6. Tokyo DisneySea

Image: Disney

Ride Count: 19

Tokyo DisneySea has a pretty hefty lineup of rides, but even better, each of those rides is one of the best in the world. The park's first success is in featuring so many one-of-a-kind exclusive rides that spared no expense (thanks to Tokyo's apparently limitless budget and management's insistence that the resort be home to only the best of the best). The park's Journey to the Center of the Earth alone functions as a shimmering icon, making the park a veritable Mecca for Disney Parks fans across the world.

The second big win is that, where DisneySea does clone rides from American parks, it improves upon them rather than simply copying them. Their Toy Story Midway Mania, Tower of Terror, and Indiana Jones Adventure are markedly different from American counterparts. That's to say nothing of DisneySea's towering settings and incredible details that earn it many enthusiasts' title of the best theme park on Earth. Bursting with rides? No. But DisneySea exemplifies quality over quantity. 

What's Next: DisneySea initially announced plans to bring a Scandanavian (read, Frozen) port to the park's largest expansion pad for 2017. Since then, they've walked back plans for the animated land to reevaluate, which many U.S. fans feel is the right thing to do. For now, the park's largest project is transforming Stormrider, an opening day original, into Nemo and Friend's Searider. It's very unlike the renowned and internationally celebrated park to shutter an original concept (even a mediocre one like Stormrider) in favor of a cartoon intellectual property, so fans are eager to see how this develops. In any case, it's an even trade, leaving the park's ride count at 19.

5. Disneyland Paris

Image: Disney

Ride Count: 21

Disneyland Paris is perhaps the most beautiful Disneyland-style park on Earth. It was built with an attention to detail and a focus on storytelling that rivals Disney's Animal Kingdom, but it also has plenty of rides: a perfect mixture of style and substance. Granted, the Paris park has fought an uphill battle to its current place, including some odd operations missteps. It also doesn't seem that major attraction investment is in its immediate future, but today it has a healthy lineup of rides that can sustain the European resort for a while as it focuses on maintenence. Like DisneySea, even rides borrowed from other Disney Parks were given entirely new identities and stories to fit the romantic and literary European locale.

What's Next: As it is, Disneyland Paris is in a perpetual state of catch-up. The resort's infamous financial pitfall of an opening derailed Disney Parks plans for decades, turning executives off of ambitious expansion and cutting costs across the division for years (and in some ways, up to today). Somehow - despite being the #1 paid attendence tourist attraction in Europe - Disneyland Paris still can't seem to get on track (and Walt Disney Studios isn't helping).

For now, it looks like refurbishment is the name of the game, with an overdue Star Tours upgrade, renovation to Space Mountain and Big Thunder Mountain, and general clean-up of the park's once-luxuriously detailed setting. And truthfully, that's how it should be. No reason to open new rides while the rest of the park is still falling behind.

4. Disney California Adventure

Image: Disney

Ride Count: 21

A far cry from its opening lineup just a handful of years ago, Disney California Adventure is now a powerhouse. The once-infamous second gate at Disneyland Resort opened to lackluster sales and near-boycotts from Disney Parks fans for its irreverent tone, cheap theme, modern setting, and worst of all, its lack of much to do. We chronicled the in-depth story behind the creatively starved park in its own Dateline Disaster: Disney California Adventure feature. Originally advertising parked tractors and tortilla factory tours as full-fledged attractions, the park had only two stand-out rides in its miniscule lineup when it opened. Disneyland's intensely local and generations-long visitors wasted little time before outright ignoring the place.

In 2007, The Walt Disney Company announced an unprecedented $1.2 billion complete floor-to-ceiling renovation of the park re-theming almost every existing ride and adding many, many more. Between its lackluster opening and today, Disney California Adventure has added a dozen rides or more, each more spectacular than the last and culminating in the opening of Cars Land and Buena Vista Street in 2012.

What's Next: In 2017, Disney will pull the plug on the park's relatively new headlining Twilight Zone Tower of Terror to transform the "13-story" drop ride into Guardians of the Galaxy – Mission: BREAKOUT! Fans largely detest the change that will tamper with the park's $1.2 billion rebirth as an idealized, historic Golden Age of California narrative, but Disney isn't stepping back the decision. The odd move that's become a symbol of Disney's short-sighted, IP-obsessed strategy of late will, nonetheless, leave the park's ride count at 21. But Disney's made it clear that this unusual transformation is only the kick-off point for an upcoming Marvel super hero themed land that will take shape at the park in stages over the coming years, expected to add at least a major ride or two. 

3. Magic Kingdom

Image: Disney

Ride Count: 25

The Florida Project began with the opening of Magic Kingdom, a super-sized version of Walt's original Disneyland. Taking all they'd learned from the little California park and growing it, Magic Kingdom has a whole lot of land available to it. It has a sizable collection of rides at 25, which can easily fill a day or two. Also interesting is that Magic Kingdom has more rides than Walt Disney World's other three parks combined!

What's Next: Magic Kingdom just finished up New Fantasyland, a revitilization of the 1971 original. More than half of the land was flattened and re-built with outstanding, DisneySea-esque environments based on Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, The Little Mermaid, and Beauty and the Beast. Unfortunately for the park's ride count, the ambitious and extraordinary expansion added a net one ride, since one closed to make way for it. Still, the experience is vastly improved and at the end of the day, that's what counts.

2. Tokyo Disneyland

Image: Disney

Ride Count: 26

Disney's first foray into international parks may still be its most successful. The Oriental Land Company actually owns and operates all of the Tokyo Disney Resort, paying big licensing fees to Disney to use its names, characters, and likenesses almost like a franchisee. Luckily, the Company also had the foresight to know just what the Japanese wanted. They very purposefully designed a park based closely on Florida's Magic Kingdom. They didn't want to have a "Japanese" version of a Disney Park. They wanted the Western version, just with supersized pathways!

The park itself actually has more rides than Magic Kingdom, and it's no surprise. Tokyo's park needs all the capacity it can get to handle the crowds. Their Tokyo Disneyland is one of the most-visited parks in the world, full of frenzied Japanese fans who completely buy out gift shops each night and queue hours to meet obscure Disney characters. But the cultural traditions of the Japanese always win out, as order, kindness, and friendly behavior always mark a day at the parks. And you won't find a single piece of litter anywhere. It's truly a remarkable place and a culture that wildly embraces Disney's culture.

What's Next: Along with the DisneySea expansion, Tokyo Disneyland will get its own New Fantasyland over the course of the next few years, due to finish in 2018. Modeled after Magic Kingdom's, it will feature a Beauty and the Beast sub-area and an entire zone dedicated to Alice in Wonderland, as well as a new Big Hero 6 ride in Tomorrowland. That said, Disney hasn't announced any official attraction counts yet, and the expansion is expected to wipe out some existing ones. So we'll see. 

1. Disneyland Park

Image: Disney

Ride Count: 34

Disneyland fans often proclaim their superiority to Magic Kingdom by using the phrase "quality over quantity." We won't say who wins in the former, but believe it or not, Disneyland has a LOT more rides than Magic Kingdom! It makes sense, though. After all, Disneyland Park has all of Magic Kingdom's E-tickets (Pirates of the Caribbean, Space Mountain, Haunted Mansion, etc) plus many more (Roger Rabbit's Car Toon Spin, Indiana Jones Adventure, Star Tours, Matterhorn, etc). And that's to say nothing of Disneyland exclusives like Storybook Land Canal Boats, Mr. Toad's Wild Ride, Snow White's Scary Adventures, Pinocchio's Daring Journey, and Alice in Wonderland.

The end result is that Disneyland Park is quite a bit smaller than Magic Kingdom, but actually has 10 more rides. You can chalk that up to a number of variables, like Disneyland's need to grow (whereas Walt DIsney World executives tend see their parks as "mature," sure that they could invest practically nothing and still "coast" for many years of pop culture, American dream wonderment) or the original park's 16 year headstart on its sister.

What's Next: Disney's Hollywood Studios isn't the only park that will soon be home to a Star Wars land. In fact, Disneyland Park will recieve its own copy of the interstellar port planet and its two signature E-ticket attractions. Not much is known about the two rides beyond the most general of plot details. While the signature land should be stunning in its execution and detail, some fans have voiced concern about how a Star Wars land changes everything at Disneyland. Maybe it's a fair point, and we explore it in our feature. But when the area opens (probably in 2019 or so), Disneyland will have two more astounding rides, putting it even more firmly in the lead.

Resort Versus Resort

Consider these unexpected statistics for total ride counts at each resort as of today.

• Walt Disney World: 46 rides
• Disneyland Resort: 55 rides
• Disneyland Paris: 31 rides
• Tokyo Disney Resort: 44 rides

That's right: the entire Disneyland Resort (including its two theme parks, three hotels, and Downtown Disney) could comfortably fit inside of Disney's Animal Kingdom's borders, but the Californian resort's two parks have more rides than all four of Walt Disney World's combined. Again, that's just rides (no walkthroughs, shows, character experiences, or other "attractions") but the side-by-side is really astounding and, maybe, just a little telling. That's why we've shown them here!

The two parks of Tokyo Disney Resort contain almost as many rides as all four of Walt Disney World's added together. 

Disneyland Paris still brings up the rear since its second park isn't yet able to pull its weight. We hope and expect that that will change at some point, but until then the resort's average is drawn down.

We know that at the end of the day, it's not always about rides. We know that shows and entertainment and streetmosphere and attractions and walkthroughs can make or break the experience. But in terms of measuring the stuff that brings people to parks, it's worthwhile to look at rides for a sense of investment.

If you're interested, click on to the final page for an alphabetical listing of the rides we counted.