Ikos holidays are not cheap. They consistently price higher than most other all inclusive resorts, but they stand head and shoulders above the competition in terms of what’s included, the quality of the food, drinks and service. Whilst Ikos has a cult following, it can sometimes require a leap of faith to extend to that higher price point. That’s not to say there aren’t ways to save money.

Find Your Perfect Holiday

Most properties have a room type to meet your needs, whether it’s a standard room for a couple, a junior suite or a multi-bedroom suite or villa for families. There’s also usually inland or sea view rooms and then the Deluxe Collection, a range of suites which come with additional benefits and amenities; but more on that later.

With a bit of research, you can determine the room categories available at each hotel. Promo doubles are your lead-in rooms all the way up to Deluxe three bedroom  villas with private pools. Olivia and Dassia seem to have the most promo room types, although you’ll often find Oceania the cheapest property overall. 

Once you know which room type you need or would be happy with, do a normal search in the Ikos website and you can view the dates that room type is actually available on the “check room availability on alternative dates” link under the description of each hotel. Pink is sold out on the calendar. 

Let’s say we’re looking for a 7 night stay from 2 September. In this example, by using the availability calendar, I can see that the promo double room isn’t available on 8 September. By either moving my trip forward a day, to 1 September or taking off the night of 8 September, I can now book a promo room and save over £2000! 

Really helpfully, the Ikos website also publishes a price calendar for each room type so it’s easy to see the specific date for when rates increase or decrease. See how the rate drops from 18 September? You can then see if moving the dates of your trip by a few days could save you money.

Book Ahead

Ikos resorts are extremely popular and will usually be fully booked months in advance, especially during school holidays.

Rooms generally go on sale up to 18 months in advance and the promo rooms get snapped up quickly. Because of the high proportion of suites, if you’re a late booker, it’ll only be the most expensive suites left available when you come to book. 

Ikos will usually have discounts up to 15% (and 35% or even 65% for some of the biggest suites) for early booking, reducing to 10% and then no discount at all so it pays to be organised for an Ikos holiday.

Shop Around

For each of my Ikos trips, I’ve booked a different way each time. In my experience, there’s no hard and fast rule over who will be the cheapest to book through so do shop around and compare prices.

One benefit of booking hotel and flights separately is the flexibility over the number of nights, this is especially useful if you’re happy to mix airlines. Some airlines only fly certain days of the week but a 6 night trip flying outbound with Jet2 and back with EasyJet could be quite a lot cheaper than a 7 night break with Jet2 flights both ways. This is where using the room and rate calendars come in to their own. Note that Ikos have a minimum 5 nights stay requirement.

Hotel booking sites and the hotel directly will usually offer a broader range of room types over some of the main tour operators such as BA Holidays, Tui or Jet2holidays who might only contract certain room types. This is where you’ll often start to see savings. You’ll need to pay a 20% deposit if booking directly with Ikos or maybe the full amount with some hotel booking sites. Only ever pay this with a credit card for Section 75 financial protection (your card issuer or bank may charge a foreign exchange fee). Bookings direct with the hotel get free airport transfers so remember to factor that cost/saving in to your calculations. If you have found a room cheaper via a booking site, it’s always worth asking the hotel to match it – they’ll be saving on commission so a direct booking could work in their favour too.

If you’re not confident, too busy or just don’t want to book it yourself, a good travel agent will be able to put a package together for you or you might find that a package holiday offers the best price anyway. Jet2holidays categorises Ikos resorts as part of their Indulgent Escapes program which includes additional benefits such as private transfers, extra baggage allowance and complimentary drinks during the flight. If you’re not bothered about those things; you might find Tui cheaper although Tui does include some Ikos resorts in their A La Carte program. 

Join the cult

If you book direct with Ikos, after your stay, you’ll be emailed a discount code for 10% off a future booking. Best of all, the code stacks with early booking discounts so you can double dip on your next booking. The code should pop in to your inbox within a few days of checking out and it’ll be near impossible to resist having a sneak peek at what it would cost to go back!

When asking a question on a Facebook group about how the returners discount works, one reply was that it sounded “like a cult that I definitely want to join” and I thought that was just wonderful!

Is Ikos Deluxe worth it?

It’s hard to save money when considering a splurge on upgrading to Deluxe, but whether Deluxe is worth the cost is a question often asked on forums so I wanted to try and add some perspective. Regardless of the cost, I think it’s important to look at value for money. This assessment is, obviously, subjective and is my personal opinion based on my own experience of Deluxe at Oceania.

The Deluxe Collection are a range of suites which have access to an exclusive area at each of the hotels which has its own pool and bar, plus a section on the beach with double bed cabanas. In addition, you’ll get an Ikos branded beach bag, larger toiletries (100ml vs 50ml bottles), a bottle of chilled Tattinger in your suite on arrival, enhanced room service menu, premium spirits and exclusive cocktails plus more. Deluxe guests also get use of a higher spec Tesla and are able to prebook restaurants for every night of their stay, rather than being limited to 3 nights per week (non-Deluxe guests can book restaurants for the rest of their stay during check-in), as well as candle lit dinner on the beach (just check the weather!). One of the nicest benefits is the included neck and shoulder massage to start a relaxing holiday, although you’ll probably find that this leads to spending more money in the spa!

Whether Deluxe is worth it, is subjective. For our stay at Oceania, we paid €250 extra for Deluxe and were completely happy with that. If you break this down in to hard value, you’re looking at; 

Tattinger = €40

2 neck and shoulder massages = €100

Enhanced toiletries (which I of course brought home!) = €40

Beach bag = €20

Olive oil farewell gift = €10

Total = €210

We didn’t often order the premium spirits but still feel we got value from the upgrade supplement. The additional and exclusive areas of the hotel also carry value but will be subjective and are harder to put a set figure on. 

If you’re booking a suite anyway and the supplement for Deluxe is less than about €400 for a 7 night stay, I’d suggest it’s worth it, but it is down to how much value you put on the additional amenities. The hard value is obviously eroded on longer stays as most benefits are only available once per stay. This is my own, personal opinion.

If you’re not booking a suite and are happy with a “standard” room, save your money for another holiday or add an extra week! The jump in price from a standard room, to a suite to a Deluxe suite can sometimes be a bit much! Standard rooms at Ikos resorts are still wonderful and you’ll be perfectly happy with it, I’m sure. 

Make sure to have a read of my own experience at Olivia and feel free to ask any questions about Dassia, which I have stayed at but didn’t write a review of at the time.