We visited the last week of April 2022. Using CityPass saved us a considerable amount of money during our stay. We only saved a little time from not standing in line during our visits because we arrived at the opening time of all the attractions and the lines were never that long - in addition, all of our visits were during the work/school week, not during the weekend. All of our tickets were downloaded on my I-phone, so it made entry easier by scanning them rather than carrying paper tickets around.
Once you start using the CityPass tickets, you have 9 days to visit the 5 attractions allowed out of 7 or 8 choices, so you want to make sure you are in Chicago long enough to visit the attractions you wish to see. Also, as I note below, CityPass enables visitors to see extra films or exhibits for free that otherwise would cost extra with only a general admission ticket.
First, we visited the Art Institute on a Monday - we got right in at their opening time of 11am. On Tuesday, we visited the Sky Deck at their opening time of 9am and we got right in. They require a separate ticket (no extra cost) in addition to the CityPass and you have to select a time of day for your visit. I'm sure this is necessary during the very busy times such as summer or weekends.
On Wednesday, we visited the Field Museum and got right in with no delay at their opening time of 9am. But, with CityPass we got to see many exhibits for free that normally would cost extra with a general admission ticket. For example, we saw the Jurassic Oceans film, the Titanosaur film, underground adventure exhibit and more - all included in our Citypass that otherwise would have cost more.
On Thursday, we visited the Shedd Aquarium and got right in with no delay at their opening time of 9am. However, similar to the Sky Deck attraction, they also require extra tickets for scanning in addition to your CityPass ticket - again at no extra cost, but you had to schedule a time of your visit to the special add on film. Our CityPass also included a special film on sharks that normally would have cost extra, but was included with our CityPass.
On Friday, we visited the Museum of Science and Industry and got right in with almost no delay at their opening time of 9:30am. At this museum, we were allowed one free entrance to a specialty visit or film - we chose to see the Tornado film, but I had to pay extra to see the U-boat exhibit and my wife paid extra to see the coal mine exhibit. Again, you had to have a separate ticket in addition to CityPass to visit this attraction - again, it's included in the CityPass cost, but we had to disclose the time of our visit to the tornado film in advance when we purchased the ticket - whick was 12:30.