Hotel Review: Waldorf Astoria Maldives Ithaafushi

Tranquility.

Natural Beauty.

Understated elegance.

Aren’t those markers of true luxury? The Waldorf Astoria Maldives Ithaafushi certainly delivers in all of those respects.

It is the crown jewel of the Hilton family of hotels (as of now). Each room is one of 119 beach, ocean, or reef villas with a private pool; the setting is the epitome of a luxury vacation. The price certainly reflects this as well; when we stayed, it was $2381/night (pre-tax and service charge) for the base reef villa which is pretty extraordinary. We have stayed at the hotel twice and stayed in three villas: the reef villa (overwater), overwater villa (same as reef villa, but with a glass floor in one section), and the grand overwater villa (a larger version of the overwater villa).

Room

The villas themselves are at least 2500 SF with all villas containing personal pools, private outdoor spaces, and swings. The bathrooms all have full stone bathtubs and indoor as well as outdoor showers – they may be my favorite bathrooms to date. Salvatore Ferragamo makes the toiletries (who knew?) and they are dispensed in the large stoneware bottles. The finishings are just simple, yet refined. My family just loved hanging out at our pool and watching for the sunrise each morning. It was completely serene and idyllic.

Surprisingly, the kids enjoyed the reef villa – which was in the 500s – the best. We got a wonderful view of the sunrise and it was quiet and spaced out. They enjoyed walking to breakfast every morning. We stayed in an overwater villa – which was in the 600s – and this was also nice though slightly further from restaurants. The reef and overwater villas are exactly the same, except that the overwater villa has The completely insanely big grand overwater villa – which was in the 100s – was on the far side of the island necessitating a buggy or bike. This room is an extra $1000 / night and I’m not really sure it’s worth it. It is the exact same layout at the reef and overwater villas, but with an additional living room. I wish there was something crazy, like a slide or jacuzzi or something. The upgrade to an overwater villa is an extra $500 / night and may be worth it if you have never had an overwater villa.

Hilton Diamond members – unfortunately, you won’t get an upgrade here. There are so many diamond members and customers on packages. But you will still receive a welcome amenity of white wine and a large fruit basket.

Transfer

You have only one option when visiting the resort – take the private yacht at a cost of $765 +23.2% tax = $935.60 per adult. Kids from 6 – 12 years old are half of that rate and kids 5 and under are free. Yes the transfer fee is eye watering and unavoidable. You used to be able to use Hilton points to offset this fee, but I haven’t seen that option. But at least the boat has practically no limits in timing. We left the resort at 9 pm for a late flight and there was no problem. I really like taking seaplanes, but they could not take off in the evening and are usually for longer distances. The yacht ride was relatively short at 45 minutes and they serve bento boxes of snacks (sandwich and cake) and beverages of your choice. The ride was a little bumpy for my toddler though and he vomited both times he took it from the airport. Always have extra clothing handy!

Facilities

The resort is spread out and relatively large. Your villa will be provided with bicycles and there are even children’s bicycles. The second time we stayed, our concierge didn’t manage to secure children’s bicycles for us. Luckily we were within walking distance of one of our favorite restaurants and the Kid’s club was a short buggy ride away. Otherwise, just send a quick message to your concierge or inform the restaurant staff to request a buggy. The entire resort can be covered by buggy in about 15 minutes. We were mildly frustrated when there were no buggies for about 20 minutes the evening we had to check out. It was definitely too far and dark to walk at that point. Supposedly they will add more buggies in time.

While this is a manmade island, we still saw bats fluttering around as well as a few other varieties of birds. The reef wasn’t very extensive, but the variety of ocean life was abundant and plentiful. We saw everything from parrot fish to blue tangs relatively close to shore, by the dive center.

The Wellness center encompasses the fitness center/gym, as well as the spa and an aqua wellness center. The spa has a good variety of massage options, reflexology, as well as an evening option with visiting practitioners. The gym was cool, clean, and staffed by a personal trainer. We got to have a deep stretching session with the trainer which was great.

Food

The resort is worth it simply for access to Michelin star chef Dave Pynt’s Burnt End cuisine at Ledge. It is very easy to walk in for lunch, though we never managed to secure an early dinner reservation. Children’s menu cheeseburgers were basically regular burgers with a wonderful smoky flavor. We were luckily able to request and receive Peri-Peri chicken several times for lunch.

Nava is the beachside restaurant with tacos from Burnt Ends, pizza from the custom made, Italian pizza oven, and a variety of other casual food. The waiters were sweet with my youngest and let him win at fooseball a few times.

We otherwise enjoyed the wide variety of international foods at Tasting Table which is the only restaurant that serves breakfast. My daughter was so happy to get gluten free waffles with Nutella and my husband and I happily had spicy Maldivian omelets daily. We would happily have a long breakfast while our kids played on the beach in front of us. Champagne is free flowing during breakfast as well so the option is there if you’re in the mood for bubbly! Peacock Alley serves a similar menu to Tasting Table at other times during the day.

If you are a Hilton Diamond member, please remember that you get a free children’s menu item for children under 6 years old with every paying adult. This is a resort with $50 burgers so of course, save whenever you can!

If you are a Hilton Diamond member and don’t have kids, you can still enjoy free Happy Hour drinks at Peacock Alley daily from 4 pm – 5 pm. Mixed nuts are served though I’ve heard you can request fries instead.

Children’s amenities

The Kid’s Club is the largest one we’ve ever seen. There are lots of structured activities during the day and my eldest even participated in an introductory scuba diving class. The outdoor area is very impressive and has a small water park as well as a trampoline and playground apparatus. Our kids loved the water park and we were able to drop them off for an art session while we went to the wellness center. There is a babysitting charge for kids under 4 years old, like many other Kid’s Clubs.

Service

Every villa is assigned a personal host or concierge. We had three different ones during our two stays. All of our hosts were warm, though we got varying levels of response. They switched from these old school phones in 2020 to using WhatsApp now. I was informed that each host handles 3 – 5 villas at a time. I tried not to bother the host for every single buggy ride and consolidated requests whenever possible. Some small requests fell through the cracks (getting kid’s bicycles which were automatically at our villa the first visit) but our host was also able to procure free life vests for the kids. So it was good, but not always stupendous.

I did appreciate that the hotel is very responsive very email and the front desk manager seemed to genuinely listen to and take our concerns into consideration when we left.

Booking Tips

This hotel is the best value in the Hilton portfolio if you are patient (check up to 330 days in advance or even 2 days ahead!) I booked 1.5 months before our stay when I saw rewards open up; similarly, I booked about 2 months out when I booked a few years ago. Saver awards can be redeemed for 150,000 points a night compared to a rate that may reach 1,200,000 points / night (oh my!) I was able to use free night certificates I received via the Hilton Honors Aspire card. I also received a $250 resort credit for using my card. That is a stupendous value and this trip completely makes the card worth the annual fee.

Hilton silver members and above, you can get the 5th night free. So you would pay 600,000 points for 5 nights instead of 4 nights. This is a pretty amazing value and if you’re flying from far away, go for it.