Koh Phangan is our favourite island. We have called it the best island in Thailand and our favourite place in the world, and we keep coming back to it. It also gets a really bad rap, and all of that comes from one party.
The Full Moon Party is one of the biggest parties in the world. The story goes that a group of guys threw a party for a mate on the full moon in 1988, did it again the next year, and it kept growing. It happens once a month on Haad Rin, at the bottom of the island. The rest of Koh Phangan is free of it.
When we first came, in October 2023, we booked a month in Ban Tai, close to the action. Almost 30 days in, we loved it so much that we booked to come back for four months the next year. This is what that first stretch and every visit since taught us.
Five things that caught us out
1We stayed at the party end first
Ban Tai was fun. There is lots to do there, with heaps around and some really cool gyms. But if you want the really beautiful beaches and a chill vibe, with yoga, fitness classes and the good cafes and restaurants, you want to be further north.
The north and the south feel like different islands. Chaloklum is the chilled fishing village on the north end, away from the party scene, and it has the best Sunday market on the island. Haad Yao and Haad Salad are the other two we tell people to stay near.
If the Full Moon is the point of your trip, do a couple of nights in Ban Tai, close enough that you are not paying a fortune for a taxi home or riding a scooter after drinking. Then head north.
2The party has rules nobody tells you
Book your accommodation and your ferries well ahead for the full moon, because both fill up and the rooms cost more. And do not stress about missing the night itself. From our experience the parties leading up to it are better, like the Jungle Party and the Waterfall Party, and there are parties on all month.
On the night, watch your stuff because there are pickpockets, and be careful with the buckets, which are made with local alcohol. Skip the fire rope too. It burns very badly when it hits you, and we have seen so many people with those injuries.
The most common injury on the island has nothing to do with the party itself. It is people riding their scooters home after drinking, falling off and scraping themselves up badly.
3Getting around is hard work without a scooter
Koh Phangan has no airport. You arrive by ferry at Thong Sala, about half an hour to an hour from Koh Samui or around four hours from Surat Thani, and in peak season it is packed when the boat comes in. We book our ferries online on 12Go, early, so we do not miss out.
From the pier, a shared taxi was the only real option when we filmed in January 2025, at 200 to 300 baht a person, and you will not get a private one. The easiest move is asking your accommodation to organise a car from the ferry.
There is no Grab here and taxis are hard to call, so the island is shocking if you do not drive. A scooter was 150 to 300 baht a day in January 2025, while a shared taxi late at night or in peak season could be 300 to 400 baht for a five to ten minute ride. Haggle.
It is about an hour from one end of the island to the other. One resort we stayed at on the north coast took us an hour and 20 minutes on the scooter, because the road makes you go all the way down and back around.
4The rain does not follow the rest of Thailand
The Gulf islands run on their own calendar. We came straight to Koh Phangan that first October, and at the tail end of the month it got really, really wet, so we went to Koh Kood, where it was dry.
The worst months here are October to December, and November is usually the worst of the lot. From May to September it is just patches of rain, and the rest of the day is sunny.
It can still surprise you. In late February 2025 we had never seen so much rain on the island, and that January heavy downpours had washed away a lot of Zen Beach. If you want good weather without the crowds, April is our pick.
5A small island gives you cabin fever
We first thought about living on Koh Phangan. In the end it was a bit too small for us. Stay too long and you get cabin fever, and the island is harder to travel to and from, with no airport and hospitals that are not as good.
For a trip, that does not matter at all. One to two weeks here is easy, and if we were just travelling and not living somewhere, Koh Phangan is the island we would pick.
The bits we would keep exactly the same
The training. Evolve is our favourite gym on the island, open air, with friendly members and staff, great equipment, Muay Thai, an ice bath and a sauna. It is quieter than the other big gym, which gets very busy in high season, and on a wet day nobody is there at all. Wild Wood Beach Fitness is the fun one, a gym right on the beach where all the equipment is made of wood, like training with the Flintstones. We spent a fair bit of time there early on, training and working from the laptop.
The cafes. Of all the Thai islands, Koh Phangan has the best cafes. A coffee at a beautiful cafe cost us 100 baht in January 2025, around 4 Australian dollars, when the same coffee in Melbourne was 7 or 8. Because we work as we travel, a lot of our days started at co-working cafes with a pool and a view.
The sunset. Top Rock Bar is our favourite bar on the island and the best sunset spot in Thailand for us. It is family run, the food is simple, and it is a fair trek up, about a five out of ten fitness level for the stairs. We took the family up there and they loved it.
The food. KikeKla does the best beef massaman of our entire lives, and the pad Thai rice paper rolls are to die for. Next door, L'Alcove is the French restaurant someone we met at the gym sent us to when we first arrived. Huge meals, dancers at night, and they organised the best cake for Tijs's 30th. On a budget, stop anywhere for a pad Thai or a curry, then go to the Chaloklum Sunday market, where everyone eats on the pier.
The massage. Chaloklum Massage made our top three massages from twelve months in Thailand, out of hundreds. All the ladies there are incredible.
So, is Koh Phangan worth it?
For us it is the best island in Thailand, and it is underrated because of one beach and one night a month. Go north, hire a scooter if you can ride, avoid October to December, and give it a week or two.
If you only do one thing, make it Bottle Beach on the north east side, our favourite beach on the island. Hike to the viewpoint, walk down for 40 minutes to an hour, swim and have a coconut, and organise a longtail boat earlier in the day to take you back.
Abbey & Tijs