Where to Stay in Cabo: The Two Questions I Ask Before I Book
By Cabo Wander
Picking where to stay in Cabo is honestly the hardest part of planning the trip. There are nine different areas spread along about 50 miles of coast, they all get labeled "Cabo", and the hotel photos all show the same beautiful blue water.
Here's what took me a few trips (and a few expensive mistakes) to figure out. Most beachfront hotels in Los Cabos sit on water you're not allowed to swim in. So now, before I book anything, I ask two questions that no listing is going to answer for you:
- Can I swim in the ocean in front of this hotel?
- What does it cost me to leave it?
If it's your first trip, stay on Médano Beach. For every trip after that, those two questions will sort it out for you.
The second question matters almost as much as the first. There are really only three places here where you can have a normal vacation on foot. Two are in Cabo San Lucas (Médano Beach, and the marina and downtown) and the third is the historic center of San José. Everywhere else is a resort with a transportation bill attached. That's totally fine if it's what you want! Just pick it for the resort, the beach in front of it, and an honest guess at how often you'll go out.
Also, don't trust the address. Hotels over the hill on the open Pacific and hotels fifteen miles up the highway are all sold as "Cabo San Lucas", and a few that are 20 minutes from San José's plaza still carry its name. Always look at the map pin.
If you're still deciding between the two towns, I've got a whole post on that: Cabo San Lucas vs San José del Cabo. This one goes area by area, starting with the one I recommend most.
Médano Beach
This is where I send first-timers, families who want the ocean, groups, and anyone doing more than one boat trip. It's the only place in Los Cabos where a swimmable beach, the boats and dinner are all a walk from your room.
Most of it is swimmable, and the middle is the safest bet. It has the calmest water in the area, and the resorts have roped-off swim zones out front. The exception is the far east end, where the sand gets steeper and the water rougher, and the beach in front of the Riu resorts is not a swim beach. What changes as you walk along it is the noise. The marina end is beach clubs with MCs and big speakers going all afternoon, plus the most boat and jet ski traffic. The east end is quiet. I pick my spot based on how much of that I'm up for, which these days isn't much, so I usually end up in the middle.
The trade-off with the east end is the walk. It's a long beach, the sand is soft, and it's dark at night. From the middle and the west end, the marina is five to fifteen minutes on foot. From the big resorts at the far east end, I walked it the first night, walked it the second night, and took a cab after that. A cab runs US$10 to $30 depending on who's quoting, and Uber is cheaper.
Rooms run from about US$150 to $450 a night before tax, and quite a bit less in September. These three cover the range:
- Bahia is a small mid-priced hotel one block back from the sand.
- Casa Dorada has suites right on the beach at the busy end.
- The Riu resorts at the far east end are the full package all-inclusive. Book them for the pools, because you can't count on a swim out front.
Speaking of all-inclusive, I personally wouldn't pay for it here. There's really good food that costs less just a short walk away, and I've watched people pay for the wristband and then go out to eat anyway. I do the math on that in whether a Cabo all-inclusive is worth it.
It's not for anyone who wants total silence, or anyone who's going to be bothered by being offered a bracelet while they're lying on a lounger. My tip is to get in the water before ten, when it's flat and the vendors haven't started yet. Everything else is in my Médano Beach guide.
The Marina, Land's End and Downtown San Lucas
This is the most walkable place to stay in all of Los Cabos. It's also the wrong pick if you want to swim from your hotel.
The hotels around the marina itself don't have a beach. The ones behind it, facing the Pacific at Land's End, have a huge, beautiful one that's for walking only. I really like those Land's End hotels for a quiet week. You're about ten minutes on foot from dinner, all you hear is the surf, and in winter you can watch whales from your balcony. You just have to be okay with the beach being a view.
The rooms that face the marina are a different experience. You get the bars late at night and the fishing boats early in the morning, and there are timeshare salespeople working the boardwalk all day.
Prices start low here, and across all of these you're looking at about US$110 to $450 a night:
- Tesoro is right on the marina. It's the budget one, and it's showing its age.
- Sandos Finisterra, between the marina and the Pacific, is the all-inclusive.
- Grand Solmar is the nice one, with suites on the beach you can't swim at.
Downtown, the grid of streets behind the marina, is cheaper still. The Cabo Inn has been the lowest price I've found anywhere in Los Cabos, around US$50 to $75 with tax, and very little downtown goes much over US$150. It's room only, there's no beach, and Médano is a ten to twenty minute walk depending on your block. It's a great fit for fishing groups and for anyone who's going to be out from breakfast until bedtime. Just check how close you are to the bar strip before you book, because those clubs go until two or three in the morning.
Bottom line: it's an inexpensive room in a loud, fun town, and sometimes that's exactly what a trip needs. The rest of the town is in my Cabo San Lucas guide.
Pedregal
Pedregal is one hotel and a hillside of villas. It's very expensive, and there's no swimming.
The hotel is the Waldorf Astoria, and the thing that surprised me most is how close to town it is. You get to it through a private tunnel that runs 300 meters straight through a mountain, which feels very James Bond, and then you find out that the other end of that tunnel is a ten minute walk from the marina. It's the only hotel at this level in Los Cabos where you can walk into town. And if you don't feel like walking the tunnel, the guards will drive you through in a golf cart.
Every room has its own plunge pool, and you'll use it, because the beach here is on the Pacific and you can't go in. Rooms start around US$1,500 a night in the quiet months, and once service and tax are added it's closer to US$2,000.
So is it worth it? The hotel itself is superb. Whether it's worth two thousand dollars a night with a beach you can only look at is really a personal call. For a honeymoon with a big budget, I think yes.
The villas are a different situation. The walk down to the marina takes about twenty minutes, and the walk back up is a climb I wouldn't want to do after dinner. One night the guard house wouldn't let my Uber in, and I ended up walking down the hill to meet it. Villas here are great for big groups splitting the cost who are happy to take a cab everywhere. If anyone in your group has bad knees, I'd look somewhere else.
The Corridor
The Corridor is the 20 miles of resorts along the highway between the two towns. I'd only stay here if the resort IS the vacation, and then I'd pick the hotel by its cove. Only five hotels on this whole stretch have a beach you can swim at. The rest have a pool with an ocean view.
Here are the five:
- Montage, on Santa María Bay
- Chileno Bay Resort, on Chileno Bay
- One&Only Palmilla, which has two sandy coves
- The Hilton and Paradisus, which share a calm patch of water behind a breakwater
On those last two, the cove was built by engineers, and it's only swimmable behind the wall. It still counts in my book!
Everywhere else on the Corridor, the answer to the swimming question is no. That includes Esperanza, The Cape, Garza Blanca, Le Blanc, Dreams, Zoëtry, Marquis, Hacienda del Mar and Grand Fiesta Americana.
It also includes two that might surprise you. Grand Velas is one of the most expensive all-inclusives on this coast, and its own website answers the swimming question by pointing guests to the public beach a short ride away. And at Las Ventanas, which is one of the priciest hotels in Mexico, I watched guests walk down the sand to go swimming at the Hilton. The Hilton costs around US$400 a night. I still think about that.
So the Hilton is my value pick on the Corridor. Paradisus is the adults-only all-inclusive on that same calm water. And if budget isn't a concern, I'd go with Montage or Chileno Bay.
Even at those five, swim in the morning when the water is calmest. Summer and early fall bring swells from the south that can close the good coves too, and from February to April the water is cold. I've ranked the hotels themselves in the best luxury resorts in Cabo, and the public coves in the best swimmable beaches in Cabo. If you'd rather see one list across every budget, that's the best resorts in Cabo.
The other thing to know is that nothing on the Corridor is walkable. A taxi into either town is US$25 to $50 each way depending on where on the highway you are. Uber is about half that and usually picks you up at the gate. Honestly, I tend to go out for one dinner midweek and then not bother with a second. That's why all-inclusive makes sense in the middle of the Corridor in a way that it doesn't on Médano.
It's also the most expensive place to stay by a good margin, about double either town on average. Rooms start around US$350 and go into four figures in high season. There's more on the area as a whole in my Tourist Corridor guide.
San José's Historic Center
Stay here if you'd rather eat than swim. It's where I stay now whenever I'm not traveling with someone who needs a beach.
Everything in town is walkable, the rooms are in small hotels and inns, and the airport is only 15 to 30 minutes away, which makes this the best base for a short trip. Tropicana and Casa Natalia are the two I'd point you to, and Casa Natalia is right on the plaza. Expect about US$150 to $300 a night, room only. Nobody sells all-inclusive here, because the restaurants are the whole reason to come. I cover those in the best restaurants in Cabo.
Evenings are a long dinner and a walk around the plaza, with live music on Thursdays and weekends. I love it, but it does wrap up early. And from July to September the town gets very quiet and some places cut their hours.
The downside is that you're staying in a beach destination without a beach. The closest sand is a half-hour walk, and you can't swim there. To swim, you'll need a ride of about ten minutes to Palmilla, or over to La Playita. If that sounds like a dealbreaker to you, it probably is, and that's okay. The town gets its own full write-up in my San José del Cabo guide.
The San José Hotel Zone and Puerto Los Cabos
This area is a pool vacation close to the airport, with the best all-inclusive prices in Los Cabos. That's a perfectly good thing to want! I just want you to know that's what you're booking.
The hotel zone is a strip of big beach hotels south of the historic center. The beach is wide and long, but it drops off steeply and has an undertow, so it's usually flagged against swimming. Town is a half-hour walk in the heat or an Uber of about US$5. For what it's worth, I took that Uber twice in a whole week.
The range here is about US$160 to $600 a night:
- Royal Solaris is the budget all-inclusive.
- Hyatt Ziva is the family all-inclusive, a couple of steps up.
- Viceroy is the design hotel, and it sells rooms only.
If you surf, you'll want the Costa Azul end.
The thing that catches people off guard is the name. They book "San José del Cabo" and expect to be in the town.
Puerto Los Cabos, across the estuary to the east, is similar but with newer rooms. It's a marina and golf development that's very spread out, 10 to 15 minutes from the plaza by car, and you can't walk to anything from the big resorts.
The exception is Hotel El Ganzo, and I really like it. It's an adults-only hotel on the marina with a small protected beach club, and La Playita is a few minutes' walk away. It's the one hotel in this part of San José where you can get in the ocean. El Ganzo sells day passes for about US$50, and most of that comes back to you as food and drink credit. It's an inexpensive way to find out if you like it before you book a stay.
Secrets is the adults-only all-inclusive out here, with lots of space and not many people. Zadún is the top of the market, and its beach is too rough for swimming. And if it's your first trip, keep in mind that the Arch and all the boats are 45 minutes away in the other town.
The Pacific Side
I'd book the Pacific side for the room, the sunset and the whales. Just go in knowing that you won't be swimming in the ocean and you probably won't be going out much. Which resorts are a walk from town and which are a US$50 cab is in my guide to the Pacific side of Cabo.
These are the big gated resorts over the hill northwest of San Lucas: Pueblo Bonito's Sunset Beach and Pacifica at Quivira, and the Hard Rock and Nobu farther up at Diamante. I put those last two head to head in Hard Rock vs Nobu Los Cabos.
What You'll Love
You get a much bigger and nicer room here than the same money buys you on the Corridor, about US$300 to $500 a night. The sunsets are gorgeous. And from mid-December to April, you can watch whales from your balcony. In August the breeze out here is a real selling point, and I'd happily take it.
What to Know Before You Book
You can't swim at any of these hotels. And in late winter and spring, this coast is cooler and quite a bit windier than the bay side, so the pool can be chilly too. At Pacifica the hot tubs have wind guards built around them, which tells you a lot.
If you want a real ocean swim, Pueblo Bonito also owns hotels on Médano, where the water is calm, and it runs a free shuttle over there for its Pacific-side guests. It's a nice perk, and I appreciate that they offer it. But it does mean your beach day comes with a bus ride on the hotel's schedule.
Going out to dinner works the same way. Uber will drop you off at your door, but it can't come in to pick you up, because the cars aren't allowed past the gate. At Sunset Beach the pickup spot is the security gate, which is about a mile away and mostly uphill. From the condos deeper inside Quivira, the gate is a few miles away, and that's an hour on foot. Cars get stopped at the entrance at Diamante too. So a night in town means either the free shuttle with one eye on the clock, or a taxi both ways. I can't give you a taxi fare that I trust. I'd budget US$20 to $35 each way and ask at check-in before you make plans around it. I explain all of this in getting around Cabo.
The resorts are also big enough that getting from your room to a restaurant can mean calling for a golf cart. I once waited half an hour for a cart to take me to dinner at the hotel I was staying in.
My Tips If You Stay Here
- Get the all-inclusive. Eating on property without it is expensive, and there's nowhere else to go. Read what the package leaves out, because caps and exclusions are common.
- Stop at a grocery store on the way in. Ask your airport driver to make a stop for water and snacks.
- Say no to the free breakfast. Several of these are timeshare properties as well as hotels, and the breakfast comes with a sales presentation.
- Rent a car if you're in a condo. I wouldn't stay in one without it. Start with renting a car in Cabo.
- Ask about construction at Diamante. Parts of it have been a building site for years, so find out what's going up next to your building before you pay for a view.
- Plan for the transfer. The airport is almost an hour away, and a private car is US$100 to $150 each way.
If you're coming in February and you get cold easily, I'd think twice about this side.
The East Cape
I'm mostly including the East Cape so that you don't book it by accident. I wouldn't use it as a base for seeing Los Cabos. As a two or three night add-on it's a different story, and that's what my East Cape guide is for.
When people say East Cape, they mean the Four Seasons at Costa Palmas, a marina development on the Sea of Cortez in the opposite direction from Cabo San Lucas. The hotel says it's 45 minutes from the airport. I'd plan on an hour. San José is more than an hour away, San Lucas is more than an hour and a half, and the transfer is about US$280 each way. The nearest town, La Ribera, is a ten minute drive. It has a couple of thousand people, a handful of shops, and a gas station that keeps pretty unpredictable hours.
What you get in return is the best hotel beach in the whole region for actually getting in the water. It's two miles long and calm enough for kayaks and paddleboards. Rooms start around US$900 and go way up from there, before the usual third on top for tax and service.
It is VERY quiet. Some evenings it almost felt too quiet for me. I think it's a great fit if you've already done Cabo and want calm water and no scene, or if you're diving at Cabo Pulmo.
Also, there's now a second Four Seasons on the Corridor, at Cabo del Sol, just minutes from San Lucas. The two are well over an hour apart and they're completely different trips, so double check which one you're booking.
What Gets Added at Checkout
Wherever you stay in Los Cabos, the rate you see when you book is not what you'll end up paying. I'd rather you hear it from me now than at the front desk.
Tax adds about a fifth to every room. At the luxury hotels that sell rooms without meals, there's also a service charge of around 15% on top of that, and it applies to the room as well as to what you eat and drink. So plan on about a fifth extra at a regular hotel and about a third extra at the high end. To put real numbers on it, a week at US$600 a night shows up as US$4,200 on your screen and comes out to somewhere near US$5,600 at checkout, before you've ordered a single drink.
Then there are a few smaller charges:
- An environmental fee of four or five dollars a night. It's charged per room and not per person, so it's the rare fee that works out better for families.
- A state visitor fee of about US$25 a person. You pay it online, separately from your hotel bill.
- Resort fees aren't standard here, but they do show up at the vacation club properties. Read the fee line before you book one of those.
All-inclusive also doesn't quite mean everything. The usual extras are premium liquor, the menu items with an asterisk, reserved daybeds, room service delivery charges and the spa's water circuit. "Resort credit" usually comes with a service charge that you pay in cash. None of it is going to break the bank, but it's annoying when you weren't expecting it.
And watch the room category. "Ocean view" gets used pretty loosely at the clifftop resorts, and sometimes it means a corner of blue behind another building. "Oceanfront" is the word worth paying for.
My rule on the meal plan is that the harder a hotel is to leave, the more the all-inclusive is worth. I've got the full budget, from flights to tips, in how much Cabo costs.
The Verdict
There are nine areas here, and you can only walk to dinner in three of them. I'd start with those three and work outward.
Here's where I'd send you:
- It's your first trip: Médano Beach, in the middle.
- You're coming for the food and can live without the ocean: San José's historic center.
- You don't plan to leave the resort and you want to swim there: one of the five cove hotels on the Corridor. The Hilton if you're watching the budget, Montage or Chileno Bay if you're not.
- You're fishing, or you want San Lucas without the beach scene: the marina or Land's End.
- You want the cheapest room and you'll be out all day: downtown San Lucas.
- It's your honeymoon and you have a serious budget: the Waldorf Astoria in Pedregal, and swim in your plunge pool.
- You want a good-value all-inclusive near the airport and a pool is plenty: the San José hotel zone.
- You want quiet near San José plus somewhere to swim: El Ganzo at Puerto Los Cabos.
- You golf, you love a sunset and you're coming in summer: the Pacific side.
- You've done all of the above and want a calm beach with nobody on it: the East Cape.
And a few matches I'd steer you away from:
- Light sleepers: skip the marina end of Médano and the blocks near the bar strip.
- Swimmers: skip the whole Pacific side, the San José hotel zone and most of the Corridor.
- Under-thirties and groups: San José and the Corridor will probably feel too quiet.
- Anyone here for three nights: skip the Pacific side and the East Cape, because too much of a short trip goes to transfers.
Once you've picked an area, I've ranked the hotels in it. Start with the best hotels on Médano Beach, the best hotels in San José del Cabo, the best all-inclusive resorts in Cabo, the best adults-only resorts in Cabo, the best family resorts in Cabo, the best boutique hotels in Cabo, the Cabo resorts with swimmable beaches, the best Cabo honeymoon resorts and the best affordable hotels in Cabo.
I wouldn't book a "beachfront" hotel here again without checking the swim flag first. I've learned that one. And I'd only book a hotel I can't leave without paying a fare if I've already decided I'm staying put... which, some trips, is exactly the plan.
Quick Answers
What is the best area to stay in Cabo for a first trip? Médano Beach in Cabo San Lucas. It's the only place where a swimmable beach, the boats and dinner are all walkable, and you can pick your spot on it by how much noise you're up for.
Which Cabo hotels have a beach you can actually swim at? Most of Médano, with the middle the safest bet and the far east end by the Rius the exception. On the Corridor, only Chileno Bay, Montage, One&Only Palmilla, and the Hilton and Paradisus behind their breakwater. El Ganzo at Puerto Los Cabos has a small protected spot, and the Four Seasons at Costa Palmas has a calm beach on the East Cape.
Is the Pacific side too far out? In minutes, no. It's 15 to 25 from the marina. In practice it does cut you off, because nothing is walkable, Uber can't pick you up inside the gates, and you can't swim at any of the hotels.
Should I stay in San José's hotel zone or the historic center? The historic center if you're coming for San José itself. The hotel zone is a pool vacation on a beach you can't swim at, a half-hour walk or a short ride from the plaza.
What extra charges land at checkout? About a fifth in tax everywhere, and around 15% service on top at the luxury hotels, so plan on about a third extra at the high end. Add a few dollars a night per room for the environmental fee and about US$25 a person for the state visitor fee, which you pay online.
