This post covers the top toilets at Walt Disney World. This list is a combination of great hidden away locations, top-notch restrooms, and a couple of bathrooms that make the list because they’re flat out bizarre. Picking a favorite restroom is like choosing a favorite child, but it’s also important to do. (Updated December 3, 2021.)
When Disney Blogstorians (because that will totally be a thing) document the history of the bizarre phenomenon of sites like this one, this post will live in infamy as the point this site jumped the shark. I’ve actually wanted to do this list for an eternity, but I’ve avoided it because, well…it’s weird. That is, until the Tangled Toilets opened, and every blog had like 38 posts on them. All bets were off at that point. That really broke down the bathroom barrier, and the toilet taboo.
Truthfully, I don’t know why I’ve shied away from this topic. Just think, there’s probably some dude sitting in a forgotten corner of the Imagineering offices with the title of “Potty Show Design, Tiling & Technical Director” who takes his work very seriously, yet is the butt of jokes. Good sir, your day is finally here. You can now do a celebratory fist-pump and regale your family with this blog’s praise of your fine work. I can only hope my great investigative journalism shining a light on your work helps earn this blog its first (of many) Peabody Awards…
While this might seem like a tough topic to tackle, I’ve had a mental list of the top toilets at Walt Disney World for years. Maybe decades. The hard part was the photos. I’ll bet most of you reading this have never taken photos of a restroom. Why would you? Until compiling this, I hadn’t either. As such, you probably don’t know about restroom photography decorum.
First and foremost, you never take a photo when another person is in the restroom, especially if they cannot see you. Can you imagine sitting in there–alone–and hearing someone waltz in, fire off a series of photos, and then rush out? That pricey once in a lifetime Walt Disney World trip just got even more expensive due to the years of therapy after it.
Unfortunately, the difficulty presented by capturing all of these restrooms empty is why we don’t have photos for each. I’m not just going to repeatedly duck in and out of various Walt Disney World restrooms to see if there’s anyone in there. That wouldn’t be fun to explain to security when they inevitably showed up to see what the heck I was doing loitering in restrooms. I do some weird stuff for the sake of blog posts, but that’s a bridge too far.
2021 WDW Restroom Retrospective
You might notice the updated parenthetical above, and be thinking, “why on earth does a post about toilets at Walt Disney World need an update?!” Well, a lot has changed on the toilet tech front and this blog aims to be on the cutting edge of the “new sanitation revolution.” We envision a brighter tomorrow, with smart toilets and health monitoring (think Baymax but for your butt) hopefully coming soon to Tomorrowland and Future World.
Unfortunately, the last year has not been a bright one for bathrooms. To be sure, incremental progress has been made. There’s a new restroom for Remy’s Ratatouille Adventure and the once-worst washroom in Morocco received modernizations and improvements. Similar restroom refreshes occurred elsewhere, including in Epcot and outside the parks. However, there were no game-changers, qualitatively or thematically. Nothing like was found in New Fantasyland, Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge, or other recent lands. This year’s newcomers are more utilitarian–what’s the fun in that?!
Of course, we’d be remiss if we didn’t start by paying our respects to the bygone bathrooms of Walt Disney World. Nothing of value was lost this year, but we’re still mourning the Innoventions restrooms. This was a huge blow for the gloriously-weird early 1990s restrooms. Here’s hoping that the creative minds behind the Epcot overhaul can put their tile-selecting talents to good use and create new restrooms worthy of the legacy of EPCOT Center. (In the spirit of Creations Shop, I hope they opt for “Bathroom Building.”)
With all of these important updates out of the way, let’s turn to our list of Walt Disney World’s most outstanding outhouses…
Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge – I’m truly torn about these toilets. On the one hand, they’re incredibly industrial and utilitarian, lacking the warmth and good vibes I’m looking for when rating a restroom.
On the other hand, they’re large and incredibly efficient, real “people eating” bathrooms in a land that’s often busy and crowded–a stark contrast to the restrooms in Toy Story Land. Plus, the background music ‘radio’ feed is fun and these restrooms are the best place to hear it.
Space 220 Restaurant – As noted above, Epcot has done a lot of washroom work in 2021. Restroom refreshes in World Showcase, in the entrance plaza under Spaceship Earth, and in other areas of the former Future World. However, only one newcomer is a space (comfort) station standout.
Space 220’s is actually a similar story to Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge. The Space 220 restrooms have a sterile quality, but that’s perfect for a space station. There are also a number of clever signs, and the comm chatter you can hear in the restrooms is fun and amusing.
Arendelle/Norway – The other relatively recent addition in Epcot to make the list is the expanded area of the Norway pavilion that is, essentially, the Kingdom of Arendelle.
This area is home to Anna & Elsa’s Royal Sommerhus, the Wandering Reindeer gift shop, and some of the nicest, most modern, and thematically charming restrooms in all of Walt Disney World.
Hollywood Brown Derby – Flush like the stars, in the restroom that is a beacon for the show business elite. These restrooms are located just inside the side entrance to the Hollywood Brown Derby, making them easy options even if you’re not dining at the restaurant.
The two upsides here are that they are rarely crowded and well-themed, making them far and away the best options in a landscape of dull restrooms at Disney’s Hollywood Studios.
Mexico – Despite the restroom situation being pretty deplorable in World Showcase, there are some gems. These include the ones up and outside Katsura Grill in Japan, ones back by International Gateway, and the unheralded ones in the World Showplace pavilion, created to flush in the new millennium.
Of all of these, though, my favorite is the restrooms inside San Angel Inn. Classy, rarely crowded, and the most convenient spot if you’re in urgent need after spending some time at La Cava del Tequila, these are a beacon of light in the darkness that is the World Showcase restrooms.
American Adventure – Modern Americans use the restrooms more than our forefathers in 1982. Or, so you would think if you strolled through the World Showcase and found small restroom after small restroom, all of which are insufficient for demand, especially in the era of “Drinking Around the World.”
Teddy Roosevelt once offered words of motivation to those toiling in the quest to find a restroom in Epcot: “courage is not having the strength to go on; it is going on when you don’t have the strength.” These sage words gave former Epcot VP Jam MacPhee a spark of inspiration, and he used them as his motivation for adding new restrooms to American Adventure. Easily the largest set of restrooms in World Showcase, these toilets embody the American Dream.
Trail’s End & Pioneer Hall – If you’ve ever been in the men’s restroom here, you know exactly why it made the list. That. Mural. I assume (and hope, quite frankly) that this is some sort of twisted inside joke among the Imagineers added clandestinely during construction, and by the time someone in management caught this thing, it was already too late to change it.
Whatever the reason for this inexplicable mural, it is glorious. Sorry, ladies, but from what I understand, you don’t have the national treasure that is this mural in your restroom. Our friend Adam recreated this mural in a brilliant piece of performance art, but I don’t think the internet is ready for that photo yet, so here’s a celebratory group photo of my crew in there following the Walt Disney World Marathon.
Deluxe Resorts – Only commoners should be forced to subject themselves to using paper towel to dry their hands, a truism Disney recognizes when stocking the Deluxe Resort public restrooms with cloth towels for hand-drying. In general, the public restrooms at these resorts are small, but well appointed (often with floor-length, wood doors for the stalls), with nicer soap than their counterparts in the parks. I’m not even kidding.
If I had to pick favorites, I’d choose the restrooms outside of Citricos and Victoria & Albert’s, the hallway near Belle Vue Lounge in BoardWalk Inn, and the lobby level of the Contemporary. With the unwashed masses tracking their muddy boots all over the floor, I guess the parks simply can’t do nicer restrooms? 😉
Tangled Toilets – The opening of the Tangled Toilets paved the way for bathroom blogging, and for that, I think we can all rejoice. There was some initial outrage over the hype about these restrooms, but that was entirely the result of over-coverage by bloggers rather than actual hype by Disney. Sadly, there was no “grand opening” for the restrooms nor a press release.
Irrespective of all that, the restrooms are nice. While they do draw significant crowds due to their location at the boundary between Fantasyland and Liberty Square, they can easily meet demand thanks to their huge size. Other favorites in Magic Kingdom include those in the old Tomorrowland Skyway building (near Carousel of Progress), Tomorrowland Terrace, and tucked away in Caribbean Plaza north of Pirates of the Caribbean.
Restaurantosaurus – I know what you’re thinking: “but Tom, isn’t all of Dino-rama just one giant toilet?” Figuratively, yes. However, I would caution you against treating it as such, because security might disagree with that assessment. Being the newest of the parks, Animal Kingdom was constructed after Walt Disney World had really exploded in popularity, so the park built restrooms in light of modern attendance numbers.
As a result, you don’t really need “hidden gem” restrooms here, as the park does a much better job–on the whole–of meeting restroom demand. There are some colorful locations up in Discovery Island and my second-favorite location is the restrooms in Harambe Village, but the Restaurantosaurus ones are personal favorites.
Journey Into Imagination – This restroom was the inspiration for doing this list in the first place. My absolute favorite restrooms at Walt Disney World. These are on the far right front side of the Imagination Pavilion, and they are never crowded. That’s one selling point, but the even bigger one for a Disney geek like me is that they are one of the last vestiges of EPCOT Center, playing the Journey into Imagination pavilion’s original 1983 background music loop.
While the rest of the pavilion got new music in the late 1990s, these restrooms were strangely forgotten–or intentionally spared so we fans could enjoy this wonderful loop. No comment as to whether I’ve ever spent ~15 minutes in here solely to enjoy the full loop. The video above is a small clip–the entire time I stood there in fear that someone would walk in, because that would’ve been a fun one to explain. YOU’RE WELCOME, AMERICA.
BONUS BATHROOM: Sivako Secret – Will you “rise to the challenge” and use the covert commode in the queue for Avatar Flight of Passage?! There’s actually nothing special about these, aside from their mid-queue location in what’s frequently the longest line at Walt Disney World. That alone can make them the most welcome latrine scene–an oasis in a desert, but in a reverse sense.
The Avatar Flight of Passage mid-queue restrooms were actually added to the attraction not that long ago and were borne of necessity. For the first few years of the attraction’s existence, there was a sign outside the entrance that informed guests there were no restrooms in the queue. Of course, most kids and even adults can’t forecast their bathroom breaks 2-3 hours in advance, so didn’t do a whole lot. Hopefully there’s a Disney+ behind the bathroom scenes on the making of these.
DOUBLE BONUS: Cinderella Castle Suite – Okay, so this one features a royal throne that none of us will ever be able to sit upon (there’s literally a “Show Ready” sign on it, letting you know it’s not for use among us peasants), but we’d be remiss if we didn’t at least mention it here.
You can see more in our Cinderella Castle Suite Photo Tour, but this is unquestionably the most memorable bathroom in all of Walt Disney World. If given the chance, I could spend hours photographing it’s ornate and lavish details–and that bathtub! Wow.
Normally, I avoid speculation as to what Walt Disney would think, but in this case, it goes without saying that Mr. Disney would totally agree with this list of the best bathrooms at Walt Disney World. As he so often said, “if you can dream it, you can do it.” 😉
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Your Thoughts
Everyone has their favorites, so what is your favorite bathroom at Walt Disney World? Any location with particularly exceptional theming? Better than average TP? Great music? Low crowds? Share your wisdom on this urgent matter in the comments below!