10 Best Family Resorts in Florida With Water Parks

Having a pool at your hotel or easy beach access is an awesome family vacation perk. But there’s one thing that’s even better: an onsite water park! Florida—not surprisingly—offers some of the best hotel water parks around. And as you’d also except, many of them are in landlocked Orlando. But there are others to seek out, too. From Florida’s Gulf Coast to the Atlantic side, we’ve chosen our favorite hotels with water parks in Florida, featuring the best lazy rivers, lagoon pools and twisting waterslides to keep you and your gang wet (and perhaps a little wild) all day long. These are the best family resorts in Florida with water parks.

1. Gaylord Palms Resort & Convention Center

A destination entirely its own, the Gaylord Palms Resort & Convention Center is such a sprawling complex, it’s tempting to never leave the property! (But you should—the theme parks are all close by). And for pool and water park lovers, there’s tons to love right at the hotel itself. The hotel’s Everglades-themed Cypress Springs Family Fun Water Park has all manner of diversions for surfing, sliding and swimming the day away, including a huge zero-entry pool, racing waterslides, a drop waterslide, a treehouse playground and even a double FlowRider, where kids can perfect their skills at hanging ten.

2. The Grove Resort Orlando

What’s not to love about twisting waterslides that empty you out into the launch point for a lazy river? The Surfari Water Park at The Grove Resort Orlando has that and more. And if you’re looking for a hotel stay near the theme parks where you can cool off with lots of family fun at day’s end, you can’t go wrong here. Your youngest kids can play at the zero-entry pool and splash area just for them, while your pre-teens and teens lose their minds over the totally awesome dual FlowRider surf simulator (an extra fee applies for the latter). The hotel’s 695-foot-long lazy river delights everyone with waterfalls, overhead bridges you can cruise under, and water cannons to dodge along the way.

3. Hammock Beach Resort

South of St. Augustine, Palm Coast makes for a relaxing family beach vacation within easy-enough reach of both Orlando and the historic attractions of old St. Augustine. The Hammock Beach Resort‘s poolside Water Pavilion is a 91,000-square-foot complex with upper and lower level pools, a spa tub as big as a swimming pool itself, a zero-entry beach pool, a twisting waterslide, lazy river and poolside bar. There’s even an indoor pool here, should you want to escape the blazing Florida sun for a spell.

4. Orlando World Center Marriott

Families who love to swim will have no time to miss the beach at this hotel with a water park in Florida. Close to Disney Springs, the Orlando World Center Marriott has six pools within a central area called the Falls Pool Oasis, and it’s easy to walk from the zero-entry kiddie splash pad area, with its miniature waterslide, to the big lagoon pool with cascading waterfalls and multiple hot tubs. Your adrenaline seekers will love the two, twisting 200-foot-long waterslides here, accessed by several flights of stairs. The hotel’s fire pits add lots of atmosphere come evening time, and there’s a cool nightly laser show that lights everything up poolside.

5. Hilton Orlando Bonnet Creek

You’re a quick shuttle ride to the Orlando theme parks when you stay at this popular family resort. But be sure to leave time during your vacation for lots of family pool play at the Hilton Orlando Bonnet Creek. For starters, there are the three outdoor swimming pools. But the water park, with its slide and three-acre lazy river for a winding tube ride, is where your kids will want to spend their time. The two zero-entry pools that flow into the lazy river are a nice place for parents to relax with younger kids while your pre-teens and teens do laps on the tubes.

6. CoCo Key Hotel and Water Park Resort

Younger kids especially love the colorful water park that’s part of CoCo Key Hotel and Water Park Resort on Orlando’s ticky-tacky main tourist drag, International Drive. You can even request a room overlooking the Caribbean-themed water park. And you can be sure they’ll be tuckered out after a few hours of running around this tropical complex with exciting waterslides that have names like the Boomerango and Cyclone Slide. A huge dump bucket atop the complex rains down torrents of water every few minutes, keeping excitement and anticipation levels at a peak all day long.

7. Holiday Inn Resort Orlando Suites – Waterpark

There are a lot of things for families to love about this Holiday Inn close to Disney World, including free transportation to the Disney parks, the spacious family suites, and the fact that kids 12 and under get free breakfast and dinner! But for families who love to spend time together swimming, it’s all about the pool, splash areas and slides at the Holiday Inn Resort Orlando Suites – Waterpark. The huge, freeform lagoon pool has water features and poolside cabanas, but the highlight here is the multi-level waterpark, complete with several twisting slides of various adrenaline levels to delight younger kids and thrill your pre-teens and teens, too.

8. Disney’s Vero Beach Resort

The beach is beautiful at Disney’s Vero Beach Resort, south of Orlando. But kids are likely to spend at least half of their vacation splashing around the pirate-themed waterpark, where the main attraction is a 163-foot-long, spiraling Pirate’s Plunge waterslide that will have them shrieking with delight. The Tiger Lily Wet Play area has a pirate ship, water cannons and even a mini-slide for your energy-filled toddlers.

9. JW Marriott Orlando, Grande Lakes

When the JW Marriott, Orlando Grande Lakes opened back in 2003, it set a new standard for luxury near the theme parks. Part of that luxury? An onsite water park. The lazy river is heated year-round, so even on the odd, chilly day, you can dive in for a fun float, dodging waterfalls as you meander around the property pushed by the gentle current. There are five lagoon pools here in total, and the zero-entry access pool is a favorite for families with young children.

10. Reunion Resort

So vast are the hotel options in Orlando and Kissimmee, it can be a real challenge just to narrow down where to stay. But if an onsite water park is important to you during an Orlando vacation, put the Reunion Resort in Kissimmee near the top of your list. The property has all kinds of accommodation options (suites, condos, villas and more) and is absolutely enormous, with a total of 10 community pools, as well as a five-acre water park with a 1,000-foot-long lazy river, twisting waterslides and a water playground for your littlest kids.

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