Costa Rica Trip Reservations: Booking In Advance, How Much Time Is Needed?

Written by Nikki Solano

Nikki is the CEO of Pura Vida! eh? Inc. (Costa Rica Discounts), and the author of the guidebooks Moon Costa Rica (2019, 2021, 2023, and 2025 editions) and Moon Best of Costa Rica (2022 edition) from Moon Travel Guides. Together with her Costa Rican husband, Ricky, she operates the Costa Rica Travel Blog, created the online community DIY Costa Rica, built the Costa Rica Destination Tool, oversees the brand-new (summer 2023) Costa Rica Travel Shop, and designed the Costa Rica Trip Planning 101 E-Course. Also, Nikki wrote the Costa Rica cover feature for Wanderlust Magazine's sustainability-focused Travel Green List issue, showcased Costa Rica destinations and experiences on Rick Steves' Monday Night Travel show and podcast/radio show, and served as the Costa Rica Destination Editor for Essentialist, a luxury travel brand. Want to show your appreciation for her free article below? Thank Nikki here. ❤️️

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Our article below focuses on timelines for reserving all kinds of Costa Rica vacation items, including hotels, tours and activities, transportation services, car rentals, and restaurant visits. You may be asking yourself whether it’s necessary or recommended to reserve tours and activities before you travel. If so, for specific information about that topic, please see our related blog post:

Costa Rica Tours And Activities: Should You Book In Advance Or Wait?

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Timing Costa Rica trip reservations: When to book your Costa Rica vacation

One of the most important steps you’ll take when planning a trip to Costa Rica is securing your chosen vacation items. Researching everything you want to experience during your trip—from accommodations and transportation services to tours and activities—requires a lot of time and effort, but successfully booking vacation items is typically quick and easy, not to mention necessary if you want to put your perfect travel plan into action.

If you’ve never planned a vacation to Costa Rica before, you probably have no idea when you should book your trip. Are these types of questions running through your mind?

When should I reserve my Costa Rica hotels?

How soon in advance do I need to book tours and activities?

When do rental cars in Costa Rica begin selling out?

If so, we can help. We have worked in Costa Rica’s tourism industry since the mid-2000s, and we know how much advance notice is required to snag availability for different types of vacation items at various times of the year. Through our business (Pura Vida! eh? Inc.), we’ve had to be the bearer of bad news, time and time again, when informing travelers that the experiences they wish to have in Costa Rica are sold out on their desired travel date(s). It’s heartbreaking when individuals, groups, and families diligently save money for a vacation and invest time into researching where they want to stay, how they want to travel, and what they want to do and see, only to learn that they waited too long to reserve the items they want. Fortunately, with insider knowledge and some sound reservation timeline guidelines, both of which are provided below, this kind of vacation disappointment is entirely preventable!

Two quick disclaimers regarding our reservation timeline guidelines

This should go without saying, but in case not, every hotel, tour operator, attraction, transportation service provider, vehicle rental agency, and restaurant in Costa Rica is different. Some hotels can sleep upwards of 300 guests, and others provide less than 10 rooms. Some attractions receive hordes of visitors daily, and others receive a few visitors from time to time. Some vehicle rental agencies, shared shuttle service providers, and private transfer service providers have large fleets and an endless list of freelance drivers at their disposal, and others do not. Some in-demand restaurants require a reservation while the majority invite you to pop in at your leisure. Our reservation timeline guidelines below portray, in our opinion (based on our personal and professional experience), the amount of advance notice that is needed to secure each type of vacation item, on average. In some cases, more advance notice may be necessary. In other cases, less advance notice may suffice.

It is equally important to recognize that although we’ve done our best to identify particular times of the year when more or less advance notice is generally required, an endless list of factors contributes to certain days, weeks, and months being more or less popular than others, and that impacts vacation item availability. In Costa Rica, factors including favorable weather, increased wildlife and marine life activity, ideal water and wave conditions, and national holidays often translate to an above-average number of visitors and tighter vacation item availability. Outside of Costa Rica, international flight price hikes, worldwide pandemics, and the cost of inflation can result in fewer visitors and provide vacation item availability for the taking. Because it is impossible to account for every possible factor that weighs on the topic of availability, our reservation timeline guidelines below reflect availability throughout an average year in Costa Rica.

For information that can help you decide when to go to Costa Rica, don’t miss our related blog post:

When To Go To Costa Rica According To Cost, Weather, Wildlife, And More!

If you’d rather get help with deciding where to go in Costa Rica, don’t miss our related blog post:

Where To Go In Costa Rica: Determining The Best Places To Visit During Your Trip

When you’ve decided which tours and activities you’d like to experience during your trip, head on over to our Discount Database to browse hundreds of discounts for Costa Rica day tours:

Browse our Costa Rica Discount Database on our sister site, Pura Vida! eh? Inc.

Our Costa Rica trip reservation timeline guidelines

Please be aware:

We developed the tables below to help travelers like you quickly and easily identify how soon before a Costa Rica trip reservations should be made for hotels (popular hotels, moderately popular hotels, or off-the-beaten-path hotels), tours and activities (popular tours or off-the-beaten-path tours), shared shuttles, private transfers, rental cars (4×4 vehicles or non-4×4 vehicles), and restaurants (where applicable).

Here are some examples of vacation items that fall under each category:

• Popular hotels: Peace Lodge in the Central Valley, Tabacon Resort in La Fortuna, El Mangroove in Guanacaste, The Gilded Iguana on the Nicoya Peninsula, Tulemar on the central Pacific coast, Lapa Rios on the Osa Peninsula, and Mawamba Lodge on the Caribbean coast
• Moderately popular hotels: El Silencio Lodge in the Central Valley, Arenal Springs Resort in La Fortuna, Hacienda Guachipelin in Guanacaste, Tango Mar on the Nicoya Peninsula, Vista Ballena on the central Pacific coast, Iguana Lodge on the Osa Peninsula, and Umami Hotel on the Caribbean coast
• Off-the-beaten-path hotels: hotels located in less frequented parts of Costa Rica, such as the Savegre Hotel, Natural Reserve, and Spa in San Gerardo de Dota, the Ladera Hotel in Turrialba, and the Natural Lodge Cano Negro in the Northern Inlands
• Popular tours and activities: zip-lining tours, hanging bridge tours, and hot spring visits
• Off-the-beaten-path tours and activities: caving tours, canoeing tours, and indigenous community visits
• Shared shuttle services: such as shuttles operated by Interbus
• Private transfer services: such as transfer services operated by Ride Costa Rica
• 4×4 vehicles: compact, mid-size, or full-size SUVs
• Non-4×4 vehicles: sedans or vans
• Restaurants: most restaurants in Costa Rica do not require reservation; however, we’ve included reservation timeline guidelines for those that do

Availability for the aforementioned vacation items is further broken down by the time of year you intend to visit Costa Rica. Months or weeks that share the same reservation timeline guidelines are grouped together. These are the groups represented across our tables:

• Travel during January (first two weeks)
• Travel during January (last two weeks), February, or March (excluding Easter Week)
• Travel during Easter Week (sometimes in March, sometimes in April)
• Travel during April (excluding Easter Week)
• Travel during May or June
• Travel during July or August (first two weeks)
• Travel during August (last two weeks), September, October, or November
• Travel during December (first two weeks)
• Travel during December (last two weeks)

For Costa Rica travel during January (first two weeks)

For Costa Rica travel during January (last two weeks), February, or March (excluding Easter Week)

For Costa Rica travel during Easter Week (sometimes in March, sometimes in April)

For Costa Rica travel during April (excluding Easter Week)

For Costa Rica travel during May or June

For Costa Rica travel during July or August (first two weeks)

For Costa Rica travel during August (last two weeks), September, October, or November

For Costa Rica travel during December (first two weeks)

For Costa Rica travel during December (last two weeks)

Pura vida!

Do you have questions about when to book your desired Costa Rica vacation items, including hotels, transportation services, tours/activities, and even restaurant visits? No problem! When you’re ready, make an appointment here to communicate with me (Nikki) privately and we can discuss these and other topics to get your questions answered fast and your Costa Rica trip poised for success. Pura vida, amigos! 🙂

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