The new Island Tower at Disney’s Polynesian Resort is now open to guests as of today, December 17, 2025. This shares photos & videos of the hotel expansion, plus a few first impressions of the high-rise that’s been plopped in the middle of the monorail loop at Walt Disney World and purports to celebrate the South Pacific, Moana, and natural elements.
Located on the shores of Seven Seas Lagoon and offering views of that and Magic Kingdom, the Island Tower replaces Disney’s Spirit of Aloha Dinner Show. The new Island Tower is essentially between the existing Great Ceremonial House at the Poly and the Grand Floridian, and right next door to Disney’s Wedding Pavilion.
It’s a towering addition to a monorail loop ‘skyline’ that already looks dramatically different than it did 15 years ago, with many more guest rooms added to the mix. For its part, the Island Tower at Disney’s Polynesian Villas & Bungalows adds 260 guest rooms in a variety of types that will sleep from two to nine guests. This includes duo studios, spacious one and two-bedroom villas, and brand-new two-bedroom penthouse villas. The tower will also include deluxe studio rooms, adding to the deluxe studio rooms already available at the Poly Villas.
According to Walt Disney World, the new 10-story Island Tower’s architecture pulls inspiration from early concept art of the iconic property by Walt Disney Imagineering. When pitching the project to fans, the company has invoked legendary Imagineer Marty Sklar’s quote: “A good idea never goes away!”
In their defense, early concepts for Disney’s Polynesian Village Resort included a multi-story terraced structure surrounded by three-story buildings along the shores of Seven Seas Lagoon. The original design for the tower at Disney’s Polynesian Village Resort would have been modern for the 1970s and reminiscent of the luxury hotels found on Waikiki Beach.
Here’s a look at the original concept art from the late 1960s:
Disney keeps touting this, so I’m going to once again push back on it–especially since we also often use the line that a ‘good idea never dies at Imagineering.’ Perhaps the statement is, in fact, more accurately that ideas never die–both good and bad–at Imagineering.
It bugs me that Disney is taking plans that never made it off the drawing board to argue that this completes the original vision for the Polynesian Resort, as if everything from the past is automatically good. Perhaps there’s a reason the tower concept didn’t come to fruition in the first place decades ago. That it was and is a bad idea, not a good one.
Ironically, every change away from Walt Disney World’s past that actually was realized is justified with a Walt Disney quote about progress. Guess they decided to switch up the playbook here.
To each their own, but this argument falls flat for me. Mostly because I have eyes. I can look at the thing in question, evaluate it, and determine whether or not it’s a good or bad idea. If others just want to blindly believe that the Island Tower completes the vision for the Poly based on what Disney is saying, I suppose that’s their prerogative.
Frankly, I’d prefer that other Disney fans disagree with me on the merits, and think the Island Tower actually looks nice and the complaints about its appearance are overblown. I can accept that–different strokes for different folks and all that.
Not only that, but the Island Tower is very different than the decades-old concept art Disney is showing to justify its existence. (The act of them doing this alone suggests to me that they felt it necessary, as the thing cannot speak for itself on substance.)
While I don’t love the look of the unbuilt tower and think the Poly is/was better without it, the structure is at least visually interesting, evoking a mountain–perhaps Diamond Head. It reminds me a bit of the Hyatt Grand Cypress but with a more ambitious design. We’ve actually stayed in tower hotels designed like this–they can be eye-catching. By contrast, the Island Tower is more boxy, reminding me of Gran Destino Tower more than anything else.
Beyond that, the Island Tower as finished is very different than that concept that had a tower at the heart of the Poly. It would be one thing to have a quasi-tower with bungalows radiating out from it. That’s not what this is. Disney’s Polynesian Village Resort was already built one way, with a purposeful design and layout–and no tower. Now it has a tower plopped at the periphery of the resort, and in a different style.
There is no thematic cohesion or shared design language between the legacy Polynesian Village Resort and the Island Tower. It’s obvious just from looking at them that they’re two different visions from two different eras.
I’m not even suggesting that the Island Tower is inherently bad–just that doesn’t complete some grand vision for the resort as a whole. There’s no unity or harmony between the two. From a design perspective, they’re basically two standalone resorts next to one another that share some visual motifs and common inspiration.
Honestly, if the Island Tower weren’t being wedged in between the Grand Floridian and Polynesian, forever altering the ‘skyline’ of the monorail loop, I wouldn’t have nearly as much issue with it. If this exact same design were being built out on Western Way near Coronado or the All Stars, it would be fine. Good enough, even!
It still would not my personal favorite style, but I’d recognize that modern guests actually want towers like this. Not everything needs to be tailored to my tastes. The issue here is all about where Island Tower has been plopped–what’s around and “connected” to it.
While leaving Magic Kingdom and heading to Wilderness Lodge the other night, we saw the Island Tower illuminated from the boat dock. Sarah stopped in her tracks and said, “wow.” It wasn’t a good wow. Sarah has generally been more forgiving of the Island Tower than me, choosing to focus on the practical upside (it’ll be a great place to stay!) than the way it looks.
She’s also a fan of both Gran Destino Tower and Riviera Resort, and has been optimistic about the addition based on its similarities with those properties. But even she was taken aback by just how the Island Tower dominates the view from all along Seven Seas Lagoon.
Again, the Island Tower is more like the ex post facto additions of Gran Destino and Riviera Resorts than it is something like the original Polynesian tower concept or even Aulani, which would have been (or was) master-planned and has visual cohesion as a result.
Even though I don’t love the exterior appearance of Gran Destino, at least it has become the focal point of Coronado Springs. That resort has been re-centered around Gran Destino Tower. It’s not perfect, but Imagineering really made lemonade out of lemons there. (The stakes were also lower–Coronado Springs was not beloved nor is it park-adjacent.)
That has not happened with the Poly. Great Ceremonial House remains the nucleus of Disney’s Polynesian Village Resort, but now there’s this gigantic tower at the edge of the resort that serves as the focal point of the property. It is incongruous and jarring.
But enough on my rants about the way the Island Tower looks from the exterior and how it irrevocably alters the skyline of the monorail loop. At this point, you either agree with Disney or with me, and even though I could probably ramble on for another thousand words, there’s no further persuasive value in doing so.
Let’s instead talk about the Island Tower’s impact on infrastructure. As noted above, the Island Tower adds 260 guest rooms, but with a higher guest count than that number would suggest if this were a regular resort, as many of those are multi-bedroom units. One of the things we’ve stressed repeatedly during the tower’s construction (and even before it) is that the Poly is already bursting at the seams on busy dates.
During our recent Walt Disney World holiday trip, we made it over to the Great Ceremonial House as part of a Christmas-time tour of the monorail loop resorts. This is hardly stop-the-presses news, but the Great Ceremonial House was absolutely bonkers. Guests overflowing from the ‘Ohana waiting area, a surprising number of people standing around waiting to be seated at Kona, a long line for the monorail–just crowds, everywhere.
To be fair, this is the worst time of year for congestion and chaos at the monorail loop resorts. Families want to do nice meals at the resorts or come to see the decorations, which can make both the Polynesian and Grand Floridian lobbies feel like madhouses. I’ve encountered more or less the same thing each of the last few years at both GF and the Poly. It’s nothing new, and certainly cannot be attributed to the Island Tower.
But a lessened version of this is already the norm at the Poly. The second-level of the Great Ceremonial House has been loud and chaotic every evening I’ve been there in the last several years (save for 2020-2021). My fear is that the Island Tower will exacerbate this. Same goes for stress on the resort monorail, which is already overburdened due to Bay Lake Tower and Grand Floridian Villas.
The Island Tower just opened, so the jury is still out on all of this. I hope that my fears are not well-founded, and that more guests will use the lovely walkway to Magic Kingdom, boat service, or otherwise avoid the monorail.
I also hope that the excellent-looking Wailulu Bar & Grill has more-than-sufficient capacity to service the Island Tower, and even pulls people away from the Great Ceremonial House. That strikes me as unlikely, but I’m nevertheless hopeful.
The alternative is ‘locking down’ the Polynesian (and maybe also the Grand Floridian). Walt Disney World already restricts parking at these resorts (and sometimes fireworks viewing), but perhaps they’ll need to take that a step further and restrict access, period. I’m not exactly how they accomplish that from a practical perspective given how porous arrival points are, but it’s not unprecedented–Tokyo Disney Resort does exactly this with Toy Story Hotel and Fantasy Springs Hotel.
I already have my alarm set for the 7-month mark so we can (hopefully!) book a stay at the Island Tower next Christmas. For research, of course. To see how the resort ‘performs’ during the most crowded time of year after another year of DVC sales and (presumably) higher occupancy in the tower than the remainder of this holiday season.
Let’s end on a positive note, with the rooms! Disney has released room tour videos that offer a better look at the inside of the various room types at the Poly’s Island Tower:
Duo Studios
Perfect for 2 Guests, these Studios offer an outdoor patio and kitchenette, plus vibrant artwork inspired by both Moana and the sky element.
Deluxe Studios
These earth-themed rooms that sleep up to 4 majestically showcase the flora and fauna of the islands, and offer an outdoor patio and kitchenette with a dishwasher.
1-Bedroom Villas
Discover beautiful water-inspired artwork in Villas that sleep up to 5 and feature an outdoor patio, full kitchen, spacious living area, 2 bathrooms and a washer and dryer.
2-Bedroom Villas
In addition to everything the 1-Bedroom Villas offer, these Villas—themed to both water and earth—have a third luxurious bathroom and sleep up to 9.
It might be a controversial opinion with diehard fans (and our commenters), but my overall impression of these rooms is positive. And I don’t doubt for a second that the rooms will be well-received by regular DVC members.
Disney has been doing a great job with the new and reimagined rooms at the villas for the last 5 years. We also just stayed at the new Fort Wilderness Cabins and absolutely loved them, which also seems like an unpopular perspective among fans.
I’m not a fan of the Island Tower and wish it did not exist at all, but the guest rooms are not part of that criticism. My only concern before was that the rooms were overly beige, ‘earthy,’ and one-note.
Given its mid-century and Polynesian roots, I was hoping for a lot more color. But in actually watching the video and seeing the finished product, what they lack in color they make up for in texture and other details.
The jury is still out until we actually stay there, but my first impression is that these aren’t bland, but rather, subtle. A lot of fans will likely appreciate the ‘calming’ design and the way they act as counterprogramming to the existing Poly Villas.
Ultimately, there’s a lot to criticize about the Island Tower and the way it looks from the outside and what it does to Walt Disney World as a whole. Beyond the above, I also think it leeches off goodwill and good design from over 5 decades ago, and that if everything were built this way from the beginning, most of us wouldn’t be Walt Disney World fans in the first place. It’s a brand withdrawal rather than a deposit, to use Disney’s own language.
But what’s done is done. I just wanted to get this out of my system one last time before actually reviewing the Island Tower and repeating the mistakes made in our Disney’s Riviera Resort Review, which focuses inordinate attention on themed design and characteristics that are not relevant to average guests or from a practical planning perspective.
The bottom line is that there’s also a lot to love about the Poly’s Island Tower. Wailulu Bar & Grill, the Moana pool area, and (especially) Terrace Gardens look like fantastic assets that guests will love. I cannot wait to spend late nights or early mornings with a cup of coffee in those gardens, overlooking Magic Kingdom as it wakes up or goes to sleep for the day.
In the end, I hate how the Island Tower looks from the outside, but just like Riviera and Gran Destino before it, the ugly and undercooked tower should be great once you’re inside and enjoying views from it rather than of it. The Island Tower is the one place that offers sweeping views of Magic Kingdom and Seven Seas Lagoon, without having to look at the Island Tower! (Kinda feels like DVC has developed its own form of moral hazard, but whatever.)
I’m also confident that actual guests who aren’t armchair Imagineers or online critics (ahem) are going to love the Island Tower. I have no doubt about that. It combines two things that score really well with current guests–towers and the new styles of rooms. (These two things may not rate highly with you personally, but they do perform exceptionally with guests as a whole.)
There’s no undoing the damage already caused by adding this tower to the monorail loop…so we might as well enjoy the good if we have to put up with the bad. We cannot wait to stay at the Island Tower as a family; as a reviewer, I cannot wait for a point in time when Walt Disney World additions don’t need to be evaluated from a “lemonade out of lemons” perspective.
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YOUR THOUGHTS
What do you think of the Island Tower? Is this a net positive or negative for Walt Disney World as a whole? What about for the Polynesian or DVC members? Have you already booked a stay at the Island Tower? Are you optimistic or pessimistic about the Island Tower at Disney’s Polynesian Village Resort? Do you agree or disagree with our first impressions? Any questions we can help you answer? Hearing your feedback–even when you disagree with us–is both interesting to us and helpful to other readers, so please share your thoughts below in the comments!
