First trip to the Maldives: resort or local island, costs

Resort or local island: two kinds of holiday

A resort in the Maldives is a whole island given over to one hotel: villas on the beach or on stilts over the lagoon, its own restaurants, bar, dive centre and house reef, and a speedboat or seaplane that meets you at the airport. A local island is an inhabited island with a harbour, a mosque, a school and streets of white sand, where guesthouses take visitors. Rooms there cost far less, and snorkelling trips, sandbank picnics and dolphin cruises leave from the harbour; the local islands guide compares the best-known islands.

What most visitors come for is under water. A resort's house reef can put turtles and reef fish a few strokes from the beach, and from Maafushi shared and private boats go out to turtle reefs, sandbanks and dolphin waters. Two sights need a trip of their own: from about May or June to November, plankton draws manta rays into Hanifaru Bay in Baa Atoll, sometimes hundreds at once, and in the South Ari Marine Protected Area whale sharks can be seen throughout the year, along with turtles and manta rays. Sightings are never certain; our snorkelling and diving guide explains the seasons, the rules in the water and the packages.

The rules are what set them apart. Alcohol is sold only at resorts and on liveaboard boats; you cannot buy it on, or bring it to, Malé and the inhabited islands, and it must not leave the resort. On inhabited islands, cover shoulders and knees in the streets and on the public beach; swimwear is fine on the island's designated bikini beach, which most guesthouse islands have, while signs on other beaches, in Malé among them, say bikinis are not allowed. Friday is the weekly day of prayer, and public ferry services change or stop on Fridays on some routes. During Ramadan, eating, drinking and smoking in public between sunrise and sunset is forbidden outside resorts, also for non-Muslims, and cafés outside hotels close by day; the festivals guide has the expected dates. Nudity and topless sunbathing are banned everywhere, resorts included.

Doing both is the easiest first trip: local-island nights for the reefs and everyday Maldivian life, then a resort at the end, close to the airport, for the beach bar, a swim straight from the beach and a short hop to the flight home.

A first route: Malé, Maafushi and two resort nights

Every move between islands goes back through Malé or the airport, so a first trip works best as a line out and back from Velana International Airport (MLE). The airport is on Hulhulé island; Malé, the capital, is the island next to it to the south-west, joined by the Sinamalé Bridge, and Hulhumalé is the newer reclaimed island to the north, joined to the airport by road. The route map shows the week; the 7-day itinerary has the day plan and the hotels, and the 10-day itinerary adds three nights on Thulusdhoo.

When to go: the Maldives Meteorological Service puts the dry north-east monsoon from January to March and the wetter south-west monsoon normally from mid-May to November, with December and April as transition months; even in the wet season, rain normally comes in showers with sunny spells. The best-time guide goes month by month.

Choosing the resort: the board basis matters more than on a local island, because the resort is the only place to eat and the only place on the route that sells alcohol; half board, full board and all-inclusive plans move meals, and on all-inclusive the drinks too, into the villa rate. Resorts near the airport send a speedboat; farther out, Trans Maldivian Airways' seaplanes fly only between sunrise and sunset and are booked through the resort. Some resorts have a house reef you can snorkel straight from the beach or from an over-water villa; at others the reef is a boat ride away.

• Day 1: land at Velana and cross to Malé on the airport ferry, which the Malé Airports Company runs from 05:30 to 00:00 every 15 minutes for MVR 15 per person, cash or card, or on your hotel's transfer. Malé is small enough to walk: the fish market, where fishers, butchers and customers trade the day's catch, and Hukuru Miskiy, the Friday Mosque of 1658 built of carved coral blocks, are a short walk apart near the north waterfront, with Sultan Park and the Artificial Beach close by. If you land late and want a beach rather than the old town, sleep in Hulhumalé instead, joined to the airport by road and lined with long beaches. Our Malé and Hulhumalé guide covers both.
• Day 2: the shared speedboat to Maafushi: Kaani Hotels' boat leaves the airport and Malé at 09:15, 11:00, 13:30, 15:00 and 18:00 and takes 35 minutes; meet 30 minutes before at counter E12 in Terminal 2, or at Jetty No. 6 in Malé. It costs USD 25 per person each way and some Maafushi guesthouse packages include it; the slower public ferry is in the transport guide.
• Days 3 and 4: Maafushi. Kaani's shared Full Day Trip, from 08:30 to 14:00 at USD 40 per person before tax, snorkels Biyadhoo Reef, Coral Garden and Turtle Reef, where turtles and reef fish swim close to the surface, stops to watch dolphins and ends with a picnic lunch on a sandbank. The next day is for the bikini beach, and the evening for the night-fishing trip that is part of the package; the Maafushi guide has the other trips and their prices.
• Day 5: the shared speedboat back to the airport, leaving Maafushi at 08:00, 10:00, 12:30, 14:15 or 17:00 (35 minutes), then the resort's own boat. The resort the 7-day itinerary prices is about 20 minutes from the airport by speedboat and accepts only its own speedboat: USD 140 per adult return plus service charge and T-GST, about USD 360 for two, with your flight details sent 48 hours ahead. Resorts farther out are reached by seaplane or by domestic flight and boat, booked through the resort, and cost more to reach: one South Ari resort lists its 30-minute return seaplane at USD 700 per adult, and seaplanes fly only in daylight, so a same-day transfer needs a landing by 15:30.
• Day 6: a full day at the resort: snorkelling on the house reef, a swim from an over-water villa or the beach, and a drink at sunset at the resort's bar.
• Day 7: the resort's boat back to the airport and the flight home. Boats can be cancelled in rough seas, so ending at a resort near the airport leaves slack before the international flight.

What a first trip costs per day, all in

What a day costs depends on where you sleep. The trip cost guide prices three eight-day stays for two adults sharing a double room, all in on the ground: rooms with their taxes, every meal and drink, the boats, the trips, a tourist SIM each and a 10% buffer, at prices checked on 28 October 2026.

The week above costs about USD 260 per person per day, USD 520 for two. It has three Maafushi nights rather than the four in the eight-day mid-range example; the 7-day itinerary prices the route night by night, with its hotels and boats.

Economy returns from London to Malé cost about GBP 600–1,800 per person, about USD 800–2,390 at the Maldives Monetary Authority's rate on 28 October 2026 (GBP 1 = USD 1.3305), on top of the daily figures; the date you fly decides where in that range you land.

Entry and the arrival declaration

UK and EU passport holders need no visa in advance: you get a free visa on arrival for up to 30 days. Entry requires a passport with a machine-readable zone and at least one month's validity, as Maldives Immigration requires (six months avoids trouble with airlines; passports with extended validity are refused), a confirmed return ticket, a prepaid booking at a registered hotel or guesthouse and enough money for the stay. Every traveller, children included, must submit the free IMUGA Traveller Declaration online within 96 hours before arrival. Cash and other monetary instruments worth USD 10,000 or more, in any currency, must be declared to Customs on arrival and again on departure; the declaration can be made online on the Maldives Customs Service website. The entry guide has the customs allowances and departure taxes.

Money: US dollars, rufiyaa and the taxes on tourist bills

The currency is the Maldivian rufiyaa (MVR), but most tourist prices, from rooms to boats and dives, are quoted in US dollars. On 28 October 2026 the Maldives Monetary Authority's reference rate was USD 1 = MVR 15.42. Rufiyaa are handy in local cafés and shops.

Major international cards are accepted at nearly all resorts, and there are cash machines at the airport, according to the German Foreign Office. Bring a card with a PIN and some US dollars in cash as well, because getting money on the smaller islands can be difficult. Customs rules, including what to declare, are in the entry guide.

Hotel, guesthouse and resort bills add a service charge of at least 10% (by law; most places charge exactly 10%) and the 17% tourism goods and services tax (T-GST), and then the green tax: USD 6 per person per taxable day at guesthouses and hotels with 50 or fewer rooms on an inhabited island, USD 12 at resorts, liveaboards and other hotels. No GST is charged on the green tax. Ordinary shops and cafés outside the tourism sector charge the general 8% GST. A package that says it includes taxes and service has them already; a rate quoted 'subject to' them does not. The service charge is shared among the staff under the Labour Relations Authority's rules, so a tip on top is your own choice.

SIM cards and data

Dhiraagu and Ooredoo both sell tourist SIMs and eSIMs, and Visit Maldives notes that prepaid SIM cards from the two companies are on sale at the airport. Dhiraagu's Traveler Premium is USD 50 for 100 GB of data over 30 days.

Safety, swimming and the law

Two points change how you plan the days. At sea, swim only where it is supervised, designated safe or has a lifeguard, and never alone, even at a resort: France counts several deaths at sea every year from strong currents, so choose excursion boats that carry life jackets. In Malé, political protests take place from time to time; keep away from demonstrations, large crowds and political or religious gatherings. France keeps the whole country under increased vigilance (vigilance renforcée), a call for alertness rather than advice against travel. Other governments may draw a wider line, so check your own government's advice too.

The law follows Islam: publicly practising another religion is illegal, and so are same-sex relations, with fines or long prison sentences. Dress correctly to visit a mosque and do not film or photograph around one.