Iberostar renamed its entire brand line-up in the summer of 2024 — and most of what is written about it still hasn't caught up. The adults-only luxury tier is no longer Grand but JOIA; the old unprefixed hotels became Waves; and IHG, whatever you have read, didn't buy the company — though it now sells the stays and pays out points on them.
The other great Mallorcan family chain, and RIU's closest peer — though the two have pulled apart. What distinguishes Iberostar in 2026 is a clean three-tier ladder topped by a real luxury collection, an alliance that plugs the whole estate into a global loyalty program, and the most heavily marketed environmental program in mainstream all-inclusive travel, which is worth examining instead of repeating.
Scored across the beach-resort portfolio. The tier you book changes the experience more here than at most chains, because the ladder spans genuine budget-adjacent family product through to adults-only luxury.
The spread between tiers is the story. A Waves property and a JOIA property are barely the same holiday. Note one thing the brand does better than several rivals: unlimited specialty dinners are part of the standard all-inclusive plan, not a club upgrade — reservations are required, but there is no per-stay cap to buy your way out of.
Iberostar restructured its brand line-up in July 2024 and rolled the new names out over the following months. If you are reading anything that still says "Iberostar Grand," it predates the change.
| Tier | Positioning | Who it is for |
|---|---|---|
| JOIA by Iberostar | The luxury collection. Five-star, highly personalized service, signature dining, suites. | Couples and special occasions. Adults-only everywhere except JOIA Aruba, which takes children. |
| Iberostar Selection | Premium upper tier — style and elevated touches. | Mixed. Families and couples both. |
| Iberostar Waves | The core family tier, activity-driven. | Families and active couples. |
Grand became JOIA. Iberostar Grand Paraiso, Grand Rose Hall and Grand Bavaro are now JOIA Paraiso, JOIA Rose Hall and JOIA Bavaro, all adults-only. Waves is genuinely new and absorbed the previously unprefixed hotels — Iberostar Punta Cana became Iberostar Waves Punta Cana, Iberostar Cozumel became Iberostar Waves Cozumel, and so on across the portfolio. Selection survived unchanged, and is the one tier name a pre-2025 guide still gets right.
One thing that is not a tier: Iberostar Beachfront Resorts is the umbrella portfolio brand sitting above all three — and it is specifically the name licensed to IHG. It sits beside the tiers — not among them.
Grand isn't extinct everywhere. The tier was retired from the main portfolio, but Iberostar's Cuban estate — which sits outside the rebranded, IHG-licensed portfolio — still trades hotels under the Grand name. And JOIA is not universally adults-only: JOIA Aruba welcomes children, while every other JOIA is adults-only.
The second most misreported fact about the brand — and the correction matters because the thing it did change is useful.
IHG holds a thirty-year license to the Iberostar Beachfront Resorts brand, with renewal options, covering up to seventy resorts. Iberostar retains one hundred percent ownership — IHG didn't buy the company and didn't take an equity stake. The Fluxa family remains in control.
Distribution and loyalty. The resorts became bookable through IHG channels and participate in IHG One Rewards. That is a real benefit for anyone who collects that currency, and it is the closest thing Iberostar has to the World of Hyatt advantage that Secrets enjoys.
| Included | The detail that matters |
|---|---|
| Buffet and à la carte dining | Gourmet market buffets for all three meals plus specialty restaurants — commonly steakhouse, seafood, Japanese, Mexican and Italian. |
| All drinks, 24 hours | Domestic and international cocktails, beer, spirits and soft drinks, around the clock. |
| Room service — at select properties only | Round-the-clock menus, but explicitly only at some hotels. Not a brand-wide inclusion. |
| Sports and activities | Tennis, volleyball, archery, water polo, aerobics, non-motorized watersports including catamaran sailing and windsurfing, fitness club, billiards. |
| Entertainment | Nightly shows, live music, adult discotheques, teen programming, beach parties, plus daytime classes in cocktail-making, dance and crafts. |
| Star Camp kids club | Included — see the family section below. |
| Taxes, gratuities and service charges | Stated as included at property level, which is a meaningful contrast with much of the US-market competition. |
Free. Iberostar's own property pages list complimentary Wi-Fi throughout, so treat any third-party listing that shows internet as a paid line item as out of date.
Iberostar runs two exclusive-tier concepts that are frequently treated as the same product. They aren't — they are different products in different regions, and only one of them is still a club level.
Both are sold as "the exclusive bit" and both attach to a host resort, but Star Prestige is a room-and-zone product concentrated in Spain and the Canaries, while Iberostar Selection Coral is a separately branded hotel in the Caribbean. Different products, different regions, different booking paths.
What Coral genuinely adds over a standard Selection room is the private beach and concierge, the premium-spirits lounge and the beach butler — not the specialty dining, which is already unlimited on the standard plan.
| Not included | Notes |
|---|---|
| Spa treatments | Consistently excluded. Wet-area and thermal-circuit access varies by property — included at some, one visit per stay at others — so check the thermal circuit separately from the treatments. |
| Diving | The in-pool scuba demonstration is included; certified diving and open-water courses are charged. The PADI dive center is charged. |
| Motorized watersports | Non-motorized kit is in the rate; anything with an engine is not. |
| Golf | Charged. Iberostar lists golf as a paid extra; any complimentary rounds come from a specific retailer package, not the brand plan. |
| Premium minibar restocking | Daily restocking is standard; premium spirits and specialty items above the standard stock are charged. |
| Laundry and dry cleaning | Standard exclusion at every tier. |
| Premium à la carte experiences | The standard specialty restaurants are included and unlimited; chef's-table style dinners and private beach setups are separate paid experiences. |
| Premium branded spirits | A genuine tier sits above the standard pour and is sold as a club privilege. |
| Childcare below age four | Star Camp starts at four. Nursery care and babysitting for under-fours aren't addressed at all in the brand's published material. |
Also excluded, though not itemized in the brand's own material: airport transfers, excursions, medical services and phone calls. One oddity worth understanding: at several properties the included non-motorized water activities — catamaran sailing, kayaking, windsurfing — are metered at one hour per day. Tennis courts aren't.
The kids club is included in the stay at no separate fee — and its structure is unusually well defined for this segment.
| Camp | Ages |
|---|---|
| Monkey Camp | 4–7 |
| Dolphin Camp | 8–12 |
| Eagle Camp | 13–17 |
More than a hundred and forty age-specific activities span arts and crafts, storytelling, dance, nature exploration, culinary training, watersports and gaming — plus sustainability projects tied into the company's environmental program, including turtle-hatching assistance and science experiments. Staff are described as CPR- and special-needs-certified.
Operating hours aren't published, there is no stated provision for under-fours, and babysitting, nursery and extended care aren't addressed on the official page. All three are property-dependent and should be confirmed directly.
Iberostar markets harder on environmental credentials than any other brand here. There is real substance here, and there is also a gap between the historical reporting and the current consumer pages that is worth naming.
The strongest verifiable claim is the elimination of single-use plastics across all hotel operations, completed by the end of 2020 with a published definition of what counted. The responsible-seafood program is anchored to external standards, and the company publicly reported missing its own interim target — a credibility marker, not a failure.
Two 2025 targets — one hundred percent responsible seafood, and zero waste to landfill — have passed with no confirmation either way. The live site shows a percentage waste reduction, which isn't the same thing as zero-to-landfill, and suggests the goal wasn't fully met. And the carbon-neutral-by-2030 pledge is offset-led: a minimum of three-quarters of emissions are to be offset via nature-based solutions rather than eliminated. That is a noticeably different claim from net zero and worth stating plainly.
One caveat that matters if the program is part of why you are booking: the external bodies Iberostar cites are commitment platforms and benchmarking organizations — not auditors of its hotels. The program is substantive and better than the peer norm, but it is largely self-reported against externally defined standards, with no independent certification.
Around a hundred hotels across fourteen countries, split roughly between a Spain and Mediterranean business and an Americas business of comparable weight, with Spain the single largest market.
Iberostar moved into urban Miami Beach across two properties, the first opening in December 2024 and the second in January 2025, breaking the pure beachfront-resort pattern. The Mallorca and Fuerteventura projects the same year were refurbishments. In 2026 the brand enters Montenegro on the Adriatic and Zanzibar — its East Africa debut; any framing of Iberostar as Spain-plus-Caribbean is now out of date. Note also that JOIA Rose Hall in Jamaica is closed from June to November 2026 for full refurbishment — and two Mexican Waves properties are under renovation through the year.
Iberostar spans the widest range of any brand here, from value through to luxury — but its tiers are different hotels, not rungs inside one, which changes what the question even means.
| Sub-brand or tier | Where it sits |
|---|---|
| Iberostar Waves | Value to upper mainstream. The core family product. |
| Iberostar Selection | Upper mainstream. Premium-focused, and where the Coral properties and most Star Prestige zones sit. |
| JOIA by Iberostar | Premium to luxury. The luxury collection, adults-only apart from JOIA Aruba. |
| Iberostar Grand, Cuba only | Premium. Outside the rebranded portfolio and still trading under the old name. |
There is no upgrade ladder to price here, and that is a genuine difference in how the brand is built: Waves, Selection and JOIA are separate hotels in separate places — so you are choosing between properties instead of paying up within one. The two in-resort enclaves are a different matter. Star Prestige is sold as a flat per-person supplement, which means its proportional cost is inversely related to the room you are already in — substantial on a value room, modest on a suite — so a single percentage would misrepresent it in both directions. For Coral we could find no published differential at all.
No figures on this page are quoted by the brands. None of them publishes an official upgrade percentage, so every proportion here is derived from comparing published category rates across properties. Treat a step that buys a different room product — a suite instead of a room, a swim-up instead of a standard — as durable, because the scarcity behind it doesn't move. Treat a step sold as a flat per-night supplement as volatile: as a proportion it widens whenever the base rate falls, in a promotion or in low season, and compresses at peak. Because the tiers are separate hotels in separate places, the thing to price here is the destination itself.
You want a clear ladder and intend to book the right rung — JOIA for an adults-only luxury week, Selection for a premium family trip, Waves for value. You collect IHG points. Or you want the environmental program to be more than a towel card, in which case this is the most substantive one in the mainstream segment.
You want to eat à la carte every night without booking a week ahead — the dinners are unlimited, but the reservations aren't. You want the sport bundled in. Or you are traveling with a child under four and need care for them.
Waves is the volume family product and JOIA is a luxury price. Selection sits between them, takes both families and couples, and is where the Coral properties and most Star Prestige zones live — so it is the tier where an upgrade actually buys you something.
The specialty dining is already unlimited on the standard plan, so don't buy up for that. What Coral actually adds is the private beach and concierge, the premium-spirits lounge and the beach butler.
Montenegro and Zanzibar are new territory for the brand and for the segment.
Iberostar and RIU are the two Mallorcan giants and they split in exactly one place that matters for dinner, which makes that the comparison to read first.
Tell us which tier and destination you are weighing — and we will answer against the actual property.
It was retired from the main portfolio. Iberostar restructured its brand line-up in July 2024 and the Grand tier became JOIA by Iberostar — Grand Paraiso, Grand Rose Hall and Grand Bavaro are now JOIA Paraiso, JOIA Rose Hall and JOIA Bavaro. One exception: the Cuban estate sits outside that restructure and still uses the Grand name. If you find a cheap "Grand" rate on a third-party site, check which property it actually resolves to.
JOIA is the luxury collection — adults-only everywhere except JOIA Aruba — with signature dining and suites. Selection is the premium tier and takes both families and couples. Waves is the core family tier, activity-driven, and absorbed the previously unprefixed Iberostar hotels in 2024.
No. IHG holds a thirty-year license to the Iberostar Beachfront Resorts brand covering up to seventy resorts. Iberostar retains one hundred percent ownership and the founding family remains in control. What changed for guests is that the resorts are bookable through IHG channels and participate in IHG One Rewards. If you hold IHG status, book through IHG channels rather than Iberostar direct so the stay credits.
Yes. Iberostar's own property pages list unlimited specialty dinners inside the base all-inclusive plan, which is better than several rivals manage. The one thing that does bite is timing — the restaurants take reservations, and the popular ones go early in the day. Book the week's reservations on your first morning rather than day by day.
Yes. Star Camp runs Monkey Camp for ages four to seven, Dolphin Camp for eight to twelve and Eagle Camp for thirteen to seventeen, at no separate fee, with over a hundred and forty activities including sustainability projects. Nothing is published for children under four. Families with under-fours should confirm what is actually offered at their specific hotel before booking.
Yes. Iberostar's own property pages list complimentary Wi-Fi throughout the hotels; third-party listings that show internet as a paid item are out of date. Bandwidth varies by property, so don't plan on video calls from a beach lounger.
No independent hotel eco-certification appeared anywhere in the material we checked. The program is substantive — the elimination of single-use plastics across all operations is well documented, and the seafood program is anchored to external standards — but it is largely self-reported, and the carbon-neutral-by-2030 pledge is offset-led, not an elimination target.
