Zsolt Soóky
Large resort hotel in Platanias village right next to the beach. The hotel is spread over a huge area, with many room types to choose from in several buildings. There are several smaller and larger pools between the buildings, which are not heated. Unfortunately, hotel guests "reserve" the sunbeds in the morning, so it often happened that although there was no one in the pools and around them, we still couldn't find a free sunbed.
The sea-view rooms are spacious and have a kitchenette. Their terraces open onto the hotel's beach or a small fishing port. There are also rooms overlooking the pools or the main road or in quieter corners of the hotel.
The staff is polite, helpful, and friendly.
The service includes breakfast and all-inclusive. We paid for breakfast. The breakfast buffet offers a range of dishes in line with general European trends, supplemented by a few Greek specialties.
Hotel guests also have access to a moderately equipped fitness room and a spa area available for a fee.
We spent a very pleasant week in the off-season at the hotel. Thank you!
Александр Митрович
We stayed at this hotel from September 29th to October 6th 2025. We had a two-level Maisonette room. The room was fairly clean but old. The lighting was inconvenient, there weren't enough sockets and hooks for towels, and there weren't even any shoehorn and slippers. You have to pay for the safe box, which is very strange, but the most outrageous thing is that we also have to pay for sun loungers, even though we bought all-inclusive. This was disappointing. The waiters in the restaurant were slow to take away dirty dishes from the tables. There wasn't much food after dinner, and they wouldn't give it to you even if you be all-inclusive. The bartenders at the pool bar were greedy and would make you a cocktail without a tip, treating you like you are a piece of shit. I wanted to throw a slipper at them, but I held back. I would never return to this hotel and I wouldn't recommend anyone stay there until they change their “policy” towards guests. The hotel management apparently doesn't understand that it's 2025 now, not 2005, and they're losing out to Turkish hotels.
Rachel Swift
We were moved from the village resort to the beach resort due to being under subscribed at the end of the season. We were worried as we booked there for the water park but on jet 2 looking into it they were keeping the park open with the rest of the resort shutting. Fine print though states both resorts have to pay extra for the water park at €15 per person. We did use it one day and as the resort was shut there was only one other family there, only downside was we couldn’t use the shop as it had closed down for the season but the main rd is very close.
The beach resort is lovely, clean and the rooms are clean and can be cleaned daily.
The food is lovely but it’s the same things every night with a very small variation so does get a bit boring by day 5-6.
Pools are very cold apart from one which is heated.
Beach is on the doorstep but you have to pay for the beds and drinks.
If you’re a white wine drinker, find something else, it’s not nice.
Buses to chania are very frequent but very busy so be prepared to wait as they will just drive on.
Marina Di
Very disappointing stay — definitely not a real 5-star experience.
If this hotel honestly marketed itself as a 3-star hotel with an appropriate price, we honestly would not have had such a problem with it. But calling this a “5-star luxury family resort” creates expectations that are simply not met.
We traveled with our 9-month-old baby, and the hotel was surprisingly uncomfortable and impractical for families with small children.
The room was old, small, and had a musty smell when we arrived. The bathroom also had an unpleasant odor most of the time. We booked a room with one double bed but received two separate beds that constantly slid apart. The mattresses were extremely soft and unsupportive, causing back pain every morning.
The shower temperature constantly changed between hot and cold without warning, making it stressful and unsafe to shower with our baby.
The baby crib situation was honestly shocking. The first crib was broken and had a blanket instead of a proper mattress. The replacement crib also had no real mattress. Our baby sleeps on his stomach, so this felt genuinely unsafe.
The hotel area is almost entirely concrete with very little greenery or shade. There is basically nowhere comfortable for a baby to crawl or play freely. The room was too small for crawling, and outside everything revolves around pools and sunbeds.
There are two small playgrounds, but they are not practical for babies/toddlers: no shade, very limited space, and difficult to use safely when older children are using the swings.
The only place where our baby could somewhat crawl around was the beach, but even there the conditions were poor: no shade, no promenade, very little greenery, and the sand was not properly cleaned. There were cigarette butts, sticks, and debris in the sand.
There were no heated pools for babies or small children. The pool water often felt oily and poorly maintained. Pool sunbeds were “reserved” with towels from early morning every day, and staff did absolutely nothing about it.
Almost everything costs extra: parking, spa, water park, tennis, beach sunbeds, and even luggage weighing. The beach sunbeds cost €15/day for two loungers, but there was no clear sign saying they were paid. You sit down assuming they belong to the hotel area, and later someone comes demanding payment, which feels very misleading.
The gym was also disappointing: small, located in the basement, terrible ventilation, unbearably hot, and very limited equipment. One machine even had a loose part that cut my partner while using it.
The hotel lacked many basic amenities expected from a high-category resort:
- no welcome drinks
- no fruit basket
- no bathrobes or slippers
- no daily water refill
- no complimentary tea or coffee despite having a kettle
- no complimentary toiletries
- extremely poor WiFi
We also had constant mosquito problems because there were no mosquito nets on the balcony doors.
Another unpleasant surprise: on Ving’s website the hotel is advertised as a 4+ star hotel, but on site it is classified as 5 stars, meaning we had to pay a higher tourist tax (€15/day instead of €10/day).
The beach area was also constantly disturbed by people aggressively trying to sell massages every few minutes, while hotel staff did nothing to stop it.
Overall, we left feeling frustrated rather than rested. This hotel simply does not deliver the comfort, service, atmosphere, or quality expected from a true 5-star resort — especially for families traveling with small children.
Casper Steenkamp
We made a reservation at the Porto Platanias Beach Resort & Spa. However, upon arrival the Hotel refused to honor our reservation and accommodate us at the hotel. They suggested that our reservation was at the Porto Platanias Village Resort (a much lower rated hotel in same group).
Booking.com responded to our enquiry and confirmed that our reservation was in fact at the 5-star Porto Platanias Beach Resort & Spa as we had said all along. We forwarded all our proofs of the reservation but the the hotel did not accept it and never responded to our messages. We had to stay at the second-rated hotel for the entire stay.
We wanted to stay at a hotel that fronted the beach. We did not even consider (know of) the Village-hotel at the time of making the reservation and therefore would have chosen a completely different hotel had we have known that the hotel would transfer of our reservation from the Beach Resort & Spa to the Village Hotel.
We believe the hotel is directly responsible since they are either grossly negligent in allowing third-party partners to offer rooms at the Beach Resort& Spa and then placing them in the second-rated village hotel. Or alternatively, they are complicit since ultimately they are selling rooms at much higher rates than what one would pay if you were to book directly at the second rated village hotel, that would not have been sold.
