How to Choose a Maldives Island

Every Maldives resort photographs identically: white sand, a wooden jetty, water in three shades of blue. Which is exactly the problem. The photographs are true and they tell you almost nothing, because the differences that matter between one island and the next are invisible in a drone shot.

These are the six questions we work through with every client before naming a single property.

1. How do you get there — and does it cost you a day?

Transfers are the most underestimated factor. A speedboat island is 20 to 45 minutes from Malé and runs at any hour. A seaplane island is a spectacular 30 to 60 minute flight, but seaplanes only fly in daylight. If your flight from India lands at 4pm, a seaplane island can mean an overnight in Malé before you begin — and the same problem in reverse on departure.

Domestic-flight islands sit in the far atolls and combine a plane with a boat. Remote and extraordinary, and best for seven nights or more. For four or five nights the transfer eats too much of the holiday.

2. Do you actually want a house reef?

A genuine house reef means you walk off the beach or drop from your deck and are snorkelling in thirty seconds. Not every island has one. Many have a distant reef requiring a boat and a booking, which is a materially different holiday.

If snorkelling matters, this narrows the field faster than any other criterion, and it's worth paying for. If you'd rather sit by a pool, it isn't worth the premium at all.

3. Overwater or beach villa?

Overwater villas are the image everyone has. They are also hotter in the middle of the day, less private on a busy jetty, and often further from the restaurants. Beach villas with a private pool are frequently the better room — especially for families, and for anyone travelling in the hottest months.

Our usual advice: two or three nights overwater, then the rest on the beach. Most resorts will split a stay happily, and the change of scene makes the week feel longer.

4. Who else is on the island?

An island holds between forty and two hundred and fifty villas, and that number sets the entire mood. Forty villas is silence. Two hundred and fifty is a small resort town with four restaurants and a nightly programme.

Adults-only islands exist and are unapologetic about it. Family islands have kids' clubs, shallow lagoons and a different noise level around the pool at four in the afternoon. Neither is better — but arriving at the wrong one is the most common Maldives disappointment we hear about.

5. What does the board basis actually cover?

This is where Maldives budgets go wrong. On a remote island you cannot leave for dinner, so the resort's pricing is the only pricing. A bed-and-breakfast rate at a high-end property can mean 250 to 400 US dollars per couple per day in food and drink on top.

An all-inclusive rate that looks expensive is frequently cheaper in total than a room-only rate that looks reasonable. Compare the full week, never the nightly headline. We do that arithmetic on every option we send.

6. When are you going?

The dry season runs roughly December to April — the reliable months, and the expensive ones. May to November is the southwest monsoon: rain in bursts rather than all day, considerably lower rates, and better marine life. August and September bring manta and whale shark activity in Baa Atoll that peak season doesn't offer.

A May or October trip can cost forty per cent less than the same villa in February. Whether that trade is right depends entirely on why you're going.

The short version

Answer those six honestly and the field narrows from 160 resorts to perhaps five. After that it becomes a question of taste rather than research — which is the enjoyable part, and the only part you should have to do yourself.