The full timeline: every Disney and Universal park, in the order they opened

Seventy years, two companies, and nineteen gates. If you've ever wondered how we got from one park in a California orange grove to today's sprawling global lineup, here's the full order it actually happened in — and why each new park showed up when it did.

1955 — Disneyland, the one that started it all

Disneyland opened in Anaheim, California on July 17, 1955, built in about a single year for roughly $17 million. Opening day itself was a mess: counterfeit tickets meant around 28,000 people showed up against the 11,000 Walt Disney had actually invited, and the live TV special covering it — co-hosted by Art Linkletter, Bob Cummings, and a young Ronald Reagan — is still remembered by park historians as gloriously chaotic. It didn't matter — the "themed land" format Disneyland invented that day is still the template every park on this list follows.

1964 — Universal's quiet, gradual start

Nine years later, Universal Studios Hollywood began its own story, but not as a theme park — it opened on July 15, 1964 as a studio tour, a tram ride through Universal's actual working backlot. The first real ride wasn't added until 1965, and it took until a 1972 expansion for the property to genuinely feel like a theme park rather than a tour with a few added stops. There's no single "grand opening" date to point to here — Universal Hollywood grew into what it is slowly, over almost a decade, rather than arriving fully formed.

1971–1989 — Walt Disney World becomes a resort

Magic Kingdom opened on October 1, 1971, deliberately on a quiet Friday — only about 10,000 people showed up on day one, with the real celebrity-filled grand opening (Bob Hope hosted) not happening until three weeks later.

Eleven years after that, Epcot opened on October 1, 1982. It cost somewhere between $800 million and $1.2 billion — one of the largest private construction projects in the country at the time — and broke ground exactly three years earlier, to the day.

The following year, Disney went international for the first time: Tokyo Disneyland opened on April 15, 1983. It's a detail a lot of guests don't know — Disney doesn't actually own it. It's built and operated under license by a Japanese company, Oriental Land Co., which still runs it today.

Back in Florida, Disney-MGM Studios (now Disney's Hollywood Studios) opened on May 1, 1989 as an honest working production studio co-branded with MGM — only two attractions were actually ready to go on opening day.

1990–1999 — Universal fires back, and Europe joins in

Universal answered Disney-MGM directly: Universal Studios Florida opened on June 7, 1990, a $630 million joint venture with a star-studded ribbon-cutting led by Steven Spielberg. In a funny echo of Magic Kingdom's own rocky start, three of the park's marquee attractions — Jaws, Kongfrontation, and Earthquake — weren't actually working yet on opening day.

Two years later, Disney's second international park opened: Euro Disneyland on April 12, 1992, later renamed Disneyland Paris in 1994. Unlike Tokyo, this one was fully Disney-owned.

Disney's Animal Kingdom opened on April 22, 1998 — deliberately timed for Earth Day. It was so popular on day one that gates opened early and still had to close just 75 minutes later, after roughly 28,000 guests had already poured through the turnstiles.

The following year, Universal answered again: Islands of Adventure opened on May 28, 1999 alongside CityWalk, turning the Orlando property into a genuine multi-park resort for the first time.

2001–2002 — three parks in eighteen months

The early 2000s were the busiest stretch in theme park history. Disney California Adventure opened on February 8, 2001 — the first new gate at the original Disneyland Resort since 1955 — and was widely seen as underwhelming until later overhauls, especially Cars Land in 2012, turned it around.

Seven weeks later, Universal Studios Japan opened in Osaka on March 31, 2001, Universal's first park outside the US. It reached 10 million guests faster than any theme park had before it.

That September, Tokyo DisneySea opened on September 4, 2001 — still the only Disney park built entirely around an ocean theme. It hit 10 million guests in just 307 days, a record for Disney parks at the time.

The following spring, Walt Disney Studios Park opened in Paris on March 16, 2002. In a detail almost nobody following this timeline would have predicted, it was renamed Disney Adventure World in March 2026, tied to a major expansion built around Frozen.

2005–2016 — the move into China

Hong Kong Disneyland opened on September 12, 2005, Disney's first park in China — its opening ceremony was presided over by the country's then–Vice President.

Universal Studios Singapore followed with a soft opening on March 18, 2010, and a formal grand opening over a year later on May 28, 2011.

Then came Shanghai Disneyland on June 16, 2016 — Disney's first park in mainland China, and at the time, one of the largest foreign investments Shanghai had ever seen.

2021–2025 — the newest generation

Universal Beijing Resort opened on September 20, 2021, two full decades after it was first planned. It's now the largest Universal Studios park in the world, with 37 rides and attractions.

And most recently, Universal Epic Universe opened in Orlando on May 22, 2025 — the first major new theme park built in Orlando in 25 years, and the single largest investment Comcast/NBCUniversal has ever made in theme parks.

The full order, at a glance

1. 1955 — Disneyland (Anaheim)
2. 1964 — Universal Studios Hollywood (gradual, as a studio tour)
3. 1971 — Magic Kingdom
4. 1982 — Epcot
5. 1983 — Tokyo Disneyland
6. 1989 — Disney-MGM Studios / Hollywood Studios
7. 1990 — Universal Studios Florida
8. 1992 — Disneyland Paris (as Euro Disneyland)
9. 1998 — Disney's Animal Kingdom
10. 1999 — Universal's Islands of Adventure
11. 2001 — Disney California Adventure
12. 2001 — Universal Studios Japan
13. 2001 — Tokyo DisneySea
14. 2002 — Walt Disney Studios Park (now Disney Adventure World)
15. 2005 — Hong Kong Disneyland
16. 2011 — Universal Studios Singapore
17. 2016 — Shanghai Disneyland
18. 2021 — Universal Beijing Resort
19. 2025 — Universal Epic Universe

Final thought

Look at the list long enough and a pattern shows up: almost every park on it exists because of the one before it. Universal built a Florida resort because Disney did. Disney went to California Adventure because Universal proved a second gate could work. Every "first Disney park in X" or "largest Universal park yet" is really just the next move in a seventy-year game the two companies have been playing with each other — and with us, since we're the ones who get to go ride it.