Review: St. Regis Kanai Resort, Riviera Maya, Mexico (I’m Impressed!)

Our older son, Miles, recently turned three years old. We wanted to do something for his birthday — he asked to fly somewhere (yay, he’s getting into airplanes!), to a destination with a beach or pool. Or at least that was my interpretation. 😉 Ford and I didn’t want to go too far (since our younger son, Jet, would stay behind with family, given that he wasn’t even six weeks old), and we ultimately decided on the St. Regis Kanai Resort, Riviera Maya.

The 143-room property opened back in early 2023, and I had heard generally good things about it (and for that matter, we had a great stay with Miles at the St. Regis Longboat Key not long before that).

Admittedly Cancun isn’t exactly the most seasonal destination for August, but this trip seemed easy, and checked all our boxes — American even flies a 777 between Miami (MIA) and Cancun (CUN), so that was a fun way to get there.

Let me be honest — I came in with low expectations, and I’m generally not a huge fan of traveling to the Cancun area. Nothing against it, but living in Florida, the climate is just too similar, and it’s very much an all-inclusive destination.

Fortunately, the St. Regis Kanai positively surprised us, we had an incredible stay, and I’d return in a heartbeat. It’s a genuinely gorgeous property with beautiful scenery, an expansive pool setup, a beautiful beach, and really good service and food. They also went out of their way to make the stay special for our son’s birthday, and as a parent, if your kids are happy, you’re happy. Let’s get into the review…

Booking the St. Regis Kanai Riviera Maya

Ordinarily I try to redeem points for hotel stays in Mexico, given that hotels in many parts of the country add around 37% to the room rate for taxes, fees, and service charges. However, since we were staying in low season, the rate was relatively reasonable.

Specifically, we booked our three-night stay through the Marriott STARS program. The rate was $609 per night, but that was before a third night free promotion, bringing the average nightly rate down to $406. For booking through Marriott STARS, we also received complimentary breakfast, a $200 property credit, and a room upgrade subject to availability (admittedly some of those overlap with my Marriott Bonvoy Ambassador perks).

So while it wasn’t cheap, the rate seemed reasonable compared to what this hotel usually charges in peak season, which is over $1,000 per night.

As a point of comparison, if we had instead redeemed Bonvoy points, the cost would have been 96,000 points per night. For what it’s worth, I value Bonvoy points at 0.7 cents each, so paying cash was the better value.

I also used three of my Bonvoy Nightly Upgrade Awards (earned as part of the Bonvoy Choice Benefits program) to confirm a St. Regis Suite, and that cleared a few days before arrival.

St. Regis Kanai Riviera Maya location

The St. Regis is located inside the 680-acre gated community of Kanai. In addition to the St. Regis, this compound has two other hotels — the Riviera Maya EDITION and Etereo Riviera Maya, part of Auberge Resorts Collection. While these multi-resort “compounds” may feel isolated at times, they’re at least great in terms of providing access to multiple dining outlets, since you can dine across the properties.

The St. Regis Kanai is suspended above a mangrove forest, with different elements of the hotel connected by elevated walkways. Kanai offers two miles of unobstructed white sand beaches, which is pretty great.

The property has unique architecture — I’m not someone who flies drones on vacation, so below is a picture from Marriott’s website that shows you the property layout.

As you can see, the property consists of semi-circular buildings arranged in overlapping rings. This is intended to provide ocean views from most vantage points (including from all the rooms), and also to avoid disturbing the root system of the mangroves.

I’ve gotta say, the people who developed Kanai are kind of genius. You basically have a mangrove forest that you typically couldn’t develop in any sort of useful way, but they turned that into a “feature” rather than a “bug,” and I’ve gotta say, it makes for some cool views.

When it comes to getting to the St. Regis Kanai, the property is a roughly 35-40 minute drive from Cancun International Airport (CUN). The hotel charges a minimum of $171 one-way for airport transfers, or you can book through a third party for a bit less.

There’s obviously some sort of ground transport pricing collusion, since just about all private transfers cost at least $100 nowadays, which seems mighty high.

St. Regis Kanai Riviera Maya lobby & check-in

The St. Regis Kanai has cool design, and you can appreciate that as soon as you step into the open-air lobby. As you enter the property, reception and the concierge desk are located to the left, while there’s some seating to the right.

Our check-in process was quick and friendly, and we were offered cold towels and welcome drinks, and we were then handed over to our assigned butler, who escorted us to our room. Even though it was well before check-in time, our suite was ready — you’ve gotta love traveling in the off season.

Enroute to our room, I admired the gorgeous open-air seating just past the lobby, which is sort of the central part of the resort, connecting all other areas.

Guest rooms are spread across a few different buildings, each of which has three floors. We were assigned room 233, located on the second floor, one building over from the reception area.

St. Regis Kanai Riviera Maya suite

We were assigned a St. Regis Suite, marketed as being 1,130 square feet (105 square meters). Talk about a massive suite, especially when you consider that this is the base suite category at the property. I found the suite to be functional, and also thought the construction quality felt good (I’ve been to my fair share of resorts in Mexico that are supposed to be luxury, but where the construction quality feels poor).

I thought the suite was super spacious, and functionally designed. Just inside the entrance was the living room, with a large couch and two chairs, along with a wall-mounted TV.

Then right next to the entrance was the dining area, which had a rectangular table with four chairs.

The minibar and wet bar area was near the dining table.

There was a complimentary Nespresso coffee machine and some tea (annoyingly, there was no milk or cream for coffee), plus a variety of drinks and snacks for purchase. There was even a cart with wine on the other end of the room. There was plenty of bottled filtered water all over the room, and the hotel was happy to deliver as much of that as guests needed.

Off the living room was a half bathroom, with a sink and toilet.

A door then separated the living room from the bedroom. The bedroom wasn’t huge, but featured a comfortable signature St. Regis bed, a chair in one corner, and a TV in the other corner.

Immediately behind the bed was a large closet space, and behind that was the primary bathroom, which was huge. The bathroom had two sinks with mirrors in the center of the room, a vanity, a soaking tub, and a large walk-in shower.

Toiletries were from SACHAJUAN, which is brand standard at St. Regis nowadays, though I find the brand to be pretty unmemorable.

Then the toilet was in a separate room near the entrance to the bathroom.

The room had a huge terrace, with a dining table that had four chairs, two chairs with a coffee table, and a loveseat of sorts.

I find the terrace views of the mangroves plus the beach and water in the distance to be a cool combination.

Shortly after arriving in the room, we were brought a welcome gift that included a plate of fruit, a couple of bottles of water, and a small birthday treat for miles (though it was the first of many gifts he received during our stay).

There was daily housekeeping along with turndown service, and there was great attention to detail. Since this is a St. Regis, butler service was also offered, though I’ll talk more about that in a bit.

St. Regis Kanai Riviera Maya pools

The St. Regis Kanai has an impressive pool setup, with an area dedicated to families, plus an adults only area. All of the pools are located right by the beach, so if you’re coming from the main part of the hotel, you’ll have to take one of the elevated walkways across the mangrove forest. You can also be driven in a golf cart, but the walk isn’t that long, and the golf cart ride requires taking a detour.

The main pool area is for families, and actually consists of three(ish) pools. I find this to be a ridiculously pretty pool area, given the way the infinity edge pool is positioned right above the beach.

One of the main pools is rectangular and quite large, and it has a shallow area that’s ideal for kids.

Interestingly, there’s a little mini-pool within the pool. You’d assume it’s a hot tub based on looking at it, but that didn’t actually seem to be the case.

There’s another pool area immediately behind that, positioned right in front of the cabanas (which can be rented by the day).

There’s no shortage of seating around the pool…

The other family pool is located right next to the two you can see above, and it’s in more of a square shape, with seating on three sides of it.

Separate from the family pool area, there’s an adults only pool area, which is also quite pretty. The pool is much smaller, but it doesn’t get as full, given that this is such a family friendly property.

I was impressed by the whole pool setup, and as you’d expect, there’s attentive service, in terms of staff helping to set up chairs, offering water, and of course providing a menu with food and drinks.

St. Regis Kanai Riviera Maya beach

The St. Regis Kanai is set on a beautiful two mile stretch of beach, so this is an ideal resort whether you’re looking to enjoy pools or the beach.

Even before getting to the main stretch of the beach, there’s a bunch of seating and games on the sand right by the pool, which also offers a bit of shade thanks to the palm trees.

The resort then has a bunch of loungers set up on the main stretch of the beach, with umbrellas, towels, etc.

If you enjoy beach walking, you’re in for a treat here, as the sand quality is great, and you can walk long distances unobstructed.

St. Regis Kanai Riviera Maya spa, gym, and kids club

The St. Regis Kanai has a full service spa with eight treatment rooms plus a salon, and all the amenities you’d expect. We didn’t have a chance to use it, given the purpose of our trip (family time).

The resort also has a 24/7 gym located just a short walk from reception. The gym was a good size (especially since the property doesn’t have that many rooms), and had an impressive selection of cardio and weight equipment.

The St. Regis also has the Tortuga Kids Club. This is open to kids ages 4-12 without supervision, though younger kids can go there when accompanied by an adult. We took Miles there a couple of times and he enjoyed everything from arts and crafts, to making cookies.

St. Regis Kanai Riviera Maya restaurants & bars

The St. Regis Kanai offers a solid selection of restaurants and bars. I’ll go into more detail below, but to briefly summarize:

• Chaya is the hotel’s Italian’s restaurant; it’s where breakfast is served, and it’s also open for dinner
• Toro by Richard Sandoval is the hotel’s Latin American restaurant; it’s only open for dinner
• Riviera is the hotel’s (family) poolside Mexican restaurant; it’s open midday through early evening
• The Beach Club is the hotel’s (adults only) poolside Mediterranean restaurant; it’s open midday through early evening
• Jack’s Club is the hotel’s adults only sports bar; it’s open midday through early evening
• St. Regis Bar is the hotel’s bar; it’s open in the afternoon until late at night
• Pik Nik & The Library is the hotel’s coffee shop; it’s open in the morning

Since the St. Regis is part of the larger Kanai complex, there are also dining options at the two other properties — EDITION and Etereo — though we didn’t check those out during our stay. As you’d expect for a luxury resort, dining prices are steep by Mexican standards, as it’s not like this is an all-inclusive. With that out of the way, let’s go into the restaurants in a bit more detail.

Chaya is located close to the lobby, and is the hotel’s breakfast restaurant, with that being served daily from 7AM until 11:30AM. The restaurant has both indoor and outdoor seating, and it’s a nice space.

Breakfast was included (both on account of Marriott STARS plus my Marriott Bonvoy status), and the selection was excellent. There was a huge variety of both Mexican and international options.

The indoor part of the buffet was more internationally focused, with options like pastries, freshly baked bread, cereal, cold cuts, cheese, yogurt, fresh fruit, waffles, french toast, an omelet bar, and much more.

The outdoor part of the buffet was more focused on Mexican cuisine, with lots of options to choose from.

We enjoyed everything we had at breakfast, including chilaquiles.

The coffee options were excellent as well, from filtered coffee, to iced coffee, to cappuccinos. I thought the filter coffee was particularly good. All of those were included with breakfast.

We also had dinner at Chaya one evening, as that’s served from 5:30PM until 11PM. In the evening there are white tablecloths at all the tables, which definitely gives the space more of an elegant feel. At the beginning of the meal, we were brought some pineapple and jicama, along with an amuse bouche, plus freshly baked focaccia.

For appetizers, we split the smoked bresaola (~$25) and the cauliflower with habanero and basil (~$22), both of which were excellent.

Then for mains, we split the pizza margherita (~$21) and chicken breast (~$31). Admittedly there were more interesting things on the menu, but since we were basically gorging ourself with delicious food for breakfast and lunch, we kept it relatively simple for dinner.

The hotel’s signature restaurant is Toro by Richard Sandoval, open daily from 5:30PM until 11PM, and that serves Latin American cuisine. The restaurant is in the direction of the beach, and primarily has outdoor seating, though also has an indoor area, including a bar.

We were brought some tasty warm bread at the beginning of the meal.

Once again, we just split several things, including the sweet corn empanadas (~$20), the hamachi tiradito (~$32), and the catch of the day, with rice, salad, grilled avocado, corn, pico de gallo, and more (~$58).

For dessert, we couldn’t help but share some churros (~$12).

Every day we had lunch at Riviera, the hotel’s restaurant next to the family pool, which is open from 11AM until 5PM.

The food here was great, and we enjoyed everything from the guacamole (~$20), to the local ceviche (~$24), to the chicken tacos (~$26), to the signature salad with fish (~$27).

There was also an ice cream sundae bar at the restaurant, which definitely ranked as one of Miles’ five favorite things about the property.

Then there was The Beach Club, the hotel’s Mediterranean lunch restaurant, open daily from 11AM until 5PM. Since this is an adults only restaurant, we didn’t eat here.

Then there’s Jack’s Club, the hotel’s adults only sports bar, which is open daily from 11AM until 6PM. I couldn’t imagine wanting to spend any time here, but then again, I’m not straight and have zero interest in organized sports, so…

In addition to an indoor space, Jack’s Club also has plunge pools of sorts, so it’s an unusual setup.

Next, there’s the St. Regis Bar, open daily from 5PM until 12AM, and it’s a great place from which to watch the sunset. It’s located above the lobby area, so it offers a great vantage point. The bar has both an indoor and outdoor area, plus games.

We enjoyed cocktails here a couple of nights, including mezcal negronis, plus some of the property’s signature cocktails.

As you’d expect for a St. Regis, there was also a signature bloody mary, plus the nightly champagne sabering, but we didn’t have a chance to check out either of those.

Last (and probably least), there was Pik Nik, the hotel’s coffee shop, open daily from 7AM until 11AM, with coffee and light bites.

This is right across from The Library, which I guess is just intended to be a communal, indoor, air conditioned place where you can hang out (given that the hotel is otherwise very outdoor focused).

St. Regis Kanai Riviera Maya service

Mexico is a country known for friendly people, but that’s not to say that service is always polished or attentive. So I have to give massive props to the entire staff at the St. Regis Kanai, because across the board, I found them to be stellar. They were friendly, anticipatory, and seemed genuinely invested in making sure guests had a great experience.

The positive interaction already started before getting to the hotel, as the email responses were lightning fast, and were frictionless. Hell, as a very basic example, when I email hotels I explain I’m traveling with my husband and son, and then half of the time they’ll respond back addressing me as Mrs. That wasn’t the case here, and way beyond that, the attention to detail was great (like proactively sharing details about the kids club).

We had nothing but pleasant interactions with staff, particularly at the pool, where Eric was stellar. Often I’m not a fan of the whole concept of having a dedicated butler, since I find that they sometimes border on being annoying. Our butler, Rafael, was excellent — he was there when we needed him and responded via WhatsApp within minutes, but wasn’t overbearing.

Most of all, what impressed me was how much the hotel staff went out of their way to make Miles’ birthday special. Personally, I can’t stand celebrating my own birthday, and I cringe at any sort of public acknowledgement. But of course as a parent, I feel differently for our son, since birthdays are much more special when you’re young (and for Miles, this was his first birthday where he sort of understood that it was “his” special day).

The hotel did a stellar job making this stay special for Miles. For example, during the daily housekeeping service, the housekeeper would leave notes and gifts for Miles…

Then on his birthday, Rafael set up a special surprise for Miles on the bed to celebrate his birthday.

And then when we returned from dinner on his birthday, they had another cake for him.

And I won’t even mention how on his birthday, he was presented with a small chocolate cake at every single meal, from breakfast, to lunch, to dinner.

Dump me at a Howard Johnson on the side of the highway, if they make my kid this happy, I’m a fan…

St. Regis Kanai Riviera Maya (minor) complaints

As you can tell, this review has been overwhelmingly positive, though let me share two negatives — one minor, and one major (in retrospect).

First of all, I love how St. Regis offers butler service coffee. The policies differ by property (in terms of what room categories qualify, what hours it’s available, how often it’s available, etc.). However, this hotel has the strangest policy of any St. Regis property I’ve been at.

You receive complimentary wake-up coffee between 7:30AM and 11AM. This is the first St. Regis I’ve stayed at where the butler service coffee is only available after breakfast starts. As someone who is an early riser, I found to be kind of annoying, as this is the first time I’ve stayed at a St. Regis and haven’t taken advantage of the butler service coffee (since we were always at breakfast at 7AM, and went to the pool almost immediately after that). This is of course minor, but it seems like it should easily be adjusted.

Second, this put more of a damper on our stay. As you’d expect, the sun is strong in Cancun in August. The hotel had SPF 50 available for guests at the pool… or that’s what was claimed. We applied it thoroughly the first day, and it felt a little watery, but whatever.

Unfortunately hours later, Ford and I noticed that we had sunburns (it wasn’t as bad for Miles, since we covered him up more, he had a sun shirt, etc.). Look, I realize sunburns are a way of life for other people, but I’ve been with Ford for over a decade, and he has *never* gotten a sunburn, because he’s that meticulous with applying sunscreen.

I don’t get it. Are they providing fake or low quality sunscreen, or why is this the first time we’ve ever had sunscreen at a hotel that didn’t work? We ended going to the gift shop and just buying sunscreen from a brand we knew, but having a bad burn within hours of arriving at the property was less than ideal.

If you’re gong to offer sunscreen, at least make it decent quality. I’m not sure what’s going on here, but consider it a warning, and I’ve certainly learned my lesson.

Bottom line

The St. Regis Kanai Riviera Maya exceeded my expectations, as someone who doesn’t usually consider traveling to the Cancun area. We were expecting it would be a bit of a resort factory, but that it would be a good option for our purposes, of celebrating our son’s birthday, since he’s happy as long as there’s a pool and a beach.

However, this hotel exceeded our expectations, and we really enjoyed our stay, and would return. The property has gorgeous architecture, I like the mangrove forest and beach combo, the pool setup is really well done, the service is friendly and attentive, and I found the food to be quite good as well.

While I’m personally still partial to Los Cabos (I prefer the scenery and climate), I’d absolutely consider returning here, as you can’t beat the ease of getting to Cancun from Florida.

The other thing this stay reinforced for me is how different travel is just as a couple vs. with a kid. When you’re traveling with little ones, their happiness is more important than anything else, so a little effort on the part of the hotel on that front can go a long way to creating favorable impressions.

What’s your take on the St. Regis Kanai Riviera Maya?