Congratulations to the 10 finalists below for the Best Hotel honor in our 21st annual Theme Park Insider Awards. Our newsletter subscribers have been nominating their favorites over the past few weeks, and these 10 hotels received the most nominations to become our finalists.
Now is your chance to pick our winner. The finalists are:
Disney's Animal Kingdom Lodge, Walt Disney World
Disney's Grand Californian Resort, Disneyland
Disney's Grand Floridian Resort, Walt Disney World
Disney's Wilderness Lodge, Walt Disney World
Hard Rock Hotel, Universal Orlando
Hotel MiraCosta, Tokyo Disney
Loews Portofino Bay Hotel, Universal Orlando
Loews Royal Pacific Hotel, Universal Orlando
Loews Sapphire Falls Resort, Universal Orlando
Universal's Cabana Bay Beach Resort, Universal Orlando
We will announce the winners of the 21st annual Theme Park Insider Awards on January 1, 2022.
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If I'm looking at value, Every Universal resort is amazing and affordable and wins hands down beating every Disney hotel. If I'm looking at Impressive Grand lobbies and grounds, Every Disney hotel is Amazing and beats every Universal hotel. When it comes to your rooms, they are all similar size and amenities, so Universals Value wins for me.
As the years moved on, every Disney hotel begins to look more and more like every other hotel internally with the main difference being the slight size of the room and extreme cost. The Universal hotels are all similar as well, but three have a huge benefit plus they are extremely convenient.
As far as best pools, my preferences are highly subjective, and my likes may not take into account features that others like. Based on that, my favorite has to be the Animal Kingdom Lodge. Second would be Hard Rock. There are others that might be better, and I have found that the Disney French Quarter may be a very underrated hotel. I would probably prefer to stay there over any other Disney hotel, and it has a pretty good pool too.
Animal Kingdom for the pool though.
Man, a toughie. I mean it, so hard to figure, Grand Floridian, Animal Kingdom always epic, I still love Wilderness Lodge but also enjoyed Hard Rock when stayed there and Royal Pacific good too. I lean toward Floridian but really hard to pick a true fave with such great choices.
Robert, maybe split this category into two next year as I agree, whole-heartedly, with the above comments - Disney's best are the most opulent but Universal's are by far the best value. I will have to vote with the "opulence" weighting based on the wording of the category. Grand Floridian for me........but I can't afford to stay there! I have stayed at all of Universal's but none match the splendour of GF.
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Loews RPR at USO -- hands down the best value for the money when you consider unlimited express, walkability to the parks and the overall sense of relaxation you feel as soon as you cross the bridge. Plus, their staff loved my dog :-)