Harry Potter’s Wizarding Worlds: London vs Orlando – Which Is Better?

I’m a HUGE Harry Potter nerd and like any other Harry Potter fan, there are 2 world-wide MUST visit attractions I just had to go to. So rather than between England and Iowa…this is more between London and Orlando! England, UK is home to the Warner Bros Studio Tour…and Florida, USA has The Wizarding World of Harry Potter, so let’s have a wizard dual between the two, which is better?!

Harry Potter London vs Orlando: WB Studio Tours or Wizarding World of Harry Potter?

Warner Bros Studio Tour: Making of Harry Potter (UK)

Despite Harry Potter essentially being a British creation, there’s actually no such thing as the ‘Wizarding World of Harry Potter’ in London…or even the UK! For now, it’s the USA and Japan that get the glory of that particular attraction. However, London does have the Making of Harry Potter at the Warner Bros Studio Tour!

Leavesden Studios in Watford (just outside London) is where the majority of filming for the Harry Potter movies took place. When filming finished, the studio opened its doors to visiting guests!  It showcases some of the real sets and props used during the filming of the Harry Potter series.

Other than the first 10 minutes or so, the rest of the time at the Warner Bros Studio Tour is self guided or with the help of an audio guide for an extra charge. I’ve been twice and both times it took around 3 hours to go around. It could easily take longer if you were to stop and look at every little prop on display.

You even get the opportunity to sit on a broomstick rig in front of a green screen background and watch as you fly through the streets of London or around the castle! It continues to expand, they have now re-created Kings Cross train station complete with the Hogwarts Express and the Forbidden Forest!

They also hold themed evening meals in The Great Hall for special occasions, such as: Christmas and Valentine’s Day.

The majority of the tour is inside, there’s just a small outside ‘backlot’ area that has the houses of Privet Drive and Godric’s Hollow, the Knightbus and the rickety old Hogwarts bridge that appears in a couple of the movies. Even if it’s raining it is possible to get between the indoor areas without getting wet as part of it is covered by a canopy.

Good Points

• It’s the REAL sets!!! The Great Hall, Diagon Alley and the Hogwarts Castle model are brilliant and it makes you feel all warm and fuzzy inside when you stop and think how many great actors and actresses have stood on those sets too! Not going to lie, when I saw The Great Hall for the first time, I did nearly cry, I think I’m allowed to, I’ve grown up with Harry Potter! (I was 10 when I first started reading the books…I’m now 30).
• The broomstick experience is fun…even for the adults! You get robes to wear and everything!

• For visitors in England, it’s easy to get to. It’s just off the M25 if driving or they have shuttle buses to and from the nearest train station (Watford Junction) that has links to central London.
• Butterbeer. It’s odd, but strangely addictive!
• It’s not too over crowded. Although they don’t try and shuffle you on, entrance is at staggered times, so it’s easy to get photos with the props and sets, without getting too many heads in view!

• I’ve visited twice now and each time I’ve been, I’ve spotted different things that I hadn’t seen on my first visit!
• Again, release your inner child, even if you’re an adult (especially if you’re a travel lover…), you can pick up a ‘Harry Potter Passport‘ at Customer Services, while walking around, keep an eye out for machines to collect passport stamps! 
• There are plenty of photo opportunities too, whether you choose to ‘run through the wall’ at Platform 9 and 3/4, sit in a Ford Anglia, knock on the front door of Number 4 Privet Drive, stand on the back of the Knight Bus or take part in one of the green screen experiences!

• The gift shop is huge and on the way out (other than the smaller ‘Kings Cross Station’ shop), so if you buy anything you don’t have to worry about having to carry it around, unlike the shops at the theme parks!

Bad Points

• Having the staff in the uniforms and costumes would add to the magic! Currently they only do this during theme weeks or special days.
• Obviously some things don’t look like how they do in the films…the pictures don’t really move…you just see the green screen, props like the Chamber of Secrets door isn’t always turned on etc.
• There are no ‘rides’ in the tradition theme park sense.

Ticket prices range in price, plus there are family ticket options and packages with guide books etc available. Find out more on the WB Studio Tours website.

Related Reading: Harry Potter Inspired London Itinerary: 4 Days

The Wizarding World of Harry Potter (USA)

Living in the UK, it’s a long expensive trip over to the States just to go and see it. Tucked away in the corner of Universal’s Islands of Adventure theme park, lays a HUGE ‘Hogwarts’ castle and the snowy streets of Hogsmeade Village and train station.

The theme park next door, Universal Studios, is now home to Diagon Alley and Kings Cross. If you have a park hopper ticket, you can jump on the ‘Hogwarts Express‘ and ride between the 2 parks! This half of the attraction wasn’t yet built when I visited, so my opinions are based on the Island’s of Adventure side!

There’s now a second Wizarding World of Harry Potter in California too!

The Wizrding World of Harry Potter has different aspects from the Studio Tour. For starters, there are 4 rides:

• Harry Potter and the Forbidden Journey
• The Flight of the Hippogriff
• Hagrid’s Magical Creatures Motorbike Adventure (all Islands of Adventure)
• Harry Potter and the Escape From Gringotts (Universal Studio).

The Forbidden Journey is inside Hogwarts Castle and in my eyes, has one of the best queue lines of any ride I’ve been on. The ride itself amazed me. The technology was incredible, having a mixture of motion and picture (not like regular 4D type rides, the cars actually move around on a track) and the joins between scenes were seamless, again, I nearly cried at the end of it!

Good points

• It allows you to LIVE Harry Potter, you can wander into shops and eat in the ‘pubs’ that you recognise from the books (even get an owl post ink stamp for postcards!), feel like you are walking the Hogwarts corridors (with moving pictures on the walls!) and watch performances from the frog choir and the 2 foreign exchange schools from Goblet of Fire. The staff members are all dressed in costume!

• The frozen Butterbeer is awesome. Only the regular Butterbeer is available at the WB Studio Tour, but the frozen version beats it hands down!
• The ticket obviously includes access to the rest of Islands of Adventure, if you buy a hopper, you can go into Universal Studios next door on the same ticket.
• They’ve added interactive elements, so if you buy a wand, you can actually control some of the surroundings!
• The rides are AMAZING.

Bad Points

• Although all the cast members are dressed up in costumes and school uniforms, they obviously had American accents (being in America!). For me this kind of ruined the affect as Harry Potter is very English, to the point where it was a requirement of the actors cast in the movies. It was strange having the wrong accent in the uniforms!! (Just to cover myself, I have NOTHING against the USA accent, after all I lived in the US…but Harry Potter is English so it was strange!)
• The queues for the rides can be pretty awful and there’s obviously no control on the amount of people that are let in the area so it gets crowded throughout the day.

• It doesn’t happen very often, but being an outdoor attraction, the weather can affect operations at the parks. For example, outside roller coasters won’t run in electrical storms (they did actually shut down for part of my visit in June 2012 for this reason).
• Again, the expense. Even the basic park entry is expensive, but then you do get access to everywhere in the park, not just the Harry Potter area. It does feel like they have split up the Harry Potter parks purposely to make more money as people will buy a park-to-park ticket rather than just a single day pass as it’s $55 MORE. Then if you want the wand to ‘play’ with the surroundings, that’s extra etc.

For more information on tickets, attractions and exact hours, visit the Universal Orlando website.

*TIP FOR VISITING WIZARDING WORLD OF HARRY POTTER* We found that the cheapest accommodation for visiting Universal was to stay at the ‘Days Inn Universal Maingate‘. It was very basic and we had 5 million pizza delivery leaflets shoved under the door each night, but when you are at the park all day, which is only a 20 minute walk away, we were able to overlook all the leaflets!

The Round-up

For me, I think I preferred the WB Studio Tour, just because it’s the real life home of Harry Potter and nothing will ever take away the magic of walking into The Great Hall for the first time, it really is amazing. The huge amount of props they have on display is awesome too, they span all 8 films so as you can imagine, there are quite a lot!

(There’s a bit of a size difference between the two Hogwarts Castles!)

Don’t get me wrong though, the experience you get at Universal is definitely worth seeing! The major difference between the two, is that one is more like a museum and the other is more interactive…do you want a behind the scenes look or do you want to feel like you are part of the wizarding world!?

A good thing is that both attractions keep expanding and changing so you could go back several times and see something new!

Which would you pick: Harry Potter London or Orlando? Pin It For Later!

Last Updated on April 29, 2024