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Park Queue TimesPQT

Universal Studios Japan cheat sheet

worked out from 21 days of our own wait data23 rides

Arrive for 08:00 and ride Mine Cart Madness™, Hollywood Dream - The Ride:Backdrop and Hollywood Dream - The Ride first. Leave Mario Kart: Koopa's Challenge™ until after 9pm, when its queue drops to about 24 minutes. The park's queues peak around 17:00 at 69 minutes and are lowest around 21:00.

Before you go

When to go

The days and months this park's rides run quietest

Quietest weekday
Sunday
Busiest weekday
Wednesday

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. 08:0039m
  2. 09:0051m
  3. 10:0055m
  4. 11:0059m
  5. 12:0058m
  6. 13:0056m
  7. 14:0059m
  8. 15:0063m
  9. 16:0066m
  10. 17:0069mpeak
  11. 18:0056m
  12. 19:0048m
  13. 20:0033m
  14. 21:0017mquietest

Arrive for 08:00. Queues climb to their peak around 17:00 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. 1Mine Cart Madness™ ~173 min typical · up to 222 at peak · worst around 9am173m
  2. 2Hollywood Dream - The Ride:Backdrop ~109 min typical · up to 136 at peak · worst around 5pm109m
  3. 3Hollywood Dream - The Ride ~94 min typical · up to 127 at peak · worst around 5pm94m

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. 1Mario Kart: Koopa's Challenge™~91 min typical · about 24 min after 9pm24m
  2. 2Yoshi's Adventure™~67 min typical · about 18 min after 9pm18m
  3. 3The Flying Dinosaur~76 min typical · about 28 min after 9pm28m
  4. 4Flight of the Hippogriff™~66 min typical · about 22 min after 9pm22m
  5. 5Harry Potter and the Forbidden Journey™~52 min typical · about 17 min after 9pm17m

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 minutesFrieren: Beyond Journey's End Story Walk -- Echoes of Adventure8m

Watch-outs

Rides that spend the most of the day not running

  1. 1JAWSrunning 64% of the park's open hours64%
  2. 2Jurassic Park - The Riderunning 70% of the park's open hours70%
  3. 3Detective Conan 4-D Live Show: Jewel Under the Starry Skyrunning 78% of the park's open hours78%
  4. 4Hollywood Dream - The Ride:Backdroprunning 80% of the park's open hours80%
  5. 5Jurassic Park - The Ride in the Darkrunning 81% of the park's open hours81%

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.