Disney is always working to improve and better the parks, the food, the merchandise, and the resorts at Walt Disney World. With the huge 50th anniversary celebration coming up quickly in 2021, Disney is making sure many of their resorts get a nice update so they look their best for the grand celebration.
Table of contents
Art of Animation
Art of Animation’s main lobby floors were recently redone to help eliminate the noise caused by the small tiles and luggage wheels. It looks much cleaner and sounds quieter.
The Cars buildings 2 and 3 have already had their refurbishment completed. You can watch a room tour of one here. The first building in the Cars section won’t be completed till all the other rooms at the resort are done. The Finding Nemo family suites and Lion King family suites are completely finished. The Little Mermaid rooms are currently being remodeled. You can see the new Little Mermaid rooms here. The entire resort should be completed by fall 2020.
Wilderness Lodge
The Wilderness Lodge rooms with club level access have finished their remodel on the seventh floor. The only rooms with club level access that still need to be remodeled now are the deluxe rooms. The rest of the rooms on the other floors have started their remodel recently and should be done by this fall. One of the bigger changes coming is that the bunk bed rooms are supposed to be removed.
The Contemporary
UPDATE: They have moved this back to August. The Contemporary’s remodel is scheduled to begin in January 2020. Not much has been said about this refurbishment, but with the the fact that The Contemporary is supposed to be, well, contemporary, so it definitely needs this update. You can watch a room tour here.
The Polynesian
The Polynesian rooms will be getting complete remodels with many of the issues fixed that guests have raised awareness about over the years. The refurbishment is scheduled to begin in August 2020 with the standard rooms being the first to get remodeled, and the club level lounge and rooms being the last. We look forward to seeing what these rooms will look when they’re finished. This is a video of what the rooms currently look like.
The Grand Floridian
The Grand Floridian main public areas will be getting updated with some new carpet and new paint. We haven’t heard whether the wallpaper will be changed at all. The rooms will be getting remodeled as well, but only the bathrooms will be updated as the rooms were refurbished a few years ago. You can watch a video here to see what most of the rooms currently look like at Grand Floridian.
All-Star Sports
All-Star Sports will be the last of the All-Star resorts to begin its remodel. This resort will not get refurbished until All-Star Music is complete. They are expecting to begin work on this in 2020, but the timeframe will depend on when All-Star Music is finished. The family suites at All-Star Music have already begun their remodel and look amazing. You can watch a room tour of one here.
All-Star Music
All-Star Music is the next in line to get a remodel and currently has a building and a half down for remodel. All-Star Movies is officially done getting remodeled, and we love how it turned out. These new rooms look so much better, and the All-Stars are going to a universal look in the rooms with a few minor changes for each resort theme.
Saratoga Springs
Saratoga Springs began its remodel in 2019 and has finished a building and a half in the preferred section in Congress Park. Once the whole section is done in Congress Park, they’ll begin refurbishing the rooms in Springs section. Disney will finish all of the preferred sections before beginning to remodel the standard sections. The remodel is scheduled to finish sometime in 2021.
Videos of the newly remodeled rooms can be watched from the links here: Deluxe Studio, 1 Bedroom Villa, 2 Bedroom Villa, and 3 Bedroom Grand Villa
Port Orleans- Riverside
While most of the resort has been completed at Port Orleans- Riverside, there is one section that still needs remodeling. The Royal Guest Rooms will begin their remodel in March of 2020, and we are very interested to see the changes that come in these rooms as they are so well themed. But we trust the Imagineers and look forward to seeing what they come up with.
I love your tours of rooms. You are so thorough and walk through slowly. I don’t get dizzy watching your videos!! Great job!
Thank you!!!
Hi. Do you think the family suites at All Star Music will be completed by Sept 2021? Guessing as they’ve already started and there’s still 15 months till then it’s a good chance they will be, just not sure if Covid has effected their time scales.
They were halfway done with them when everything shut down. Since All-Stars aren’t on any list yet to reopen, we’re thinking Disney is going to finish remodeling before opening them up again which would definitely make them completed by then. Of course this is just our guess as we can’t ask right now, but it’s a really good chance they will be done by then.
Hello, when will all star sports be completed? Thanks!
All-Star Sports is set to begin work the beginning of 2021 and be completed by October of that year. With all the changes currently happening, that timeline may change, but we won’t be able to verify that until the resorts reopen.
Have the renovations started yet on the Deluxe rooms at wilderness lodge? Going in September and hoping they will be completed by then.
All the rooms at Wilderness Lodge should be completed by end of summer 🙂
So it’s not just club level being refurbed correct?
Correct. All the rooms at Wilderness Lodge are being refurbished.
Do we know if the coronavirus will be affecting this timeline for renovations? We’ll be staying at WL towards the end of September and hoping 5th or 6th floors will be renovated too!
All of the renovation work has been stopped, so yes, it will change the timeline. We don’t know what it will be changed to, but most likely the Wilderness Lodge renovations won’t be completed until late fall (that is a guess based on when we think Disney resorts will reopen, but until they actually do, we won’t be able to ask how much the timeline has changed).
Has there been any news on when Wilderness Lodge will reopen? And if they are continuing with renovating the rooms?
Disney still hasn’t announced dates for the reopening of Wilderness Lodge, but Copper Creek and Boulder Ridge open 6/22. They will definitely continue the refurbishment, and it’s possible that work has already resumed, but without access to the resort we can’t confirm just yet. 🙂
Trying to decide between Little Mermaid room and Pop Century. No children just my husband and me. Hoping Little Mermaid would be complete by end of November 2020. I like the look of Little Mermaid but have read that Pop Century is better for adults. Got any suggestions?
For just two people, Pop is better since it has the bed you can keep up and not have in the way. Also, Art of Animation’s main pool will be closed for refurbishment this fall, so you won’t have the main pool at that resort. We really like Pop and the food court, so it’s a great option.
We are staying in a Royal room at Riverside at the beginning of May, any chance of them being completed by then?
We were told today they will start remodeling them in March, so there’s a chance a few will be done, but they couldn’t give us a timeframe yet.
My group is staying at The Art of Animation at the beginning of August 2020 in 2 Little Mermaid rooms and a Lion King Family suite.
Any idea how much of the renovations are completed in The Little Mermaid and Lion King areas?
Thanks!
We were told all of the rooms at Art of Animation should be finished by this fall, so the Little Mermaid rooms should be done by then since those will be done before the final Cars building.
We are in All Star Music mid October – we are really hoping all rooms are done by then! The Calypsso pool will be closed when we stay but that doesn’t bother us as we just stay at the park all day.
If two building are done and two are well on the way, here’s hoping all 10 can be done in the next 8 months!
Do you think it’s wise to request a refurbed room now?
Disney is making great progress on these rooms, so there’s a good chance you’ll get a remodeled room, but if you know you really want one, we’d recommend putting in a request now and again requesting when you check in (Disney gets a lot of room requests, so sometimes they get lost in all the bookings, so requesting a couple times never hurts). Good luck!
Any more progress to All Star Music? What is your prediction for beginning of September?
We aren’t sure how the closures will change anything at this point. They’ve moved quickly through the All-Star resorts so far, and the last we heard, they were still on schedule to finish All-Star Music by the end of the year, so most likely more than half of the resort will be finished by September, if not closer to most of it.
Very useful blog post, thank you so much. You both do such great video reviews, I’d also like to ask for a blog entry regarding ‘Recently completed’ (perhaps in the past 18 months) renovations. For ex, reading this, people might not realize that in addition to All Star Movies, Pop Century offers a good alternative to the in-progress All-Star Music renos.
That’s a great idea! Thank you for the feedback. 🙂
Hi! Any updates on the progress to Music?
Buildings 9 and 10 are completed. Buildings 7 and 8 are being worked on now.
I love this list…. Can you add the DVC resorts to it sometime too? (Other than SS) The one I am anxious for is WL Boulder Ridge, but I think that is not until 2021.
Hi Patricia, as far as we are aware, this list does include the DVC resorts. Many of them have been remodeled in the last few years, so they won’t be updated for several more years. If we find out more will be worked on next year, we’ll add them to the list, but as of now, this is all that has been announced for 2020.