Cape May's largest oceanfront hotel, 163 rooms across two interconnected buildings at the corner of Beach and Philadelphia Avenues, indoor and outdoor pools, beach cabanas, and the city's most operationally serious resort programme for families.
"For a Cape May summer week with three children and an unwillingness to negotiate every meal in a B&B, the Grand is the only answer at scale, two pools, two restaurants, a 1,000-foot beach across Beach Avenue, and rooms large enough to actually unpack."
The Grand Hotel of Cape May occupies the full block bounded by Beach, Philadelphia, and Stockton Avenues at the western end of the Cape May strand, the largest single hotel parcel in the city by floor count and by room count. The property was built in two main phases in the late 1970s and early 1980s as a purpose-built oceanfront resort, the response to the limited-capacity historic-district inventory of the time; it has been owned and operated independently throughout, has been comprehensively refurbished in the 2010s and again as a phased programme through 2024, and is the only Cape May hotel that operates at full year-round capacity rather than the city's traditional Memorial-to-Columbus-Day summer season.
There are 163 rooms across two interconnected buildings, all with private bathrooms, premium bedding, refrigerators, microwaves, in-room safes, free WiFi, premium cable, and the first-run movies that the Grand specifies as a Cape May rarity. The room categories are organised by view rather than by floor: Standard Doubles look inland toward Philadelphia Avenue or south toward Stockton; Partial Ocean View rooms sit at the building's east or west wings; Direct Oceanfront rooms occupy the front-facing block with Beach Avenue and the Atlantic immediately below; the Family Suites and Two-Room Suites add adjoining bedrooms or full kitchenettes for stays of three or more nights. Configurations sleeping two to eight guests are available in every view category.
The amenity programme is what makes the Grand the operational answer for Cape May families and groups. The hotel has an indoor pool open year-round, an outdoor pool open Memorial Day through September, a separate kiddie pool, a hot tub, beach cabanas and umbrella rentals on the property's reserved beach across Beach Avenue, a full-service oceanfront restaurant (The Boiler Room) and a casual poolside option (the Crystal Ballroom), a 24-hour fitness centre, a billiards room, two arcade rooms, beach-toy rental, and the largest meeting and event space in Cape May. The Grand Ballroom handles weddings and corporate events for up to 350 guests, the only Cape May venue capable of doing so without a marquee.
The position is the Grand's third proposition. The address sits at the western anchor of Beach Avenue, two blocks west of Congress Hall and three blocks west of the central Promenade, the strand at this end is wider and quieter than the boardwalk centre, the Cape May Lighthouse and Sunset Beach are a fifteen-minute drive south, and the Cape May-Lewes Ferry terminal is six minutes north by car. For groups who want a single-building, full-amenity, year-round oceanfront resort in Cape May, the Grand is the only option that delivers the full programme at the scale modern travel actually requires.
For Cape May family weeks the Grand is the structural answer. Indoor and outdoor pools (the indoor pool is the city's only year-round option), connecting Family Suites with kitchenettes, the reserved beach across the street with rental cabanas, the arcade and billiards rooms for the third-rainy-afternoon contingency, and the casual Crystal Ballroom for the meal nobody wants to dress for. Book Direct Oceanfront Family Suites for groups of four to six.
Cape May bachelor and bachelorette weekends route through the Grand because the property is the only one in town that will block ten to twenty adjoining rooms, run a private cabana programme on the beach, and handle a private group dinner in one of the Crystal Ballroom configurations without the historic-district restrictions. Booking the western corner Direct Oceanfront block as a group is the standard play.
Cape May does not have a traditional business-hotel market, but the Grand handles the corporate retreat and the regional-association meeting market for Southern New Jersey and Philadelphia. The Grand Ballroom is the only Cape May meeting room over 5,000 square feet, the property has full AV, fast WiFi, dedicated meeting catering, and the off-season programme runs from October through April at prices that compete with the suburban Philadelphia conference market.
1045 Beach Avenue
Cape May, NJ 08204
United States
Corner of Beach and Philadelphia; reserved beach access; six minutes to ferry terminal; fifteen minutes to Cape May Lighthouse
163 rooms in two buildings
Standard Doubles from $161/night
Partial Ocean View from $219/night
Direct Oceanfront from $289/night
Family/Two-Room Suites from $359/night
Check-in: 4:00 PM
Check-out: 11:00 AM
Open year-round (only Cape May hotel)
Comprehensive refurbishment 2024
Indoor pool (year-round)
Outdoor pool + kiddie pool + hot tub
The Boiler Room oceanfront restaurant
Crystal Ballroom (350 guests)
Reserved beach with cabanas
24-hour fitness centre
Arcade, billiards, kids' programme
From $161/night. Direct Oceanfront and Family Suites book three months ahead for summer; the off-season weekend programme (October through April) is the value play, with rates under $200 for Direct Oceanfront.
Book This Hotel →The 1816 grand hotel facing the ocean, the founding piece of Cape May, fully restored after the 1995 closure.
Twenty-four rooms above the Ebbitt Room, the most adult of Cape May's historic-district small hotels.
The 1894 Second Empire oceanfront hotel at the foot of Ocean Street, the city's most photographed facade.