LEGOLAND® Hotel Florida — Hotel in Winter Haven

For anyone with small children who enjoy Legos, or adults who are just nuts about Legos, a visit to Legoland is a must. While I won't review the theme park or water park here, the hotel is worth reviewing on its own.||You have a couple of options with the themed hotels, and we chose Pirate. I did quite a bit of research ahead of the trip and saw a lot that I liked, so I decided my 5-yr-old boy would probably enjoy this one the most. Firstly, the hotel is themed in an outstanding way. Giant Lego structures adorn the exterior, and almost everywhere you go on any Legoland property, you will find large play pits with hundreds of Lego pieces for kids to build on a tabletop, a pillar, or even the wall. There is just so much opportunity for children to get carried away into an impromptu building session - great for parents who want just a bit of peace at a meal, or while waiting for service from the front desk, for example. I also loved the Lego figure trading aspect of the entire park, including the hotels. My son was focused on looking at each employee's name badge to see if he wanted to trade a figure of his for one that was affixed to a badge. The properties also have "trading boards" with multiple figures for trade, and the employees are obligated to trade a figure at any time if a child asks. It introduces a "hunt" of sorts to the trip, and is exciting for the family. The hotels also have small stores on-site if you want to buy Lego sets, and there are build sessions held multiple times each day, where a guide leads you through constructing a small Lego creation without instructions. Your child will keep their creation at the end and with only 15 minutes of time invested, my son had fun and learned in the process.||As for the rooms - Legoland has spent considerable time designing the experience for the guests. The room is covered with Lego-themed decorations, wall prints, shower tiles - as you might imagine. Each room contains a small safe with a 4-digit code, and the code's digits are found by answering questions about what is found in the room. Inside the safe we found small, bagged sets of Ninjago Legos to build, and Honest Apple Juice. The rooms are split into two sections: one with bunk beds (and a pull-out trundle) to sleep up to 3 children, complete with a Lego build area and baseplate, and the second with a queen bed for the adults that features a small table and set of drawers. We found the space in the room to be fine for our needs as a family of 3. It might get a little crowded with 4 or 5, especially considering the size of the bathroom. The housekeeping replaced all the themed toiletries each day, even when we didn't need them, so you have plenty to spare. They are also apparently supposed to replace the treasures inside the safe, but this did not happen for us. Front desk folks were happy to supply them anyway. My only real complaint about the room was the humidity level - even running the AC on 68 or 70F, we could never get the humidity even close to 50%. So while not hot, the rooms do tend to stay a bit stuffy. Granted, this is central Florida in the summer, so humidity is expected, but it seems like the facility should do better, especially considering it's a fairly young building.||We did not dine at Bricks, an on-site restaurant, but the Shipwreck restaurant was decently good. One nice benefit of Legoland hotel visits is free breakfast - you simply leave a gratuity. Everything at the Shipwreck is served family style: you have a few customizations that are possible, but breakfast is a large skillet with eggs, sausage, bacon, Lego waffles / pancakes, fruit, juice, etc. I felt it was a good value. Dinner, on the other hand, although a similar "skillet" style with lots of good features, was nearly $100 for my family of 3. Typical theme park gouging, but not worse than Disney. There are restaurants nearby that you can easily reach quickly in a car, so don't feel boxed into eating at the on-site restaurants.||The Pirate hotel has a fun feature of the elevator where a recorded voice says silly things when it stops on each floor, and plays a pirate song while descending, which my son loved. There is a pool on the property but we frankly did not have time to use it, especially since we reserved a day for the water park, but it looks nice and even has a large water slide.||Overall, this was a great experience. Although not perfect, the design is spot-on for children and Lego-lovers, and I had lots of joy watching my son have so much fun, especially since the Legoland theme park is about 30 seconds' walk outside the front door of the hotel. The staff in the hotel made the stay memorable, and many of them take a lot of pride in their work, showing their own fondness for the world of Lego. If we return to Legoland, which I suspect we will, I would...

We recently stayed at the LEGOLAND Florida Hotel for a weekend trip with our kids. While the location and theming are fantastic, our experience was significantly impacted by a cleanliness issue and poor customer service from management. For the premium price this hotel charges, we expected a much higher level of cleanliness, service, and overall experience.

Pros:

Unbeatable Location: You can’t beat the convenience—LEGOLAND and Peppa Pig Land are right next door, making it easy to go back and forth without worrying about transportation.

Awesome Themes and Decorations: The hotel is beautifully themed throughout, and the rooms are vibrant, fun, and packed with LEGO details. Kids (and LEGO-loving adults) will absolutely love the immersive experience.

Plenty to Keep the Kids Entertained: From LEGO play areas to scavenger hunts in the rooms, there are tons of activities to keep kids engaged, even when you’re not in the park.

Nice Pool Areas: The hotel has fun pools, although it was frustrating that the larger activity pool with more attractions only opened at 4 PM, limiting daytime use.

Cons:

Roaches in Our Room (Room 481): The first night, I killed a medium-sized roach. I initially brushed it off, but on February 15, we found another roach crawling on the ceiling. This was disgusting and unacceptable, especially since my wife has a strong fear of roaches.

Management’s Response Was Dismissive and Unhelpful: When we reported the issue to the front desk, the staff was kind and responsive. However, the manager was completely dismissive of our concerns and never once apologized. Instead, she immediately tried to minimize the situation by saying that roaches are “normal” in Florida. I have stayed in plenty of Florida hotels, and I’ve never encountered a roach problem—this excuse was unacceptable.

Ridiculous Ultimatum on Room Change: When I asked for a room change, the manager reluctantly agreed but told us that if we switched rooms, we would not receive any credit. This made absolutely no sense—we were being inconvenienced and not receiving an upgrade or better accommodations, just a clean room of the same type. She then rushed us to move immediately, even though we were about to leave for the park. No offer to help with our belongings, no apology—just a blatant attempt to turn the room over for another guest who wouldn’t know about the roach issue.

Mediocre Food with Long Wait Times: The hotel’s restaurants are average at best with ridiculous wait times. While they claim to be buffet-style, in reality, servers bring a platter of food where they minimize the good items (e.g., meats, eggs). Since it already takes forever to get your food, there’s little opportunity (or patience) to request extra portions of the items you actually want. Breakfast and dinner were both frustrating experiences.

Overpriced for the Experience: This hotel charges a premium price, but the experience doesn’t match the cost. For the same price (or less), you could stay at a much nicer, cleaner, and more luxurious resort like the Gaylord Palms, which is only about 50 minutes away. The only real advantage here is location, but that doesn’t justify subpar cleanliness, poor service, and average food.

Final Thoughts:

The location, theming, and kid-friendly atmosphere are fantastic, but cleanliness and customer service matter—and this hotel failed in both areas. The presence of roaches and the dismissive, unapologetic attitude of management was disappointing. Instead of acknowledging the issue and making things right, the manager rushed us, refused any real compensation, and made us feel like an inconvenience.

Pair that with average food, long wait times, and poor buffet service, and it’s hard to justify the price of staying here. For what this hotel costs, you could stay at a true luxury resort like the Gaylord Palms, where cleanliness and service are top-notch. If management focused more on guest experience instead of damage control, this could be a fantastic...

Visited on 2 day park tickets Cons: Cleanliness of the bathroom did not meet the standard. Toilet was not clean thoroughly.

No microwaves in the rooms. Upon request you can request one if available. One was available and took over an hour to get it.

Shorted us 3 wash clothes. Requested more and took over an hour. Both requests were done at the front desk in person. Housekeeping delivered the microwave with no wash clothes. Informed them of the wash clothes & they were not aware of my previous request . Received them a few minutes later.

Complimentary breakfast underwhelming & lacking. It's not buffet style but you are seated & served by a waiter. As a family we have diet restrictions. After declining certain items due to restrictions. The serving sizes were 1 mini size pancake, 1 mini size biscuit, small serving of eggs per person. A very small plate of fruit for 5 to share. Including the size of a 16oz bottle of O.J for all. We were not offered more servings or other options to make up for the items we declined. Additionally, you get the guilt ticket to tip the waiter. Wish I took a picture to show literally they were mini size servings. .

Did not reserve a room in advance because of the hotel industry cancel policy & health matters that can make me unable to travel on any given day. You either have to pay almost double to reserve a room that has a late cancel coverage but still have to be 24 or 48hrs in advance I believe. Basically the hotel industry has put the entire risk on you as the customer if you don't show up & you are out of your money. Then make you feel guilty for not having or push you to buy travel insurance. Very poor cancellation policy.

Found cheaper hotels in the area that were comparable before arriving & confirmed the day of my arrival. I decided to go with Legoland hotel even though it was more expensive but went with the convenience of location & experience for the children. After leaving the theme Park day one of the visit went to the hotel front desk for price & availability for that night. The price given was more expensive than the price online under a discount. I asked why the difference and showed them the price on my phone in my checkout cart. They could not give a logical explanation & did not seem willing to assist any further. Requested a customer service line to call & booked the room over the phone for the same price online. Clearly the triangular system of communication don't match & the front desk were clearly lacking customer service. One of the ladies were on her 2nd day of training but tried to be helpful. The experienced employee could not be bothered with helping & lacked the ability to lead a trainee. Shared with the experienced employee I booked the online price over the phone when checking in. She did not say anything but had the look of lacking interest. Only shared because I thought that it would be a point of interest for her & the staff. I was wrong.

Recommendations:

I would not stay at Legoland resort again considering the above cons. The price you pay & what you get in return did not meet expectations. Paying a more expensive price over other hotels I would expect a higher standard of cleanliness, responsiveness, customer service, and a decent breakfast. Plus cancelation policy is a negative. Policy has zero flexibility or compassion for individuals with special needs or emergencies. Hotels in the area provide breakfast that are self serve. Would not have restricted serving size & allowed us to select what to eat based off our restrictions. If you have the means to accept risk of cancelling or paying more to cancel then it should not be an issue for you. Its low season so I accepted the risk to not book a hotel in advance but made sure I checked availabilities in advance so I knew what my options were. Will not give a corporation an opportunity to take my money because of a cancellation/emergency. Interesting that they are flexible when rescheduling theme Park dates but...