Is Atlantis The Royal ‘The most ultra-luxury resort in the world’?
The phrase “Disneyland for adults” is thrown around to describe everything from Monaco to Miami, to certain Soho House outposts. At Atlantis The Royal, the 795-key mega-resort on Dubai’s Palm Jumeirah, the comparison actually holds up, except this time Mickey is wearing Balenciaga, and demanding tableside caviar bumps.
This isn’t so much a hotel as a glitter-dusted pleasure dome engineered for maximum spectacle. It’s a place where you sip cocktails beside the world’s largest jellyfish aquarium, sample Heston Blumenthal’s “Meat Fruit”, stock up on Graff diamonds, and, if you’re a literal billionaire, sleep in the Royal Mansion, which at $100,000 a night is touted as the world’s most expensive hotel suite. It’s so over-the-top, it makes the Vegas Strip look like a National Trust tearoom in the Cotswolds.
There is no pretence of boutique cosiness here: Atlantis The Royal is all about scale is. This is maximalism turned up to 11. And nowhere is that more in evidence than in the food: it’s why I came, and why you should, too. With 17 restaurants, eight helmed by celebrity chefs, Atlantis The Royal is essentially a global tasting menu with hotel rooms attached.
Atlantis the Royal: Best restaurants
Behind the landmark water and fire fountains where Beyoncé headlined the hotel’s launch, is the Middle East’s outpost of Milos, the acclaimed seafood-led Hellenic restaurant founded by Costas Spiliadis, the Greek visionary who opened the first Milos in Montréal in 1979. Now a $10m, family-owned global empire, Milos is the largest restaurant at Atlantis, with 220 covers, three private dining rooms and a dramatic chef’s table set inside the kitchen. It offers the kind of simple, ingredient-led cooking that’s quietly confident in a sea of pageantry.
The Milos Special arrives like a savoury haystack: paper-thin courgette and aubergine slices, lightly fried with saganaki cheese. They resemble Walker’s Ready Salted and are dangerously addictive. Our waitress nudges us to try Fava Santorini: a velvety, lemon-kissed split pea stew, its creaminess enhanced by the crisp floral notes of Ktima Gerovassiliou’s Xinomavro Rosé.
At La Mar by Gastón Acurio, the pisco sours are sharp like frothy lime sherbet. Menu highlights include bluefin tuna ceviche with smoked yellow chili leche de tigre, a Peruvian classic with smoke and citrus dancing over cool buttery flesh. The Piqueo king crab sharing platter arrives in a gaudy plastic lobster, a fun, tasty build-your-own affair: crisp crab, lettuce cups and Nikkei glaze. And then there’s my favourite spot, Ling Ling, a pink, glossy, Pan-Asian restaurant that transforms into a nightclub when you’ve finished your robata and dim sum. The menu features one of the resort’s most audacious creations: The “24K Gold” specialty roll, a decadent seaweed duvet filled with lobster, bottarga, Hokkaido Wagyu, caviar, and – of course – edible gold.
Nobu by the Beach is a rare display of restraint. The brand’s debut pool and beach club is chic but a little unremarkable. You might momentarily forget where you are until you glance up at the hotel itself: a brutalist cascade of concrete Jenga blocks, rising 45 storeys and stretching the length of two Eiffel Towers laid end to end. You don’t fully grasp the scale and geometry until you’re lying poolside at Nobu or at the equally sleek (and equally sedate) Royal Pool. On the menu? Nobu classics like black cod miso and yellowtail sashimi, plus a surreal take on fish and chips, with both components sealed within the batter like some delicious Russian doll. It arrives alongside a Nobu-branded coconut, naturally.
How are there 90 swimming pools?
Atlantis The Royal boasts a total of 90 swimming pools, most of which belong to suites or private residences. The most talked about is Cloud 22. Perched on the 22nd floor, the Insta-famous infinity pool and lounge offers views of the Arabian Gulf, Palm Island and the Dubai skyline. A Dolce & Gabbana x Ounass collaboration blankets the space in blue-and-white majolica print: parasols, cushions, sunbeds, even floaties, alongside 110 giant hand-blown glass flowers.
It’s where Kendall Jenner launched her tequila brand. If it’s good enough for Kendall, then it’s good enough for me, and for Holly, a Liverpudlian day guest I befriended on a floating double sunbed, who seems impressed we are staying here. Holly gives us a wink of approval as we tuck into a girl dinner of Caesar salad and Diet Coke. Should you wish to reserve the two-storey Dulux cabana here, it will set you back £2,000 per day. I gave it a miss.
The hotel rooms themselves are modern, bright, but ultimately forgettable. But you don’t come to Atlantis The Royal to stay in your room. You come to be seen, to indulge, and to get £800 diamond facials. What you’re really paying for is access. And maybe a gold-plated toothbrush. Atlantis The Royal isn’t just a hotel. It’s a place where every detail is curated to overstimulate and hypnotise you until you forget what normal life looks like. It’s a high-octane fever dream for trust fund babies, glowing symmetrical people, and those with cast-iron pre-nups. Your neighbours might be royals, rappers, or a robot dog with a Tik Tok account.
Would I go back? Maybe. But would I sell my left arm for one more bite of caviar brioche? Absolutely.
• Rates at Atlantis The Royal start from £654 per room per night including breakfast at Gastronomy and based on two sharing. For more information visit atlantis.com/atlantis-the-royal