Where To Get The Best Price On Universal Orlando Tickets

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If you live in the U.S., admission tickets to Universal Orlando Resort theme parks are expensive. You can save money, a lot of money in fact, if you do some work ahead of time to find whatever discounts you can. Since you’re reading this article, you’re already on your way to finding cheaper tickets. Congratulations!

I checked out prices from websites offering discounts to see where the cheapest tickets were hiding. Turns out, the prices at one website were consistently lower than everywhere else.

What Type Of Ticket Should You Buy?

The Universal Orlando admission choices can be intimidating. There’s a few basic things to know which will make your decisions easier.

• How many days of admission do you want?
• Do you want to visit Volcano Bay water park in addition to the two theme parks?
• Do you want to be able to go between parks on the same day (A park to park ticket is needed if you want to ride on the Hogwarts Express)?

Here’s what I found out:

I looked at prices for non-Florida Residents (since residents get lower pricing and if you are really a resident, those are the prices you should be looking for anyway). I looked for prices for one adult ticket and all of the prices quoted in the article are BEFORE tax.

TWO day, THREE park with PARK TO PARK capabilities

UNIVERSAL ORLANDO WEBSITE 

I used the official Universal website as a control to see what the base price was:

UNDERCOVER TOURIST

The Undercover Tourist website sells passes to many theme parks at discounted prices. They are one of the places where you can legally get discounts on the Orlando theme parks. They have also run specials with AMEX offers that would let you save even more on your tickets.

AAA

I’ve mentioned how an AAA membership is good for more than road service for a flat tire or towing. They also provide discount tickets to Universal.

TICKETS AT WORK

Tickets at Work is a program offered through many different employers. I’ve mentioned their website before, as they have great discounts on many types of tickets.

Here’s the final breakdown:

Tickets at Work has the best price, saving $35.99 off the normal price from the Universal Orlando website and $20 less than the other two services.

I also looked for a ticket good for a longer stay:

FIVE day, THREE park with PARK TO PARK capabilities

UNIVERSAL ORLANDO WEBSITE

UNDERCOVER TOURIST

AAA

Tickets at Work

Once again, Tickets at Work has the best price. If you don’t have access to their prices, AAA is your next best choice. Undercover Tourist’s price isn’t that much of a discount over the normal price from Universal Orlando.

HALLOWEEN HORROR NIGHTS

Halloween Horror Nights, or HHN for short, is the most popular special ticket event that happens at Universal Studios Orlando. While it’s possible to get discounts, like the two nights for the price of one offer they had earlier this year, if you wait until last minute you’ll end up paying much more for your ticket.

I was surprised to see that discounted tickets for this event were available. Note that the ticket price varies depending on which day you want to go. Weeknights earlier in the season are less expensive and weekends are the most expensive.

UNIVERSAL ORLANDO WEBSITE

For comparison purposes, I checked on tickets for October 10th. On the Universal website, a ticket for that night costs $62.99

AAA

The AAA website had tickets for $60.99.

Tickets at Work

Tickets at work has tickets on sale for $57.00, a $6 discount.

Final Thoughts

Based on this non-scientific sample, Tickets at Work consistently offers lower prices for Universal Orlando admission tickets than other websites. It might take some investigating to find out if your company participates with this program but the savings you find makes it a worthwhile quest. A good place to start is the human resources and benefits website of your employer. The links are often buried somewhere on that page.

Even if you don’t have access to Tickets at Work, getting tickets through AAA or Undercover Tourist is still cheaper than paying the prices on the Universal Website. Whatever you do, don’t walk up to the park gate to buy tickets or you’ll pay even more than on the website. Oh, and don’t forget to use a credit card that offers bonus points on theme park admission tickets when making your purchase.

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This post first appeared on Your Mileage May Vary