#4 in Top 20 Bali for A Wellness Retreat · ★★★★★
Amandari
The original Balinese-village Aman, above the Ayung River gorge near Ubud, where wellness comes from place and ritual.
The original Balinese-village Aman, above the Ayung River gorge near Ubud, where wellness comes from place and ritual.
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Scored on our six-point framework, weighted for a wellness stay. See our methodology.
Because it restores you through place and ritual rather than a clinical programme. Amandari does not run multi-day medical protocols or a fixed programme, yet it delivers much of the same result by different means. The property was designed as a traditional Balinese village on the rim of the Ayung River gorge, so the recovery begins with the architecture: low thatched pavilions, garden courtyards, the hush of the grounds at dawn, and an emerald swimming pool that follows the shape of the rice paddies below. Layered on top are the parts that make it a genuine wellness base, an open-air spa, daily yoga, a resident spiritual healer and Balinese healing rituals drawn from the surrounding village. Couples and solo travellers who find the structured, results-driven model too clinical tend to book Amandari and leave just as rested.
Its wellness identity is inseparable from its sense of place. Amandari sits inside Kedewatan, a working Balinese village near Ubud, and the resort was built to belong there rather than to sit apart from it. Villagers still cross the grounds carrying offerings to a shrine below the property, children learn traditional dance in the Lotus Pond Pavilion, and the Aman service standard runs quietly underneath all of it. For a wellness stay, that cultural depth matters: the calm here feels rooted rather than manufactured, which is a large part of why it holds #4 on our list.
Ask for a Valley Pavilion for the view, or an Asmara Pool Villa if you want a private plunge pool as well. Amandari's rooms are free-standing pavilions and villas rather than corridor hotel rooms, each with alang-alang thatch, coconut and teak wood and an outdoor bathroom or garden courtyard. The Valley Pavilion, at 250 square metres, sits in an elevated position with a direct outlook over the resort's rice terraces and valley, which is the single view most worth prioritising for a restful stay. If a private pool is part of your idea of wellness, step up to an Asmara Pool Villa, with jungle and rice-paddy views, or an Ayung Pool Villa on the river-valley edge.
Whatever the category, the outdoor bathing and the quiet are the point, so plan your days around a long soak and an early night rather than packed itineraries. Because the view-facing and pool categories are limited and sell out first, our editor recommends booking around twelve weeks ahead for high season, when the best suites disappear months rather than weeks in advance.
Walk down the rice-paddy path toward the Ayung at first light, before the day warms; the trail leaves from the edge of the property and drops to a quiet river bend. Ask the resort to arrange a Melukat water-blessing ceremony at Tirta Empul temple for the middle of your stay, and keep one evening free for the spa rather than a dinner out.
Amandari's setting is its defining feature: it stands on the verdant lip of the Ayung River gorge at Kedewatan, a short drive from central Ubud. Peter Muller, the architect, first imagined a Bali-village-style resort here in 1970 and spent nearly two decades finding a partner who shared the idea. He completed the design in eight days, and the resort opened in 1989 as the second Aman, after Amanpuri in Phuket. It was the first resort to translate the layout of a Balinese village into hospitality, and it has been copied across the island ever since.
The details carry that origin story. Free-standing pavilions are reached along winding stone pathways, split gateways and courtyard walls echo village compounds, and the emerald-tiled swimming pool, curved to mirror the rice paddies, was the first infinity pool built in Bali. The resort rests 129 steps above a moss-covered stone tiger that guards a 7th-century Hindu shrine, and its open reception roof still frames village processions. Central Ubud, with its galleries, markets and temples, is close enough for an afternoon and far enough to leave the calm intact.
Amandari's wellness offering is soft and ritual-led rather than clinical. At its centre is an open-air spa set among the gardens, where treatments lean on traditional Balinese techniques and local healing ingredients rather than a fixed medical protocol. The resort takes a holistic approach that includes a resident spiritual healer, and it can arrange therapies aimed at harmonising body and mind alongside the everyday rhythms of a village day.
Around the spa sits the programming that makes a multi-day wellness stay work: daily yoga in an open-air pavilion, a steam room and sauna, and Balinese practices that double as restoration, from the Melukat water-blessing ceremony to dance and rindik music sessions with children from Kedewatan. Guests looking for a structured, clinical retreat with diagnostics and set programmes will find this deliberately loose; guests who want to rest through movement, ritual and place will find it complete. It is wellness as immersion rather than prescription.
Dining is centred on Indonesian and Balinese cooking that draws on the island's seasonal produce. The main venue, called simply The Restaurant, serves Indonesian and Western dishes with a valley outlook, while the Terrace Bar handles lighter meals and drinks above the gorge. The kitchen leans local, which suits a wellness stay, and the resort can tailor lighter or plant-forward meals on request.
Meals here are unhurried and tied to the setting rather than to a roster of separate restaurants, in keeping with the resort's small scale. Traditional afternoon tea is included daily, and private dining can be arranged in the gardens or by the Lotus Pond for a quieter evening.
Amandari is a soft-wellness resort, not a clinical retreat, and its strengths come with real trade-offs. Consider whether the following would bother you before booking.
Our counter-recommendation: if you want a larger riverside spa resort, the Four Seasons Resort Bali at Sayan or Mandapa, a Ritz-Carlton Reserve are the picks, both minutes away on the same Ayung River. Choose Amandari when cultural immersion and architectural soul are the whole point.
Within our Top 20 Hotels in Bali for a Wellness Retreat it ranks #4 with an aggregate editorial score of 9.8 out of 10. It leads on cultural immersion and architectural character; the Ubud hotels ranked above it lead on spa scale and riverside drama. For the full field, see the Bali wellness ranking.
| Hotel | Best for | Trade-off |
|---|---|---|
| Amandari | Village architecture and cultural immersion above the Ayung gorge | Soft wellness, not clinical; older property; premium rates |
| Four Seasons Resort Bali at Sayan | Riverside spa resort with a dramatic lotus-pond arrival | Larger and more resort-scaled than Amandari |
| Mandapa, a Ritz-Carlton Reserve | Butler-serviced riverside villas with a full spa and programming | More structured and polished, less village-like |
| Capella Ubud, Bali | Tented luxury with a strong design and spa focus | Safari-tent format on steep terrain, no rice-paddy village feel |
Because it restores you through place and ritual rather than a clinical programme. Set above the Ayung gorge at Kedewatan near Ubud, Amandari has an open-air spa, daily yoga, a resident spiritual healer and Balinese healing rituals such as the Melukat water blessing. It suits guests who want to unwind through architecture, movement and culture rather than a structured medical protocol.
Amandari opened in 1989 as the second Aman resort, after Amanpuri in Phuket in 1988. Architect Peter Muller designed it as a traditional Balinese village, with alang-alang thatched pavilions, coconut-wood pillars and an emerald swimming pool shaped like the surrounding rice paddies, which was the first infinity pool built in Bali.
For the view, request a Valley Pavilion, which looks over the resort's rice terraces and valley. For a private pool as well, step up to an Asmara Pool Villa or an Ayung Pool Villa, which add a plunge pool with jungle and river-valley outlooks. Book the view-facing and pool categories early, as they sell out first.
Amandari is in Kedewatan village, just outside Ubud in Bali, on the edge of the Ayung River gorge. It is about a 90-minute drive north of Ngurah Rai International Airport (DPS) in Denpasar, and a short drive from central Ubud's galleries, markets and temples.
A ranked shortlist, a special offer worth booking, and the overpriced stay to skip. Straight from the editors.