Disney's All-Star Music Resort

Value is the category, and Disney uses that word precisely rather than politely. It buys you three-storey blocks with outdoor walkways, a food court in place of a table-service restaurant, and car parks framed by props built at the scale of a house. All-Star Music sits at the southern edge of Walt Disney World, sharing an access road with All-Star Sports and All-Star Movies.

Music is the organising idea, and it is spelled out in giant objects rather than hinted at. Calypso drums, a jukebox for the rock section, cowboy boots and a country fairground, jazz instruments and Broadway theatre masks stand over the five courtyards. Melody Hall is the main building. Reception, the Intermission Food Court, the shop and the arcade all sit inside it, so almost everything you need day to day happens within a few steps of one set of doors.

What sets Music apart from its two sisters is the family suite. Parties of up to six sleep in a single booking, with a separate bedroom, a kitchenette and two bathrooms, which is the most genuinely useful thing any value resort offers a British family travelling with three or four children. Art of Animation is the only other Disney value resort that sells them.

Early Theme Park Entry applies here in full. Every guest gets 30 minutes inside a theme park before the published opening time, every morning of the stay, exactly as a family paying four times as much at the Grand Floridian does. Extended Evening Hours are a separate perk restricted to Deluxe and Deluxe Villa guests, and they do not apply at any value resort, whatever a booking site implies.

Standard rooms are the default booking and the cheapest way in, and you are paying for a bed rather than a view: a car park, a roofline or a stretch of landscaping. The blocks holding them sit furthest from Melody Hall, so there are a few minutes on your feet before breakfast and the bus stop. For a family who plan to be out of the door by half seven, that walk costs almost nothing.

Preferred rooms are the same room in a better position. Disney places them close to Melody Hall and the transport stop, which matters more than it sounds like it should after a fourteen hour day on your feet. Parents pushing a buggy, anyone travelling with a grandparent, and families who come back for a midday swim all tend to find it money well spent.

Family suites are the reason many British families pick Music over Sports or Movies. Disney describes them as sleeping up to six, with a bedroom holding a queen bed, a living area with a double sleeper sofa, a sleeper chair and a sleeper ottoman, plus a kitchenette and two bathrooms. Two bathrooms is the detail that changes a fortnight. A kettle, a microwave and a fridge in the kitchenette also mean breakfast in the room on the mornings nobody can face queueing.

Bed layouts vary by category and by date, and Disney shows the exact configuration on the booking page for the nights you are pricing. Check it there rather than assuming, particularly if you have older teenagers who will not share. Accessible rooms are sold in the standard, preferred and suite categories, and connecting rooms can be requested but never guaranteed.

Storage is the common complaint from anyone packing for two weeks. Standard rooms give you a small fridge, a coffee maker, a safe, a hairdryer and a table that ends up holding suncream and park bags rather than meals. Housekeeping runs daily. Empty suitcases generally live under the bed or on top of the wardrobe, and in a suite they go in the second bathroom.

Come back at two on a hot afternoon and Calypso Pool is where the day turns around. The main pool is shaped like a guitar, holds a little over 251,000 gallons, and has a bright fountain of the Three Caballeros at its centre. Donald Duck, Jose Carioca and Panchito spray water at anyone who gets close, which children find funny for far longer than adults expect. Depth suits mixed-age families, and Disney screens films poolside here on selected evenings.

Piano Pool is the quieter alternative, laid out as a grand piano complete with black and white keys and holding roughly 106,000 gallons. Fewer people find it, which is exactly the appeal at four in the afternoon when everyone piles back from the parks at once. A kiddie pool sits behind Melody Hall for toddlers who need somewhere shallow and separate.

Neither pool has a water slide. If slides are the thing your children will judge the holiday on, a moderate resort such as Port Orleans or Caribbean Beach is the better spend, because no Disney value resort has one. Towels are provided at both pools and lifeguards are on duty during posted hours.

Beyond swimming, the leisure offer is deliberately thin. An arcade sits inside Melody Hall next to the food court and absorbs the hour before dinner when nobody can face any more walking. A one mile jogging and walking loop runs around the All-Star area for anyone who runs in the morning, and there is a playground for smaller children.

Value resorts are built on the honest assumption that you are here for the parks and come back to sleep. Pricing reflects that rather than pretending otherwise, and families who plan a rest day at the hotel tend to find there is not quite enough here to fill it. Take that day at Disney Springs or at a water park instead.

Animal Kingdom is the nearest theme park and the bus ride is short enough that children have barely settled before they are getting off again. Blizzard Beach water park and the ESPN Wide World of Sports Complex are the other immediate neighbours, and the latter matters enormously if your trip is built around a youth football, cheer or baseball competition.

Disney Springs is around 15 minutes away by bus and is where the resort's limited dining stops mattering. Dozens of restaurants, a two-storey World of Disney store, cinemas and live music sit along the waterfront, and there is no admission charge to walk in. Go on your arrival evening while everyone is still fighting the time difference and nobody has the stamina for a park.

Off property, Highway 192 in Kissimmee runs about 6 miles east and holds the supermarkets, pharmacies and cheaper chain restaurants that keep a UK family's budget intact. Publix is where most British visitors end up for breakfast supplies, milk, drinks and sun cream. Universal Orlando sits roughly 12 miles north east on Interstate 4, a 25 minute drive outside rush hour and a good deal longer inside it.

Flamingo Crossings, on the western edge of Disney property, has grown into a useful cluster of shops, quick restaurants and a supermarket, and it is under 10 minutes by car. Anyone with a hire car and a spare day should know that Clearwater Beach on the Gulf coast is around 90 miles west, a comfortable morning's drive that turns into a genuine day out.

Larger families are the obvious audience. Five or six people sleeping in one family suite with two bathrooms, for a price that sits below one moderate room plus a second value room, is the reason All-Star Music exists on most UK shortlists. Add a kitchenette for breakfast and the daily spend drops again.

Parents doing a first Disney trip on a controlled budget are the other core group. You are inside the resort bubble, you get the same 30 minute early entry as everyone else, and the money saved on the room buys park days, meals and the odd Lightning Lane. Children under about ten adore the theming and never once notice the room is small.

Couples and older teenagers are a harder sell. Noise carries, the pools are busy, and there is no bar with any real atmosphere once the sun goes down. Anyone planning several rest days at the hotel should look at a moderate or deluxe resort, because there is simply not enough here to fill an afternoon that was not spent in a park.

Sports groups get the shortest journey of any Disney resort to ESPN Wide World of Sports, which is why the All-Stars fill with team kit every spring. British families combining Disney with Universal or the coast tend to be happiest here when they have hired a car and treat the resort as a base rather than a destination in itself.