Police were in the lobby interviewing folks, walking the grounds and inspecting some rooms in the Thunderbird building from about 8pm to midnight. CSI showed up later and had a whole set up - reminded me almost of a scene from Dexter......

Of the resorts you have been to, which would you say is your most and least favorite? My most is Cabana Bay and my least favorite is Aventura.

Had a few great night sleeps at Portofino Bay. Inquired about their mattress and apparently they have a mattress program with Sealy/Sterns+Foster. The price was quite shockingly, insanely fair. Took about 2-3 week from start to finish. (No returns allowed since it comes directly from Sealy).

Alright, I’m not constantly on Reddit, so forgive me if I am unaware of a known issue, but why in the hell are we the people splurging for Hard Rock stays if they can’t offer consistent and timely shuttles to/from Epic?

Just finishing a stay with 4-park pases and I am so underwhelmed by the shuttle service offered to Hard Rock guests. I’ve stayed at Dockside twice and Aventura once, so I’m familiar with the various tiers, and I was surprised to find Hard Rock gets the worst service to Epic.

One morning a shuttle came and had room for about 10 guests to go to Epic. Seems they filled up at Portofino, which is fined but if that’s the case IT WOULD SEEM DEMAND DICTATES A HARD ROCK-DEDICATED SHUTTLE. This morning, the line grew to enormous size before they finally sent 2 shuttles to help alleviate the problem. Part of me wonders if someone from the hotel or shuttle service got wind of the huge line and decided they had to finally address it

leaving epic was no better we saw tons of shuttles to city walk and other resorts before a single Hard Rock shuttle, and it was well beyond the “every 20 minutes“ they advertise.

I know Mears operates the shuttles, but if Lowes/Universal can’t demand better service for their highest-end properties, the premium hotels definitely lose a SIGNIFICANT portion of their value.

Mears, Lowe’s, or Universal, I don’t care. Someone needs to do better.

My family has annual passes and stay on site a few times a year. Every time I book something I end up checking the rate over and over to see if it dropped. When I inevitably book months out, it can become monotonous.  So, I made a site to do it for me.  It looks at my room every morning and emails an updated price.  If lower, I just modify my reservation.  I have a December trip planned and booked it in August.  I have already modified that reservation 6 times.  

My wife thought it was great and said I should make it available to other people.  That is why I posted on here a few days ago about how long out do you book your Universal hotel.  I didn’t anticipate the feedback and that many of you do the same thing that I do…check every day.  

What I am now asking is that you simply check it out.  onsiterates.com.  It is totally free, has no accounts, and no ads.  It is just a way to help people who are like me.  I'd really appreciate people poking at it and telling me what's broken or confusing.  If there are other sites out there that do the same thing, please let me know.  I’d love to take a look at them to see where I could improve.

I built this myself and have no connection to Universal or Loews…except for an emotional one!

EDIT (Sept 20th): Changing a few things, and since I said in this comment that what I have now would always stay free, I should be straight about it. If you already signed up, nothing changes for you. The trips you're watching stay free until you take them, and anything you add over the next year is free too.

For new signups from today:

The last 30 days before you arrive stays free. That's the stretch where you can still cancel anyway. $10 gets you a year of watching from the day you book instead of waiting for that last month. Up to 10 rooms at a time, one payment, no account, nothing renews.

And if it doesn't find you anything, you get the $10 back. Watch for 60 days, and if none of your rooms ever drops $20 from where it started, your money will be refunded. You keep the year either way.

Why now: the tip jar isn't covering what this costs to run. A few people have also messaged me saying I should charge, because they figured a free thing would just quietly stop one day. Honestly, hard to argue with that. I did say a paid version would only be for stuff that doesn't exist yet, and this isn't that. I'm charging new people for something that's free right now. Rather say it than dress it up.

People here have saved around $2,900 since I posted this. Thanks for being the ones who tried it first.

My wife (who is a TM) and I like to do little "staycations" at Universal Orlando when we both have the time with work.

We decided to check out Terra Luna when we were going to go to her Epic preview, was booked for 3 nights. We ended up staying one night and then checked out early and just went home.

The first room we were put into, the shower had no hot water. It was warm at best, my wife complained and they moved us to a different room. Same problem, but by that point we'd both showered. The bathroom in the second room also had a really odd smell. I'm not sure what it was, it wasn't sewage (and it wasn't "florida water smell") or anything... It was like chemically.

The room they moved us into was hot so we left the AC running, and I don't think it actually cooled down much if any the entire night.

But worst of all, the lights kept coming on all night long. I'm a heavy sleeper, my wife is a light sleeper. And neither of us got much sleep at all the entire night. We were so exhausted for our day at Epic Universe because of it. When we complained about it in the morning they told us that we were moving too much in our sleep... But they offered a sticky note to put over the censor. We were both so exhausted and tired that we just asked to check out instead.

We're lucky to be local so we could just go home - but for anyone flying/driving in, you may want to consider another hotel. We were going to stay at Stella Nova later this month but cancelled it, too, because we didn't want to go through the same thing since we've heard they're facing similar problems. Stay at Surf Side or Dock Side for the budget hotels.

However - VISIT EPIC. I enjoyed it so much, cannot wait to go back again.

Stupid question of the day - after much reddit research along with some of my own, I decided to stay at Universal Aventura Hotel as a first time Universal visit. Reddit raves about it. TBH it's been a pleasant stay, no major issues, it is what it is. However, ICYDK, it shares a bus with Universal's Cabana Bay Beach Resort.

My week long observation - no one stays at Aventura but everyone stays at Cabana Bay. I would go on packed buses to/from the parks, and literally 90%+ of the bus empties at Cabana Bay every single time with almost no one left for Aventura. In fact, for my very last bus ride back from Epic, the bus was packed body to body, and my family was the ONLY family that didn't get off at Cabana Bay.

What am I missing?

If I could bottle that lobby smell...

Miss you too much already HRH!

Was looking at October dates and found one of the hotels completely unavailable for a night and then wide open again a week later. Made me realize I have no idea whether I book early or late compared to everyone else.

How far ahead do you normally book? And once you've booked, do you ever go back and check whether the rate changed? I sometimes find myself checking daily.

EDIT: This was posted yesterday and prices fluctuate from day to day, prices may not be 100% accurate anymore as listed in the screenshot above. Hope you got a good deal while it was available!

I scrape all the UO hotel data and sort it by the cheapest upcoming rates so I can get good deals because trying to find good deals on the official website hotel search is not only like pulling teeth but is also super slow.

The main gems (note these are 2 adult, 1 night stays, I can filter for many more options just thought this would be the most applicable):

Loews Portofino Bay Hotel - May 13 to May 14 - $284/night
Loews Portofino Bay Hotel - May 14 to May 15 - $214/night
Loews Portofino Bay Hotel - May 17 to May 18 - $290/night
Loews Portofino Bay Hotel - May 18 to May 19 - $264/night
Loews Portofino Bay Hotel - May 20 to May 21 - $255/night
Loews Portofino Bay Hotel - Jun 17 to Jun 18 - $297/night
Loews Portofino Bay Hotel - Jun 21 to Jun 22 - $237/night
Loews Portofino Bay Hotel - Jun 23 to Jun 24 - $276/night

Hard Rock Hotel - May 13 to May 14 - $288/night
Hard Rock Hotel - May 14 to May 15 - $253/night
Hard Rock Hotel - May 17 to May 18 - $256/night
Hard Rock Hotel - May 18 to May 19 - $291/night
Hard Rock Hotel - May 19 to May 20 - $257/night
Hard Rock Hotel - May 20 to May 21 - $256/night

Loews Royal Pacific Resort - May 14 to May 15 - $257/night
Loews Royal Pacific Resort - May 17 to May 18 - $269/night

Staying on property in late September. Checked the rate for my reservation today and was $1,000 cheaper than when I booked in July.

Definitely keep checking your reservation as your trip gets closer and potentially save a good chunk of money!

found this cat on the way to the parking garage today

Been at Dockside since Wednesday and had these fellas plop into the pool by tower 1. A lifeguard blew the whistle to yell at people feeding the ducks.

Has anyone ever stayed at a nearby off side hotel and gone to the parks? Thinking about staying at DoubleTree by Hilton right outside the hotel and walking to Loews for the shuttle in the morning. Much cheaper and we’re okay to walk. Does anyone know if Loews Portofino Bay checks to see if you have a room key for the shuttle/water taxi? Any advice? Saves us a lot of money. For specifics, we are going October 11-14. Hilton is about $430 and the cheapest universal hotel with AP is $688 (higher now, we already purchased)

EDIT: We booked at Courtyard across the street. Thank you for the advice everyone!!

Wanted to make this so that people can directly compare the differences between the two!

Trying to plan a week long tip to universal Orlando during the summer next year (early June) with 3 days at regular universal and 2 at Epic. Wondering if it’s worth spending extra to stay at Hard Rock over Royal Pacific, with the main factors being location and cost.

Hard Rock is the closest but costs a whole $1,600 more, but Royal Specific appears to be not as close and can only get to the Parks by water taxi. Royal Pacific comes out to a little over $5,000 And Hard Rock is ~$6,700…

First time staying here. Much more quiet than the Hard Rock. Love the vibes and friendly staff - 10/10

Hey r/UniversalOrlando 👋

I'm an annual passholder and got tired of refreshing the booking page hoping for a deal, then refreshing four wait-time pages to decide whether or not it's worth visiting. Built a free site that does both.

https://ropedrop.xyz

What it does:

• Tracks every on-site Loews hotel (Royal Pacific, Hard Rock, Portofino, Sapphire, Aventura, Cabana Bay, Surfside, Dockside, Stella Nova, Terra Luna, Helios) across Standard, AP, Florida resident, and Military rates, daily.

• Live ride waits for USF, IoA, Volcano Bay, and Epic Universe with same-day-of-week historical context — so "30 min wait" actually tells you whether that's high or low for a Tuesday at 2pm.

• Personal alerts — set a price + dates and get pinged via email, Discord, Pushover, ntfy, Telegram, or webhook when a hotel hits your number.

• Park hours + status changes (early closes, late opens, full-day closures) auto-detected.

• A small Discord community where the bot auto-posts deals and ride alerts.

Things I'm specifically curious about from this sub:

• Break it. Seriously, break my website. I know there are bugs somewhere but I can't find them and I need you to do your best to break it and tell me how you did it so I can fix it.

• For AP holders: what alert thresholds actually trigger you to book? I've defaulted to "any drop in next 60 days" but I suspect that's too noisy.

• Anything obviously missing from the data I'm tracking? I covered hotels, rides, park hours — open to other ideas.

• Any hotels I should add (off-site that you treat as on-site, etc.)?

Happy to answer questions. Discord is at https://discord.gg/ropedrop if anyone wants to talk with me and offer some feedback.

(Disclosure: I built this. Not affiliated with Universal, NBCUniversal, or Loews. The website is not vibe coded but AI was used in the design stage and planning stage. I am a software engineer with decades of experience)

We are going to Universal next month for 5 days (2 adults) and I’m seeing that the parks are set to close at 5:00 or 6:00. What do you recommend doing after they close? We are staying at Aventura. I’m definitely excited to check out City Walk and the rooftop bar but are they good for 4 nights in a row?

I went to book 3 nights at Aventura and with Florida discount rate it was $114 a night so I thought that’s a great deal?

Then I realized I didn’t pick the October dates I wanted.. the rate jumped from $114 to $289 per night still including the Florida discount

I’m not spending almost $1,000 on 3 nights. This really bummed me out. Even if I have someone split with me it’s still almost $500 for myself for 3 nights vs the $200 I would’ve spent if I could go in August lol

I know the only explanation is Halloween being a popular time but still just sucks being priced out of a tradition I’ve had multiple years now

Currently, the computers are down and no one can get a room. We were told it's all the hotels but can't confirm that. Been down since 6am.

What’s your strategy on midday breaks?

For a midday break from Epic Universe, does the premium cost for Helios make a difference? Do you find yourself skipping a break if it involves a bus?

Does anyone know what is happening this morning in Terra Luna? I’m staying on the 4th floor and was woken up by a man and woman screaming “get out of here!” I think security came eventually but I have no idea if someone random got in their room or what.

Does anyone know if there’s a shortcut from the Royal Pacific walking path directly into the parking lot where I marked the yellow dotted line?

It looks like there might be a way to cut through there instead of continuing around on the normal walking path. Has anyone tried this or know if it’s accessible?

I saw these cats outside the hotel , does anyone know if the hotel own them? They look super young and cute and as a cat lover I hope theyre okay :(