Disney’s Art of Animation Resort

I have a love and dislike relationship with this hotel. Positives outweigh the negative. First off, this resort is GORGEOUS. It is absolutely stunning. The attention to detail is remarkable. We love the little mermaid rooms, mainly because it’s one of my favorite movies. I could stare at everything all day long. Here’s the negatives. The beds. Dear god the beds are awful. After walking ALL day all you want is a nice comfy bed to rest for the next day. But these beds are horrible. These places make way too much money to put those pathetic beds in their rooms. Also in the little mermaid rooms you don’t get cell service or Internet service. We’ve been twice in the past year and it was the same deal. Also the walk from the little mermaid to the buses to quite long. I realize there’s nothing that could ever be done about that but it’s a bummer. Beings you’re walking all day at the parks. Other than that it’s an awesome resort.

This hotel is so beautiful and the staff super friendly. When I called to order towels, the staff member Carlos received my call by mentioning the family name and offer suggestions to try around the hotel.
I will be staying here again soon :)

Makes my top five favorite Disney resorts list. Whether you are staying in a standard little mermaid room or one of the family suites, the property itself is awesome.
Pick a pool, any pool.
There’s a pool in front of the little mermaid rooms. There’s a pool in front of the cars suites. Then there’s the big blue pool which actually plays music underwater. Seriously, you can’t make this shit up.
Your kids can play in the elephant graveyard. They can Splish splash On the splash zone. they can play on the little reef playground.
Very large gift shop that they call the ink and paint department.
Nice food court.
Awesome arcade with great selection of arcade games.
And, as with all Disney resorts, free transportation to all things Disney World.

My family has been here all week and we’ve really enjoyed our stay. We are on the top floor of the cars suite in building one pool side. Nice and quiet over here. It’s a bit of a walk to parking lot, lobby, dining area but well worth it for the quiet. Pool looks nice although the we haven’t used it. Our room is spacious enough for the 5 of us. The two bathrooms has been a real help!

Considering everything at Disney is expensive as sh*t, I have found that Art of Animation is definitely a nice bargain.
I stayed in the Little Mermaid area during the recent WDW marathon weekend. The room is no frills – 2 beds, small table with 2 chairs, TV; bathroom, etc. it was decorated cute though – everything was in line with the Little mermaid theme, including Ariel on the shower curtain and Flounder and Sebastian on the walls.
I loved the décor of the whole resort – there are four differently themed areas, the Little Mermaid, the LIon King, Finding Nemo, and Cars. Each building/​courtyard area had fun sculptures/​designs on the exterior building walls. They have 3 separate pools, apparently the central «Finding Nemo» pool is the largest pool out of any of the Disney World resorts. Little Mermaid pool is nice if you are wanting to be at a pool that’s not as busy and crowded with kids.
Food court has plenty of options though it was usually very noisy and very crowded.
And finally, maybe most importantly: adult libations are available at «the drop off», a bar by the main pool. Cool.
beware of little mermaid rooms and cell phone service – I have AT&T and had NO service in that area. Rest of the resort was finr

Let me start by saying that really it is a 3.5, but I am rounding up as the positives outweighed the negatives.
Since we live in Florida and we are annual pass holders I always want to stay at the cheapest Disney resort I can. We go about 4 – 5 times a year and spending over $ 150 a night gets too expensive. In order to get the lower priced little mermaid room we had to book over 6 months in advanced. We have wanted to stay at the Art of Animation for some time and finally had the opportunity.
The hotel is nice. The room was your typical value resort room with 2 full sized beds. The room was clean. We checked in around 8:00pm…ate dinner… went to our room to find the carpet soaking wet. I called the front desk and after a little odd exchange (no I will not wait for you to try to extract the water) they sent the housekeeping manager to see what was happening. He was the only one who actually didn’t give us confused answers. He looked up the cleaning schedule and our room had the carpets shampooed earlier in the day and was not given sufficient drying time. Within 20 minutes we had a new room and 3 additional fast passes.
The food court is nice with an interesting array of selections. We always do the dining plan and find the choices are plentiful for snack options. We do wish that we could get seltzer/​soda water from the machine as no one in my family drinks soda.
Our room was far from transportation and the main areas. We ended up driving to the front of the hotel. The buses run all day and leave you in more convenient locations at the park so we always opt to take the bus.
After a longgggg day at the park we came back to a birthday surprise for my daughter who turned 6 the night we arrived. An array of gifts and a personalized card from Mickey. My daughter was in heaven.
We really didn’t have a chance to use the pool or discover the rest of the hotel. Maybe next visit.

Walls are paper thin. First room they put us in had stained bedding and toe nail clippings in the pullout. Beds are hard as a rock. We have no cell service at all in our room but if I step 15 feet away from the building our room is in I have 4 bars. Ridiculous in this day and age. Not to mention it is a NEW resort. They charge rates that rival moderate/​deluxe resorts but you feel like you are in a cheap motel. Can hear every door on our floor open and close and toilets flushing in the rooms above us. I have stayed in every level resort on property from club level at Polynesian to all star music. This is by far the absolute worst resort. Stay away! Do not let the themes cause you to waste your money. It is NOT worth it!

Clean and friendly. All though i did not eat there, the food court is huge and the food and snacks looked and smelled amazing. You can even grab a ½ gallon of milk there which is super convenient. Very entertaining for the kids with movies outdoors, arcade, numerous pools (lifeguards on duty do a great job looking out), beautiful grounds. The walk is not bad at all to the Mermaids ur only 2 buildings away.

First time at AoA this past weekend. Decent stay!
The décor is a lot of fun, with lovely drawings and paintings of Disney characters every which way. Saw all the kids marveling. I loved the bright and colorful lobby. It smelled sooo good, too (random — same scent as all of the hotel lobbies in Hong Kong that I stayed or ventured in.) Anyway.
The four of us stayed in a Nemo suite in the 5^th building. The room was so BLUE and cute. Decent size and has two bathrooms — definitely a plus. The water pressure in the shower wasn’t the best but no biggie. Pull out sofa and pull out table bed (so strange!) allows for a comfortable stay for up to 6 people. The beds are nice and firm, woo! I prefer my mattresses as hard as a table so it was perfect. My only gripe was that the walls are paper thin and we were in a room close to the elevator — couldn’t sleep in because we kept hearing doors slam and people chit chatting while waiting for the elevator.
Food court was decent. Breakfast fare seems to be more or less the same stuff across all the resorts. The pool by our building looked so fun but it wasn’t hot enough nor did we have time to check it out.
I’d definitely stay again if I was coming with a bigger group but request a room further from the elevators.
If anyone knows the scent that they spray. LMK! I should have asked.

The very first «are we there yet?» happened before we even left our street, so as you can imagine the Art of Animation was a vision upon our arrival. The staff was very helpful and worked hard to make check-​in painless and efficient. The kids loved the walk to the room as we travelled through a life-​sized replica of Radiator Springs (we stayed in the cars building). The kids got a kick out of seeing all the characters. Each building has its own theme… hats off to Disney for this one.
The suite was very clean and fairly spacious. This is the newest Disney hotel, so all appliances and furniture are new and in good shape. We are a family of five and I was impressed with the efficiency of the room. The common area table can be pulled down to convert to a bed and the couch, which looks like the back seat of a car, hides a pull-​out bed. There were two bathrooms with a spacious shower in the master. We didn’t spend much time in the room, but it was comfortable while we were there. The bedding left a little to be desired, but the bed itself was comfortable. There was a small kitchen area with a deep sink, fridge, storage space, and a coffee maker (to provide the life-​blood necessary to get the motivation for the day ahead).
The resort actually has a lot to offer if you end up spending a day at the hotel. Each area has its own pool and there is a larger, centrally-​located Nemo themed pool. The kids loved it and the Drop Off Bar served up the only necessity when visiting Disney with little ones… alcohol. They also have an inflatable movie screen where they show Disney movies each night on the lawn next to the pool. There offer a great deal of activities run by the staff. The concierge can also help with any activity planning. They helped me book 9 holes on the Magnolia Course the night prior. They also arranged transportation and provided a taxi voucher so that it cost nothing to get there. They also provide free transportation to the other parks. Get there early though… it gets crowded.
Dining at the hotel was… interesting. I have never been to prison, but felt like I was in the gen pop cafeteria on our first night. All the families that knew how the joint worked rushing by all the newbies trying to figure out which line to get in. Once you get the layout down it is actually pretty efficient with wait time being minimized. The food itself is not horrible, but as with everything in Disney… it is way overpriced. By the way, I believe the true «magic» in the Magic Kingdom is their ability to make your money disappear. We only ate at the hotel a couple of time, but they offer pre-​made breakfast sandwiches to grab on your way to the park
Overall, the staff is friendly and accommodating, the hotel is new and comfortable with a lot of on-​site activities. They do offer a military rate, but be prepared to pay, it is after all Disney. But if you kids are like mine and can watch the same Disney cartoon back to back without batting an eye… this is the place for you. If you are planning a trip to Disney I highly recommend taking a look at the Art of Animation.

Disney’s Art of Animation was okay. We stayed in a Cars Suite in building 2. My travel agent didn’t request a particular themed suite when she booked us. If you are considering staying here try to request the theme suite (Cars, Finding Nemo, Lion King) when you book, because we got the run around when we tried to put a request in. One time on a phone call to the resort they said to call back ten days prior and then the next person I talked to said they never take requests unless it was requested at booking and the first person I spoke to was wrong. Don’t know who in this situation was wrong… but either way one of them was blowing me off which is annoying.
The décor throughout the resort is super cute. The pools were nice. The quick serve meal options were decent. There was also a small arcade. This resort definitely lacked a lobby to sit in. The décor in our room was cute and it was nice to have two bathrooms in the evening so two can shower at the same time.
Art of Animation is considered a value resort… even though we were in a suite. It certainly feels like a value resort. There are no towels at the pool… so before you plan to go call ahead for extras. The towels are tiny scratchy little towels so bring your own if you would like even an ounce of luxury. We asked for an extra set of sheets and they had rips in them.
The room we had was okay, but it was right next to the laundry room and when my daughter came down with a bug there we ended up spending more time during the day at the resort than planned. The room was very noisy with loud barrels of laundry crashing into the wall waking up my sleeping child. When I locked out my window to see what the noise was the CM looked surprised that I was checking on what the noise could be.
The bus system to the parks was okay. Plan a full hour to get just about anywhere. It was nice not having to drive, but at certain times there were very long waits for a bus. In particular getting to Mickey’s Not So Very Scary Halloween party took close to two hours after waiting (there were a lot of people in line) as well as the travel time to the park. In the mean time my kids got cranky in their costumes and we had to ditch them before we ever made it to the park.
I don’t think it was a bad resort… but I certainly don’t think we are «value» resort kind of people. It wasn’t bad though as we didn’t spend too much time at the resort… but in the future I think we are done with value resorts.

Visited some friends who were staying there. The staff was unprofessional and didn’t seem to care.
The room they had was nice but far. I was really looking forward to going there myself with my 3 kids but I really hate hate hate when staff couldn’t care less about anything else around them. One of them was constantly on their phone texting. Yes. I am also in the hospitality business and I know what’s professional and what’s not. I just expected more I guess from a Disney hotel.

Great hotel for families with young children who plan on visiting any of the Disney theme parks. The hotel theme is based on four disney movies, Cars, Finding Nemo, The Lion King, and The Little Mermaid which are divided into separate complexes. We stayed in a Cars suite which was outfitted with over the top, custom, movie inspired furniture and décor. Dressers look like tool chest, lamps are construction cones, pictures are from the movie, couch is modeled after a classic car seat, etc, etc, etc. The suite was more than adequate size for 4 adults and 2 infants. The couch and the dining table convert into full beds which believe it or not have quite comfortable mattresses. A small kitchenette with fridge, sink, and microwave were extremely convenient. Soundproofing was outstanding but did cause cell phone reception problems (we thought it was a fair trade. Bathrooms have instant hot water and great water pressure. Free wifi in rooms and throughout the property. Full size characters from the movie sit outside each of the buildings in the car complex.
The property features a cafeteria (I’d suggest using only under dire circumstances, pretty generic food), huge gift shop, arcade, several pools that are open late with lots of vigilant lifeguards (the main pool has speakers that play music under water), laundry (very busy), ample parking, typical overly friendly disney service, buses that run to/​from the main parks, water parks and downtown disney every 20 minutes or so, a bar that is open till midnight, and lot of kids activities throughout the day.
The few, albeit minor, cons were hard flat pillows and no comforters on beds. No cover between the lobby and the other buildings means you could end up getting drenched in rainstorms. Towels aren’t provided at pools, so guests must take their undersized towels from their room, then later call reception for more towels. And the only 2 elevators are in high demand going down in the morning with the number of strollers on property.

Just stayed at Art of Animation and want to write an honest review showing the ups and downs because I almost cancelled my reservation and stayed offsite based on some reviews, but decided to give it a go and was fine with it.
First, I stayed in the little mermaid rooms– and was not upgraded magically like so many others seem to have been. I am not sure how that happens– maybe you have to complain or something and I am not much of a complainer so I stayed in the room I booked.
Is it a bit of a walk– yeah a little, but welcome to Disney … Wanna have fun, plan on walking. It honestly takes between 5 – 10 min to walk to the hotel lobby and «big pool» from the little Mermaid rooms… But it’s not a bad walk, there are some disney theme props along the way. Plus there is a smaller pool next to the building if you just want to swim. So, don’t let the «long walk» scare you into booking rooms at double the price.
Next– it’s not a «motel»… Yeah, the doors open to the outside, but the room is nice, I found the beds comfy– especially as tired as I was at the end of the day. As far as room amenities– There is no microwave in the rooms, but there is a fridge.
I have stayed in other Disney resorts and you tend to get what you pay for, but at Disney World there aren’t any resorts that you can just walk outside and be in the park like there are at Disneyland (I love the Disney’s Grand California Hotel and Spa– but it is $ 450 a night on sale). Since it is a lot if trouble to get back, most people don’t spend much time in the room– you are out by 8 and back around 10 pm. So unless you don’t plan to spend all day in the parks, I wouldn’t spend more than I had to on a room.
The down side, at least for me, compared to other resorts I have stayed at is that there is no jacuzzi at the pool. Doesn’t sound like a big deal, but the water in the pool
Is warm… When you get out, you are cold, and would die to get into a hot tub and warm up… And there isn’t one. Second– they don’t give you a towel at the pool, so unless you came prepared (and I didn’t) you get to freeze all the way to your room… A wet, cold, 10 min walk. Disney could do better here. I can’t see the reason for not giving out towels at the pool. also one of the reasons we chose this hotel was the «music under the water» in the pool. This was a bit disappointing as there was music, but it was not Disney music as we thought it would be.
Anyway though, other than those issues, the advantages of staying on property — with the magic bands and pre-​planned dinner reservations and fast passes outweigh the issues with the walk and the not so great pool.
Lastly, I bought the $ 14.95 cups at the resort for unlimited drinks… Only problem is that they only work at the resort– and we only ate there 2 times, so I wouldn’t call them
A money saver for us. However if you eat breakfast there every day (and plan to either lug the cup with you all day, or carry it back to your room before you set out for the theme park) it may be worth your money. We always got back too late, and ended up buying cokes from the vending machines.
Anyway have fun!

Everything in the animation resort is detailed and fun to see, great place for kids, the colors in the pool area are so vibrant and pleasant to enjoy, the hotel we are staying at just sets the vibe for your vacation in an extraordinary way! I encourage all to visit the resorts here in Disney at least once in your lifetime .
They have busses that can transport you to down the parks and to downtown, they also feature places to eat and lounge !

Wow, I can’t even begin to sum up how wonderful this resort is! My family (husband, grandma, and myself) stayed in a Cars themed Family Suite. During online check-​in I had requested a room close to transportation and on the highest floor (I was worried about possible stomping above us). One of those requests was possible, and i’m glad we ended up closer to transportation after a long couple of days. We were in the ‘Mater’ building, which isn’t too far from the main building (which houses the lobby, arcade, gift shop, and Landscape of Flavors) and right next to the front parking lot.
Our room was facing the Cozy Cone pool — seriously, the themed areas here are amazing! Surprisingly we didn’t encounter very much noise, from the pool or the room above us, so that was a relief. I think most of the noise was in the Big Blue pool, which is in the Finding Nemo area. It was ALWAYS packed. Our room had 2 full bathrooms, a queen size bed in the bedroom, a pull out sofa that looked like the backseat of a car, and a murphy bed that doubles as a table. The theme of the room is ‘cones’, you’re staying at the Cozy Cone Motel after all. They are everywhere from the carpet to the light fixtures. But not in a tacky way, they all have a purpose.
The main building was always clean and tidy. You have to check out the bathrooms, the Ladies room has pink everywhere. If you have any purchases sent to the hotel from the parks, you pick those up in the Ink and Paint gift shop. The workers there were very friendly and helpful, especially when my husband bought a bottle of wine and realized we didn’t have a corkscrew to open it. They let him use one of theirs, which saved us from having to buy one. This gift shop has several items that are available in the parks and at Downtown Disney, which was convenient when we realized we’d forgotten to buy something. While you’re in the main building, be sure to check out the artwork on the walls and on the chandelier. Lots to look at in here!
The transportation to the parks was super easy to find, right out front. Wonderful signage, and getting back to the hotel was super easy. The buses were pretty much always packed at the main times, but there were plenty of buses to go around so we were rarely waiting very long. So many good things about this hotel, and tons to look at. We will definitely stay here again!

You guys, I had so much fun here. I stayed with my sister, her husband and their kids. We had a ball! My nephew stopped and pointed at every Nemo, Mater, Ariel and Lightening statue he saw on the way. My niece always wanted to swim in the Cozy Cone pool.
We just had fun. It’s not the nicest hotel, with the most amenities that Disney has to offer, but it was good. Super cute. The food was good (just a café, no sit down places).
There are really one 2 things that were a bit of a bummer. 1. It’s kind of a long bus ride back from the parks (I got stuck standing carrying a sleeping 4 year old in my arms.) 2. They need a drink station in the Cozy Cone area.

This is newest Disney hotel and it’s amazing! It’s ultra themed and features 4 separate lands: Finding Nemo, the Lion King, Cars, and The Little Mermaid.
We didn’t stay at the hotel, we just came to look around which is totally worth it!
We asked the concierge what’s best to see and he let us know about all the wonderful sights on the property including the themed lands with larger than life statues… all scaled to the size of a featured character such as Sebastian from the Little Mermaid. Check out the gigantic Titan and Ursula in the The Little Mermaid land.
Also, the concierge let us know about a tour around the property which even gives you a peek inside one of the rooms, which ended up being a highlight of our trip! The tour is free and is offered daily at 12:30 pm. It’s amazing and we ended up being the only two people on the tour.
Our tour guide Stuart was incredible! He had such a breadth of knowledge and told us so much about the resort, Disney history, Disney and Pixel film history and was able to field any question we threw his way! He was remarkable; this was such a cool thing to do!
The rooms are ultra themed too. The Cars land family suite has a car wash themed mirror in the bathroom and traffic cone lights that you have to «roll over» or step on to turn on. They were designed this way because cars can’t turn on a switch. Everything is thought of to the last detail!
They also offer free animation drawing classes open to the all, 3x a day at 11 am, 2 pm and 5 pm.
This would be an amazing hotel to stay at, but it’s also wonderful just to have a browse around the property!

This is a really, really cute hotel. When you first enter, their wall is filled with sketches of the Little Mermaid, Cars, Lion King and Finding Nemo, all characters that grace their property. The characters in each area are all life-​size (or even building size) and it’s great to walk through them and feel like you’re in the movie.
We were shuttled in by the Disney Cruise Line bus. We arrived around 9am. We were staying in a standard Little Mermaid room, I had requested a building 7, lake view room (shortest walk) and a king size bed (since we had a little one and needed a crib), they told us a room would not be ready until 3pm. They also notified us two packages (Amazon packages I had delivered filled with waters, milk, and munchies) had arrived. The lady at the front desk told us they could put the packages on the luggage cart and have them delivered to our room. Then they told us we could wait by the pool and they will text me when the room was ready.
Come 1pm, I mosied over to the front desk to check on our status of the room and whatdya know. our room was ready, where was my text?
Our luggage arrived but no packages. We called the front desk and they said they will be delivering it shortly.
3:30pm and the packages had not arrived yet. The Canadian called and they said they will have them delivered in the next hour.
5pm: Packages still had not arrived. We called and they said they said they could see the packages on the cart and that they were ‘on their way’.
5:30pm: Still nothing. By this time I was pissed. How can it be FOUR AND A HALF HOURS and our packages still not come yet? We have baby MILK in there with waters and munchies and we’ve been waiting for them! They offered for us to come get them. hellooooo? Didn’t they say they were on their way at 1pm?
6:30pm: STILL NOTHING. By this time, I was pissed. I called the front desk and talked to a Michael (lady, but pronounces it ‘Michelle’) and she said that they would have never promised to deliver it ‘within an hour’ and they usually deliver packages at 10pm! 10PM!!! WHY WASN“T THAT RELAYED TO US when we checked in! And WHY did they keep saying it was ‘on the cart’ but yet. where is that cart? STILL SITTING THERE? She said it normally takes a long time to get to the rooms. I told her, we fly from California and we’ve been here since 9am. Our flight from California is LESS TIME than it takes that package to arrive from the front desk.
As before, she told me she ‘sees the package on the cart’ and that the package will be arriving shortly. I told her if the package doesn’t arrive in half an hour, she can expect to hear from me again. Twenty five minutes later, our package finally arrived. SIX HOUR LATER.
Before heading off to dindin, I spoke with Nathan and told him about the package situation. There is no reason why a package should take SIX HOURS (TEN if you count from when we originally checked in at 9am) to arrive at our room. I told him we had been waiting ‘cuz the package had food and baby milk and our baby was hungry. He tried to accommodate us by giving us a credit for our taxi service to and from dinner. I told him we appreciate it but. the whole experience just left a bad taste in our mouth and we probably won’t stay at this property again.
Awesome grounds. Sucky customer service. We had better service at the Hilton.

Disney Magic at work.
Our home sweet home during my recent stay at Disney World.
We arrived at night and the visuals were just amazing.
From the entrance with their big colorful sign.
To the lobby which had sketches and colorful drawings on one side & brightly decorated registration desk
to the walkways and court yard of each of the 4 resort themes
And finally the rooms.
You’re definitely in a Disney Resort.
Registration was a breeze. The only hiccup was the «Magic Bands» they gave us were all colored gray. I had requested (or should I say, my son assigned the color for each of us) a blue, red & pink one. My son was very disappointed!
The magic band was important because it opened our room, paid for our purchases and got us into the theme parks.
We were in the Little Mermaid Resort. The rooms were smaller than what I thought they would be, but they worked out fine.
This resort only had one restaurant and it was basically four fast food stations serving a variety of dishes.
It had two pools, several laundry facilities (which came in handy), an arcade and of course a mini Disney Store.
Getting around to the four Disney Parks was easy. Buses ran to the theme parks at 20 minute interval and it was FREE.
I really enjoyed my stay and I would consider going back. Disney really knows how to give their guest, specially kids the Disney experience.
2015 Review #25