Five: Don’t Panic

If your purchase is successful, you’ll get a button appear that says ‘Display Code’ but, if you push that button now it’s unlikely to do anything!

Don’t worry. It will become valid about five minutes before you can return to the ride. You’ll also receive a reminder at this point.

If you’ve clicked off the screen, you’ll find your Premier Access passes by clicking on the attraction on the map (the ones you’ve booked will have your Avatar on them – like the Tigger below).

If that doesn’t work, hit the little house icon and swipe the screen up, and you’ll find all your premier access tickets, entry requests, and dining reservations listed.

Step Six: Turn Up

You have an hour-long window during which you can return to the ride. Just turn up at any point in that time window, click on your pass, and then click on ‘view code ‘Display Code’.

Enter the attraction at the Premier Access entrance, show the QR code to the attendant, and/or scan it in the machine at the ride entry. You’ll then go into the Premier Access queue.

Just follow it to the ride (note, don’t stash your phone away too tightly as you’ll likely have to scan your pass again at the point where the Priority Access queue joins the main queue just to stop anyone jumping the line).

Tips for Choosing Your Premier Access Time

These are the tricks I learned after three different Disney visits and buying ALL of the Premier Access passes for times first thing in the morning. Next time I go, I will do things very differently.

Check the Crowds

Knowing if you’re traveling to the park on one of Tokyo Disney’s busy days might change how you buy or use Premier Access. You’ll find a guide to those here, including suggestions on how to adapt Premier Access if you’re visiting on one of them.

You can also use a Tokyo Disney crowd calendar to check numbers for your date – it’s in Japanese, but this explains how to read it.

Don’t Rush Around

Give yourself enough time to enjoy the ride you’re queuing for and explore other things in that area before you rush off to the next one.

The parks are big, and the less crisscrossing you can do, the better. I did not take this advice and stacked up the big rides, and it all went a bit chaotic by the end of the day. I know I missed some things because I was tired.

Remember, you have a whole hour to head to the ride; you don’t need to be there dead on when your Premier Access starts.

Keep an Eye on Wait Times

I didn’t buy passes for everything. I had budgeted on one for Splash Mountain, but I noticed that at one point, it had just a 15-minute queue, so I headed straight there.

The queue turned out to be a bit longer than that by the time I arrived, as I’m guessing everyone else had the same idea, so I probably ended up waiting about 20 minutes more than I would have done with a PA Pass, but it was still a pretty short queue anyway.

The moral of this story is don’t rush into buying all the Premier Access passes at once – while BATB is unlikely to get a short wait time at any point, you can keep an eye on the other rides throughout the day.

I also didn’t buy one for Baymax, as the queue for Baymax is part of the fun, as people sing and dance along, and so, that’s one queue you might want to stand in for a bit! If not, then buy it as it’s another VERY popular ride.

Be Strategic With Timing

Don’t necessarily rush into booking the first slot available – especially early in the day when queues for other rides are likely to be short (the wait time screenshot above was taken as soon as the park opened, and as you can see, everything is pretty short).

You might even consider booking slots later in the day and use higher energy levels, and less achy feet, for lines now, then when later you’re a bit fatigued with lines, you can make the most of the Premier Access boost.

If you do this, you might want to stack your passes up but, you can’t buy them all one straight after the other so, here are the rules about buying another pass.

When Can You Buy a Second Pass?

The rules are that you can buy a second Premier Access pass either after your time to enter the ride has started, or, an hour after you bought your last one, whichever comes first.

I stacked mine up once the hour had passed, so I had them ready.

The exception to this is holding a PA for both a show and a ride. You can have both of these at once.

Is Buying Premier Access Worth It?

Yes! I thought it was – especially for Enchanted Tale of Beauty and the Beast (which you shouldn’t miss), Toy Story Mania (see look how happy I am below after that one), and Soaring: Fantastic Flight all of which had queues of over two hours by the time I went to buy my passes – and, at one point you could only join the queue for BATB if you had a Premier Access pass, the general queue was just too long.

It Saves Time

Freeing up the time meant I got to see pretty much the whole park in the time I had, which, due to aching legs, wasn’t quite the whole day.

The longest I queued using Premier Access was about 15-20 minutes, meaning I probably saved myself a good four or five hours over two days and two parks. Not to mention saving the toll on my feet.

If I did it again, though, I’d take my own advice above and book the passes for slots after lunch and use my fresh legs and feet to walk around more of the park in the morning.

It Saves Your Legs

If you have any kind of pain issue (and aren’t eligible for a DAS pass, which lets you use shorter queues) or just hate standing in queues per se, then paying for the convenience of standing in shorter lines may make a big difference to your day

I appreciate that the passes can add up if you’re traveling as a family, but the Tokyo Disney Resort entry tickets are generally cheaper than visiting a park in the US, so, you could budget for one pass per park and still come out paying less than a day at WDW. See more about this is our guide to Disney costs.

What to Do if It Doesn’t Work?

It’s well known that Tokyo Disney doesn’t always play well with foreign credit cards, which is possibly why some of you reading this bought tickets via Klook or Get Your Guide in the first place! And if you haven’t done that yet, here’s where to buy them from Klook.

The good news is that buying Premier Access seems to be less fraught with problems than booking entry tickets. My WISE card that doesn’t work on the Disney app is the one I used to buy everything once in the park.

But, if you do have issues, all is not lost. You can still buy Premier Access passes for Disneyland in person at Main Street House in World Bazaar.

If you’re at DisneySea, then go to Guest Relations at the gate of the park.

What Happens If Your Premier Access Ride Breaks?

This happened to me on Journey to the Center of the Earth. We had just pulled away from the loading dock when the car stopped, and all the lights came on (check out the empty car below!). They couldn’t restart the ride, and so we got walked back to the dock.

When this happens, everyone on the ride is given a free Premier Access pass to use later that day for a list of attractions—which is great as it means you don’t have to queue again. However, if you’ve already paid for a PA pass, you might feel a bit fed up – don’t worry.

You can show the staff your Premier Access pass when they give you your new pass, and they will process a refund.

It said this might take a few months to appear on my card, but it appeared a day later.

This might be even more important if you buy Premier Access to one of the parades, as poor weather can cancel them. In that case, just tell the staff, and they will issue a refund.

Oh, and if you do get a free Premier Access pass, you’ll find it by going to the home screen and scrolling upwards to find your plans – that took me a little while to work out as I’d always clicked on the ride I had a pass for before then and, because this one didn’t have a dedicated ride I couldn’t find it for ages.

Premier Access vs Solo Rider

I was traveling solo, so I used single-rider lines on the few rides at Disney that had them, like Indiana Jones. At this time, there wasn’t a cross over between rides with Single Rider and those with Premier Access, but this has now changed.

Anna and Elsa’s Frozen Journey, Peter Pan’s Neverland Adventure and the Enchanted Tale of Beauty and the Beast now all have single rider lines.

The queues for these are generally shorter than general admission, but your party will be split up to ride the ride. To use Single Rider, head toward the Priority Entrance, and you’ll either see a single rider line or ask the staff and they will send you down the right line.

I’ve regularly been the only person striding past the queue. When you reach the loading area, you wait until there’s a free seat in a car and you fill that seat.

What’s the 40th Anniversary Priority Pass?

These passes launched at Tokyo Disney Resort in Summer 2023. It lets you book free passes to jump the queue on a number of attractions at Tokyo Disney Resort and Tokyo DisneySea – just like you used to with Fastpass in the park (and in the US).

These attractions include some rides where the queue would normally be half an hour or more – like Pooh’s Hunny Hunt, Monster’s Inc and Big Thunder Mountain in Disneyland and Indiana Jones in DisneySea. Others like 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea often have short queues anyway.

Booking Priority Pass is run through the app like Premier Access, but the main difference is that you can only get your next pass once your time for the first one has started, or after waiting two hours (whichever comes first). Priority Passes usually run out well before the Premier Access Passes do.

So, that’s everything you need to know to actually use Tokyo Disney Premier Access, whether you bought your tickets from Klook or Get Your Guide, or directly via the Tokyo Disney Resort App – but, if you do have any further questions, please head over to our Facebook group and ask them there. Either I, or someone else will do our best to help you out.

Sharing is caring!