Disney World Makes Major Progress on Multi-Year Yacht & Beach Club Construction Projects

Walt Disney World has multiple refurbishment projects at Yacht & Beach Club Resorts through 2027, and the work has made major progress over the last few months thanks to a huge crew of construction workers. Here’s a rundown of everything happening at the sister resorts, August 2026 photos, and our take on whether to stay or avoid these hotels.

Let’s start with the good news about Disney’s Yacht Club Resort, which is that all of this work is part of a bigger-picture overhaul that has involved everything from guest rooms to the porte cochere to Stormalong Bay. All of that work already wrapped up last year, and the results are excellent.

In particular, we love the redone guest rooms at Yacht Club. These received a soft goods refresh last year, and the results are excellent. Lots of little improvements, more pops of color, and a great balance of modern luxury and Disney details. Yacht Club now has some of our favorite rooms in all of Walt Disney World. Check out our Review: Refined Redone Rooms at WDW’s Most Sophisticated Resort for tons of photos and comprehensive thoughts.

Before digging in, let’s cover Walt Disney World’s official ‘construction bulletin’ regarding Disney’s Yacht & Beach Club Resorts as of August 21, 2026:

Now through mid-September 2026, the lobby at Disney’s Beach Club Villas will undergo maintenance in phases. Portions of the lobby may be temporarily unavailable, and alternate paths of travel may be in place. Guests may see or hear construction activity in the area from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. until the work is complete.

Disney’s Yacht Club Resort is undergoing visible exterior maintenance through late 2026, and Disney’s Beach Club Resort is undergoing visible exterior maintenance through late 2027, which impacts views from various locations across the Resort hotel and—at times—requires alternate paths of travel. Guests may see or hear work in the area during daytime hours until the refurbishment is complete.

Now through August 2026, Yachtsman Steakhouse is temporarily closed for refurbishment.

Now through late August 2026, the FriendShip Boat dock at Disney’s Yacht Club Resort and Disney’s Beach Club Resort will be closed for maintenance. During this closure, there will be direct bus transportation available from Disney’s Yacht Club Resort and Disney’s Beach Club Resort to Disney’s Hollywood Studios. Guests visiting EPCOT will be able to use walkways from  Disney’s Yacht Club Resort and Disney’s Beach Club Resort to the EPCOT International Gateway.

From January 24 through January 30, 2027, Disney Skyliner will be closed for refurbishment. Complimentary bus service will be available during this time.

Let’s start with the Signature Restaurant closure, which should wrap up soon. Yachtsman Steakhouse closed back on May 11, 2026 for a refresh. According to a bulletin at the time, guests may see or hear daytime work until the refurbishment is complete. Prior to this, no specific opening date had been announced.

Walt Disney World still hasn’t announced a reopening date for Yachtsman Steakhouse, but they have indirectly revealed when the restaurant will return. Starting August 28, 2026, Yachtsman Steakhouse has operating hours (Dinner – 5:00 PM to 9:30 PM) on the DisneyWorld.com website.

Additionally, Advance Dining Reservations for Yachtsman Steakhouse are now open beginning August 28, 2026 and every day thereafter as far out as the calendar goes. This seems pretty conclusive to us that the target reopening date following the restaurant’s refurbishment is August 28th.

Given that’s only a week away, it’s slightly surprising we haven’t seen new concept art or a new menu. Unless nothing guest-facing is materially changing, which is always a possibility. For reference, Crew’s Cup didn’t get an announcement; it just reopened with lightly updated upholstery and the same menu. Stay tuned.

Similarly, the FriendShip Boat dock maintenance should be finished within the next week or so.

In all likelihood, no one reading this is booking a trip between now and the end of the month. But if you already had one planned and are reconsidering Yacht & Beach Club solely on this basis, my advice would be: don’t.

It is usually faster to walk between the Crescent Lake resorts than it is to take the FriendShip Boats. Not always, as efficient watercraft service and lucky timing does give an edge to the FriendShips, but we prefer to be in control of our own destiny. Obviously, walking does up your step count, so there’s that. The extra exercise also gives me an excuse to buy a ‘bonus’ Buffalo Chicken Grilled Cheese Sandwich right when ABC Commissary opens, in addition to regular lunch. That might read like a joke; it is not a joke.

With that out of the way, let’s take a look at current exterior work at Disney’s Yacht & Beach Club Resorts:

In terms of the impact to guests staying at Yacht & Beach Club, what you see is what you get. As the photos should illustrate, scaffolding stands out while walking around Crescent Lake. Presumably, this will shift around over the next year or so as different sections of the facade are repaired and replaced.

The extent to which that visual blight is noticeable or disruptive will depend on the guest and location of the work. We’ve been around Yacht & Beach Club countless times in the last ~5 years when there was exterior work happening, and I wouldn’t say it really stuck out from the outside on any of those trips. It was visible, sure, but it didn’t negatively impact our experience in the past.

I’m not so sure I still feel that way. When I saw all this work, my first thought was that I was glad we stayed at Yacht Club last Christmas as opposed to right now. As contrasted with the past, crews have been doing larger sections of the resort during the 2026 project. A few points are worth addressing as of mid-August 2026…

First, that the construction is currently confined to Yacht Club. A couple of months ago, there was facade work on both sides of the sister resorts. There’s still a lot happening, as is clear from the photos, but less than there was then.

And as the bulletin suggests, Yacht Club will wrap up late this year while Beach Club will continue into 2027, so it’s not as if Beach Club is done. To the contrary, it appears that Yacht Club is the priority now and will finish first.

Consider booking accordingly for 2027 stays, and perhaps even Christmas 2026.

Second, this project is moving fast. What you see here may not be what you get tomorrow or a few weeks from now. I was shocked to see such a large construction crew on this project, especially for one with such a (seemingly) long timeline.

There very clearly appears to be a sense of urgency, and they really are making major progress. That might be difficult to believe given the drawn out nature of the timeline, but Walt Disney World is clearly throwing a lot of resources at this. That also arguably makes it more impactful for current guests, as the crew is large and the site is very active.

Finally, the completed work looks good! The stretch of Yacht Club on the far side (closer to Swan & Dolphin, away from Beach Club) is all finished and looks fantastic. There’s a noticeable difference between the areas that are done and those that haven’t been started.

All the scaffolding isn’t the end of the world, but I personally wouldn’t want to pay Yacht Club rates to encounter all of that. To each their own, though.

If you want to enjoy Stormalong Bay or are just a big fan of Yacht & Beach Club, this may not matter. Or the upside might outweigh the downside of the construction. The above photos should pretty much speak for themselves, so you can judge accordingly and draw your own conclusions.

It’s unclear whether the rooms behind the scaffolding have been taken out of guest inventory, but I would hope so. The exterior work is incredibly impactful to those particular rooms, as it makes the balcony completely off limits and unusable. It’s unlikely that Disney is placing guests in the rooms behind the scaffolding, and would be disappointing if they are.

With that said, we had a Yacht Club a few years ago when we arrived in our room, and construction crews were actually on our balcony, which was out of commission. That was relatively brief, and perhaps was only occurring during what they thought was the housekeeping turnover period.

Construction equipment was parked outside and below our window for the duration of the stay and in use during daytime hours. The distinction between then and now is that there was no scaffolding outside our room; just cherry pickers that were lowered for most of our stay after that initial arrival.

If we were regular guests or planned on using our balcony, we probably would’ve gone down to the front desk and requested a different room. The impacted area of Yacht Club was fairly small and the crews were right there, so being relocated probably wouldn’t have been an issue. Even so, the work didn’t end up bothering us too much.

We’d recommend erring on the side of caution and placing a room request to be in a location away from the exterior construction at Yacht Club if you have a trip in 2026, or Beach Club between now and 2027. It may be unnecessary overkill since, again, we’d assume these rooms have been taken out of inventory. But it’s better to be safe than sorry.

This is a scenario where I’d make the room request prior to arrival, and then stop by the front desk before entering the room to confirm that the room assignment is away from the exterior refurbishment. Making change requests before entering the room is always a better safe than sorry best practice.

Another option is booking a stay over at BoardWalk as opposed to Yacht & Beach Club. Although BoardWalk has its own construction warning for now through late 2026, the work there is (currently) confined to a trio of locations. All we spotted on our most recent visit was the restaurants that are being replaced (see New Hurly-Burly Night Club, Restaurant & Retail Coming to BoardWalk in 2026!)

Ultimately, Yacht & Beach Club are far from the only resorts with major ongoing construction projects at Walt Disney World in 2026-2027, especially among the Deluxes, so you may not have much when it comes to accepting some degree of disruption. (For details about other ongoing work, check out our Walt Disney World Hotel Construction Tracker.)

There’s a lot of construction happening right now all around the Walt Disney World resorts. Every monorail loop resort has work ongoing, as do both of the lodges. If you’re looking to avoid any and all construction and want a Deluxe Resort, I’m not really sure where you even go. Saratoga? Old Key West? Those have their own downsides and are very dissimilar to Yacht & Beach Club.

Disney’s Riviera Resort is probably the most obvious alternative to Yacht & Beach Club, as there’s zero construction there. You also might just choose to tolerate this, especially since the Yacht Club side of the property is (fingers crossed) in the home stretch.

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Your Thoughts

What do you think of the exterior refurbishment at Yacht & Beach Resorts? Have you experienced construction impacts at either of these resorts in 2026? How impactful was the work on your stay? Gotten one of the new rooms at Yacht Club? Do you agree or disagree with our assessment? 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!