Image courtesy of Waterbom Bali

If you’re heading to Bali with kids, you’ve probably already heard about Waterbom Bali.

Waterbom is a vibrant, fun-filled water park located in the bustling tourist hub of Kuta. While it’s aimed primarily at families, anyone can have a good time here. Waterbom Bali’s rides range from a toddler splash park (with height limits pleasantly enforced by Waterbom’s friendly staff) to high octane vertical slides for teens and adults. There are also tube slides that can be used by up to four people at a time, a large seated courtyard for eating (with plenty of Western food options for fussy eaters), and luxurious cabanas available to rent. Not to mention the massages, manicures and Bali-braids. It’s the ultimate addition to your Bali itinerary.

A friend – who we’re fairly sure is an actual adult person – told us that he had “the best day of his life” at Waterbom, and this is what prompted our visit. While I’m not sure my enthusiasm is quite up to his level, I’ll put it this way – next time I go back to Bali (and probably every time after that), you can find me at Waterbom. Sure, we have places like this in Australia too, but here they don’t run as smoothly and they’re definitely not as affordable.

To ensure you get the best adventure experience at Waterbom Bali, we’ve put together a complete guide to visiting, from ticket prices to photography, to tips for what to bring, what to wear, and what to pay for. Read on and if you have any questions, leave a comment below and we’ll get back to you within a couple of days.

Table of contents

Where should I buy my Waterbom Bali tickets?

While some blog posts and people posting in online forums recommend buying at the gate for the best Waterbom ticket price, we found significantly cheaper prices by shopping around online and booking a few weeks in advance. Klook is a reputable online travel agent which, at the time we booked, had the cheapest Waterbom Family Pass. Group buying websites like Groupon do offer Waterbom Bali discount tickets from time to time, so make sure you include them in your research.

Premier packages are available that include things like photos and massages. While these might seem like a good idea, most online reviews advise steering clear of them because of variables out of your control – you might find you don’t get a lot of photos taken, or there are no massage or manicure appointments available at a good time for you.

Passouts are available with all tickets, and we advise taking advantage of those. A full day at Waterbom can be taxing, so taking a break for a bit and coming back is a great idea. Leaving for an hour or two also broadens your lunch options.

When’s the best time to visit Waterbom?

While the line management and cash-free system work wonders for keeping lines at a minimum, Waterbom still gets extremely busy, especially in the middle of the day. This is where the pass outs can come in handy. Land yourself at Waterbom early in the day, as soon as it opens, and take advantage of the cooler, quieter time and day. Get a pass out for lunch and a wander around Kuta’s shops, then come back in the afternoon when lines have died down again.

Try and avoid Australian school holidays – the number of families with kids in Kuta increases exponentially over those weeks, and Waterbom is hugely popular with Australian families.

Waterbom Bali water park - Bali - Indonesia

So how does it all work once we’re in?

Waterbom works on a completely cashless system, which is excellent for keeping your Indonesian Rupiah (paper money) dry. On entry, you’ll be given a Velcro wristband with an NFC chip in it, which you load money onto. You then use this to pay for everything – food, drinks, beauty services, equipment hire, lockers and additional rides.

While most of Waterbom’s rides and areas are free with your entry price, there is a small additional price for the Flow Rider and the Euro Bungy.

At the end of the day, any money left on your band will be refunded to you. You can check your balance and top up at various points around the park.

There are locker rooms available at two different locations in Waterbom, and it’s well worth hiring one for the day. They will lock and unlock with your wristband, and they provide ample space to leave all your stuff. They are also located right next to the large and very clean bathrooms (with showers).

You can hire a cabana for the day, all of which come with their own safe, so you won’t need an additional locker. It’s worth noting that while the cabanas are quite large, shady and luxurious, they have two single sized daybeds, with a table in between, and not a whole lot of additional room besides that. There are lots of free tables and chair spread around that you can make your home base for the day instead, especially if you’re part of a large group (because you just know your kids are going to argue over those day beds like their life depends on it).

What should I bring to Waterbom Bali?

The less you bring with you to Waterbom, the better. Most of what you bring will spend the day sitting in your locker.

  • Bringing a towel is optional. You can bring your own, but if you don’t, Waterbom has them available for a very reasonable rental price. While some of the slides have a spot to leave your shoes and towels, you often come out of the slide a good distance from where you lined up. We ended up leaving our towels and shoes in the locker for most of the day.
  • In our locker, we also had sunscreen, which we applied at regular intervals. That Bali sun bites, and you will be out in it all day long.
  • Speaking of the sun, make sure you bring your water bottle and hydrate, hydrate, hydrate. While there are plastic bottles available for purchase, there are also safe and free water refill stations available. Save your money and avoid single-use plastics.
  • No outside food or drink is allowed in Waterbom. Your bag will be checked on the way in, and anything you have with you will be held aside for you until you leave. There’s plenty of good quality food available within the park, including heaps of lunch options, good coffee and ice cream. It is expensive for Bali prices (but still slightly cheaper than Western pricing), so take advantage of your pass out if you are worried about cost.
  • While a hat and sunglasses are always a good idea, you won’t be able to wear them on most of the bigger slides. We left them in our locker and retrieved them whenever we were having a break. Fortunately, the park is well shaded in most areas.
  • Waterbom is very strict with their safety standards and one of them is that you can’t have metal or hard plastic elements on your swimwear or board shorts. This includes zippers, decorative elements, or drainage holes in your boardies. While they do have loan pairs of boardshorts available, it’s better to be safe and make sure your swimmers are Waterbom-friendly before you get there. If you’re doing any Bali shopping before your day at Waterbom, you can use this as an excuse for some new swimmers.
Waterbom Bali water park - Bali - Indonesia

What about photos of my Waterbom Bali adventure?

Even if you have a waterproof camera, you won’t be able to take it on most of the slides, which makes it a pain in the butt to have with you. Waterbom has an excellent system in place where they have photographers in set places – like at the end of some rides or at various points along the Lazy River – and some roaming freely around the park. They will snap as many photos as you like and then give you an orange Velcro wristband. You can have any other photos taken of you loaded on the same wrist band, or everyone can have a separate one and you can put them all on the same order at the end of the day.

A digital copy of your photos is going to cost you around $55 AUD, no matter how many photos you have. So, take full advantage of the friendly photographers and get as many snaps as you can.

What else do I need to bring money for?

There are various beauty or day-spa type services available at Waterbom, including massages, hair braiding and manicures. You will pay a slightly higher price for these than you would on the beach, but the added bonus here is that there is no haggling, and no hassling to upgrade your service, buy extra or pay more. The Waterbom staff are well paid, welcoming, friendly and professional, so a mani, pedi and a massage might be the ideal way to take a break from the sun or amuse yourself while the kids tackle the more heart-stopping rides by themselves.

What are Waterbom’s slides and rides like?

As well as the aforementioned toddler splash play area – which is only for littlies under 120cm tall – there’s also a very large and pleasant pool for family swimming, complete with a water volleyball area, plenty of sun lounges around the edge of the pool, and a bar nearby.

The Lazy River is also a popular choice for all ages, which is exactly what it sounds like – a man-made river where you’ll lay back and relax in a one or two-person inflatable tube while the current takes you around a large circuit, complete with beautiful carvings, waterfall areas and stunning vegetation.

The slides themselves range from tube slides for one to four people, to high adrenaline racing slides that use mats with handles, and vertical drop slides with a platform that retracts from beneath your feet and sends you flying straight down.

Flow Rider and Euro Bungy are the two rides available in the park at an extra cost. You would have seen them both elsewhere before – Flow Rider is a surfing simulator and Euro Bungy is the typical shopping centre activity with trampolines and bungee harnesses. We didn’t bother with them since they’re pretty common elsewhere.

Waterbom Bali’s grounds cover 3.8 hectares of land, and they haven’t wasted a single square centimetre – the place is jam-packed with fun things to do. The video below is a good preview of what’s on offer.

Is Waterbom Bali safe?

Obviously visiting a water park does come with risks, but certainly not more so at Waterbom Bali than at any other water park in the world. It became clear to us very quickly that safety is paramount at Waterbom. As I’ve said, the place runs like a well-oiled machine and safety practices are just part of its design. One thing we noticed was that the attendant running the top of the ride – briefing each person as they reached the front of the queue and telling them when to go – was never the same person when we went for our second, third or fourth go. We’d often see these attendants doing a different job somewhere else around the park, and so we concluded that they were cycling through different jobs regularly to prevent them from getting bored and complacent. This also has the added bonus that they’re always enthusiastic and making sure everyone’s having a good time.

Where is Waterbom Bali?

Waterbom Bali is in Kuta, only about 15 minutes drive from most central Kuta hotels.

The address is: Jl. Kartika Plaza Tuban, Kuta, Kabupaten Badung, Bali 80361, Indonesia

Need to know

Our research found that the cheapest Waterbom Bali tickets can be booked online through Klook.

Waterbom is open from 9am to 6pm every day of the year, except for Nyepi Day (aka Seclusion Day or Day of Silence) when – like everything else in Bali – the park remains closed. The date for Nyepi Day changes each year but it is usually sometime in March.

Pregnant women and people with heart conditions or back problems should not ride on Waterbom Bali slides.

Smoking is permitted in the park but only in designated areas.

Wifi is available for free in the lobby and restaurant areas.

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Have you been to Waterbom Bali? Got any questions, comments, updates or corrections? Let us know by commenting below.