Riu Palace Paradise Island - All Inclusive - Adults Only

Customer Ratings & Reviews

TripAdvisor Traveler Rating

3075 reviews

• 

  Beach is wonderful, staff nice, not much else

  Location was a beautiful beach that’s its redeeming quality, the beds and pillows are not very comfortable. The food is mediocre at best. There’s not much to do if it rains. The entertainment is just loud hip hop no, variety. The TVs are outdated, they have a couple of channels that actually work the rest freezes up. If you’re just staying here for the affordable accommodations it’s fair, take lots of excursions… if you came to relax and enjoy the amenities be prepared…the pool closes at 6pm, they won’t let you have any of the chairs at the beach past 6 either, we had to put our things in the sand. it’s the absolute worst wine ever, limited availability on ala carts but, the food wasn’t worth it there anyway. We ended up eating a lot of salads…You can choose from about 5 things on room service, the “mini bar” is only a few choices of liquor. Only diet soda is Diet Coke, the staff is mostly friendly… Hope this helps if you want to book and don’t know what to expect.

  Sep 01, 2026
• 

  Would not stay again

  Hotel is outdated and not very clean. Pool and swim up bar is nice. The staff is NOT friendly, they don’t smile and are rude at times. Restaurant staff was amazing. Food was surprisingly very very good. Beach was stunning but the guys selling jet skis and snorkeling were RELENTLESS! Non stop every day, all day. Wouldn’t not go back

  Sep 01, 2026
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  Riu’s forgotten stepchild!!!

  Don’t even know where to start. Here I am August 15 2026 after flying all day to check into the worst hotel experience ever, not to mention this is a Riu Palace, and all inclusive. The property has definitely been forgotten by their parent Company. I can’t find not one redeeming quality that I would even slightly find acceptable. The rooms are filthy and outdated and falling apart, the furniture,,, I’ve seen better at second hand stores, the mattress and pillows are from 1982. The food is recycled from one meal to the next. There are vacant properties on both side a currently one has a fire alarm blaring will go from the village, all day and I’m sure all night. I have stayed at at Riu properties all over the world and have never had a bad experience, especially at a palace . This isn’t just a horrible review, but a warning….. if you still book at this sorry excuse for a resort, just remember you have been warned! And I gave it one star because I had to…

  Aug 15, 2026
• 

  Bad beds, phenominal beach

  So. I’m glad I didn’t read any reviews before we stayed here. We probably wouldn’t have come. This is the 4th RIU property we have stayed at. And by far the smallest. Which was fine with us. Resort is very small. But we kinda liked how small it was. Didn’t have to walk a country mile to do anything. Beach was STUNNNNING. I can not express how beautiful the beach was. I found the staff very helpful. They don’t want you dragging your own chairs, they do it for you. As for the walk to the bar from the beach….its really not that big of a deal 🙄. The sargassum arrived around 3pm like clockwork. But it wasn’t too bad. The reviews on the staff I agree with. Many of them at the bar specifically were not friendly at all. But that’s really the only place we found staff to be unfriendly. HOWEVER. The beds. HORRIBLE. I mean truly horrible. Pillows were hard as a rock. Bed was hard as a rock and so jiggly. Everytime my husband moved in the bed, the whole bed would shake like there was an earthquake. We considered extending or stay initially but decided we couldn’t do another night in the bed. It was really that bad. And I’m so shocked no one else has left a review about the bed. I guess we got one of the rooms with the crap AC. Our room was HOT. At all times. We aren’t complainers so we just kinda assumed that’s how it worked and maybe it was too hot and muggy for the AC to keep up. Our shower leaked. You needed lots of towels on the floor to soak up the water when you shower. And the towel rack above the toilet my husband constantly hit his head on (I found this funny. He did not). They also do not automatically refresh you with bottled water. We had to call several times for water and finally my husband had to go down to the front desk for it. After that we just started refilling the water bottles at the water stations. I would come back if they got better beds.

  Aug 11, 2026
• 

  Beautiful beach, but definitely not the RIU Palace experience we expected

  We recently stayed here and, overall, had a very mixed experience. There are definitely some great things about this resort, but there are also some things that really need improvement. The beach is absolutely beautiful. The water is warm, crystal clear, and gorgeous, and we had very little sargassum during our stay. If you are someone who spends most of your vacation at the beach, you will probably really enjoy this resort. The beach staff who set up the chairs and umbrellas were wonderful. The food was another highlight. We thought the food was very good for an all-inclusive, especially the specialty restaurants. The steakhouse and Krystal were our favorites. The regular buffet was above average, and the breakfast buffet was excellent. Unfortunately, the service was a major disappointment. This did not feel like the level of service we expect from a RIU Palace. Most of the staff did not seem very friendly or welcoming, and many seemed like they were simply there to do their job and go home. There are also only two bars on the entire resort — a pool bar and a 24-hour sports bar. There is no beach bar or beach drink service, so if you’re spending the day on the beach and want a drink, you have to walk all the way to the pool. The pool bartenders were some of the least friendly employees we encountered. They often wouldn’t even look at you when you approached the bar to order. When it was your turn, they would wave you forward with their hand rather than acknowledging you or greeting you. This is definitely not the Palace service we expected. At night, the 24-hour sports bar is essentially your only option for getting a drink. Once the entertainment starts around 9:30 PM, the area becomes extremely loud and crowded. If you don’t want to sit and watch the entertainment, there really isn’t another place to simply relax and have a drink. We found this frustrating. The entertainment itself was average. It also seemed like the same dance was performed every night, so there wasn’t much variety. The resort is also in need of major updating. It is definitely showing its age and could use some attention. The cappuccino bar was another issue. Opening at 10:00 AM is much too late for a coffee bar. At night, they would start cleaning up and putting everything away around 10:00 PM. One night, I went to get a milkshake at 10:15 PM and was told no because the ice cream had already been put away. For an all-inclusive resort, that was disappointing. If you’re a beach person, this resort has a lot going for it. The beach and water are beautiful and were easily the best part of our stay. However, if you’re a pool person, I would probably look elsewhere. The pool area and pool bar were not highlights for us. Would we return? Probably only for the location, beach and beautiful water. Those things were fantastic. But when you choose a RIU Palace, you expect a certain level of service, and unfortunately, this resort did not live up to that expectation.

  Aug 10, 2026