There is a particular kind of buyer who walks into our Hurghada Marina office, orders an espresso, and announces that they want somewhere “quiet, but not boring; private, but not remote; beautiful, but not El Gouna money”. We love these people. We also have to gently inform them that they have just described roughly two places on the Red Sea coast, and that those two places are not the same place at all.
Makadi Bay and Soma Bay sit on the same stretch of coast south of Hurghada. On a map, they look like neighbours who share a fence. In practice, one is the friendly neighbour who invites you round for a barbecue and the other is the one with the gate, the golf buggy and a very good wine cellar. Neither is better. They are simply built for different lives, and the cost of picking the wrong one is a holiday home you visit twice a year with a faint sense of regret.
This is the developer-neutral comparison we wish existed when we started: golf, beaches, distance from the airport, atmosphere, and the sort of owner who tends to end up happy in each. If you have already read our comparison of Sahl Hasheesh and El Gouna, consider this the second instalment in the series.
First, the Geography: Two Bays, Thirty Kilometres Apart
Makadi Bay lies roughly 30 kilometres south of Hurghada and, administratively, belongs to Hurghada City in the Red Sea Governorate, according to the Makadi area guide published by the property platform Nawy. The same guide puts Soma Bay about 26.7 kilometres from Makadi, or around 31 minutes by road. So the two are close enough that you could, in theory, play golf in one and have dinner in the other without anyone filing a complaint.
Soma Bay, by contrast, is a peninsula. Wikipedia describes it as a self-contained community of around 10 million square metres (2,500 acres), roughly five kilometres long and two kilometres wide, reached by a 7-kilometre private road that ends at a single controlled entry gate. That one detail explains most of the difference in feel. Makadi Bay is a stretch of coast that grew into a resort town. Soma Bay is a place you enter on purpose.
Getting There: The Airport Run You Will Do Dozens of Times
If you are buying a winter base, the journey from the airport is not a footnote; it is the first and last hour of every trip. Sources differ slightly on the exact numbers, which is normal for Egyptian roads where “30 minutes” depends on who is driving and whether there is a checkpoint. Nawy lists Makadi Bay at 30.6 kilometres, or about 35 minutes, from Hurghada International Airport, while the travel guide Routri says about 30 minutes by taxi or shuttle.
For Soma Bay, Wikipedia gives 45 kilometres south of Hurghada International Airport, and Wikivoyage says about 45 minutes, adding that hotels offer transfers at around €15 per person each way. Routri calls it the most remote of the three bays it compares, “designed to be self-contained”.
The practical conclusion is simple. Makadi Bay shaves perhaps ten to fifteen minutes off every arrival and departure. If you are flying in from Manchester on a Thursday evening and want to be on your terrace with a drink before the news starts, that matters. If you are arriving for three months and unpacking properly, it matters rather less.
Golf: One Course Each, Two Very Different Reputations
Both bays have a championship golf course, which is one of the reasons buyers confuse them. They are not the same experience.
At Soma Bay, the golf is the headline act. Wikivoyage describes The Cascades as an 18-hole, par 72 championship course designed by Gary Player, with a 9-hole par 3 challenge course alongside it, a golf academy with PGA professionals and a 60-bay driving range. Wikipedia likewise credits Gary Player with the peninsula’s course. If you play three times a week and measure your winter by your handicap, this is the strongest argument for Soma Bay.
Makadi Bay’s golf lives at Madinat Makadi Golf Resort, where, according to Nawy’s area guide, an 18-hole championship course was designed by John Sandford. It is a perfectly good reason to bring your clubs, but it is not the thing the whole destination is built around. Routri’s comparison, tellingly, does not mention golf at all for Makadi Bay, while describing “championship golf” as part of Soma Bay’s appeal.
Beaches and Sea: Paddling Versus Performing
This is where the two bays reveal their personalities most clearly.
Routri describes Makadi Bay’s beaches as family-friendly with shallow entries, with accessible house reefs reached from resort jetties and short boat rides to the Giftun Islands for snorkelling. In plain English: this is a place where you can walk into the sea without a risk assessment, and where grandchildren can be handed a mask and fins without a diving certificate.
Soma Bay, according to the same guide, is a different proposition: deep-water jetties with direct access to dive sites such as Ras Abu Soma, and a reputation among serious divers for its house reefs. Wikivoyage adds that the bay offers flat water and side-shore winds of roughly 4 to 8 Beaufort year-round, with a kitesurf centre running lessons and testing weeks. Wikipedia lists windsurfing, kitesurfing and sailing as the peninsula’s signature watersports.
A fair summary: Makadi Bay is for people who like to be in the water. Soma Bay is for people who like to do something on it, under it, or above it at speed.
Atmosphere: The Barbecue Versus the Wine Cellar
Routri calls Makadi Bay “a lively, self-contained hub”, with large all-inclusive resorts, waterparks and kids’ clubs, and notes that it suits families, first-time Red Sea visitors and guests who want easy access to Hurghada’s boat tours and nightlife. For an owner, that translates into a place with plenty going on, a steady flow of visitors, and a sense of community that has a family-holiday energy to it.
It also offers a different kind of residential life. Makadi Heights, developed by Orascom Development Egypt, covers about 1,000 acres, of which Nawy says only around 12 per cent is built up, with the remainder given over to landscaping, lagoons, pools and lakes under a master plan by EDSA. Units there are delivered fully finished, which is worth knowing if you have ever lived through a snagging list. Nearby, Makadina, developed by Travco Properties, is described by Nawy as offering a clubhouse, sports courts, lakes, parks, a mall and a wellness hub. We mention these as examples of the town’s residential direction, not as recommendations, since we always match a project to the buyer rather than the other way round.
Soma Bay offers something quieter. Routri describes “a secluded peninsula dedicated to high-end active sports”, with an emphasis on privacy and premium facilities over a social scene. Wikipedia lists six hotels on the peninsula: Palm Royale Resort, Kempinski, Sheraton, Robinson Club, The Cascades and The Breakers Diving and Surfing Lodge. Wikivoyage notes a free shuttle bus running between the hotels, golf course, spa and dive and kitesurf centres. It is, in other words, a place with one gate and one rhythm.
Side by Side: The Quick Comparison
| Factor | Makadi Bay | Soma Bay |
|---|---|---|
| Distance from Hurghada airport | About 30 to 35 minutes, depending on the source | About 45 km, roughly 45 minutes |
| Layout | Coastal resort town with several residential developments | Gated peninsula with a single entry gate |
| Golf | 18-hole course at Madinat Makadi Golf Resort (John Sandford) | The Cascades, 18-hole par 72 (Gary Player), plus 9-hole par 3 course and academy |
| Beach and sea | Family-friendly shallow entries, accessible house reefs, Giftun Islands trips | Deep-water jetties, dive sites such as Ras Abu Soma, flat water for kitesurfing |
| Atmosphere | Lively, family-oriented, close to Hurghada | Secluded, sporty, privacy first |
| Typical owner | Families, first-time buyers, value-minded winter visitors | Golfers, divers, kitesurfers, privacy seekers |
Who Tends to Be Happy Where
You will probably love Makadi Bay if…
You are a family, or a couple whose family visits in waves. You want a short transfer, a lively resort backdrop and the ability to nip into Hurghada for a decent dinner or a trip to the marina without planning it like a military operation. You like the idea of a community that is already busy and a place where the sea is gentle enough for every generation. Our Makadi Bay property guide covers the buying side in more detail.
You will probably love Soma Bay if…
You play golf as a lifestyle rather than a hobby, or you dive, or you kitesurf, or you simply value a gate between your terrace and the rest of the world. You do not mind the extra drive from the airport because once you are in, you rarely want to leave. Our Soma Bay property overview explains the property side in more detail.
Practical Questions Worth Asking Before You Choose
Whichever bay you lean towards, a handful of questions separate a happy purchase from a regretful one.
- How will I actually use it? A month in January and a fortnight at Easter is a different brief to a full winter season. Short, frequent trips favour the shorter transfer; long stays favour the place that makes you want to stay put.
- Who else will use it? Grandchildren and shallow water point to Makadi Bay. Friends who dive or kite point to Soma Bay.
- What will running it cost? Service charges, utilities and local taxes vary hugely by compound, not just by bay. Our guide to the true annual cost of owning a Red Sea apartment shows how to compare two compounds fairly.
- New build or second-hand? Handover reliability, finishing quality and payment plans differ sharply. We set out the trade-offs in off-plan versus resale on the Red Sea.
- Can I see it in the season I would use it? A winter visit tells you about winter. Spend a few days there in the month you actually plan to arrive.
What the Comparison Does Not Tell You
A fair comparison should admit its limits. We have deliberately left property prices out of this article, because published asking prices for both bays vary by developer, unit type and payment plan, and we would rather show you a verified figure for a specific unit than a vague average. The same goes for rental income: a golf-focused buyer and a family-focused buyer will not rent their homes to the same guests, so any single yield number would mislead.
What we can say is that both bays reward buyers who know why they are there. The people who regret a purchase in either place are almost always the ones who bought for a lifestyle they imagined rather than the one they actually live. The golfer who buys in Makadi Bay for the price and then spends every round wishing the course were closer to the clubhouse of their dreams; the family who buys in Soma Bay for the privacy and then realises the nearest lively evening is a taxi ride away. Both are fixable, but neither is cheap to fix.
Where to Go From Here
If you are still undecided, the simplest test is also the best: spend three days in each. Stay at one of the resorts, walk the beach, eat locally, and ask yourself which evening you would happily repeat a hundred times. If you want to compare specific homes rather than general atmospheres, browse our current properties for sale or explore the wider range of development projects across the Red Sea, and then talk to us about what a viewing programme would look like. We will happily show you both bays in a single trip, because at thirty kilometres apart, you can have breakfast at one and lunch at the other.
For a closer look at each location, start with our dedicated pages for Makadi Bay and Soma Bay. For background on Soma Bay’s layout and facilities, the Soma Bay entry on Wikipedia and the Wikivoyage Soma Bay guide are useful starting points. Then pack a hat, because both bays have the same sunshine, and that, at least, is not up for debate.
