Disney’s Hilton Head Island Resort — Hotel in Hilton Head Island

The front desk staff at check-in are wonderful. When you arrive, there is a cast member waving at you welcoming you home. That was a very nice touch!

Such a cute property, with many of the rooms in small buildings on stilts. The main building, where the lobby/check-in area is, houses 1 bedroom units & studios. We had a 2 bedroom Villa (dedicated, not lock-off) and apparently all of those are located in the small buildings on stilts, so you HAVE to climb steps (12 steps up to “first” floor and 30 steps to the “second” floor) to get to those villas because those buildings DO NOT have elevators. My only complaint with that is that if you are a handicapped person or have difficulty climbing stairs, you will have difficulty getting to your room, not to mention carrying all of your luggage and groceries up all those steps. For that reason, we would never get a two bedroom villa here again.

The room was very clean, but also very dated. It has been 6 1/2 years since we stayed here, and they really haven’t made any obvious improvements. The TV in the living area was a good size and there was a DVD player, but the bedroom TVs are extremely small (possibly 24”). There was a DVD in the second bedroom, but not the master bedroom. We did like how the master bathroom had two bathroom areas…one with a toilet, pedestal sink & shower and the other had a spacious (but very short) vanity & sink, as well as a jetted tub and closet with a small safe in it. The beds slept comfortably and the bed linens were very soft and the window treatments did a good job of keeping the room dark if you want to sleep in, and blocking the heat of the sun in the afternoon.

The living room couch & chair were unbelievably uncomfortable and in dire need of being retired. We did like that there were ceiling fans in both bedrooms and in the living room. The AC worked very well, which is very important in the warmer months. The villa offered a full size washer & dryer, which was nice.

Our family member who was staying in the second bedroom complained of a scratching noise in the attic area each morning around 5 AM. When we told the front desk about it, a maintenance person came up to our room immediately and said it might be a raccoon and that they would set a trap. There are a lot of trees around the villas, as well as wildlife, so not Disney’s fault and we were very appreciative of the prompt response.

There are a lot of on-property activities, such as bocce ball, a putting green and life-size checkers, as well as a ton of hammocks and grills. The pool has a fun water slide and bicycles are available. We did not use bikes on this trip, so I’m not sure if you have to pay to use them. There’s a shuttle that can take you to the Disney beach house on the ocean, just a quick 5 minutes away. I believe you can also ride your bikes there or drive your car there. Masks are currently required in all indoor locations. We forgot to bring ours when we went to the gift shop, so the cast member gave us one, which we greatly appreciated.

For security reasons, someone will enter your villa on a daily basis to do a security check and empty your trash, if requested. The staff at this hotel is superb!! The cast members who operate the gift shop and the quick service food place are just delightful!!

This Disney property is located in a marina area, so just across the inlet are shops and restaurants, which just adds to the experience here. Overall, we had a great stay & would definitely stay here again, but we would only want to stay in the main building and I would probably wait a few years with the hopes of them changing out the living room furniture...

Sadly my experience here was really bad, this place is not up to Disney standards.

There is a phenomenal bakery across the bridge and one day we brought some stuff back to the room and left in the bag right next to the TV. Housekeeping went in, never touched the bags that were on and next to the trash bin in the kitchen but took away that bakery bag.

About the room… Room layout is odd and non-functional, with a claustrophobic shower.

Back of the room has a nice balcony but facing a smoking area. Not only I don’t like cigarette smell, I have an asthmatic daughter so the nice balcony was totally useless…

Dishwasher was not working when we got in and was promptly fixed next morning, but failed again 2 days later. Shower drain seemed clogged (water was backing up) and they told me maintenance had fixed it but they never did, in fact got worse each day. Sofa bed sheets were not replaced from previous guest so I took a spare one to put on top but it had a huge hole in it. The sheets were not replaced despite my report, they simply gave me more.

Sound proofing is horrible and I had neighbors that enjoyed loud conversations before 5:30am.

I spoke with the manager which was really nice but ultimately didn’t solve anything, so I decided to not report anything again.

About the property… Everything here (pool, food, market, activities, character meet, rentals, etc.) is in one spot so if you’re lucky to get a room near there it’s nice, I ended up really far away and had to haul kids back and forth multiple times (breaks, pool closure, other activities…). I honestly don’t mind to walk but losing over 2h/day just walking back and forth was not fun.

One of the days my daughter had a burger at the pool restaurant and didn’t sit well on her stomach. Since we were too far from the room it became really complicated to manage.

Pool is very small and really hard to get a chair if you’re not there at opening time. People just throw towels on several chairs and barely use them, which is a shame. As a family of 4 we never get more than 2 chairs but other people are just not as considerate. So all this time and distance from the pool make vacation quite stressful.

Also, they don’t offer text updates about closures or openings. This would be really helpful, walked all the way to community hall only to find it closed. A little text update goes a long way…

The hotel is far from the beach and they have another place there called “beach house”, with a restaurant and a pool. Although the flyer says it closes 8pm their schedule is very inconsistent even with good weather.

Parking is also a big challenge… One positive note though, they have an EV charger on property. While there are only 2 plugs, I did not have any problems to get my car juiced up. A bit pricey at $.35/kWh but very convenient.

The CMs, especially the ones at recreation, are simply amazing. They are the only reason I gave 2 stars.

Maybe this place fits well to other families but it did not to mine. We are leaving a day early…

In conclusion this is an overhyped place and was not a good use of my points. This place left a bad taste in our summer vacation. I still love my DVC but only for the park resorts, it’s a huge difference of service from the hotels there to here. I don’t believe we will come back.

Note: The FB group about this place doesn’t allow anyone to share issues, so all members only get a rosy picture...

We just returned from a week at DHHI. We are DVC members and stayed in a two bedroom villa. This resort is fabulous. We were a party of two 21 yr old girls and their moms. The resort felt like adult summer camp for us. There were kids but not a ton of them and the resort is big enough that you barely notice them when you’re there without littles. The resort is very chill and quiet WITH ONE EXCEPTION. We were in a first floor unit and it literally sounded as though there was a family of elephants above us. It was the strangest thing; we never heard voices or water running or any other noise but the stomping was unreal. I will only return if I’m guaranteed a unit on the top floor. The pool was nice and clean and the lifeguards were attentive. The day we went they were training and even let the kids get involved. The food at the pool quick service was really good and surprisingly well priced. The gift shop was ok but I wish they had more HHI specific merch. They did have some Halloween stuff out on our last day there so that was cool. The beach house is gorgeous and very spacious. Plenty of parking. We took the shuttle one day and drove one day. The shuttle was very convenient. Nothing like the Hunger Games experience of the WDW bus lines. One downside was that the towels at the beach house are pretty small. You may want to bring a beach towel if you plan to head down to the beach. There were also chairs and umbrellas available for rent. Parking was decent. I wouldn’t say it was plentiful but we never had to search long for a spot. There are lots of good restaurants nearby and a Kroger within a two minute drive/ten minute walk. We did an evening dolphin cruise that was lots of fun and worth the price. The resort charged pretty much the same price as anywhere else on island for rentals and excursions. There seemed to be plenty of activities for the kids and there are really nice fireworks on Tuesday night. If you walk to the far end of the property there are some picnic tables and Adirondack chairs with the most gorgeous views. There are several gas grills throughout the property which was a nice surprise. We also noticed lots of people enjoying the hammocks throughout the property, as well as mini golf, cornhole, shuffleboard, and bocce ball. Unfortunately my 21 yr old daughter left her lovey she’s had since birth. We realized it as soon as we got home and called the resort and filled out the online lost and found form. Hopefully it will be found by housekeeping wedged between the mattress and the bed frame. Speaking of housekeeping, they were great and came to the room offering fresh towels and trash service every day. Overall, an excellent use of your DVC points if you don’t want to go to the parks. We will...