Every New Disney Ride Coming in the Next Year, From Encanto to a Brand New Space Mountain

Disney has eight new rides on the way across four resorts, led by Animal Kingdom's Tropical Americas, a reworked Carousel of Progress and Tokyo's rebuilt Space Mountain. Here's where each one stands.

By Jeanpierre Florent · FirstDrop News TeamOct 10, 20266 min read

Outside DINOSAUR at Disney's Animal Kingdom, the building Indiana Jones is taking overPhoto: mrkathika / Flickr, CC BY-SA 2.0

Disney's next year is going to be a busy one. Between Walt Disney World, Tokyo, Shanghai and Paris, eight new rides are in the works, and a few of them are big swings: the first Encanto ride anywhere, an Indiana Jones adventure built inside the old DINOSAUR show building, and a Space Mountain in Tokyo rebuilt from the ground up.

Some have firm opening windows and some only have a year attached. Here's every one of them, what we know about the story and the ride, and how close each one is to opening.

Walt Disney World: Tropical Americas

Three of the eight rides belong to Tropical Americas, the 11 acre land replacing DinoLand U.S.A. at Disney's Animal Kingdom. Disney has pointed to 2027 for the land, but it hasn't named a season, and the year has quietly disappeared from one of its own planning pages. Disney hasn't announced a delay, so 2027 is still the working target.

Indiana Jones and the Myth of the Jade Serpent

The headliner takes over the building that housed DINOSAUR, which closed in February 2026. Disney revealed the name in August. Riders head out on an archaeological dig at an ancient Maya temple, and everything goes wrong when a portal to the underworld opens up.

Expect a dark, bumpy ride. DINOSAUR already used the same style of bucking motion vehicle as Disneyland's Indiana Jones Adventure, which makes the building a natural fit. The story is set in the 1950s, before the events of Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, and Indy himself appears as a Harrison Ford Audio-Animatronics figure.

The big moment comes near the end, when riders come face to face with Tsukán, a giant serpent like creature built as an Audio-Animatronics figure of its own. Construction is well along, and the temple facade is already rising at the front of the building.

It is the end of the road for DINOSAUR, which opened with the park in 1998 as Countdown to Extinction before taking the name of the Disney film in 2000. Its show building and ride system get a second life here, which is a big part of why the Indiana Jones ride could be built in the same footprint.

Antonio's Fiesta de Encanto

This will be Disney's first Encanto attraction anywhere. It's a slow moving musical dark ride for the whole family, set on the day Antonio Madrigal receives his gift of talking to animals. It sits in Pueblo Esperanza, the village side of Tropical Americas, and it's the kind of ride that should work for every age in the group.

El Carrusel de los Animalitos

The third piece of the land is a merry-go-round with a backstory. A local woodcarver in Pueblo Esperanza built it with steeds based on his favorite animals from Disney stories, and the lineup includes Eeyore, Bambi, Heimlich the caterpillar from A Bug's Life and Squirt the sea turtle from Finding Nemo.

Walt Disney World: Magic Kingdom and Hollywood Studios

Walt Disney's Carousel of Progress

One of Magic Kingdom's oldest shows is getting a major overhaul. The rotating theater still moves an American family through time, but the scenes are changing. The current version visits the 1900s, 1920s, 1940s and 1990s, and the new one moves to 1964, 1985, 1999 and the distant future.

There's a new introduction too, led by an Audio-Animatronics figure of Walt Disney himself. The updated show is set to return in late spring 2027, which makes it one of the more firmly dated projects on this list.

The Carousel of Progress started life at the 1964 New York World's Fair before moving to Magic Kingdom in 1975, so the new 1964 scene is a nod to where the show began. It is also one of the few attractions Walt Disney worked on personally, which makes his Audio-Animatronics introduction feel earned.

A holiday scene in Walt Disney's Carousel of ProgressPhoto: JeffChristiansen / Flickr, CC BY 2.0

Monstropolis

Hollywood Studios' Monsters, Inc. land isn't one of the eight rides opening in the next year, but it's coming right behind them. Monstropolis opens in waves, with an indoor show and dining in the first phase in 2027. The marquee attraction, a suspended roller coaster, is likely to follow in 2028.

Tokyo Disneyland: a new Tomorrowland

Tokyo is rebuilding a large part of Tomorrowland, and two of the eight rides are part of that project.

Tomorrowland at Tokyo DisneylandPhoto: Wpcpey / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0

Space Mountain Earthrise

Tokyo's original Space Mountain is gone. It was demolished, and the new indoor coaster is being built from scratch instead of updated. It's called Space Mountain Earthrise, and Oriental Land Company says the name comes from the view of Earth rising past the edge of the moon, the same way the sun rises over the horizon.

The original opened with Tokyo Disneyland on April 15, 1983, and ran for more than four decades, so replacing it outright instead of refreshing it is a big statement from the park.

Space Mountain at Tokyo Disneyland before it was demolishedPhoto: Dick Thomas Johnson / Flickr, CC BY 2.0

The Imagineering team behind it wants riders to come off the coaster with a fresh appreciation for Earth and how rare it is out there. Space Mountain Earthrise and the new Tomorrowland Plaza around it are set for a 2027 grand opening, with no season announced yet.

Sugar Rush: Sweet Rescue

Disney's first Wreck-It Ralph ride moves into the old Buzz Lightyear's Astro Blasters space, which closed on October 31, 2024, and reuses its ride system. The Sugar Rush game is glitching, and riders help Ralph and Vanellope fix the code before it's too late. It's set for spring 2027.

Since both rides belong to the same Tomorrowland project, some fans expect them to open together around Tokyo Disneyland's April 15 anniversary. That's a prediction, though, and nothing official points to that date yet.

Shanghai Disneyland

Spider-Man roller coaster

Shanghai is building a Spider-Man coaster that runs mostly outdoors. In the story, Peter Parker's Spider-Bot helpers give him more than he bargained for, and riders get caught in the middle as Spider-Man tries to stop the rogue robots. The track is already fully assembled, but Disney hasn't confirmed a 2027 opening.

Disneyland Paris

Wilderness Explorers Sky Swings

At Disney Adventure World, the park that used to be called Walt Disney Studios Park, a Pixar themed chain swing ride is on the way. It follows Russell from Up as he earns his aviation badge. It won't headline the park, but it adds another ride that the whole family can do together.

What about Disneyland?

Disneyland Resort isn't getting a new ride in the next year, but it is bringing back three favorites: the Remember... Dreams Come True fireworks, the original World of Color and the Magic Happens daytime parade, which returns in summer 2027.

The ones to watch

Tropical Americas and the Tokyo Tomorrowland project account for five of the eight rides, so those are the two to keep an eye on. Carousel of Progress has the most specific window so far, while the Shanghai coaster is the biggest question mark despite its finished track.

We'll keep this list updated as Disney locks in opening dates, so check back as 2027 gets closer.

Written by Jeanpierre Florent, part of the FirstDrop News Team

Jeanpierre is the Southern California based creator behind JPLAND21, a theme park community of more than one million subscribers across YouTube and Instagram. Our reporting is grounded in regular firsthand park visits. More about us