Andaz Maui at Wailea Resort: Is It Worth It? (2026)

The Andaz Maui at Wailea Resort is the design-forward, points-friendly luxury hotel on the Wailea strip — four terraced infinity pools dropping to Mokapu Beach, an Iron Chef restaurant, and a spa where you blend your own oils. It is a Hyatt, and that is the whole plot twist: its neighbors want 110,000 Hilton points a night, while the Andaz wants 35,000 Hyatt.

Is it worth it? On points, it is the best deal on this beach, full stop. On cash, at roughly $1,100 a night, it is worth it for couples and design lovers who want calm and snorkeling over a kids' water park — and oversized for anyone who will spend the week out exploring the island.

Here is the honest review of the Andaz Maui at Wailea Resort, as of 2026: what this Hyatt hotel actually is, the famous terraced pools, the rooms, the apothecary spa, Mokapu Beach and the snorkeling, where to eat, what a night really costs, and who should book it. Planning the rest of your stay? Our where to stay in Maui guide covers every other area.

In this guide

• What the Andaz Maui at Wailea is: a Hyatt resort
• The four terraced infinity pools
• Rooms, suites, and villas
• 'Awili Spa: the Hawaiian apothecary
• Where to eat at the Andaz Maui
• Mokapu Beach and the snorkeling
• What a stay at the Andaz Maui costs
• Is the Andaz Maui at Wailea Resort worth it?
• How to book the Andaz Maui: points vs cash
• Where else to stay in Wailea
• FAQ: Andaz Maui at Wailea Resort

What the Andaz Maui at Wailea is: a Hyatt resort

The Andaz Maui at Wailea is a Hyatt luxury hotel — Andaz is Hyatt's boutique, design-forward brand — located on 15 beachfront acres in Wailea, the manicured resort row along Maui's sunny south shore. It offers about 290 rooms and suites plus a handful of multi-bedroom villas, which makes it a fraction the size of the 800-room Grand Wailea up the beach, and that smaller footprint is the point. Among the marquee Wailea Maui resorts, it is the one that traded scale for design.

It sits about 20 minutes south of Kahului Airport (OGG), an easy drive down to the warm, dry, reliably sunny corner of the island. Wailea is the calm, polished side of Maui — green golf, paved beach paths, and a cluster of big-name resorts — the opposite of the wild Road to Hana.

The resort opened in September 2013 on the bones of the old Renaissance Wailea hotel, gutted and rebuilt as the first Andaz at a beach resort anywhere — the brand's bet that Wailea wanted something cooler and more contemporary than the marble-and-chandelier grand hotels around it. More than a decade on, that bet reads as correct: the Andaz still feels like the modern one on the strip.

The design language is the whole identity. Where the Grand Wailea goes for scale and the Four Seasons goes for white-glove polish, the Andaz goes for clean lines, neutral palettes, and an architecture built entirely around one move — those terraced pools stepping down the hillside to frame the Pacific. Walk in through the open-air lobby and the ocean is doing all the talking.

Location-wise, Wailea is the easy half of Maui. It is dry and sunny when the rest of the island is grey, the roads are smooth, the beaches are calm, and the airport, the golf, and the south-shore snorkel tours are all close. If your priority is a low-friction, high-comfort base — and you would rather it look like an architecture magazine than a theme park — the Andaz is the Wailea front door to pick.

The move: fly into Kahului, rent a car, point south to Wailea · When: the south shore is sunny year-round; mornings are calmest · Note: this is the small, design-led resort on the strip, not the big family one.

The four terraced infinity pools

The pools are why the Andaz photographs the way it does. Instead of one big deck, the resort runs four infinity-edge pools terraced down the hillside — each one stepping toward the next, the whole sequence framing the ocean from the Lehua Lounge at the top to the lagoon pool at the sand.

It is a fundamentally different idea from the Grand Wailea's nine-pool water canyon. There are no waterslides here, no lazy river, no rope swing — this is a place to float and look at the view, not to ride anything. The fun is quieter, and almost always involves a drink. One of the four pools is adults-only, the quiet end of the terrace for a book and a drink, and the splurge suites and villas come with their own private plunge pools on the lanai.

Down at the bottom, where the deck meets Mokapu Beach, the Bumbye Beach Bar sits beside the lagoon pool — the spot for a mai tai with your feet still wet from the sand. The drinks are well made and priced like a Wailea resort, which is to say a lava flow runs about what a sandwich costs anywhere else.

So is all that water worth the rate? If you want a calm, beautiful pool day with the ocean in every photo, absolutely — this is one of the prettiest pool settings in Hawaii. If you are traveling with kids who measure a pool by its waterslides, you will hear about the missing slides by lunchtime, and the Grand Wailea's canyon next door is the better call.

The move: claim a lounger on the adults pool early, then drift down the terrace to Bumbye by the sand · When: mornings before the day fills in · Note: beautiful and calm, but no slides — manage the kids' expectations.

Rooms, suites, and villas

The rooms match the architecture: clean, contemporary, neutral, each with a lanai and none of the dated tropical-print grandeur you get at the older resorts. The entry tiers are the partial and full ocean-view rooms, and on a property built entirely around the view, paying up to a real ocean view is the upgrade that earns its keep — the resort-view rooms look over handsome grounds, but you came for the water.

Couples celebrating something move up to the Andaz suites, some with a private plunge pool right on the lanai, which is the kind of unnecessary delight the whole place is built on. Bigger groups and longer stays look at the residential villas — two- to four-bedroom units with full kitchens, set a little apart from the main resort, closer to renting a contemporary home than booking a hotel room.

A genuinely odd, genuinely on-brand detail: a few rooms come with a Viking grill on the private lanai. It is the sort of amenity nobody asks for and everybody photographs, and it tells you exactly what kind of hotel this is — one that would rather be interesting than conventional.

One honest note on the layout: this is a hillside resort, so your room can sit a real walk up or down from the beach and the lobby, and the terraced design means stairs. It is nothing like the Grand Wailea's sprawl, but if steps are a problem, ask the front desk to place you on a lower terrace near whatever you will use most.

The move: book a full ocean view, or a plunge-pool suite for a special occasion · When: request your terrace level at check-in · Note: it is a hillside property — expect some stairs between you and the sand.

'Awili Spa: the Hawaiian apothecary

The spa is one of the most distinctive on the island, and it leans hard into the Andaz design sensibility. 'Awili Spa and Salon is built around a Hawaiian apothecary concept — there is a literal apothecary bar where you blend your own custom body oil, scrub, or balm from local island herbs and botanicals before your treatment begins.

It is the kind of gimmick that could read as a marketing stunt and somehow does not. The ingredients are real Hawaiian plants, the blending is hands-on, and the resulting product is genuinely yours — you walk out with the leftover oil, which is a nicer souvenir than a fridge magnet. The treatments themselves lean on Indigenous Hawaiian healing traditions rather than generic resort-spa polish, and that intent shows in the room.

You do not need a marquee treatment to enjoy it, either. Even a shorter service paired with time on the open-air relaxation terrace can make for a slow, memorable afternoon, and for a couple marking an anniversary or a honeymoon — especially a milestone one — an hour here is one of the better splurges on the property.

Is the spa worth a special visit? For a milestone, yes — the apothecary ritual is the sort of thing you remember long after you have forgotten the room rate. For a casual day, book the shortest service that includes the apothecary blending; that is where the distinctive part lives. Either way, reserve when you book the room, because the best slots are not included with a walk-up and go early in high season.

The move: book a treatment that includes the apothecary blending — that is the unique part · When: reserve on booking; prime slots fill fast · Note: it is luxury-priced, like everything in Wailea — budget honestly.

Where to eat at the Andaz Maui

The resort runs four restaurants and bars, including a couple of genuine destinations rather than captive-audience filler. The headliner is Morimoto Maui, the Iron Chef's poolside restaurant, blending Japanese and Western cooking — it is the special-occasion dinner, and the rare resort restaurant worth the bill on its own.

The everyday flagship is Ka'ana Kitchen, a farm-to-table restaurant with an interactive open kitchen and pool views. Breakfast here is the move: a build-your-own feast of local island produce, fish, pastry, and made-to-order dishes that is closer to a chef's tasting than a hotel buffet. It is not cheap — nothing at this resort is — but it is the meal people remember.

Lehua Lounge and live music at sunset

Lehua Lounge sits at the top of the pool terrace with the best sunset view on property — craft cocktails, often live music, and the place to make a plan for dinner over a drink. Down by the lagoon pool and the sand, Bumbye Beach Bar handles all-day casual food and drinks. Between the four options, you can genuinely eat well on-site all day, though the bill climbs the way it does anywhere in Wailea.

Here is the honest move: eat a few meals out. Wailea and nearby Kihei have excellent restaurants a short drive away, and rolling every meal onto the room bill is how an Andaz stay quietly doubles. Our things to do in Maui guide points to the wider south-shore dining; use the resort for the Ka'ana breakfast, one big dinner, and the pool bar, not three squares a day.

The move: Ka'ana for breakfast, the signature for one big night, dinners out otherwise · When: reserve the marquee tables well ahead · Note: the room-charged meals are where the bill balloons.

Mokapu Beach and the snorkeling

The Andaz fronts Mokapu Beach, a short golden crescent of sand at the north end of the Wailea beach path — calm, clear, and quieter than the bigger resort beaches up the coast. Like every beach in Hawaii, it is public by law, so the sand is open to anyone even though the pools are not, and the paved Wailea beach path runs right past it for an evening stroll.

The reason snorkelers love this stretch is next door. Ulua Beach, a two-minute walk south, has a reef that hooks around its rocky point and forms one of the most reliable easy snorkel spots in Wailea — calm water, reef fish, the occasional turtle, and an entry you can wade into. Andaz guests get free snorkel gear, which makes a morning at Ulua the easiest of the resort's free activities, and the one snorkelers love most. Of all the water activities on the south shore, the house reef is the one you can do on a whim. Check conditions first; the state's ocean safety site tracks south-shore surf and advisories, and posts daily beach information for the area.

Beyond the house reef, the Andaz sits perfectly for Maui's south-shore tours. The big one is the Molokini snorkel — a half-sunken volcanic crater of clear water and reef fish, a short boat ride from the Wailea–Kihei coast and an easy morning out before an afternoon back at the pool. Past that, the resort makes a great base for sunrise atop Haleakala, the Road to Hana, and the rest of the best beaches in Maui up and down the coast.

The move: grab the free snorkel gear and walk to Ulua Beach first thing · When: mornings, before the south-shore wind picks up · Note: the beach is public; the snorkel reef is at Ulua, just south.

What a stay at the Andaz Maui costs

A standard room at the Andaz runs around $1,100 a night in normal season, starting near $900 on the softest weeks and climbing past $2,000 over the holiday and summer peaks. That is full Wailea luxury pricing, in line with its neighbors — on cash, you are not saving money by picking the Andaz.

On points is where it gets interesting, and here is the opinion this guide will stand behind: the Andaz is the best luxury-resort points value on the Wailea beach, by a wide margin. It is a World of Hyatt Category 8 hotel, which means 35,000 points a night off-peak, 40,000 standard, and 45,000 at peak. Put that next to the Grand Wailea's 110,000 Hilton points for a comparable cash rate and it is not close — your Hyatt points stretch more than twice as far on this beach. Add World of Hyatt's fifth-night-free benefit on award stays and a five-night Andaz stay can land near 140,000 points total, which for an $1,100-a-night oceanfront resort is a genuine steal.

The catch, as everywhere in Wailea, is the daily resort fee. The Andaz charges one nightly, though it recently reworked the amenities it covers to bundle real activities — a lei greeting, outrigger canoe paddles, stand-up paddleboarding, and ukulele and hula lessons, all included — rather than the usual wifi-and-towels padding. It is still a fee you cannot opt out of, but at least the bundled amenities are now things a guest might actually use, especially a family with a free morning to fill.

A few ways to soften the cash rate: redeem World of Hyatt points (the headline value here), travel in the spring or fall shoulder seasons when rates ease off the peaks, and book early, because the best award nights and the lowest cash weeks both go first.

The move: pay with World of Hyatt points and chase the fifth-night-free · When: spring or fall shoulder season for the softest cash rates · Note: the resort fee is mandatory, but it now bundles real activities.

Is the Andaz Maui at Wailea Resort worth it?

Here is the honest verdict: the Andaz Maui at Wailea Resort is worth it for couples, design lovers, and anyone holding Hyatt points — and the wrong call for families chasing a water park.

Book it if you bank World of Hyatt points. At 35,000 to 45,000 points for a room that sells for $1,100-plus, this is the single best luxury-resort redemption in Wailea, and nothing else on the beach comes close on value. Book it, too, if you want the design-led, grown-up version of a Wailea stay — the terraced pools, the apothecary spa, Morimoto, and the easy Ulua snorkeling are exactly the kind of details design-minded couples love.

Skip it if you are traveling with kids who want pool thrills. The Andaz's four calm terraced pools are gorgeous and entirely slide-free; a family chasing a water park is happier at the Grand Wailea canyon next door, full stop. And skip it if your week is built around exploring the island — if you will spend your days on Haleakala and the Road to Hana, you are paying Wailea luxury prices for a bed you will barely use.

The comparison that settles it for most people is the Grand Wailea versus the Andaz, two very different resorts on the same golden coast. The Grand Wailea is the big family pool palace; the Andaz is the smaller, cooler, couples-and-points play. Pick by who is in your party, not by which is "better" — they are aimed at different travelers.

If you only decide one thing, decide this: are you booking the property as a base, or as the vacation itself? If the Andaz is the trip — slow pool days, a spa afternoon, sunset cocktails at Lehua — it is genuinely worth it. If Maui is the trip, book somewhere smaller and cheaper, like the Maui Coast Hotel in nearby Kihei, and spend the savings on the island.

How to book the Andaz Maui: points vs cash

The cleanest way to book is to price your exact dates both ways — cash and points — before committing, because the right answer flips week to week. This review assumes you will make at least one points-versus-cash comparison before you commit; it is the single highest-value move on this page. Start by checking live cash rates and availability for the Andaz and the rest of Wailea's resorts side by side, then compare that against the World of Hyatt award rate for the same nights — the points information is where the real savings hide.

The points path is the headline here, and it is worth understanding. As a Category 8 Hyatt, the Andaz costs 35,000 points off-peak, 40,000 standard, and 45,000 peak per night, with award availability that is genuinely findable if you book a few months out. The fifth-night-free benefit means a five-night stay runs four nights of points — about 140,000 to 180,000 total for a week that would cost north of $5,000 in cash. For anyone who earns World of Hyatt points through a Chase card or work travel, this is the redemption to save them for.

On the cash side, if you carry a premium card, check whether the Andaz is bookable through a luxury-hotel program like Hyatt Privé or a travel portal that adds perks — resort credit, breakfast, or an upgrade — because at this rate those extras materially soften the bill. And a World of Hyatt Globalist status, if you have it, waives the resort fee on award stays, which is the quiet best-kept-secret saving at this property.

On timing: Wailea is sunny and dry nearly year-round, so the real variable is crowds and price, not weather. The Christmas and summer peaks bring the highest rates and the busiest pools; the spring and fall shoulder seasons are the sweet spot. Our Maui itinerary helps you slot the resort days around the island days. As of 2026, both cash rates and award costs are holding at the top of the Wailea range, so lock dates early if a specific week matters.

The move: price cash vs points for your exact dates, then book the cheaper · When: book points stays a few months out for award space · Note: Globalist status waives the resort fee on award nights.

Where else to stay in Wailea

The Andaz is one of several big names on this beach, and the right pick depends entirely on who you are traveling with and what you value. The honest framing: the Andaz wins on points value and design; the neighbors win on pools, calm, or pure scale.

The Grand Wailea is the family pool palace next door — a nine-pool canyon with waterslides and the only water elevator in Hawaii, the clear pick for families even though it costs far more on points. The Four Seasons Resort Maui is the quiet, white-glove luxury play, famously without a resort fee — the only resort on Maui that charges none — and a favorite for couples who want calm above all. Fairmont Kea Lani is all-suite and family-friendly in a calmer key, and the Wailea Beach Resort (Marriott) is the bigger Marriott-points option on the same sand.

All of them share Wailea's core appeal: reliable sun, gorgeous beaches, paved paths between properties, and easy access to Molokini, Haleakala, and the south-shore restaurants. You are not choosing a better or worse location — they are all on the same golden stretch — you are choosing a vibe and a points currency.

So the decision is simple. Want the best points deal and a design-led, grown-up stay? The Andaz. Want the best pools for kids, or no-resort-fee calm? Look next door. Either way, our full where to stay in Maui guide lays out every area of the island, from Wailea to Lahaina to the quiet upcountry.

The move: Andaz for points and design, Grand Wailea for kids, Four Seasons for quiet · When: the same season logic applies to all of Wailea · Note: compare a few resorts on your dates before you commit.

FAQ: Andaz Maui at Wailea Resort

Is the Andaz Maui at Wailea family-friendly?

It is family-tolerant rather than family-built. Kids are welcome, the villas suit families, and the beach is calm — but the four terraced pools have no slides, no lazy river, and one is adults-only, so children expecting a water park will be underwhelmed. Don't book the Andaz for the pools — book it for the calm and the snorkeling. For a pool-thrills family stay, the Grand Wailea next door is the better fit; for a calmer family with snorkel-aged kids, the Andaz works fine.

How far is the Andaz Maui from the airport?

About a 20-minute drive south of Kahului Airport (OGG), roughly 17 miles down to the Wailea resort area. There is no cheap shuttle culture here, so plan on a rental car or a rideshare (figure $60 or so each way). A rental car is the smart move regardless, since seeing Maui — Haleakala, Hana, the beaches — requires one.

Does the Andaz Maui at Wailea have a luau?

No — the Andaz does not host its own nightly luau. That is one place the bigger resorts have it beat: the Grand Wailea runs a luau on its grounds, and there is a long-running luau at a neighboring Wailea resort a short walk down the beach path. For the full rundown of the island's shows and which are worth booking, our best luau in Maui guide compares them.

Is the Andaz Maui at Wailea all-inclusive?

No — the Andaz Maui is not an all-inclusive resort. Like nearly every hotel in Hawaii, the room and your meals are billed separately, and food, drinks, the spa, and activities are charged on top of the nightly rate and the resort fee. To keep the bill in check, eat some meals off-property in Kihei and treat Morimoto and the pool bar as occasional splurges rather than the daily default.

Cover photo: Jeffrey Eisen on Unsplash.