For those kids lucky enough to make the pilgrimage to Walt Disney World multiple times in childhood, the rides and attractions are rites of passage that measure their progress from little ones to big kids. Will this be the year? Will they finally be tall enough? If they are, will they dare to ride? I loved watching my kids weigh the implications of “chickening out” versus what they had come to believe was near-certain doom and grisly dismemberment, and when they chose to ride, it never occurred to me that they had made anything but a wise choice.
To help you better plan, we’re sharing what could be considered some of the scariest rides at Disney World, broken down by age group to help you plan!
Scariest Rides for Toddlers at Disney World
It’s amazing how much of your Walt Disney World wish list you and your toddler can already enjoy together. Shows, fireworks, and parades of course, but also a surprising bevy of actual rides. But not all rides are created equal. Toddlers are strange little people and it isn’t always easy to tell what’s going on in those delightful coconuts, but let’s strap on our meltdown translators and see if we can’t identify the scariest rides for toddlers at Disney World! (As always, your mileage may vary!)
Astro Orbiter
They’re delighted by the same ride mechanic when they’re riding in a flying elephant with a little hat, or on a flying carpet evading camel spit, or even a flying triceratops, which is not something the species is known for or well-suited to. So why is Tomorrowland’s spinner a one-way rocket to terror town for so many toddlers? Well, it spins faster for one thing, and somebody went and put the entire contraption on the roof.
Photo by WDW Magazine Photography Team
The rocket banks at a more extreme angle as it spins. Plus, the expansive, beautiful view of the Magic Kingdom it affords can make a little person feel exposed by day and overwhelmed by the flashing lights of Tomorrowland at night. This one is just a bit much for some littles. They’ll grow into it.
Buzz Lightyear Space Ranger Spin
I have witnessed many a meltdown on this ride, which is a favorite of kids just a little bit bigger, although it is not fast, or high-up, or any of the things that tend to set things off. Honestly, I think this is more than just fright, it’s frustration too. Those rooms full of black lights and targets must look absolutely bananas to a tiny person unclear on the concept, and those who have some idea of what they are meant to do have no way of telling if they are doing it well.
Unlike Toy Story Mania, where you can see the plates breaking or the hoops going over the rockets, it is pretty impossible to tell if you’re winning or losing at Space Ranger Spin beyond a display of numbers that they almost certainly can’t read. Overwhelmed, frustrated or genuinely scared? If they’re scream-crying, does it really matter? Skip it.
Na’vi River Journey
Animal Kingdom is, in my opinion, the park best suited to your average toddler, with animal encounters and walking trails full of living creatures to be experienced at their own pace. And then in the middle of all of this, they constructed the toddler terror-drome that is Na’vi River Journey. Why is your toddler terrified? They don’t have issues with boats, as they proved on Pirates of the Caribbean and Frozen Ever After.
Photo by Marisa Alvarado
Of course, they know what pirates are, and talking snowmen with reindeer companions. But they have no such context for the dark forests of Pandora and its strange, glowing life, some of which are predators who are clearly stalking the boat. In a few years, they will be impressed with the complex animatronics of the Na’vi shaman that concludes the ride, but for now, that thing is flat-out terrifying.
Spaceship Earth
Spaceship Earth? How can anyone be afraid of anything that happens on good ol’ Spaceship Earth? It’s not fast or swirly or bumpy and there is a complete absence of massive blue aliens who almost certainly want to eat you. Let me see if my equipment can translate these screams: “I’m bored! I’m bored and it’s dark and it moves really slow and I don’t know where I am! I don’t understand any of this, parts of it smell funny and I think Judi Dench is kind of mailing in the narration! Oh, great, now we’re going backward and everybody in all of these other pods are wishing we hadn’t got on this ride!”
Just kidding. About Dame Judi Dench, that is. She’s a treasure. But Spaceship Earth just might be the Scariest Ride for Toddlers in Disney World.
My list is based on my experience, and you know your toddler better than anyone… you’re the real expert here! Just remember to put yourself in their tiny, adorable shoes and imagine what each experience would look like to them. Don’t put too much pressure on yourself to try and get to every little thing. Your toddler will have the best time because they are with you… and when they don’t, well, a snack and a little nap goes a long way to making everything all right!
Scariest Rides for Kids Under 10 in Disney World
At this age, most of the drama of experiencing the “big” rides for the first time came from their own fertile imaginations. The second ride was easier, and the more trips they took, the more of a laugh it was (and still is), but that first time was a thrill to be savored and cherished. A tale of heroic adventure that would be told and re-told. Here are a few rides that my family would nominate for the Scariest Rides for Kids Under 10 at Disney World.
Tiana’s Bayou Adventure
What? Not Tiana’s, surely not! Yes, sir. Because under all of that re-imagining and beautiful animatronics, the guts of this ride are the same as they were when it was Splash Mountain and one of the first major thresholds to be conquered as a part of growing up the Disney World way. This was it. Were you at least 40 inches tall? Or possibly a lot taller and had just never dared to plummet to an untimely demise? Is this the year when you add those beautiful words of warning to your resume: “Thrill Rides” and “Big Drops”?
Photo by Olga Thompson
One of our fondest memories of this ride is two little girls who were at the front of our log the final time we rode before the re-branding. They started out so excited, and as the log clattered up to the point of no return, something changed. “I DON’T WANT TO DIE!” they hollered, and “I’M GOING TO DIE RIGHT NOW!” Seconds later they were soaking wet, laughing hysterically and pleading to go again. Tiana’s Bayou Adventure is now the guardian of that rite of passage, and I know it will serve this role well.
Space Mountain
Another major rite of passage, Space Mountain demands that you be at least 44 inches tall, and ready to add a new warning to “Thrill Rides” and “Big Drops”: “Dark”! And boy-howdy is it ever! Unlike Tiana’s Bayou Adventure, where all of the thrill is packed into a few seconds of plummeting, the darkness you traverse in your Space Mountain rocket-pod is continuous, and you have no idea where you are within it or how much more of it there is.
This is a big “do you dare” for the youth of Disney World – a leap of faith. My daughter was ready to take that leap before her brother was, and he seemed resigned to her trash-talking until I dropped a secret for him: from the time you start the first drop, the ride is a minute and a half long. Count to ninety while you ride and you’ll know exactly how much of it you have left. It was enough to get him on the ride, sibling rivalry was quelled for another day, and he even managed to do some quality mugging for the on-ride camera.
TRON Lightcycle / Run
And now we come to the new kid in town. Big and bright and shiny, dominating its side of Tomorrowland. TRON Lightcycle / Run is one of the Scariest Rides for Kids Under 10 at Disney World. As a new thrill ride on the block, TRON doesn’t carry the same history and emotional baggage of some of our other nominees, but it sure is fast. Our intrepid riders must be, 48 inches tall and the rider is warned of “Thrill Ride”, “Big Drops” and “Dark”.
Photo by Cliff Wang
Cleverly, after a long climb, as you approach the main building and ready yourself to launch into the Grid, this is where they have chosen to have the ride burst out into the air above the waiting throng, making every approaching young rider aware that TRON is very fast, goes very high and… why yes, I do believe that is the sound of people screaming, yes.
From there, the entire approach to the launch point is designed to bring riders into the story, and to let the drama feed their excitement, their enthusiasm and, yes, their fright, to power their imagination to help them dare to ride and become a part of this story.
Expedition Everest – Legend of the Forbidden Mountain
Expedition Everest – Legend of the Forbidden Mountain is a monster of a thrill coaster in more ways than one. The rider roars up the title mountain in search of the legendary Yeti and, having found it, races back down the peak backwards to flee its rage. “Thrill Rides”, “Big Drops” and “Dark” all apply here too, and the height requirement is 44 inches. We did not know that at the time because NONE of us had even thought of riding it.
If there is a reason that Expedition Everest might not normally appear on a list of Scariest Rides for Kids Under 10 at Disney World, it is because the under-10 often have a well-developed sense of self-preservation. Not my daughter necessarily, but most. If there is a lesson in this for my wife, who was bizarrely engaged in a little trash-talking, that lesson is “never dare a daredevil” because before anyone quite knew what was going on, my daughter was joining the queue of the coaster, while her remorseful mother followed along and I, helpfully, took the boy over to get a Mickey pretzel.
They emerged a short time later, my wife looking a bit wobbly. “Never again”, she whispered. My daughter followed behind, her hair blown out by the fast reverse, looking a bit like a misshapen topiary. “Never again”, she agreed.
The Mickey pretzel was delicious.
Crush ‘n’ Gusher (Disney’s Typhoon Lagoon Water Park)
My family loves a water park, and obviously the Disney water parks in particular. Picking a favorite is hard, but Typhoon Lagoon may win out because of the presence of the Crush ‘n’ Gusher, a “water coaster” ride down a 400-foot-long tube slide. A “gushing coaster-like raft ride” is a bit of a mouthful, but what it is really, is FAST and FUN. As we carried our raft through the “abandoned fruit processing plant”, which is, I have to admit, some of the lamer Imagineering I have heard, my son started reading some of the safety warnings and decided maybe he shouldn’t go.
“It says that heart patients and expectant mothers shouldn’t ride,” he said.
“You are neither of those things,” I said “and I need someone else on this raft. Come on.”
“I wasn’t expecting peer pressure,” he muttered.
“We are not peers, this trip was expensive and I need someone else on this raft. Let’s go.”
Of course, he did, and we rode all 3 tracks and had a great time, but even after he had thanked me for not letting him give up on the Crush ‘n’ Gusher, I still apologized for the extra push. The truth is I recognized in him the same impulse not to try anything that felt risky that I had when I was his age, which never got me anything but regret as a kid. The truth is that he’s braver than me, and I try to remember to tell him I think so, both in the real world and in our precious time at Disney World.
