Droid Depot at the Walt Disney World Resort

If you love R2-D2 and BB-8, you'll love visiting the Droid Depot at Star Wars: Galaxy's Edge at Disney's Hollywood Studios.  The Droid Depot gives guests the opportunity to build their very own droid!

The Droid Depot is Black Spire Outpost's industrial workshop filled with parts, chips, manuals, and tools to build a custom Astromech Unit. When you arrive at the Depot, you'll have the choice between building a BB-series unit or R-series unit. Once you make your selection, the clerk will provide you with a basket that includes a blueprint to design your droid. When my son and I visited, we opted to make a BB Unit. 

After you've made your series selection, you'll make your way over to the Parts Station. This is where you'll gather the parts for your droid. You'll see a variety of parts pass by on the conveyor belt and each part is available in an assortment of colors. Look at the blueprint on the bottom of your basket to determine which parts you need for the series you selected. I found it to be slightly confusing as to which parts went with our series but the Cast Members were very helpful in letting me know which parts I needed to look for. You can pick whatever colors you'd like for each part. My son picked out all red pieces and then wanted to switch to orange to match BB-8 so we put all our pieces back and started again!

Parts Station Conveyor Belt

Finally have all of our parts. The basket was a little heavy for my 3 year old!

Build Station

Once you've gathered all of the pieces for your droid and you're happy with your color choices, you can visit a Build Station. There are "placemat" style instructions located at each station that you can follow to build your droid. To be completely honest, I was lost when I first looked at the instructions and wasn't quite sure where to begin. (I'm sure my 3-year old asking me questions non-stop didn't help me focus on the task at hand.) If you find yourself lost like I was, simply ask the Cast Members for assistance as they were very helpful in showing me what I needed to do. 

Build Station Instructions

After assembling your droid, you will then go through the activation process. Cast Members will instruct you to push the big red button to activate your droid and then they'll show you how to use the remote and you can test your droid. It's then time to place your droid in a box or bag if you purchased that item, and then exit the Depot. 

My son absolutely loved the experience and is ready to go back to make another droid! The experience lasts about 20 minutes and despite my struggles, it's really not too difficult to build. Disney recommends that guests participating in this experience be ages 3 and up and after going with my 3 year old, I agree. (Although, you probably want to wait until they're a little older, if not for them but for your own sanity.)

Testing our BB-8

Reservations are highly recommended but the Droid Depot can also accommodate walk-ins based on availability. If this is on your Must-Do list, I recommend making a reservation 60 days in advance. The experience area is limited to the builder and one guest, with at least one person in the party being age 14 or older. Only the builder gets to build a droid so if you want to build 2 droids, you'll need to make 2 reservations. 

Droid Package Backpack

The cost is $99.99 per droid unit, plus tax and includes a box to carry your droid plus instructions and remote. Personality chips and other accessories are available at an additional cost. We opted to purchase the Droid Package which at the time of our visit cost $164.97 plus tax, and included a droid, personality chip and a backpack. 

A theme park reservation and a valid park ticket or Annual Pass are required to enter Disney's Hollywood Studios for this experience so make sure you have a Disney Park Pass Reservation for Disney's Hollywood Studios on the day you book your Droid Depot reservation. Remember, your Kingdom Konsultant Agent can help you make those reservations.

We visited before the COVID-19 safety protocols were put in place but rest assured this experience is still available with new safety guidelines. There are now dividers between each Build Station and floor markings letting you know where to stand in the queue, at the Parts and Build Stations. Face coverings are required at all Disney Parks and must be worn during this experience. You'll find hand sanitizing stations at the entrance of the Droid Depot so you can use some before and after the experience. 

If you're a Star Wars fan I would highly recommend this experience at least once. It's really fun and makes for a great souvenir to bring home! 

*Pictures were taken in February 2020 before COVID-19 safety guidelines.

Ashley Lehman

Ashley has been a Disney Parks fan from an early age and loves anything vintage Disney. You can email Ashley at ashley@kingdomkonsultant.com.