Hilton Tokyo Bay Review

Hilton Tokyo Bay is Tokyo Disney Resort “Official Hotel,” meaning that it’s an on-property hotel. This Hilton is located within a few hundred yards of the monorail. Tokyo Disneyland, Tokyo DisneySea, and the ocean are all within view of the Hilton Tokyo Bay, meaning that just about every guest room has a great view. Hilton Tokyo Bay is a less-expensive alternative to the Disney-branded hotels at Tokyo Disney Resort: Hotel MiraCosta, Tokyo Disneyland Hotel, and Disney’s Ambassador Hotel.

This was the first hotel at which we stayed on Tokyo Disney Resort property, and it remains one of our favorites. Originally, we based our decision to stay here on hours of research and combing various trip reports and other locations for information. After our first night in downtown Tokyo, where our room was the size of a large closet, I was prepared for the worst with the Hilton Tokyo Bay, at least in terms of room size.

I was pleasantly surprised when we opened the door and found a room that was more spacious than a typical hotel room. Definitely larger than even any standard Deluxe tier room at a Walt Disney World resort hotel. We were upgraded at check-in to the Celebrio Select rooms, which was a room with modern, retro-futuristic stylization.

There are other categories of rooms, including a “Happy Magic” category, which is themed to a fairytale forest to appeal to kids. For this review, we’ll take a look at the Celebrio rooms…

These rooms were designed by acclaimed Tokyo interior designer Asao Nakayama of the W Design International (ironically, known as “WDI” in Japan), and debuted a couple of years ago. The rooms had a predominantly white look, with aqua and black accents to give it a very clean and crisp aesthetic.

The rooms also have a lot of curved lines and colored lighting that guests can control to help change the mood. Just about everything lit up, from the headboard of the bed, to the underside of ledges, to edge accents throughout the room. If you look closely at the reflection in the mirror of the bathroom photo below, you’ll notice some of this mood lighting in the shower.

As someone who is impressed by bright objects, I thought these were awesome touches, and were my favorite aspects of the room. In seriousness, though, I really do like dynamic lighting like this and also Googie/futurist architecture and design, so I definitely have a bias towards this style of room. I’m not sure whether this review would be quite so glowing if we stayed in a standard room.

The beds were incredibly nice, with high quality bedding and great pillows. There were docks for iPhones (including the iPhone 5) that enable music to be played throughout the room, even in the shower. Televisions were flat, LCD displays, that featured a number of all-Japanese stations, including Tokyo Disney Resort TV (again, only in Japanese…but if you go, this station is a must-watch for its humorous Duffy segments).

The room also included a fridge, magazines, and other amenities. The toilet was a standard Japanese “smart toilet,” complete with heated seat and numerous other “features” that I won’t delve into! 😉 Overall, it was a very nice room.

Sarah was most impressed by the view of the ocean and Mt. Fuji in the distance, and she spent a lot of time on that aqua chair in the corner of the room in the distance.

Rooms across the have have views of Cinderella Castle that are better the best room at Disney’s Contemporary Resort would have. While I liked our ocean view, I would have preferred the Castle view! Based on orientation and layout, I assume most rooms have either Cinderella Castle/Mount Prometheus views or ocean views, but I could be wrong on that.

As was the case with everywhere we stayed in Japan, the staff at the Hilton Tokyo Bay was great. I had several late nights and early mornings, and I was always greeted by someone each time I left or arrived who was eager to find out if I needed any assistance or anything for the room.

The hotel also had a coffee shop and restaurant where breakfast was served (this was included, although we never ate here). Likewise, the hotel had numerous other amenities we did not use, such as a pool and conference rooms. You can read about those amenities on its website. In addition to monorail transportation to the parks, there were also official Disney buses that provided transportation from the hotel (the monorail was more convenient to get to the parks).

Bringing the comparison back to Walt Disney World, I’d rate this room above anything we’ve experienced at Walt Disney World, and we’ve stayed at just about every hotel there. Obviously, this room lacks any Disney motifs, so if that kind of thing is important to you, one of the three hotels mentioned above is a better option.

However, it does has its own very distinct theme, as mentioned here, and it almost reminded me of something Stanley Kubrick might dream up for a set in one of his films. The room screamed ‘modern Tokyo’ to me, and I thought the design was very fun.

Given the size and quality of its rooms, plus the location of the Hilton Tokyo Bay on the monorail loop, I think its fair to compare this hotel to a Walt Disney World Deluxe hotel. The biggest difference besides the lack of Disney branding is the lack of Disney pricing. We paid about $150/night, which is around half of what we typically pay at a Walt Disney World Deluxe resort-hotel. This is the big reason why we’ve said that a Tokyo Disney Resort trip might not be more expensive than a Walt Disney World vacation if you’re used to staying in Deluxe resorts (while the airfare will be more, this cheaper room might compensate for that).

We have noticed that prices for these rooms fluctuates substantially. The day before we booked our stay, prices on every booking site (including Hilton.com) were around $150/night. (Update: we’ve since stayed at Hilton Tokyo Bay many times, and consider a good price to be under $160/night.)

If you can’t find a good price at Hilton Tokyo Bay, there are several other “official” hotels in the area (we recommend one of these hotels, not a hotel in downtown Tokyo, as the commute will be around 45 minutes, and you definitely want to be at the parks before rope drop).

Overall, I don’t think I can praise Hilton Tokyo Bay enough. When we initially booked, I was disappointed that Hotel MiraCosta was out of our price range, but after staying in this room and then seeing the smaller rooms of the MiraCosta, that disappointed faded. Price not being an issue I’d still stay at Hotel MiraCosta just because the whole thing is so ornate and distinctly Disney, but the Hilton Tokyo Bay was certainly nothing like any non-Disney hotel you can imagine in the United States. Only the Swan and Dolphin at Walt Disney World are even close to comparable. Those of you used to staying at Good Neighbor hotels at Disneyland will definitely be pleasantly surprised by the Hilton Tokyo Bay!

If you’re thinking of visiting Japan for the first time and are overwhelmed with planning, definitely check out our Tokyo Disney Resort Planning Guide. It covers much more than the parks, from getting there to WiFi to currency and much, much more. For more photos and an idea of what we did day-by-day during our first visit, read our Tokyo Disney Resort Trip Report.

Your Thoughts…

If you have stayed at the Hilton Tokyo Bay or any hotel at Tokyo Disney Resort, we’d love to hear about your experience with your hotel (including your room category)! Do you plan on staying at Hilton Tokyo Bay? Have any additional questions? Hearing from you is half the fun, so please share in the comments!