Corinthia Palace

I had a very pleasant experience at this hotel. When I arrived, I encountered a few issues, but the duty manager immediately stepped in and resolved everything extremely quickly and professionally. I was genuinely impressed by how promptly she handled the situation and how efficiently the entire team mobilised to make sure everything was taken care of. This made a very positive impression on me. The hotel is exceptionally clean, and the cleanliness throughout the entire property is outstanding. You can really see the attention to detail and the high standards maintained throughout the hotel. I also tried the café inside the hotel and really enjoyed it. I ordered the pancakes, which were absolutely delicious. I also had dinner at the restaurant, where I was recommended the dish of the day oven-baked fish. I honestly cannot remember the last time I had fish cooked so perfectly. It was absolutely exceptional, and I was extremely impressed with the quality of the food and the overall dining experience. Breakfast was good, although I believe there is still some room for improvement. For a hotel of this category, I would add and change a few things, as some elements that I would expect from a truly complete breakfast were missing. Overall, I was extremely impressed with the hotel, especially with the exceptional cleanliness, the quality of the food and, above all, the professionalism and responsiveness of the staff. The way my initial issues were handled so quickly made a very positive difference to my stay. With a few improvements to the breakfast selection, the experience could be truly outstanding.

Our stay at the Corinthia was due to a last minute issue with our original hotel booking, and are we glad we had that issue! The Corinthia hotel has made our holiday in Malta, when out and about exploring it is the perfect relaxing and peaceful place to return to. From first walking into reception and being greeted with a refreshing drink, to the efficiency of check in and being shown to our room, we knew we had made a fantastic choice. The hotel has an old colonial feel to it but with a modern twist. We found every member of staff to be friendly and helpful. The rooms are spacious and beautifully decorated, the bed is probably the most comfortable we have ever slept in - including ours at home! The extra touches they provide during turn down (I won’t spoil the sunrise) make it feel even more special. Although the hotel is outside the main tourist area, taxis (especially Bolt) are so reasonable it does not pose an issue and indeed provides the tranquility needed outside the hustle and bustle of Valetta and Silema The pool is a relaxing and tranquil oasis - we never had an issue getting a bed even when returning from a morning of exploring - although the ‘best beds’ that have the majority of the sun all day are claimed very early and always seemed to be taken by the same people. Coming down at dead on 9am when the pool supposedly opens, to see people already having claimed the prime beds did make me question how! Maybe I should have broken the “rules” and come down before 9 - that said it did not pose us an issue just something we observed! The service and food around the pool was generally good, we only waited a longer than acceptable period for a drink once and this appeared to be due to a change in staff and our order was not placed, this was rectified and the member of staff serving apologised profusely. The pool temperature was perfect, cooling in the 40+ degree heat but not so cold you couldn’t get straight in, spent lots of time chilling in the pools to keep cool. We would highly recommend eating at the hotel both for breakfast and for dinner. We found both the food and service to be excellent. We had the privilege of meeting Francesco Mazzei, the chef associated with the restaurants - what a lovely gentleman he was, taking time to chat to us and as a big fan it made my husband’s evening. The reception area is also the lounge area with a small coffee bar - it was always lovely waking through to hear the chatter you get in a coffee shop and made the area feel warm and welcoming, rather than a thoroughfare to other areas. The hotel was spotlessly clean and all areas including the pool were well maintained. Housekeeping was amazing, our room was tidied and cleaned every day with fresh towels provided and bedding changed upon request (you just please the request card on the bed). Due to how hot it was during our week stay it was nice to have fresh bedding half way through our stay. Speaking to guests who have been returning for the past 10 years, you can certainly see why. I can’t recommend this hotel enough - we wouldn’t consider staying anywhere else when we return to Malta!

Calling the Corinthia a five-star hotel requires, in my view, a rather generous interpretation of what “five-star” hospitality is supposed to mean.

The frustrating part is that the property itself has charm. It is an attractive older building, with some genuinely elegant architectural features, and one can easily imagine how impressive it could be if properly maintained and managed. Unfortunately, during our stay that potential was largely buried beneath tired interiors, poor maintenance, inconsistent accommodation, disappointing food and a standard of service that felt much closer to a busy mass-market resort than to a luxury hotel.

The problems started immediately on arrival. There was nobody at the entrance to welcome guests or assist with luggage, and reception appeared understaffed, with one member of staff dealing with several arrivals. Once checked in, we were actually asked whether we required help with our luggage or whether we could take it to the room ourselves.

Hardly the arrival experience one expects from a five-star property.

We were then enthusiastically told that we had been allocated a “beautiful room”. That description became almost comical once we opened the door.

The room was frankly unacceptable for a hotel of this supposed category: heavily stained carpeting, badly chipped and deteriorated door frames, scratched doors, marked walls, damaged woodwork, worn fittings and an overall state of repair that suggested a very long absence of meaningful refurbishment. There were also areas of staining suggestive of moisture or damp.

The photographs speak for themselves.

And this is important: the problem was not that the room was “traditional”, nor that we personally disliked the décor. Traditional does not mean neglected. Classic does not mean damaged. This was a maintenance issue.

After complaining, we were moved to another floor where the accommodation was noticeably newer and considerably better maintained. Rather ironically, that only made the original allocation more difficult to understand. Apparently, very different standards of room coexist within the same hotel, and guests may only discover the difference once they complain.

Then came breakfast.

This was perhaps the clearest illustration of the gap between the image the hotel wishes to project and the actual experience being delivered.

The hot buffet consisted largely of the standard mass-catering selection of bacon, sausages, baked beans, tomatoes, mushrooms and hash browns served from large chafing dishes. The serving area itself was not particularly well presented, with spills and food residue visible around the dishes and utensils.

The cold-cut section was almost unintentionally theatrical. A meat slicer is prominently displayed, seemingly suggesting freshly sliced, premium produce. The effect becomes rather less convincing when the actual cold meats appear highly industrialised and pre-prepared, placed onto serving dishes with very little attention to presentation. We asked staff about the provenance of some of the products and obtaining a clear answer proved surprisingly difficult.

We also personally observed bakery items being removed from commercial packaging before being presented on the buffet. There is absolutely nothing wrong with commercially produced food in itself. There is, however, something rather odd about dressing an essentially mass-catering breakfast up as a luxury five-star experience.

And then comes perhaps the most absurd detail.

Even when breakfast is included, the hotel charges an additional €5 per dish for options such as French toast, Eggs Benedict, Eggs Royale and smashed avocado on toast, and €7 extra for a Maltese egg speciality.

In other words, after already paying for breakfast as part of a stay in a supposed five-star hotel, you are invited to pay again if you would like the sort of cooked-to-order breakfast one might reasonably have assumed would already be included at this level.

The irony is difficult to miss.

Unfortunately, service did little to compensate.

There was plenty of surface-level attentiveness: smiles, polite phrases and the appearance of being helpful. What was much less evident was the training, anticipation, discretion and quiet professionalism that separate genuine luxury hospitality from simply being pleasant.

At breakfast in particular, staff conversations were frequently loud and clearly audible across the room. Tables were cleared and reset in a hurried and rather noisy manner, and the operation often appeared reactive and poorly coordinated rather than polished.

I appreciate that recruiting and retaining experienced hospitality staff is difficult nowadays, and many employees were clearly working hard. But ultimately that is a management issue, not something that should be passed on to the guest. If a hotel chooses to market and price itself as five-star, it also accepts responsibility for recruiting, training and supervising staff to that standard.

Being friendly is not the same as being well trained, and apparent attentiveness is not a substitute for professional service.

The pool area provided another example of the same approach.

It was extremely crowded, partly because access is also available to non-residents. There is nothing inherently wrong with selling access to external guests, but it inevitably reduces the privacy and exclusivity of the facilities for people actually staying at the hotel.

The atmosphere was consequently busy and frequently noisy rather than particularly relaxing.

More importantly, the infrastructure does not appear adequate for the number of people using the area. There were simply not enough parasols for the number of loungers, meaning guests had to compete for shaded spaces in the Maltese summer sun.

The difference between the hotel’s polished promotional images and the reality was also noticeable. The pool is presented online as an elegant, luxurious environment; in reality we found fairly ordinary and visibly used loungers positioned relatively closely together, considerable crowding and insufficient shade.

It creates the unfortunate impression that maximising capacity and monetising the facilities has been prioritised over preserving the comfort and exclusivity of the resident guest experience.

Commercialising hotel facilities is perfectly legitimate. Doing so to the point where the experience of paying hotel residents is diluted is rather harder to reconcile with five-star luxury.

And that really sums up our stay.

There is nothing wrong with being a large, busy, mass-market resort. There is nothing inherently wrong with a standard buffet, casual service, external pool guests or supplementary charges for certain dishes.

What is difficult to understand is combining all of those things, together with poorly maintained rooms and inconsistent service standards, and then presenting the resulting product as five-star luxury.

The Corinthia has a beautiful shell and considerable potential. With serious refurbishment, stronger management, proper staff training, better maintenance and more attention to guest comfort rather than simply capacity, it could probably be a very good hotel.

At present, however, the five stars seem considerably more evident in the branding and pricing than in the rooms, breakfast, pool or service.

A deeply disappointing experience, and an extraordinary mismatch between what is being sold and what is actually delivered.