Continuity mistake: The tiger bites the seat off the suitor's trousers, allowing the viewer to see his polka-heart boxers. When we see the tiger in the courtyard, he has a part of the same boxer shorts in his mouth. So if he bit off the seat of the trousers, shouldn't he have purple cloth in his mouth? (00:11:45)
Factual error: The animators have clearly tried to make all the writing in the film look Arabic. However in one scene we see the faces of Jafar and the Sultan as they read a scroll. Their eyes move from left to right; Arabic is read right to left.
Continuity mistake: When Jafar is holding the Sultan and Jasmine captive, Jasmine is wearing a gold band round one arm. As Jafar pushes her to the floor, it has switched to the other.
Continuity mistake: As Jasmine and Aladdin pole vault across the rooftops at the beginning, her hair flies freely, but when she lands her hair is tucked neatly under her scarf once again.
Continuity mistake: The flower in Jasmine's hair is on the wrong side when reflected in the stream.
Continuity mistake: When Aladdin is first speaking with Jasmine on the palace balcony dressed as Prince Ali. Genie's lamp is under Prince Ali's silk hat (during the point when Genie is a bee). Aladdin is threatened by Rajah and he removes his hat and holds it by the top center (open part facing down) to shoo away the tiger. The Genie lamp is not on his head or in the silk hat. Shortly thereafter, the Genie as a bee goes back into the lamp under his silk hat and it is plain to see how large the lamp is and that it would be impossible for it not to be seen with the hat off. Then Ali and Jasmine fly off on the "Magic Carpet Ride". After the ride, Jasmine, suspecting Ali is Aladdin, unexpectedly rips the hat off his head to reveal his hair. No lamp again. But when he returns to the palace and Ali is snatched by the guards, the lamp is under his hat when the hat falls off as he is thrown into the ocean.
Continuity mistake: The curtain in Aladdin's rooftop home changes size between when he first opens it, when he shows Jasmine, and a reverse shot from outside. The inside shots also show the bottom edge to be jagged, but it is straight and smooth from the outside.
Continuity mistake: Jafar imprisons Jasmine in the hourglass, which has three feet that hold it off the floor. When Aladdin rescues Jasmine, the hourglass has no feet. One of the side supports also disappears.
Continuity mistake: During the " Magic Carpet Ride", the rug swoops down to a pool of water, Both Jasmine and Aladdin look to see their reflections. Another sharp eyed viewer already noticed that Jasmine's flower is on the wrong side, but didn't mention that Aladdin's hair in parted on the wrong side in the reflection as well.
Continuity mistake: Genie transforms Jafar into the Evil Genie. Jafar rises and grows larger to fill the giant onion dome of the Throne Room. The view switches to the outside looking down and Jafar as Evil Genie explodes through the onion dome, completely removing the top half of the entire dome. When Aladdin holds the Black Genie Lamp and Jafar comes swirling back down, the hole has transformed to a squarish opening 75 percent smaller than the original opening Jafar had made seconds earlier.
Continuity mistake: After Aladdin and Abu have given their bread to the hungry street urchins, they step towards the street to see the commotion. Aladdin looks up at the Suitor for the Princess and looks at the LEFT side of the Prince. When the street urchin kids run past Aladdin into the Prince's path, Aladdin is on the RIGHT side of the prince, across the street.
Continuity mistake: When Jafar first opens the wooden door that leads directly into his workshop,( Not the secret sliding door), the knob is on the right and the door opens to the left. After Aladdin accuses Jafar of trying to have him killed, Jafar escapes and again appears before the wooden door to his workshop, It now has the knob on the left and opens to the right. The shape of the door and design of the knob have also changed slightly.
Continuity mistake: Sultan runs out of a wing of the palace to confront Jasmine about Rajah biting the Suitor pants. The opening long shot establishes that the bird cage is on the right side of the fountain,( looking towards the palace). Later that night, when Jasmine is sneaking away through the garden, The bird cage is shown in the long panning downshot to be on the other side of the garden, and now a TOWERING structure as well. In the birdcage's place is a gazebo of some sort.
Continuity mistake: Aladdin and Jasmine climb a ladder onto the first roof on their way to his secret home. They climb over the edge onto the first roof. Behind them is a towering, dark, reddish orange building. The shot changes to a shot looking down on the scene, and the building behind them changes to bright yellow. Once Jasmine jumps to the second rooftop and throws the vaulting stick to Aladdin, the large building in the background behind Aladdin and Abu has disappeared entirely and has been replaced by sunset skies.
Continuity mistake: When Abu and Aladdin are on top of the canopy eating melon, the patches on the canopy disappear.
Continuity mistake: When Aladdin is underwater, the chains holding his shackles together disappear after he goes unconscious.
Continuity mistake: Prince Ali and Jasmine are taking off on their "Magic Carpet Ride". Just before Prince Ali begins to sing, They swoop over the top of the gates exiting the palace grounds. The massive brackets leading to the hinges on the palace ground gates are on the inside of the door rather than the outside where they belong. As a special note. these are the Brackets and hinges shown during the Prince Ali parade entrance. One of three distinctly different variations shown in the film. Also, the staircases used by Jasmine and Prince Ali the very next day, leading to the reviewing stand above the palace grounds gates, are missing as well.
Continuity mistake: When Carpet is first introduced and steals Abu's hat, the hat constantly changes size until Abu puts it back on.
Continuity mistake: One half of the Scarab is female (missing a half circle) and one is male (extends a half circle). Gazeem pulls the female from his shirt and shows Jafar. Iago snatches the female Scarab from him and drops the male into Jafar's hand. Jafar takes the female half out of his pocket. They aren't identical: the male has a head and the female does not.
Continuity mistake: As the Sultan addresses the people near the end, we can see two large columns on each side of the reviewing stand topped with onion domes. Jasmine coaxes Aladdin up the stairs and the large columns are missing.
Chosen answer: The cave has some level of sentience. It is aware of who is entering the cave, and decides whether to allow them to enter. It is able to tell that Abu is with Aladdin. It seems to keep a watchful eye on the person in the cave, and when it says "touch nothing" what it means is "don't try to take anything. It seems it was fine with them interacting with the carpet, and only had an issue when Abu was attempting to actually take something.