Ocean Maya Royale — Hotel in Quintana Roo

Two of us stayed at the Ocean Maya Royale in early August 2025. Personally, this was my third time in Mexico, and the second time at a resort, having stayed next door at the BlueBay in March 2019. Overall, we have been to many resorts in Cuba, the Dominican Republic and Jamaica, and we can definitely say this is one of the best we have been to!||Room:|We stayed in a deluxe room with a garden view. We ended up in Building 21, which turned out to be a great location as it was in the middle of the resort, with the pool/beach areas and main square/lobby being only a few minutes walk either way. The room was spacious with two king beds, TV, mini fridge (which was restocked daily), steamer, plenty of storage space and a safe. The bathroom was aa good size with two separate sinks, though I will say the shower wasn't the best - it took awhile for the water to really heat up, and the shower head spray wasn't great. This can be easily fixed with a new showerhead fixture. The room was cleaned daily and we always left a small tip for the staff. ||Pools:|There are two pools - one larger and more quieter, and the smaller one was where activities happened (eg. pool games, volleyball, aquafit, etc.) This pool also had the swimup bar (usually open by 9:30am) and the DJ. We spent most of our time at this pool for easy access to drinks and to partake in activities. The table area between the two pools also had daily activities, such as painting, tequila tasting, sushi making and Spanish lessons. Generally, the pools were a nice temperature, though on a couple of days in the afternoon the water was very warm - not surprising since temperatures often reached 40C daily. In terms of getting a chair by the pool, you need to come out I would say by 8:30am, especially if you want something with shade. We are early birds, so this was never an issue for us. The entertainment team was out daily and they brought a lot of fun and energy to our days!||Beach: |The beach area was very nice - plently of seating, shade and hammocks too. It was very sandy and easy to get into the water. However, there is no drink or snack bar, which would elevate this area. As for the water, they cleaned the seaweed away every morning, so that wasn't an issue, but because of the amount of seaweed the region has been dealing with, the water was not clear. It was clean and warm, but not clear, and so we spent most of our days by the pool. There was at times a strong seaweed smell, more so noticeable in the evenings when we ate at La Dolce Vita, as it is seaside. ||Food/Bars/Restaurants:|Overall, we were very pleased with the food! The buffet was good for breakfast, though maybe a bit more lacking in varety for lunch and dinner (but still good). We ate at the Blue Moon, La Dolce Vita, the Sports Bar and Yookoso (Teppenaki) for dinners. Yookoso requires a reservation, and I wish there was a better system for non-privilege guests - I had to line up at 5:00pm and wait until 5:45pm for them to come out and take reservations for the same night (trust me - you need to get there early for reservations). The other restaurants we never had problems getting in for dinner. We also ate at El Charro for lunch, which was nice because you order from a menu, so the food is hot and fresh. Mike's Coffee Bar is great for coffee/tea and snacks - we typically visited after dinner each night. There was also pizza made fresh daily by El Charro and on "Taco Tuesday" it was fresh tacos instead. The staff at all bars and restaurants were excellent - very prompt and friendly service! ||Entertainment:|As previously mentioned, there was lots of entertainment by the pool daily. They also had free group kayak tours in the morning, and in the evenings, there was live music and activities in the main square by the lobby followed up with shows. The shows were some of the better ones we have seen at resorts - very high tech! On Saturdays, they have a fire show by the pool followed up with a night foam party - we have never seen this before! There is also a foam party in the day on Fridays. There are plenty of options for people whether you're a night owl or an early bird. ||Overall, as said at the beginning, this was one of the best resorts we have been to and we would definitely come back. One of the unique things about this resort is the wildlife you will see - lots of coatis and iguanas in particular. In addition to all the fun things at the resort, there are LOTS of tour options off resort. We booked with our travel company and went to Playa del Carmen for some shopping one day and then did snorkeling, cenote swimming, zip lining and ATVing on another day. I went to Tulum on a previous visit, but would highly recommend it as it's not far from the resort (compared to going to Chichen Itza). Xcaret is also a really cool place to visit, and the catamaran to Isla Mujeres is also a great day trip. If you haven't been to Mexico, or haven't stayed in the Rivieria Maya, the Ocean Maya Royale is a...

05/09; I am going to update this review as we proceed on our vacation. For perspective this is our first vacation as a gay couple, by ourselves, in a country we’re not familiar with. Nor have we ever stayed at this resort. We chose this resort due to reviews and the overall customer service ratings.

So far, let me paint the actual picture…. As of day one and prior to us getting here…. PHENOMENAL customer service, accommodations, and expertise in treating someone the way you WANT to be treated. Any and every question I have cluelessly asked has been answered with multiple solutions to my questions.

The resort is SPOTLESS. Staff is impeccable, Unbelievably attentive. When my partner and I arrived, the first impression was a hand shake, personal greeting by your name, two shots of tequila and a beer…… WHAT?! Like where even in the amazing world am I.

Kevin, 11/10 unreal amazing customer service Gabriella, 11/10 ALSO consistently amazing customer service.

Maintenance (small mini bar issue) brought an entirely new fridge in less than 10 minutes to fix our broken mini bar…. It’s 8:30PM right now and no questions asked. They just did the right thing for the right reason.

I’m actually excited to continue on this review; particularly because weather is not supposed to be so great. Curious to see what they have in store despite the weather.

I can’t wait to add more to this. Unbeatable experience thus far. BOOK YOUR VACATION HERE (and no! I’m not being paid for this review!) it’s genuinely that good of an experience that you will want to leave your own review.

5/10: Today was an off shore excursion. We had a great breakfast and a TON of food options, if you’re picky - you’ll find something. If nothing else who can’t or won’t eat oats and yogurt! Everything is constantly refreshed and most things are lightly seasoned. Nothing is EXPLOSIVE with flavor which after being pumped full of liquor and sunshine all day, lighter flavors are hitting the spot. The resort handled all communication, coordination, and more or less all responsibility that I thought I needed to handled. Nope. The only think you need to handle here is eating and drinking and trying to not fall asleep in the countless comfy areas. Dear lord! I unfortunately got extremely extremely sick on my boating trip (sea sick for the loss!) and honestly the only thing I wanted was to come back to my ice cold room and hot shower - this was the only thing that revived me. Thank you for saving the day there!

5:11 I’ve recovered! Weather has been pretty lame but this entire resort goes out of their way to make you feel like it’s 90° and sunny with no rain. The staff are truly remarkable people. They are relentlessly courteous, polite, genuine, not one person is moaning or groaning or frowning. Smiles from top to bottom inside and out. The staff here truly feel like another world and another class of people. It makes you realize how rude and ungrateful America can be. I genuinely appreciate the feeling of feeling safe and welcome, not judged, or cast away. Bless all of your darn staff to the fullest! Dinner at La Hacineda was fantastic, simple but FILLLLING and again 10,000 options to pick from. Fish, pork, a whole roasted turkey, chicken, 5,000 sweets, wine, cocktails - whatever. Just blink and a genie appears with what you want. Service was attentive and fast. We were interested in spa services, comparatively to home it was a little out of our budget and seemed expensive so we opted to not partake but there are so many options for spa services (yes the spa is on site!)

5:12 - My last day at the resort. Currently it is 7:05AM and I’ve been given an espresso, 2 cocktails and then walked straight to breakfast to pile drive some goodness down. Sun is shining and the only thing I’ve been asked to day is 1) do i need a cocktail. 2) how my experience has been, 3) what can be done for me to make or give me anything else to make my trip amazing. PFFBT! Nothing! I appreciate you all so much! Thank you for coordinating...

My family recently visited the Ocean Maya Royale. If you are interested in reading only the good reviews, that's fine. But here is a true, honest review of our 5-night, 6-day stay at this resort (coming from someone who is typically an optimist!!).

Let me preface this by saying this was our first time going to an all-inclusive resort, as well as traveling to Mexico. Our hopes were high going into this given we read tons of amazing reviews, it was an adults-only resort, and we upgraded to the Privilege status. All-in-all... lots of pros and cons. I'll break it down by category.

Health Concerns - 1/5 Stars: Leading with this category but it is definitely worth putting on radars... 9 out of 11 of the people in our group ended up getting sick from our stay here. Upon returning home, 75% of us sought medical attention and were put on antibiotics to help fight off our symptoms. I personally lost 9 pounds after returning home because I couldn't eat for 12 days without immediately running to the bathroom. Some of us got rashes all down their arms and legs. Let it be known: we did NOT drink the tap water, only bottled water and the "filtered" water from pitchers at the restaurants and the buffet. The only people that did not get sick were the ones who did not drink water at the restaurants/buffet... take that with what you will. Could we all have gotten the same sort of norovirus? Sure. But it definitely came from this resort, though, because we traveled on different planes to get here.

Resort Ambiance - 4/5 Stars: The look, feel, and overall "vibe" of the resort were great. We loved hanging out by the pool, on the Privilege beach's day beds and lounge chairs, and at the lobby bar. We loved that the room keys were on a bracelet! Such a cool feature. The only downsides were A) the seaweed, and B) the amount of construction work early in the mornings. The seaweed had an AWFUL stench to it, so it was unpleasant to be right next to the water. This is obviously out of the resort’s control, and they did a good job of bringing down dump trucks and a loader to haul as much of it away as possible. We noticed our first morning there that they had repair crews all over working on various tasks, but when you start running hedge-trimmers and leaf blowers at 7:30 a.m. Every. Single. Day…. It was hard to enjoy sleeping in a little bit. We were awake by 7:35 a.m. every morning because of this.

Rooms – 4/5 Stars: While the beds were incredibly stiff, the overall rooms were nice. We were in a "Honeymoon" Privilege room, while members of our family vacation had standard rooms and they were nearly identical, minus the leather couches and jacuzzi. It didn’t make us feel like we had much of an upgrade after we saw that.

Service – 3/5 Stars: While the staff were nice, we all noted that they didn’t go “above and beyond”. Some employees seemed that they hated their life and didn’t want to be there, just giving super dismissive attitudes. We are pretty chatty people and would try to ask how long they’ve worked here and how their day was, but it was always returned with short, dismissed responses. Albeit, not all staff were like this… our check-in staff and butler were great. Regardless of how we felt in the moment, we always tipped each time as this was very much the “status quo” of the resort.

Food and Drink - 3/5 Stars: This was one of the bigger let-downs of the whole trip. We ate at each one of the restaurants and while some were just “okay”, we were only amazed by two of them: the taco bar by the pool and the Japanese restaurant. Drinks were yummy and not overly strong.

All-in-all, we did have a great vacation and got a ton of quality family time together. All of us agreed that we likely won’t return to this resort for the cumulation of reasons I stated above. Sure, it is a great resort for the price… but you get what you pay for. Hope this helps in your...