Lamai

Lamai is the island’s second beach, about fifteen minutes south of Chaweng down the east coast. It has most of what Chaweng has, in smaller quantities and at lower prices.

What makes it unusual is the spread. Our Lamai listings run from ฿1,098 a night at Phannarai House to ฿18,557 at Banyan Tree Samui, and by their coordinates those two sit under three kilometres apart. Both the cheapest and the most expensive property we list on Samui are on this one beach, while Chaweng’s entire range fits inside ฿2,485 to ฿5,100. Lamai is not the budget beach, it is the beach where the budget decision is actually yours.

It also holds both of the perfect sub-scores we have recorded on Samui: Phannarai’s 10 for staff, and Banyan Tree’s 10 for wifi.

The location scores are the genuinely odd thing here, and we would rather flag it than smooth it over. The three properties sitting directly on the sand score 8.1 (Thai Fight), 8.4 (Three Trees) and 8.5 (Rocky’s). The guesthouse up the hill scores 9.7, and the resort out on the headland scores 9.4. Beluga, on the beachfront, scores 9.2 and breaks the pattern again.

We do not have a confident explanation. The most likely reading is that guests rate location against what they were expecting, and a hillside guesthouse at ฿1,098 is not expected to be walkable to anything, while a beachfront resort at ฿5,736 is. Treat the beachfront numbers as a comment on Lamai’s quietness rather than on the properties.

For what it is worth, the practical advice does not change: you will want transport for anything beyond your own stretch of beach, wherever on Lamai you end up.