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Park Queue TimesPQT

Carowinds cheat sheet

worked out from 31 days of our own wait data36 rides

Arrive for 11:00 and ride Fury 325, Snoopy’s Racing Railway and Copperhead Strike first. Leave Kiddy Hawk until after 10pm, when its queue drops to about 8 minutes. The park's queues peak around 16:00 at 15 minutes and are lowest around 11:00.

Before you go

When to go

The days and months this park's rides run quietest

Quietest weekday
Thursday
Busiest weekday
Friday
Quietest month
July
Busiest month
April

Each ride's own quietest and busiest day, tallied and weighted by how long its queue runs. For a dated answer use the crowd calendar, which scores every day of the year.

The shape of the day

Average queue across the park, hour by hour

  1. 11:007mquietest
  2. 12:008m
  3. 13:0010m
  4. 14:0011m
  5. 15:0013m
  6. 16:0015mpeak
  7. 17:0015m

Arrive for 11:00. Queues climb to their peak around 16:00 and fall back through the afternoon; the last hour or two is the quietest the headliners get all day.

Ride these first

The headliners: longest queues, worst by late morning

  1. 1Fury 325 ~29 min typical29m
  2. 2Snoopy’s Racing Railway ~29 min typical · up to 48 at peak · worst around 2pm29m
  3. 3Copperhead Strike ~27 min typical · up to 56 at peak · worst around 4pm27m

Straight to these from the gate, in this order. Every minute before the park fills is worth three later.

Leave these until later

Rides whose queues collapse late in the day

  1. 1Kiddy Hawk~24 min typical · about 8 min after 10pm8m
  2. 2Carolina Goldrusher~20 min typical · about 5 min after 6pm5m
  3. 3The Flying Cobras~21 min typical · about 7 min after 7pm7m

Save them for the last two hours, when the coach parties have gone and the queue is a fraction of the afternoon's.

Fill the gaps with

Walk-ons at any hour, and the single-rider lines

Usually under 10 minutesCharlie Brown’s River Raft Blast5mCamp Bus5mKite Eating Tree5mZephyr5mWoodstock Whirlybirds6mPEANUTS™ Trailblazers6mSnoopy vs. Red Baron6mCharlie Brown's Wind-up6m

Watch-outs

Rides that spend the most of the day not running

  1. 1WindSeekerrunning 0% of the park's open hours0%
  2. 2Gear Spinrunning 2% of the park's open hours2%
  3. 3Fury 325running 6% of the park's open hours6%
  4. 4Thunder Strikerrunning 7% of the park's open hours7%
  5. 5Woodstock Expressrunning 46% of the park's open hours46%

If one of these is the reason you came, ride it the first time you see it running rather than saving it. The full picture is on the reliability page.

On the day

Your day-of sheet

The same park, for one date: the forecast, the hours, and your ride order

With a free account you get this sheet for a date: the crowd forecast for the day, its published hours, a ride order worked out against that day's wait curve, and a printable version to take in.

Get the day-of sheet

An account gives you a ride order for your date, with the forecast and the hours, ready to print. Free, and no card needed.

Create a free accountor sign in

  • Your rides, in order

    Sequenced against the wait curve, so the headliners land in their quiet windows.

  • quiet till 111pm · 66m

    Your date, hour by hour

    How the wait climbs on the day you picked, and the window it stays low.

Everything above is each ride's own recorded queue over recent weeks, sampled every few minutes through the park's opening hours - not an opinion. A ride with too little history is left out.