One&Only Reethi Rah Review: Twelve Beaches, Plenty of Restaurants and One Weak Reef

Updated October 2026

One&Only Reethi Rah sits in North Malé Atoll, with a six-kilometre shoreline and twelve separate beaches. It has a wide choice of restaurants and bars and a long list of sports, and its own boats reach it from the airport in about 45 minutes, around the clock. Its house reef is poor, and keen snorkellers should know that before anything else.

What stands out

Three things set One&Only Reethi Rah apart. Space: twelve beaches on one island, with villas far enough apart that you rarely see a neighbour. Choice: restaurants and bars that are genuinely different places rather than one kitchen in several rooms. And sport, on land and on the water.

The compromise is equally clear. This is not a snorkelling island, and on a resort this size, everything is a bicycle ride away.

What the island is like

Most Maldivian resort islands can be walked end to end in a quarter of an hour. One&Only Reethi Rah cannot.

The island sits in North Malé Atoll. An atoll is a ring of coral reef with islands scattered around it, and North Malé is the one closest to the international airport, which is why this resort can be reached by boat. The island is shaped like a hand, with long strips of land reaching into the lagoon, the shallow, sheltered water inside the reef. That shape is how it ends up with twelve beaches and so much private shoreline. Villas sit far apart along those strips, screened by planting. The orchid gardens are unusual for the Maldives, and a kitchen garden supplies the restaurants.

All that space buys privacy a small island cannot offer. What it costs is convenience. Every villa comes with bicycles, and you will use them.

Arriving

One&Only Reethi Rah is unusually easy to reach. The resort runs its own boats from Velana International Airport in Malé: a luxury yacht, a private speedboat and a luxury boat carrying only its own guests. The crossing takes about 45 minutes, with no stops, in air-conditioned comfort that makes it part of the holiday rather than a chore.

Unlike a seaplane, the boats run around the clock, so a flight landing in the middle of the night still reaches the villa the same night.

There is also a seaplane, about 15 minutes. Seaplanes in the Maldives fly in daylight only, so it suits a morning or early-afternoon landing. For an evening arrival from Delhi, Mumbai or Bengaluru, the boat is the answer.

The villas

Seven types, and inside they are more alike than you would expect. Most one-bedroom villas have almost the same interior, around 81 square metres. What changes is position and outdoor space.

Beach villas give you shade, a garden and sand you step straight onto. Water villas give you a deck that wraps the whole way round and steps into the lagoon. Because everything is spread out, you get privacy either way, which is not true on islands where water villas are strung along one jetty in full view of each other.

The beach villa with a private pool is the most common villa on the island, so if the picture in your head is a pool on the sand, that is the one you are most likely to get. There are pool versions of the water villas too, a few grand villas with pools of up to 50 square metres, and two-bedroom residences sleeping six.

One rule matters for families. Children under twelve can stay in a water villa only if a parent or guardian signs a disclaimer, so most families end up on the beach anyway.

Every villa comes with a Personal Host on call around the clock and bicycles. The larger villas add a private buggy. There is a clinic on the island.

Eating and drinking

This is where One&Only Reethi Rah separates itself. A choice this wide is unusual even at this level, and the restaurants and bars are distinct places.

Reethi is the main restaurant, at the centre of the island, built around a floor-to-ceiling glass cube that holds the kitchen. By night its Earth room serves pan-Asian dishes and grills from a charcoal oven, with decking out over the water. Tapasake is the signature room, overwater on the western shore, serving modern Japanese with Mediterranean touches. Botanica, set in a candlelit garden, cooks plant-based food from the kitchen garden around it and keeps a gin bar. Fanditha sits on the far northern tip: Middle Eastern mezze and grills on carpets in the sand, with chandeliers hung in the palms, and the best sunset on the island. Rabarbaro is the relaxed Italian room by the infinity pool. Rah Bar runs all day by the pool, then turns into a cocktail bar with live music and a strong collection of Indian Ocean and Caribbean rums. The Beach Club serves grills and seafood with your feet in the sand.

For wine, the resort runs tutored blind tastings and hosted pairing dinners. For two, there is also the Treehouse, a private dining platform above the treetops.

The spa, the sports and the children

The One&Only Spa has its own stretch of shore, apart from the rest of the resort, with overwater couples' rooms, steam rooms, saunas, vitality pools, a Bastien Gonzalez studio for hands and feet, and a full salon. Yoga, pilates and tai chi run from a pavilion over the water.

The sports list is long. Floodlit tennis and padel courts, a FIFA-approved football pitch, an indoor golf simulator, three pools including a lap pool running out into the lagoon, and on the water everything from catamaran sailing and windsurfing to seabobs (small underwater scooters) and e-foiling.

For children, KidsOnly takes ages four to twelve with its own pool and playground, and One Tribe runs a separate programme for teenagers. Turtle snorkelling trips and Maldivian drum lessons beat the usual colouring tables.

The water

A house reef is the coral reef you can swim to from the resort itself. At One&Only Reethi Rah it can be reached from only one point on the shore, which on an island with twelve beaches means a long cycle from most villas. Guests who came mainly to snorkel say so consistently. The guided reef trips are the way round it, and they are well run, with good fish life at the spots the boats visit. You are taken to the reef rather than swimming to it.

The diving is a different story. The PADI dive centre teaches from beginner level, with a programme for children from eight, and North Malé holds channels, walls, caves and wrecks, with mantas and hammerheads in season.

Elsewhere there are sunset trips on a dhoni, the traditional Maldivian wooden boat, deep-sea fishing, sandbank picnics and scenic flights. The sunset cruise is often sold as a dolphin trip, and the dolphins do not always appear.

Who will love it, and who won't

One&Only Reethi Rah suits people who want space, variety and things to do: couples and families who will work through the restaurants and bars, play real tennis and book the wine tastings, and anyone landing late at night. It is not for keen snorkellers, who will find better reefs in Baa and Ari atolls. It is not for anyone who wants everything close at hand, since cycling to dinner is either charming or tiresome. Three nights barely touches a place this size, and anyone after a small, simple island should look elsewhere.

Common questions

How do you get to One&Only Reethi Rah from Malé?

The resort runs its own boats from Malé airport: a luxury yacht, a private speedboat and a luxury boat carrying only its guests. The crossing takes about 45 minutes with no stops, and the boats run around the clock, so even a late-night landing reaches the island that night. A seaplane takes about 15 minutes, in daylight only.

Is the snorkelling good at One&Only Reethi Rah?

Not from the shore. The house reef is reached from a single point, a long cycle from most villas. The guided reef trips are well run and the diving in North Malé Atoll is excellent, but snorkelling straight off your villa is not what this island offers.

What are the restaurants like at One&Only Reethi Rah?

There is a wide choice of restaurants and bars, covering pan-Asian, Japanese, plant-based, Middle Eastern and Italian cooking, plus a beach club and private dining in the Treehouse. The resort also runs tutored wine tastings and pairing dinners.

Is One&Only Reethi Rah good for families?

Yes. KidsOnly takes children from four to twelve with its own pool and playground, One Tribe runs a separate teenage programme, and the sports keep older children busy. Children under twelve can stay in a water villa only with a signed disclaimer, so a beach villa usually suits families better.