Our editors choose their favorite hotels, from destination to off-the-radar.
The best hotels in Thailand for 2023 https://t.co/51vbIwjD4s pic.twitter.com/WUCjGAKbKn
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Thailand's hotels are among Asia's best. Bangkok's city hotels rival those in New York and London, but the country's landmark addresses are on its beaches and islands, such as Chiva Som, the world's best destination spa, and Aman, Banyan Tree, and Six Senses on Thailand's best islands. Boutique and off-the-beaten-path restaurants with friendly service and traditional food give you a taste of local life. Here are our favorite Thailand hotels.
Six Senses Yao Noi, Phang Nga
Listed on our 2022 Gold List of top new hotels.
On Yao Noi, a steep island in Phang Nga Bay between Phuket and Krabi, Six Senses has mastered the castaway experience. Shoes are removed on the speedboat journey to the resort, and driftwood signs indicate the white sand beach, hilltop half-moon infinity pool, and stilted thatched-roof bungalows. Searching for the spa in jungle longhouses, dining in multi-level bamboo and clapboard restaurants, and watching movies on the beach beneath the stars are all adventures. Look for pairs of sooty black hornbills and hire a hotel bike to circle the island through the fishing town and rubber plantations. LC
InterContinental Khao Yai hotel, Khao Yai
Appearing in our 2023 issue featuring the best family vacations
This fanciful resort, three hours north of Bangkok and on the edge of the national park, seems like it was designed for kids. The quirky Bill Bensley-designed hotel unfolds like a lake-dotted, railroad-themed playground, with every building, from the gingerbread-trimmed main wing to the lakeside eateries, inspired by the neighboring King Rama V-era Pak Chong railway station. Bensley creates an imaginative story about Somsak, a railway conductor whose locomotive-style sleeping accommodations are the hotel lobby. My kid still raves about the railway carriage-style cabins with low clerestoried ceilings, sliding cabin doors, and overhead baggage racks. There are mock ticket booths and moss-covered tracks. The jungle-back villas made from recycled rail carriages from junkyards and equipped with canvas-shaded patios and private plunge pools are even more entertaining. While my son did treasure hunts and Thai dance on the railway carriage turned kids' club, I sipped Negronis at the French-tinged Papillon bar. This is fun for kids and inner kids. Chris Schalkx
ChivaSom, Hua Hin
Chiva Som is Thailand's wellness queen, having pioneered spa getaways 27 years ago. There have been many imitators, but none have been able to match the original's life-enhancing mix of cutting-edge fitness (including Iron Man-like Vision Bodysuits), medical diagnostics (blood works, gene testing), traditional Asian healing therapies, and hyper-intuitive staff. 16 retreats—stress and pain management, fitness boost, immunological resilience, elder health—will be tailored to your mental, physical, and emotional requirements. Change lifelong behaviors here. LC
Banyan Tree Samui
Your villa's pool has a lotus blossom and stunning Lamai Bay views. The villas, private beach, spa, and elevated restaurant The Edge are connected via steep routes by buggies. The peninsular has villas of various sizes with sea or garden views. Family and couple villas include two-person rainfall showers and spacious bedrooms with private infinity pools. Watch the sunrise from a wooden deck with beanbags. Try afternoon tea at the beach restaurant or kayak and boat rides on the private beach. Between April and May, you may see resident turtle hatchlings enter the water. Hydrotherapy massages at the spa are essential. The Rainforest treatment begins with a steam chamber, then an ice-cold shower, and ends with powerful back muscle water jets. Sophie Knight
Four Seasons Chiangmai
31 acres of groomed gardens and rice paddy in the Mae Rim Valley house treetop pavilions, private houses, and pool villas. Rice farmers march around the fields singing after sunset. Two buffalo bathe every day in the lake, which hosts morning yoga, pottery, Thai boxing, tennis, and textile dying. Two infinity pools overlook the paddies for sunbathers. Every viewpoint is lush and peaceful. Private house visitors may spend the day in luxury, with private pools, a kitchen for private cooking, and a wrap-around patio for al-fresco eating and entertainment. Breakfast is a delight, with Chinese dumplings, English breakfast, and the friendliest employees taking coffee orders. Sophie Knight
Villa Mahabhirom, Chiang Mai
This forest getaway is a 10-minute drive from urban Chiang Mai. 14 guest houses are surrounded by tall bamboo canes and palms. It feels more like a house than a motel with 28 guests. The 120-year-old Thai family residences were painstakingly repaired and updated. Each stilt house includes an open-air living space, softly lit bedrooms, marble baths, and cozy balconies on the upper level. Large villas have gardens and pools. The grounds feel like an open-air museum with antique chandeliers, shabby-chic closets, and big taxidermy. The pool and its surroundings—greenery, clay sculptures by a local artist, hanging lanterns, and soft sunbeds—are works of art. Poolside serves breakfast and dinner. Enjoy the Vietnamese menu and happy hour cocktails—the only time you'll see other visitors. You may also view the deer that roam the grounds. Sophie Knight
Langkhai Garden, Koh Tao
The Chumphon Archipelago's sleepiest island, Koh Tao, is barely 25 minutes across. Langkhai Garden's four private villas on the island's tranquil southeast shore are for families and couples seeking lengthy vacations. A French couple who met on the island and dreamt of building a bolthole established it in 2018 after a three-year endeavor. Modern chic, the homes have polished concrete walls, high wooden beam ceilings, and thatched straw roofs. (also home to some local lizards). Huge four-poster beds lie next to pots of fresh flowers, couches are spacious enough for the whole family, kitchens are fully equipped, and there's a wraparound terrace with outdoor dining and a private pool with magnificent sea views. If you hate cooking, order from neighboring eateries that deliver. Friendly reception personnel hires scooters to reach the island's marine life-filled bays. Swim with whale sharks or turtles if you time it well. After settling into island life, leaving the property will be difficult. Sophie Knight
Raya Heritage, Chiang Mai
On our 2021 Gold List of the top new hotels worldwide.
This Ping River hotel has no ornamental roofing. Sai oua sausage and khao soi soup, two local favorites, are unlikely to be served. Aged Buddhas? Almost none. Raya Heritage, where the temple-inspired teakwood-and-gold aesthetic has been replaced with a straight-lined approach to highlight crafts, is the most rooted. Terracotta. Reed basketry. Handwoven fabrics. Indigo jolts. It honors Lanna, the 700-year-old cross-border monarchy whose capital was Chiang Mai. It's fresh and colorful, not Disney-fied, and only your conscience stops you from filling your bag with hand-dyed blankets or lacquered bamboo catchalls. (with that in mind, Raya Heritage opened its Him Gong shop in 2019). The region's cultural diversity isn't simply in the interiors. Linen-clad servers offer Burmese noodle salads, Chinese kung pao chicken, and Shan-style river prawns. The spa offers bone-cracking Burmese massages and a special steam room mix by a local herbalist. Although the 33 rooms—some with private pools—are appealing enough to lounge in all day, excursions to meet artists may be arranged. In a country that's steadily re-appreciating its crafts, this address is a model for Thai design without stereotypes. Chris Schalkx
In today's hospitality news, Songkran is the best holiday in Thailand and is celebrated during the hottest month of the year so Sindhorn Midtown Hotel Bangkok is hosting a pool party as well as super dining options for guests to cool off in style. More at https://t.co/yvoiGZG1kh pic.twitter.com/wwdMxDBMMn
— Phil@Punch Media (@PunchMedia1) April 3, 2023
Phulay Bay, a Ritz-Carlton Reserve, Krabi
Phulay Bay, a Ritz-Carlton Reserve in Krabi, has soaring red ochre walls, enormous keyhole doors, candlelight-reflected pools, and beautiful frangipani and jasmine-scented gardens. The sprawling villas overlook Phang Nga Bay's prehistoric limestone karsts and include pillared baths, double-height hand-painted murals, and mattresses so enormous you could roll about all night without touching your sweetheart. The resort's movie star looks have won it several leading parts, including The Hangover 2's wedding scene. Lee Cobaj
COMO Point Yamu, Phuket
COMO Point Yamu's exterior seems brutalist, too drab and austere for the curving seaside site. But follow Asia's coolest crowd inside and you'll find the hotel is as light and airy as a birdcage: columns of concrete chop the Phuketian sunshine into shards; razor-sharp lines frame a luminous green bay wrapped in rippling limestone hills; and a 100-meter white-tiled swimming pool shoots out toward the Andaman Sea. This hotel's outstanding appearance, excellent service, delicious food, and luxurious spa make it a favorite among LGBTQ+ Thais and tourists. LC
Amanpuri, Phuket
Amanpuri, the original Aman resort, is one of the crown jewels. Pansea Beach is stunning, with giant black stones and skyscraper-tall palm palms. From here, massive steps lead to a smoldering black-tiled swimming pool and a lovely maze of wooden paths that zigzag to graceful teak residences with sliding doors, outside salas, and occasionally pools. Thai, Southern Italian, and Japanese restaurants and a world-class spa provide health and well-being programs. LC
Four Seasons Koh Samui, Koh Samui
The Four Seasons is a luxurious beach resort on Koh Samui's northeast coast, wrapping around a private peninsula. Thatched-roof homes cascade down the hillside in breezy ivories and teals, with dark wooden shutters, netted beds, and egg-shaped bathrooms. Sit on a stripy daybed by the beachfront infinity pool and enjoy lemongrass-infused cold towels and pineapple skewers, or visit the spa for treatments using garden herbs. Yachts, Muay Thai, and coral babies are for the active. Gather at the Rum Vault for a tiki-lit tasting after dark. LC
Anantara Golden Triangle Elephant Camp and Resort
As its name indicates, the Anantara Golden Triangle's biggest draw is its elephant sanctuary, an ethical NGO that gives guests up-close contact with Dumbo. You may stroll with the gentle giants through fields of lemongrass grass and bamboo in the warm morning light, feed them melons and pumpkins for lunch, or sleep in a bubble chamber as they roam the jungle. However, the hotel offers many additional charms, including its Mekong River location overlooking Thailand, Myanmar, and Laos, best seen at dawn with the golden sunshine refracted through the cloud forest mist. LC
Mandarin Oriental Bangkok
“It is a lovely place and I am fonder of it than ever,” Nöel Coward said after visiting the Mandarin Oriental in 1929. Bangkok's stately dame is even more attractive after a multi-million dollar renovation. Most of the creamy wood-paneled suites have balconies overlooking the gardens, pool, and Chao Phraya River. Joseph Conrad, Graham Greene, and John Le Carré are honored in suites. The 1940s-era Bamboo Bar still swings. Alain Roux runs two-Michelin-starred Le Normandie, one of 10. The spa, accessible by a carved teak boat, will relax you like a lotus blossom in the sun. LC
Trisara, Phuket
This luxurious site, which descends a lush slope down a secluded part of upscale Layan Beach in Phuket's northwest, is private. 39 peaked-roof villas and 30 opulent private dwellings with private pools and breathtaking sea views are spread around 40 frangipani-scented acres and 2,000 meters of Andaman Sea shoreline. Fully dressed, you may eat at Pru, Phuket's only Michelin-starred restaurant and Thailand's only Michelin Green-starred restaurant, or attend one of the island's most popular Sunday champagne breakfasts. Disrobe again for holistic Thai therapy at the temple-like Jara spa, which combines massage with wooden hammers and chisels and maybe magic. LC
137 Pillars House, Chiang Mai
137 Pillars House is like landing at a 19th-century countryside sanctuary with all the contemporary amenities within Chiang Mai's ancient city walls, minutes from the majestic Wat Gate temple. The main two-story structure has teak pillars, white painted timber, elaborate fretwork, and Asian antiques. 30 apartments include patterned tiled floors, four-poster beds, and rocking seats on verandahs in Anglo-Lanna style. The aromatic tropical plants, outdoor pool, superb dining, and relaxing spa make it easy to forget the 21st century. LC
The Standard, Hua Hin
On our 2021 Hot List of the top new hotels worldwide.
The Standard Hua Hin injects youth into a beach town dominated by megaresorts. Contemporary art and midcentury-modern furnishings replace teakwood flooring and jasmine garlands, while bamboo and bougainvillea-lined paths lead to boho-beachy homes. (where disco balls hang in the bathrooms). Bangkok's elite relaxes under candy-striped umbrellas by the pool, where two restaurants serve beverages and Thai-with-a-twist snacks until 10. Chris Schalkx
Roukh Kiri, Khao Yai
Thai hotels' foreign-inspired décor often borders on kitsch. They have a strange, there-but-not-really-there appearance. A Disneyfied Tuscan town and a gypsum-board Scottish castle are among the biggest offenders in Khao Yai, a Hamptons-like hillside refuge two hours north of Bangkok. Newcomer Roukh Kiri might have joined those ranks, but Onion gave the notion a novel spin. The 12 villas, spread over a mango orchard, feature gabled roofs, cobblestone walls, and sliding barn doors built from repurposed lumber, but they are stripped of any frills, creating a little hamlet of magnificent residences in a whitewashed and linen-licked rustic simplicity. Picture windows open to indoor-outdoor baths and private sandstone swimming pools in feather grass overlooking the verdant valley below. The community fireplace and the reclaimed-wood restaurant, which serves twists on classic recipes using food from the organic garden, overlook that valley. (try the krapow with rosemary). Finally, a Khao Yai resort is worth the detour. CS
Capella Bangkok
In a city with practically every smart hotel brand, it requires something exceptional to stand out. After a seven-year wait, the hi-so crowd flocked here. The only city hotel with multi-roomed villas on the Chao Phraya River, Capella's first in Thailand, with marble-lined pools and private gardens. The main structure, a blocky, low-slung construction with 101 rooms, offers suites with individual balconies and has hired French chef Mauro Colagreco of Mirazur to run its namesake Mediterranean restaurant Côte. Champagne coupes accompany check-in, breakfasts, and turn-down service. The jewel-like tea lounge has Thai latticework and local antiques, while the remainder of the area is understated with blonde wood, taupe, and cream decor. The spa offers tok sen hammer massages and luk pra kob herbal compresses influenced by the Thai-Chinese population outside the gates. Service is quiet yet attentive. Capella still rules Bangkok's hotel scene. Capella Bangkok Hotel review. CS
Four Seasons Bangkok at Chao Phraya River
The hotel group's return to Bangkok (it's original home shuttered in 2015) was planned long before spontaneous foreign travel took such a hit, but Jean-Michel Gathy's Chao Phraya River reincarnation seems perfectly tailored to the city's regulars. This getaway has a multi-tiered swimming pool with thick-cushioned loungers for all-day lounging, large bedrooms with deep bathtubs and DIY cocktail corners, and floor-to-ceiling windows on multiple sides that frame stunning views. Four restaurants and a vermouth bar provide leisurely meals, such as sardine tartines and mignonette-drizzled oysters at Brasserie Palmier or lemony crudo with a crisp rosé on Riva del Fiume's riverfront patio. The Thai spa, which offers hi-tech anti-aging treatments and lo-tech bamboo massages, has a lap pool for water aerobics and stand-up paddleboarding and seems all-encompassing. The modern art collection has an urban edge: towering paintings depicting the curvature of the Chao Phraya and a monk's robe hang from the marble walls of the vast lobby, while a rotating exhibition in the gallery wing showcases local talent. Artsy businesses have made this Bangkok neighborhood a design district. Since Four Seasons joined, it has achieved its peak. CS
The Mustang Blu, Bangkok
Only a little sign above the entrance of this dilapidated 19th-century structure on the edge of the capital's dizzying Chinatown shows that it's no longer a run-down former bank turned massage parlor. After The Mustang Nero in Phra Khanong, stylist Ananda "Joy" Chalardcharoen leased space in this historic spice-trading zone.
She and her crew renovated this rundown late-night establishment in five months. They renovated only what was needed, retaining antiquities like the vault door, and opened the three-floor atrium after decades. Chalardcharoen's paint-peeled halls have her distinctive taxidermy mix—a horse and a glass-encased ostrich skeleton welcome guests in the lobby—along with elegantly organized literature and European antiques. All 10 rooms include velvet drapes, marble-tiled bathrooms, and freestanding roll-top tubs.
The ground-floor café serves upside-down banana cake and huge breakfasts of herb-rubbed chicken or baked salmon with fruit and pastries atop ceramics with the owner's Mustang Blu images. It shuts at night, but this street-food-dense neighborhood has plenty of great cuisines. Soi Nana, home to Asia Today and Teens of Thailand, is a short walk away for nighttime excitement. The Grand Budapest Hotel would have been filmed in Bangkok if Wes Anderson had set it there.
9 Hornbills Tented Camp, Koh Yao Noi
One of Thailand's greatest islands, with stilted fishermen's settlements and desolate beaches, resembles Koh Samui or Koh Phi Phi before big-brand expansions. On a moped ride over its criss-crossing dirt tracks, visitors are more likely to see grazing water buffaloes than sunbathing farang (foreigners), and much of the sand is peaceful. Swiss entrepreneur Jean-Michel Germing and his business partner founded Koyao over 20 years ago because it's a world apart from Phuket, a 30-minute speedboat ride across the strait.
9 Hornbills Tented Camp, named after Germing's first site inspection of nine hornbills, is up the hill. Ten safari tents with pools, huge gardens, four-poster beds, and reclaimed wood rain showers are spread across a former rubber plantation. Germing also directed the Six Senses one hill over.
The sister hotel's restaurant and semi-private beach are connected to the camp by a buggy, and the estate's bar is a great place for sundowners. Butlers prepare candlelight dinners, island picnics, and floating breakfasts in Thai tiffin boxes. The massive, moss-covered karst structures in the water may be the nicest vista in the country.
Hotel Gahn, Khao Lak
Rabiab Anusasananun, the boutique hotel's owner, thought it was smart to open on the main road instead than the area's honey-colored beaches. She says she created it to honor her grandpa, who arrived in Thailand in 1928 on a Chinese junk to work in the tin-mining sector.
These migrants were known as Baba Nyonya and now live in Sino-Portuguese towns across the Malay Peninsula and Singapore. The family wanted to pass on their rich heritage through this initiative. They used Phuket-based architecture company Locomotive to realize their concept, drawing inspiration from the family home's terrazzo flooring and arching columns while adding exposed-concrete ceilings and vintage desk lights. The little shop sells colorful batik, and the five stories' artworks reveal Baba culture.
Anusasananun makes her grandfather's specialties in the Juumpo restaurant, including the melt-in-your-mouth moo hong (stewed sweet pork with herbs). The nearest beach is a five-minute taxi trip away, but this charming diversion from the town's generic hotels is worth it.
Phu Chaisai, Chiang Rai
The 45-minute drive from the town's airport to this hilltop hideaway in the Golden Triangle is a fast-blast tour of the countryside: neon-green rice paddies, ornate orange-golden temple roofs, and sloped tea plantations set the tone for a stay in northern Thailand at its purest. 33 red-clay homes face the mountains beyond a tangle of vines and bamboo. They have bamboo and hill-tribe cloth pillows.
When you meet the elderly owner, it's simple and unassuming, albeit some villas have private pools. After a successful career as an interior designer, with projects in embassies and royal palaces, she moved her household from central Bangkok to this slow-paced jungle retreat where traditional crafts and eco-conscious living take center stage.
Breakfast includes Akha-tribe coffee and jungle honey, natural spa items, and forest trekking routes. Aman and Four Seasons veteran Jason Friedman spruced up the hotel five years ago, and insiders and hip urbanites now visit many times a year. The restaurant's neighbor, Bangkok-born British chef, and author Kay Plunkett-Hogge will open a culinary school.
Baan Pomphet, Ayutthaya
This temple-studded city is Thailand's traditional capital, but trendy cafés, dessert bars, and hotels have modernized it. The T-shaped riverside where the Chao Phraya and Pasak rivers meet has an eight-room hotel and restaurant. Bangkok-based architecture company Onion has developed an MC Escher-like edifice using hand-molded red brick and reclaimed lumber, featuring steps, staircases, and roofs in varied patterns.
Intricately carved Chiang Mai hardwood lamps and Hanuman-shaped doorknobs soften rigid lines. A scaffolding-like footbridge joins the two structures and divides the guests-only section, where an ancient bodhi tree shelters a swimming pool. The rooms' pod-like beds and black-tiled bathrooms contrast with the tactile outside. The corner room on the second floor has the best fortress views, while the ground-level rooms offer a little outdoor shower.
Passion fruit and pineapple smoothies and grilled huge river prawns attract day-trippers from Bangkok, 50 miles away. After nightfall, the rooftop's wooden shutters open to expose a well-stocked bar. Order a bael-fruit Shakerato or Mojito with roselle and Thai basil and watch the day's last boats splutter by on the hyacinth-covered river below.
Hotel Des Artists, Ping Silhoette, Chiang Mai
The dazzling temples of Chiang Mai's moated Old Town are stunning, and the busy Nimmanhaemin neighborhood has artisanal coffee and local designer stores, but green Wat Ket, which offers both, is one of the city's nicest locales. Rootsy art galleries line the sidewalks, while restaurants on the Ping River serve khao soinoodles and drinks under fairy-lit banyan trees. Boutique hotels in old villas are also here.
However, the Ping Silhouette is based on a time when this area was a flourishing multicultural trade neighborhood with Chinese-style warehouses. A stone-paved courtyard with big glassless windows frames trimmed bonsai trees and cozy tea nooks between glazed tile roofs and antique French shutters. Ancient Chinese artifacts (ornamental doors, stone horses) and a long goldfish-filled pond calm the marketplace. Most rooms have patios overlooking weeping willows and the riverfront lap pool.
Thai rice porridge and pa tong go doughnuts are served in bamboo steamer baskets at the café, which is decorated with chinoiserie teapots and blue-and-white pottery. Stunning amid the teakwood-dominated local environment and suitable for this strange nook.