Crush’s Coaster Closed for its Biggest Overhaul Ever
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Guests who sprint to ride the East Australian current at rope drop, where queue times regularly hit 210 minutes in the first hour of opening, are out of luck for a while. Crush’s Coaster closed on Sunday 6 September for the most extensive refurbishment it’s had since opening 20 years ago, and it won’t reopen until summer 2027.
Ten months is a long time to go without the only ride of its kind in the world. And with Disney Adventure World already four years into near-constant construction, it’s fair to wonder whether this is the investment it looks like, or one closure too many.
What’s happening with the Crush’s Coaster refurbishment
The work, announced earlier this year, is set to run in two phases starting with a full technical overhaul. Imagineers have their work cut out to replace control systems, sensors, communication gear and sections of track before conducting months of testing to ensure everything’s working when the ride reopens in 2027.
That alone would be a substantial job but Disneyland Paris are going even further.
Teams from Design & Delivery, Walt Disney Imagineering Paris, Maintenance and the Central Workshops are being brought in to also clean, repaint and repair the ride’s scenic elements.
The goal is to keep the Finding Nemo theming intact, not to rework it from scratch.
What’s undeniable is that twenty years of daily use is finally catching up with it. Crush’s Coaster closed for around six months back in 2015, but this refurbishment runs more than double that.
By Disney’s own description, it’s the most significant the ride’s ever had.
Whether it goes far enough though is top of guests’ minds. One frequent visitor pointed to the visible track walls and ceiling breaking the illusion of being underwater, a theming issue the confirmed technical work, sensors and control systems, may not touch at all.
Crush’s Coaster Refurbishment: Good investment, bad timing?
Crush’s Coaster is the only Finding Nemo ride anywhere in the world, so a trip to Disneyland Paris is the only way to experience the gyroscopic coaster full stop.
Which is exactly why the timing stings. The ride opened back in 2007, five years after Disneyland Paris opened its second park, Walt Disney Studios. After the rebrand of the park earlier this year and the launch of World of Frozen, the extensive refurbishment of Crush’s Coaster lands hard when everything else should feel “new”.
Losing one of its most distinctive rides for ten months in the middle of that is a harder gap to ignore than it would have been a year or two ago.
Disney’s own wording suggests it feels that pressure too. The announcement leans on “care for” and “preserve,” not “retheme” or “reimagine,” language that points to a refurbishment built to keep the ride running for years to come rather than change what makes it special in the first place.
That distinction matters when you look at what else is coming. Disneyland Paris confirmed at D23 in August that Space Mountain is undergoing its own major transformation, closing at the end of 2027, and unlike Crush’s Coaster, Star Wars: Hyperspace Mountain will be rethemed to make way for a return to the ride’s original 1995 design. Both are investment, but only one changes what the ride is. Crush’s Coaster is being preserved. Space Mountain is being returned to something.
The timing of the announcements is interesting, too. Disneyland Paris has recently started giving guests longer notice on major closures, with both Space Mountain and Frozen Ever After flagged roughly a year ahead. Crush’s Coaster follows that pattern, though ten months for a ride that closed for six in 2015 is a different scale of work.
Taken together it’s a real sign of investment, but the sequencing is worth questioning. If Crush’s Coaster needed this level of work, it’s fair to ask why it wasn’t folded into the years of construction the park was already living through, rather than opening a fresh closure right as Disney Adventure World was meant to be turning a corner.
For guests who’ve now sat through four-plus years of disruption across Disney Adventure World, another standalone closure is a harder pill to swallow than the investment itself should be.
What Crush’s Coaster’s closure means for your trip
Reopening Summer 2027
Disney hasn’t given a more specific reopening date beyond summer 2027, so it’s worth checking back closer to your travel dates rather than banking on an exact month.
The good news is the closure’s contained to the ride itself. Disney Adventure World will stay fully open throughout, with only Crush’s Coaster and the small stretch of pathway where meet-and-greets currently happen affected. Everything else in Worlds of Pixar carries on as normal.
So if your visit falls before summer 2027, build your must-do list around what’s actually open rather than a ride you can’t get on. Save Crush’s Coaster itself for the return trip, whether that’s your first time riding it or your chance to see how the refreshed version compares to the one you remember.
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About the author
Sam Doyle is a Disney-loving mum of three and the creator of Pixie Dust Wanderlust — a go-to planning resource for Disneyland Paris trips. Known for her honest advice and magical practicality, Sam helps families and solo travellers simplify the planning process so they can actually enjoy their trip, not just survive it.