Dates and details of the 2024 EPCOT Food and Wine Festival

Walt Disney World has announced details and dates for the 2024 EPCOT International Food & Wine Festival, the park’s flagship foodie event of the year. Here you will find all the news and our commentary on some interesting changes for this year’s popular celebration of the culinary arts.

Let’s start with the basics. The 2024 EPCOT International Food & Wine Festival begins on August 29, 2024 and runs through November 23, 2024 for a total of 87 days. It starts over a month later than last year’s event, which started on July 27 and lasted 115 days. (That event was two weeks shorter than last year, for what it’s worth.) The end date is later, but that’s due to the timing of Thanksgiving.

Nevertheless, the 2024 EPCOT Food & Wine Festival is not expected to be smaller in scale. According to Walt Disney World, EPCOT will feature more than just global marketplaces, including returning favorites like Belgium, Hawaii and Germany. A full list has yet to be announced, but Disney teased a few favorite dishes from those stalls.

At the 2024 EPCOT Food & Wine Festival, the fun doesn’t stop with the food. It extends to exciting activities that the whole family can enjoy! Walt Disney World also announced some of the entertainment and other offerings that will return for the 2024 EPCOT Food & Wine Festival. Namely the Eat on the Beat concert series (and food packages for that) will be back.

Emile’s Fromage Montage also returns in 2024. This fun food walking tour encourages guests to sample a variety of delicious cheeses served in inventive ways. Purchase five cheese dishes from the official Global Marketplaces list in your festival passport and be sure to collect a stamp for each dish purchased. Once you’ve collected all five stamps, take the passport to the designated location so you can enjoy a special, unique item!

Families can embark on Remy’s Ratatouille Hide & Squeak – a “Ratatouille” inspired adventure that very magnificent! Guests of all ages can search for Remy in the World Showcase and Global Marketplaces.

Here’s a sneak peek at some of the merchandise you can purchase at the 2024 EPCOT Food & Wine Festival:

Take home a taste of the fun with beautiful merchandise that keeps the magic alive between visits, featuring beloved friends, like Remy from “Ratatouille” and Mickey Mouse.

Here’s a fun reveal: everyone’s favorite purple dragon, Figment, will also be cooking up some fun this fall, just in time for the 2024 EPCOT Food & Wine Festival.

The biggest development for the 2024 EPCOT Food & Wine Festival is of course the opening of CommuniCore Hall on June 10, 2024 in the heart of World Celebration. During our recent days in the parks, we noticed that this building has made tremendous progress over the past month and now appears, at least from the outside, to be almost or completely finished.

Walt Disney World has shared that once the EPCOT International Food & Wine Festival begins, the new space will add exciting, fresh elements to the festival. Stay tuned for more!

In terms of commentary, the most interesting angle of this news is the decision to postpone the start of the 2024 EPCOT Food & Wine Festival until the end of August instead of starting in July like all other years since 2020. This is a return to pre-closing normal, as the 2019 event also started on August 29 and was the longest (at the time) festival ever.

It wasn’t until 2017 that the EPCOT Food & Wine Festival was extended into August for the first time. Before that, it typically started in mid-to-late September and ended earlier. The event dates back a full decade and ran from September 27 to November 11, 2013.

So the 2024 EPCOT Food & Wine Festival is still a long time by historical standards. It is just over a month shorter than last year’s event and over 40 days shorter than the 2020-2022 festivals.

That said, it’s rare for Walt Disney World to scale back events. Like prices, these things usually only go in one direction. When we’ve seen this kind of thing happen in the past, it’s been due to unpopularity or slower sales.

Mickey’s Not So Scary Halloween Party comes to mind; there were a few attempts to add dates in August and November 1st for a number of years, but they didn’t stick initially. That problem no longer exists, as every date last year was sold out.

That’s why it’s so surprising to see both the 2024 EPCOT Flower & Garden Festival and now the 2024 EPCOT Food & Wine Festival shortened, both by a month. And that’s exactly why we predict a summer festival will fill the gap!

The best theory I can come up with is that Walt Disney World is purposefully rescheduling the 2024 EPCOT Food & Wine Festival outside of the summer tourist season in an effort to push demand among Florida residents and annual pass holders into the off-season in August and September.

The thought process here would be that EPCOT now has a strong enough schedule of rides to attract tourists during the summer, so it’s better to hold off on demand from locals and regulars until the peak tourist season subsides. It wouldn’t be unprecedented to split demand by targeting different demographics.

However, I am at least somewhat skeptical of this after our recent visits to EPCOT that fell during the shoulder season and halfway through the Flower & Garden Festival. The park was the least crowded I have seen it since last August or September.

As for a summer festival, that now seems unlikely. After all, it would make sense to announce that for announcing the 2024 EPCOT Food & Wine Festival. Usually these things are done in order.

Walt Disney World has already unveiled the new limited-time show, “¡Celebracion Encanto!” which will run several times a day this summer. It invites you and your family to sing along to some of your favorite songs, and see Mirabel and Bruno on the newly opened CommuniCore Plaza stage.

The announcement for it teased the following: “And we haven’t even mentioned the more food and drink and more entertainment is coming… but we’ll have more details for you soon. That confirmed our theory – which we’ve had since last year – that EPCOT would host a summer festival.

I still tend to think something what else will happen this summer at EPCOT. Maybe not a full-fledged festival, but a kind of ‘event’ a la Incredible Summer with entertainment and special menus. It just makes too much sense for EPCOT’s other festivals to be significantly shortened. Will Disney really be willing to leave that sweet food and beverage revenue on the table?!

Again, the global marketplaces are incredibly lucrative. The average guest spends more money on this than on counter service or a meal at World Showcase. More importantly, the margins on alcohol are incredibly high. (During the lows, we heard rumors that festivals and drinkers were EPCOT’s biggest saving grace.)

Perhaps there is more than meets the eye. It is possible that the longer festival spreads almost the same demand (again disproportionately among the locals and regulars who enjoy these events), leading to lower revenues per day and higher operating costs per day.

Obviously it’s impossible to analyze the numbers from the outside, but it’s very safe to assume that Walt Disney World has done just that. Another possibility is that I am completely missing something. The bottom line is that Disney wouldn’t willingly leave money on the table. That’s not what they do.

Speaking of leaving money on the table, there’s also culinary seminars, demonstrations, meals with celebrity chefs and other special events. Walt Disney World still hasn’t announced anything each of this – or even teased its return. None of these things returned last year, which could suggest the same for 2024.

The difference for this year, however, is the debut of the CommuniCore Hall event space. It seems like a no-brainer since all of these special events are pricey and generate a lot of revenue. But I don’t know, because EPCOT has had other unused (or underutilized) event spaces in recent years and has refused to use them. After World ShowPlace was used for the event in 2020, it is no longer one of the festival sites.

Ultimately, we look forward to the start of the 2024 EPCOT Food & Wine Festival. While I’m curious about the reason for reducing the number of dates, I’m honestly happy with the decision. The event has gone on too long in recent years and, like the Halloween season, I was ready for it to be over by the time it reached its sweet spot. Personally, I still think this is a few weeks too long; my perfect EPCOT Food & Wine Festival would run from September to November.

My personal “wish list” for the 2024 EPCOT International Food & Wine Festival would include new Global Marketplaces from existing countries or regions and a return of the studio concept stands in the culinary aisle, plus past favorites making a comeback. Either way, we hope this is the year the EPCOT Food & Wine Festival turns things around. Perhaps a shorter and more focused festival is exactly what is needed!

Are you planning a Walt Disney World trip? Read more about hotels on our Walt Disney World Hotels reviews page. Read our Walt Disney World Restaurant Reviews for where to eat. To save money on tickets or determine which type to buy, read our post Tips for Saving Money on Walt Disney World Tickets. Our What to Pack for Disney Trips post provides a unique look at smart items to pack. For what to do and when to do it, our Walt Disney World Ride Guides can help. For detailed advice, it is best to start with us Walt Disney World trip planning guide for everything you need to know!

YOUR THOUGHTS

Are you looking forward to the 2024 EPCOT Food & Wine Festival? Did you attend the event last summer or fall? Do you think you will benefit from being shorter and more focused, or are you disappointed that you will miss it during your summer vacation? Any hope for Global Marketplace booths or menu items? Do you think any of the other demonstrations or seminars will return? Do you have any tips you would like to share for getting the most out of the experience? Are there any questions we can help you answer? Hearing feedback about your experiences is both interesting to us and helpful to other readers, so share your thoughts below in the comments!