Waterworld — Attraction in Stoke-on-Trent

We have been looking forward to coming here with the kids since last year when we booked it. Yesterday the day arrived for our visit and we travelled from Doncaster to Waterworld, quite a long journey but it looked worth it. This place is NOT cheap. It costs £93 for a family of 4 with a £1 saving per person on the normal £24pp price. For this price, I expected amazing, and it's not really amazing tbh.

It's a good venue, but it could be soooo much better with some improvements.

Be prepared for a bag check to get in, I thought this was good and for safety reasons, not sure if someone would take a weapon or similar to a swimming baths, but then I realised they were actually looking for your own food. You are not allowed to bring your own food or drink i here. Waterworld insist that you eat the poor quality fast food junk they serve.

The changing rooms are huge but not the cleanest and smell like sweaty feet and stale urine. Some of the changing cubicles lack any lighting so you can't see a thing. I didn't see anyone going around cleaning in the changing rooms so no surprise there was hair etc all over the floor.

Into the pool now. The main thing we found is that the water temperature is freezing. This is not because we are nesh, we heard other people saying the same.

Parts of Waterworld are looking very tired and in need of a refresh. The top of the slide tower where black hole, python and super flume is clearly used to be themed as a shipwreck. It needs replacing or a make over, looks tired. The staircase up to these rides is very rusty and the queuing system needs enforcing. You end up waiting soooo long for the flumes to the right (twister and space bowl) because the stairs are blocked by people waiting for the other 3 slides. Space bowl is very dated and would benefit from a link of paint. The pool at the top before you go down the slide is filthy and full of bits/dirt. The queuing system up to thunderbolt and stormchaser is equally as frustrating as it is chaos on the stairs with no real direction from staff or signage. People wanting to ride without a dinghy are blocked from getting to their slide by the LONG queues for platform 2 stormchaser. On platform 2, there should be 2 lifeguards managing the 2 slides up there. This would speed things up but would make it safer too when the lifeguards back is turned.

The rapids are a bit pathetic The jacuzzi pools weren't switched on and the water was the same temperature as everywhere else... freezing.

The food in the cafe is BAD it is overpriced junk food that you literally have no choice bit to eat. Surely the entrance price is enough to allow people to bring their own food in to eat so they can stay longer and enjoy their own healthy food.

We ended up having to order a cheeseburger meal deal for the eldest. This was £10.50 for a 'Rollover' processed and pre made cheeseburger with dries and a coke zero.

The youngest had a kiddies £8.99 meal deal, fries with 2 fish fingers (that have never seen fish) and a fruit shoot. It says it comes with a fruit bag but actually came with a packet of party ring biscuits.

My wife and I shared a £12.50 pepperoni pizza. This wasn't the best, basically a pre made pizza base with basic toppings.

I could see they offered jacket potatoes for £9.20 but i saw someone with one and it looked like a sorry example of a jacket spud.

Lifeguards" some were really friendly and attentive, others were rude and looked fed up. Tallulah was very good with the kids and looked like she loved her job. A credit to Waterworld.

It was a bit concerning to see security staff dressed like bouncers walking around the pool complex. Made me feel a little concerned. We saw some roudy groups of teenage lads nothing to warrant the patrolling 'heavies'.

Finally, you have to pay to park, £6 for the day. 😡

I don't want to go on anymore, I've made my point. We have ticked this off the list of things we've wanted to do for a long time, we won't be coming back. It's good for aone off visit but it would need some real improvement for...

This place is an absolute nightmare. I don’t know if it was poor timing with the holidays but even then there should only be a certain amount of people allowed in at once ISSUES it is absolutely packed. No space to move in the pool or in queues. Queuing an hour for slides. A Crazy queuing system.For tube rides you wait at the exit pool for the tube & then walk half way across the place to the stairs &join another queue up the stairs. It is Impossible to gauge how long the queue is. -Then on the stairs an absolute farce of people with tubes in the SAME stairwell as seated riders trying to get to the top past everyone with tubes. Stairwells are filthy&rusty. Risk of someone being knocked over. People frustrated that they can’t get to non tube rides with less of a queue. The whole time people are barging the rapids. We were held in what is essentially a holding pen!!On going to enter the rapids a lifeguard pointed to a section to the left. This has a gate. A small gate. I knew when the gate was opened everyone would fight to get through. In water. So I held my daughter back. Even then grown adults were barging through this tiny gate &at risk of crushing a child. A system where you need to empty the rapids before allowing people in means the pool is TOO FULL!! The behaviour in the rapids of other swimmers is the worst I have ever seen. People throwing others at you. Shoving you out the way. Hitting you in the face. Impossible to swim. the water IS cold. the wave pool- at least 100 people in it. There was one lifeguard. When the waves came on I expected several more lifeguards to appear. Only one more. They were continually whistling to adults taking small children into the deep section ( 1.8m). Due to lack of lifeguards&the general noise these people didn’t move as they couldn’t see or hear them. I read in a review from this week a child nearly drowned. This was a child who could swim but was dragged under. This does not surprise me. Pushing/shoving throughout.This was actually dangerous&I’m concerned a child will drown. There was no room to actually swim more than about a metre due to the number of people. Given the flume queues the only option I had with my daughter was to swim whilst her dad&brother did each flume once. We couldn’t move to swim -it’s dirty -there was no toilet rolls/paper towels in the toilet next to the cafe.

positives booking online easy, girls on reception were pleasant. lifeguards were trying to do an impossible job. the cyclone was brilliant and like an alternative reality. ( just a shame it took an hour to get on it) my husband/son really enjoyed the slides. However, they only went on each slide once due to queues. cost- I’ve seen a lot of people say it’s too expensive. IF it wasn’t so packed/cleaner/safer I wouldn’t mind the cost. I’d say it’s average for this sort of day out. parking fine maybe it would be better outwith holidays or weekends. SUMMARY Waterworld have the potential to have an excellent pool.slides are fun although some need updated. lifeguard/swimmer ratio is awful&the holding pen at the rapids has a risk of someone being trampled underwater, and the wave pool is a drowning waiting to happen. The most pressing issue is the Number of people in the wave pool having just read about a poor girl who got dragged under, nearly drowned and had to be rescued by a family member. *The near drowning review is a few up from mine. if you have read a good review& think it can’t be that bad- to quote my husband ‘if I could have ran out to the car in my swimming shorts to get out of that place I would have. I Only stayed in for the kids’ No one searched our bags ( apparently this is not for weapons but to check you have not brought your own food or drink!!),that would have been the...

I booked a party here for my two boys here on a Saturday in March 2025 (not during a school holiday period). After booking, I made the mistake of coming here and reading hundreds of negative reviews on trip advisor slating this place for multiple reasons. Naturally I felt quite apprehensive about what the experience was actually going to be like, and was worried about things like cleanliness, rude staff, long queues, bag searches etc.

I actually wish I had just ignored all the negative reviews. I cannot tell you how impressed I was with Waterworld, their staff, the cleanliness of it all… it totally exceeded my expectations which sadly were set unfairly low because of most of the reviews on here.

When we arrived, parking was easy, there were loads of spaces and it’s very obvious where to pay and how to pay (there’s a review on here saying they got a fine because the parking notice wasn’t clear - not entirely sure how that happened because it’s so obvious you have to pay, and it stipulated it on their website too). There was a man on the door bag searching but not everyone, mostly teenagers to check they weren’t bringing in their own water pistols or things they could use to cause a mess or damage. I totally understand why they don’t want people bringing in outside food and fluid - can you imagine the mess if you get hundreds of kids all eating a packet of crisps and then just chucking it on the floor because their parents are too busy looking the other way? It would be horrendous. So ignore the reviews from people moaning about that - it’s fairly ignorant to expect it to be any difference. We brought empty bottles with us and asked staff to fill them up with tap water once we were in. The food itself was great! Again, people moaning about the price - it’s not too dissimilar to places like a cinema. Yes, it’s not the cheapest, but do you really go to places like this and expect McDonald’s prices? Be realistic, and go with the mindset that you’ll have to spend a bit on food. It’s really nice food, well cooked and the kids and adults gobbled it up. It wasn’t 5* Michelin food but again, manage your expectations of where you’re going. The staff were beyond lovely. I can’t fault them at all; really helpful, kind, you could tell they were always watching out and doing something, they weren’t stood around chatting or ignoring people. We had a lovely party host called Molly who was great from start to finish and made the experience really lovely for my boys. It’s about as clean as you’d expect a public swimming pool to be. It’s not a spa. It’s a public place. But given it is a public swimming bath, it was surprisingly clean with staff constantly mopping the floors and clearing tables. Again, manage your expectations of where you are going.

Slides were great, the wave pool was great, the little kids area was great, rapids were great (again, it’s not going to be like white water rafting, but it wasn’t a lazy river like someone has written on here).

Overall, we are really impressed and would definitely come back. Ignore most of these negative comments who I think are probably just from people who didn’t manage their expectations, didn’t read signs, didn’t prepare in advance and weren’t able to be rational about why certain rules are put in place.

Thank you Waterworld for an incredible day! Can’t wait...