The Racha

I would like to express my sincere thanks for yet another fantastic 14‑night stay in December/January 2025/2026 at The Racha 🙏😊. For me, the hotel has a truly unique atmosphere and wonderful surroundings. It is a beautifully designed hotel where you immediately feel welcome and like a part of The Racha family. The room is clean and well‑maintained. You can really feel that everything has been thoughtfully considered, and the hotel’s beautiful location makes the entire experience and atmosphere feel very authentic. The hotel staff are incredibly friendly and service‑minded. Everyone took such good care of me during my stay – thank you so much for that 🙏 The cleanliness at the hotel is outstanding. My room, the pool area, the restrooms, the restaurants, and everything else are spotless, and there is a very special scent throughout the entire property. In my experience, the restaurants deserve special praise – there is a great variety in the menu, and the food is of exceptionally high quality. The staff are always smiling and provide excellent service. I honestly cannot find anything negative to say. I give The Racha my highest recommendations, and I truly hope I will have the opportunity to return in 2026 🙏😊

My second stay at The Racha was mostly fantastic, with just a tiny blip that the hotel fixed impressively fast—plus a standout staff member who made the trip truly special. A minor issue: A staff member stopped me rudely with hand gestures on my way back to the room from the beach, and couldn’t apologize due to limited English. I emailed the GM, and wow—they took it seriously. I later spotted the GM personally overseeing beach area upgrades and management tweaks, which made a real difference. The absolute star of the trip? Seed, a multilingual gem we reconnected with at the Phuket transfer point. Fluent in Chinese, Thai, and English, he’s warm, approachable, and went out of his way to help us hail a taxi when we were stuck. Staff like Seed are what make The Racha stand out—total MVP status. The hotel’s vibes are still unbeatable: powdery sand, crystal-clear waters, and cozy private rooms that live up to the luxury hype. The small hiccup didn’t ruin the fun, thanks to the hotel’s quick fix and Seed’s amazing service. Will absolutely be back—highly recommend!

Firstly our transfer day from Phuket was saved from upset when our hire car there refused to start. A call to the hotel re routed our driver to collect us from our Phuket villa. Arriving at the lounge there was a very loud large family group of about 13 people ( not sure the nationality) who were extremely noisy and we thought oh dear we were hoping for a nice quiet resort. No fault of the Racha. On checking in with Cham? ( huge apologies cannot remember his name) I mentioned that out of the prestigious four pool villas below the Lighthouse we had only managed to secure the one with the limited sea view and would have loved one of the better ones. He was amazing he advised that the ‘best’ one was free for 6/7 nights of our stay and if we were prepared not to unpack we could transfer to the BEST one day 2. The uplift in price was agreeable as they are all pretty much the same price. Oh my goodness was it worth the hassle. Our pool villa move was absolutely worth it. Total privacy and a view to die for. Ann ? Cleaned our room every day to a very high standard. We had an in villa BBQ twice and the effort put in by the staff was exceptional chef Roofy? Sorry cannot remember his name) created a feast twice. We ate twice in Bamboo and Dadao and BIMM lovely servers. tasting menu and a la carte good food not exceptional food. Only hiccup bottle of wine arrived after the food once. Yes there are lots of day trippers but if you have done your research it should not be a surprise, the hotel makes no secret of it. Traffic was heavy whist we were there but you just needed to time your use of the beach when they had left however it did seem to get longer each day if our stay. The staff were very efficient at politely guarding any entry to the hotel from non residents. Breakfast you couldn’t ask for more choice and seeing Apples welcoming face each day a delight. Anton ( a true gentleman and asset to the resort) and the more senior lady were very efficient at reception. The sunset bar happy hour with canapés we didn’t find until our last two nights was a delight and a place to chat with other guests. So why do I give such a glowing review yet only four stars?????? It was all down to beach bed blocking. It was hideous. People were setting their alarms for 6,30 am to bag a sunbed on the beach ( raised sandy platform) and by 10.30 am they were still not occupied. My husband woke early the second morning and went down for a swim and there wasn’t one bed free. I absolutely went mad. I was extremely cross. How come a five star resort such as this allowed such behaviour?????? . Yes the occupancy was 90% when we arrived but dropped a little over the week but nothing was being down about it; all the more reason to have a proper policy as in other top resorts we have stayed. I asked to speak to the manager that day but as he wasn’t on the island I had to wait. The best that could be done was two sun beds were sandwiched between the packed row of beds between noisy guests and smokers….we lasted about half an hour before heading back to our pool villa sanctuary. I am not someone who wishes to leave a bad review without having at least addressed the issue before we left. Devan the manager kindly agreed to meet with me over the issue ( many other guests had complained) and we discussed that for 45,000 BHT a night, a small fortune and takes a long time to earn, this bed blocking practice was wholly unacceptable. We discussed ways to change the situation from experiences we had at other top five star hotels and agreed that the hotel needed a clear policy on bed blocking ( the adult pool was now affected as well). To be fair to DEVAN he took me very seriously and within half a day a ‘SUNBED COURTESY ‘ message appeared on the hotel WhatsApp. I was delighted. It mentioned no bed blocking, removing items left unattended, etc. DAY 1 the staff should have gone in hard and follow up on the new guidance. Sorry DEVAN but this didn’t happen. Towels were placed on beds at 7am and were not removed by the beach staff. Day 2 we were leaving on a private speedboat to make our flight back to Singapore where we enjoyed the pool experience very much at the Mandarin Oriental…….no bed blocking towels handed out when you were there and removed when you left. Also luxury cushioned sunbeds inkeeping with a five star hotel and not metal hard beds. One other gripe is that we saw many social media influencers or tick tok influencers stay one night and spend the entire time filming, yes filming!!!! Themselves around the grounds, beach and restaurants. Whilst amusing at times the hotel should respect the other guests quite enjoyment of public spaces without these people.

We loved the wildlife, both above and under the sea, the private, spacious and tasteful accommodation and excellent Thai cuisine

Excellent stay, great service, lovely beach, perfect for snorkelling. Very nice restaurants, and sparkling wine at breakfast.