Paradisus Cancún — Hotel in Cancún

March 2025

Our family trip was incredibly meaningful, marking multiple celebrations: my parents' 40th wedding anniversary, our 7th anniversary, and both my son's and my birthdays. It was extra special as our first family trip together ever.

Upon arrival, our excitement dwindled when we were assigned our rooms. Despite our requests, nothing was accommodated or acknowledged. Romina at the front desk informed us that nothing could be changed due to a big group arriving the next day, making us feel like we didn’t matter. Not to mention, there was nothing special setup in our rooms for our special occasions like we've experienced at other resorts.

Our initial rooms felt like a hole in the wall on the basement-like bottom floor—claustrophobic, and the balcony faced a wall. Displeased, I returned to the front desk. Thankfully, Enrique was helpful. He changed my parents’ room to a higher floor and provided us with a room with the king-size bed we prioritized, though still on the bottom floor.

Enrique promised room changes could occur in 3 days, as they would be available by the 15th. We accepted this and was asked to return in 20 mins for our room, only to encounter Romina again. She told us the earlier promise couldn’t be fulfilled due to the large group arriving the next day, displaying a very bad attitude unwilling to help and seeming intent to block Enrique's solution.To prevent further distress, I accepted the situation with the new room, which faced only half a wall this time, resolving to not let these issues ruin our hard-earned trip.

At first glance, the room seemed acceptable, but as we settled in, it became clear how worn out everything was. Two lights were out, making the room very dim. The bathroom was filthy and appeared improperly cleaned; the tub looked like it needed replacing. This was the worst cleanliness I've encountered at an all-inclusive. Over our 7-nights stay, the cleaning person showed up only 2 times, our fridge was never stocked, until we complained and even then it only got stocked on the last day. Midway through the trip, we discovered 2 mid-sized roaches in the room and later encountered many tiny baby roaches in the bathroom.

The food was below average. Despite a wide array of options, the dishes didn't taste great and were often overly salty.

During our stay the large group ended up being a corporate conference who were not being serviced privately resulting in huge lines everywhere and multiple nights of large private dinners by the main pool where the entertainment would typically be being blocked off and only accessible to the conference goers changing the atmosphere for people who are there on vacation.

The beach was the highlight, even during a windy week when the water was too rough to swim in. The service from Eduardo at the beach club with the Kanna Bali beds was excellent, though not included, costing an additional $250 USD or available as a gift if you endure a sales pitch for Club Melia membership. I strongly advise against joining Club Melia. The brand lacks integrity and consistently fails to address issues promptly, missing multiple opportunities to make things right. why join a club when they can't do things right the first time? Second or third..

Activities for kids were well-managed by Nestor, who ran the workshops admirably and beach activities. The kiddie pool section was great for young children, with knee-high water, though it wasn't cleaned daily and seating was limited.

The 9-hole golf course, was neglected, with broken bottles and very rough greens.

The main area in building 3 is dreamy with all the vines coming down, but that's where it ends.. everything else shows its age. The resort is closing in May for a year-long renovation, and it seems many staff have lost motivation or aren't performing at full potential during this time and it shows.

Would we return? No, because our business didn’t feel valued at all. I highly recommend saving your money, time, and energy by booking elsewhere.. somewhere where they actually care about...

I recently stayed at Paradisus Cancun, and I must say it was a very disappointing experience. This resort markets itself as a luxury all-inclusive, but in reality, it operates more like a money-grab operation. • Not a Proper All-Inclusive: Most of the premium food options in restaurants come with an extra charge. Only basic food is included in the package, and even something as simple as fries will cost you extra. • Pool & Cabanas: The pool chairs are never available unless you reserve them before 7:00 AM. If you want a cabana, be prepared to pay a ridiculous $250 USD per day. • Unprofessional Staff: The staff is very unprofessional and, in some cases, outright arrogant. They are often misleading, and it’s difficult to get a straight answer. • Dirty Towels & Sales Pitch: Towels are handed out by the Aqua Activities team, and you’ll be subjected to their sales pitch before getting one. Even then, the towels are not always clean. • Constant Sales Pitches: One of the most annoying aspects was the constant interruption by photographers trying to sell their services, multiple times a day, whether you’re at the pool or on the beach.

The facility itself is poorly maintained. There was no hot water for over 24 hours during my stay, and the staff offered no assistance or apology. It also rained, and my room flooded. This wasn’t an isolated incident — multiple families experienced the same issue. The staff showed no urgency in helping us.

The food quality was average at best, and several people in my group experienced vomiting and diarrhea. To make things worse, the chefs hardly understand English, so requesting anything customized is pointless.

Overall, this resort fails to deliver a true all-inclusive luxury experience. It’s overpriced, poorly managed, and focused on upselling services instead of guest satisfaction. I wouldn’t recommend this place to anyone looking for a relaxing and hassle-free vacation.

Dear Guest Service Center Management,

Thank you for your response, but I must express my disappointment with the dismissive tone and lack of accountability in your reply.

Firstly, referring to your offerings as "an array of gourmet options included in your stay" is misleading when basic items like fries and guacamole are either unavailable or come at an additional cost. This is not the hallmark of a true all-inclusive luxury experience.

Secondly, the suggestion to make early reservations for cabanas disregards the fact that a $250 USD daily fee is far from reasonable for most guests. Calling it "an inviting and relaxed atmosphere" does not justify the exorbitant cost.

The unprofessional attitude and lack of urgency shown by your staff during serious issues, such as room flooding and the absence of hot water for over 24 hours, are unacceptable. Your team’s failure to address these matters adequately left many guests feeling neglected.

Additionally, your claim of prioritizing cleanliness contradicts my experience. Towels were not only unclean but were distributed after an intrusive sales pitch. Furthermore, the pool cleanliness left much to be desired, with sand present and the water being too cold for comfort.

As for the culinary experience, describing it as “inspiring and delicious offerings” is disingenuous when the food quality was subpar, and several guests in my group fell ill. The language barrier with your chefs compounded the issue, making it impossible to request customized meals.

Your response has only reinforced my perception that guest satisfaction is not your priority. I hope you take this feedback seriously and implement the necessary changes to meet the expectations you set through your marketing. Unfortunately, based on my experience, I cannot recommend your resort and will be sharing my review with others to help them make...

The bad unfortunately outweighed the good during our Jan 2025 trip. And please know that I’m not one to complain about small stuff - these were major issues:

Important info was not shared during the check in process (including by the private concierge that is heavily marketed as an exclusive feature of the Reserve side):

We were not told that you have to reserve the Bali beds (which are advertised as an amenity included for Reserve guests) at least 1 day in advance, and then you have to show up at 9am the day of to confirm you still want the bed. We showed up at the pool midday and tried to sit at an open bed - but were then told that the bed we sat in is actually $160 a day bc it’s a premium bed that’s closer to the beach. All the regular beds were taken. The pool staff then told us that they TRY to give each Reserve room 2 days of access to the Bali beds per stay. So that’s flat out false advertising. We asked if we could use one of the MANY open beds on the family side as that day was one of only 2 days we had open in our itinerary for pool lounging and were told, no, we would have to pay to use those. Mind you, they let people on the Reserve side have the beds for a whole day, and we saw many of the beds left unused for hours. I find it very disappointing and cheap that they wouldn’t let us just use one of the open beds on the family side.

We were not told about the sunset cruise that’s included with the Reserve stay, I only knew about it because I saw it mentioned in other reviews. I had to bring it up to our concierge.

We checked in around 4:30pm and immediately asked which restaurant we could get dinner at and were told by our concierge that reservations closed at 4 so the buffet was likely our only option. Why is there no system in place to ensure arriving guests get a dinner spot? And don’t say I should have contacted the hotel before coming because I emailed them twice and got zero response. We ended up walking around to the restaurants asking if any could seat us and one did - why couldn’t our “exclusive private concierge” have helped with this?

The restaurants also all seemed to be understaffed as they were fairly empty, yet the few servers at each restaurant were running around like crazy trying to keep up. We could only get a res. at Lemonfish 2 days out for 9:30pm and were rushed by the server to order before the kitchen closed while we could barely hear him over the insanely loud band that was playing in the foyer right next to the restaurant.

Music from the club across the street, Confessions, kept us up until 4am every night that the club was open. See my video. Our room was a street side sunset/lagoon view in Pyramid 5. And if you think you can drown it out, you cannot. I brought a white noise machine because I had read about the music but it did nothing to cover the bass which you can feel vibrating. To the hotel’s credit, they did let us move rooms over this, but the new room was still on the street side and the music was just as loud. I know it may be out of the hotel’s control, but unfortunately it is a reason to not stay here unless you are beach side. And I have seen other reviews saying you can hear the music street side regardless of what pyramid you’re in. I hope they add major sound proofing during their renovations.

The power went out on our last day, so we had no AC in our room and certain activities/food were unavailable. The hotel said it was a city issue, and perhaps an outage like that is rare, I do not know - but it was a disruption.

The good: the hotel is beautiful, the beach/views are beautiful, most of the staff were very friendly, and most of the food we had was good. Blue Agave was especially awesome.

But I do hope they make...