How to use My Disney Experience to find characters at Disney World

One of the best parts of Disney World is meeting the characters but with so many to see, it can be tricky trying to fit all your favorites in to your day.

Luckily the My Disney Experience App lists out most of the characters, making it easy to see who, where, and when the characters are meeting in the parks.

Here’s how it works…

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Important Character Meet & Greet Update

We will soon be able to hug characters again and have them sign autographs!

Disney announced on March 31 that traditional character meet and greets are returning to Walt Disney World, Disneyland, Disney Cruise Line, and Aulani Resort as early as April 18.

Per Disney, “While not all locations will be available immediately, we anticipate reopening in phases throughout the spring and early summer.”

These include both character greetings and dining experiences. We will provide further updates as soon as we learn more.

Want to find your favorite characters at Disney World? Follow these steps:

Download the My Disney Experience app

This may seem like a no brainer but you have no idea how many people never even download the app.

Once you do, open it up.

Sometimes it can be a bit…slow…to open, but don’t give up.

Select (touch) the map that is located at the top of the app

My Disney Experience App - how to find the characters step 1

When you open up the app you’ll notice a menu across the top: Filter (top left), Wait Times (middle) and Show List (top right).

The map defaults to “Wait Times” but if you select it you are able to change it to a bunch of different things, like Attractions, Dining, Entertainment, Restrooms, Characters (plus more!).

Select “Characters” from the middle menu

How to find the characters in the My Disney Experience app step 2

Narrow your search to the desired location

The “Filter” lets you narrow your search.

How to find the characters in the My Disney Experience app step 3

Toggle back and forth between map view and list view

The “List” in the upper right lets you toggle back and forth between the map view and a list view of the characters at Disney World.

Select character you are looking for

Both the map and the lists are interactive and if you select something, it will open up in a new window.

When looking at a detail view for a character you’ll see the list of appearances left for the day, plus it will plot it out on the map for you and even give you directions for how to get there from your current location.

How to find the characters in the My Disney Experience app detail view

And – that’s it!

Remember, you don’t have to wait until you get to Disney World to play around with the My Disney Experience app.

In fact, we highly recommend that you don’t.

Instead, download it ahead of time and spend some time exploring it and testing it out so that you don’t have to waste precious park time fumbling through it when you’re ready to look for your favorite characters at Disney World.