Red Sea Project & Red Sea Global: Saudi Arabia's Most Ambitious Tourism Development

In 2017, Saudi Arabia announced it was going to build a luxury tourism destination the size of Belgium on its Red Sea coast. It would have its own airport. Its own renewable energy grid. Its own regulations. It would be carbon neutral. It would protect — rather than destroy — one of the most biodiverse marine ecosystems in the world.

The international reaction was polite scepticism.

Eight years later, the first resorts are open. Guests are checking in. The airport is operational in its first phase. And the project has become the most closely watched tourism development on earth.

This is the story of the Red Sea Project — what it is, how it works, what has been built, what is still coming, and why it matters far beyond Saudi Arabia’s borders.

What Is the Red Sea Project?

The Red Sea Project is a large-scale luxury tourism destination being developed on Saudi Arabia’s northwestern Red Sea coastline, in the Tabuk region. It covers approximately 28,000 square kilometres — an area that includes over 90 islands, mountain terrain, dormant volcanic fields, ancient archaeological sites, and some of the best-preserved coral reef in the world.

The project is being built as a premium international tourism destination with a deliberate focus on sustainability. That is not marketing language — it is an operational constraint built into the project’s master plan. A legally binding commitment to a net-zero carbon footprint. No single-use plastic anywhere across the development. A target to protect 75 percent of the natural environment within the project’s boundaries. Marine conservation areas covering the coral reef.

The ambition is not to build a resort destination that happens to be in nature. It is to build a destination because of the nature, and to prove that luxury tourism and genuine environmental stewardship can coexist.

Whether it succeeds will have implications for how major hospitality developments are designed everywhere.

Who Is Red Sea Global?

Red Sea Global is the government-owned company responsible for developing and operating the Red Sea Project. It was established specifically for this purpose and is wholly owned by Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund (PIF) — the same sovereign wealth fund backing NEOM, Qiddiya, and the Kingdom’s other giga-projects.

Red Sea Global’s mandate goes beyond construction. The company is responsible for:

  • Master planning the entire 28,000 km² destination
  • Developing the infrastructure — roads, utilities, the airport, the marina
  • Building and operating the first wave of hotels and resorts directly
  • Attracting and managing international hotel brands as tenants within the development
  • Conservation of the marine and terrestrial ecosystems within the project boundary

Understanding that Red Sea Global is both developer and long-term operator — not just a construction company that hands over keys and moves on — explains why the project has been developed with a level of coherence and long-term thinking that most comparable destinations lack.

All of this sits squarely within the broader framework of Saudi Vision 2030, which identified tourism as one of the primary pillars of Saudi Arabia’s economic diversification away from oil. The Red Sea Project is the single largest tourism investment within that strategy.

What Has Been Built So Far

The question every investor, travel journalist, and curious observer has been asking since 2017 is simple: is any of it actually real?

In 2026, the answer is yes.

The Red Sea International Airport

The Red Sea International Airport — officially named RSIA — is operational in its first phase. It handles commercial flights and is designed to eventually process up to 3 million passengers per year. The terminal building itself is a statement: a sweeping roof structure designed to blend with the landscape, powered by renewable energy, sitting in the middle of a desert landscape that most international travellers never expected to fly into.

The airport is not a temporary facility that will be upgraded later. It is the permanent gateway to the destination, and it has been built to international standards from the beginning.

Shebara Resort

Shebara is the Red Sea Project’s flagship resort — the first property completed and the one that demonstrated to the world that the project was delivering on its promises. Located on its own private island, Shebara’s overwater villas sit directly above coral reef. No other resort in Saudi Arabia offers this. The property runs on 100 percent renewable energy with no single-use plastic anywhere on site.

When the first guests arrived at Shebara, it became the moment the Red Sea Project stopped being a vision document and became a real place.

Six Senses Southern Dunes

Six Senses — the internationally respected luxury wellness brand — opened its Saudi Arabia debut at the Red Sea Project. The resort is nestled in the dunes at the edge of the coastline, designed around the brand’s holistic wellness philosophy. The fact that Six Senses chose the Red Sea Project for its Saudi entry was itself a signal: this is a brand that only operates where the quality of the environment justifies its standards.

Nujuma — A Ritz-Carlton Reserve

Nujuma is one of fewer than ten Ritz-Carlton Reserve properties in existence globally. The brand operates at the absolute pinnacle of the Marriott portfolio — properties are only developed in locations that are genuinely extraordinary. Nujuma sits on a private island in the Umluj archipelago, offering the kind of experience that commands several thousand dollars per night and justifies it.

For more detail on these resorts and the full range of Red Sea beaches and resorts available to visitors in 2025, read our dedicated coastal tourism guide.

What Is Still Coming: The Scale of What Remains

What has been completed is impressive. What remains is staggering.

The Red Sea Project’s full master plan includes:

  • 50 hotels with a combined 8,000 hotel rooms and 1,000 residential properties
  • A marina village with retail, restaurants, and cultural facilities
  • Diving and water sports infrastructure across multiple island locations
  • Golf courses designed around the landscape with minimal environmental impact
  • An arts and culture programme connecting the destination to the broader region
  • Adventure tourism offerings using the mountain terrain and volcanic fields inland

Alongside the Red Sea Project, Red Sea Global is also developing AMAALA — a companion destination further north on the coastline, focused specifically on ultra-luxury wellness, arts, and medical tourism. AMAALA targets an even higher-end market than the Red Sea Project and is designed to sit alongside comparable destinations in Monaco, Portofino, and the Maldives.

Together, the Red Sea Project and AMAALA represent the single largest hospitality investment programme currently active anywhere in the world.

The Sustainability Commitment — Is It Real?

Sustainability claims from major developments are sometimes genuine and sometimes marketing. The Red Sea Project’s commitments are worth examining specifically, because they are unusual in their rigour.

Net-zero carbon target: The destination is committed to generating no net carbon emissions. This is achieved through a combination of solar and wind energy infrastructure, battery storage, and a commitment that no fossil fuel power is used anywhere across the development.

Marine conservation: The coral reef within the project boundary is actively protected and monitored. Construction methodology was specifically designed to avoid reef damage. An ongoing marine science programme monitors reef health and intervenes where necessary.

75 percent natural environment: The master plan legally commits to preserving 75 percent of the project’s total land area in its natural state. The 28,000 km² figure often quoted includes vast areas that will never be built on.

No single-use plastic: This is an operational commitment across all properties within the development, binding on all hotel brands that operate there. It is verified and enforced — not a suggestion.

Whether these commitments are maintained long-term as the development scales will be the real test. For now, the first phase properties are delivering on them. Shebara, Six Senses, and Nujuma all operate according to these standards.

What the Red Sea Project Means for Business in Saudi Arabia

The Red Sea Project is not only a tourism story. For businesses operating in Saudi Arabia, it represents one of the most significant concentrations of economic activity in the Kingdom — and one that will sustain demand for a wide range of services for decades.

The scale of human resource and operational requirement is enormous. A destination of 50 hotels, thousands of residential units, a marina, cultural facilities, and supporting infrastructure requires tens of thousands of people — in construction, in hospitality operations, in technical maintenance, in soft services, in management.

This is where companies with deep operational expertise in the Saudi market play a critical role. Seerah has been building that expertise for years. The company’s manpower solutions cover the full spectrum of workforce needs — engineers, technicians, hospitality professionals, supervisors, maintenance teams, and support staff — deployed in full compliance with Saudi labour law and Saudization (Nitaqat) requirements.

Equally important is what happens once a resort or hotel is built and guests are arriving. Maintaining a luxury property — especially one built on an island, powered by renewable energy, in a marine environment — requires specialist facility management services that go well beyond standard building maintenance. MEP systems, HVAC management in a high-humidity coastal environment, planned preventive maintenance programmes, soft services that meet luxury hospitality standards, energy management, landscaping — all of it needs to function invisibly, every day, so that the guest experience is never interrupted.

Seerah provides both. For developers, investors, and operators active in the Red Sea region, having a single integrated partner for workforce deployment and facility management is one of the most practical decisions you can make in what is still a rapidly developing market.

The Red Sea Project and Saudi Arabia's Tourism Numbers

The targets attached to the Red Sea Project are ambitious even by Vision 2030’s ambitious standards.

Saudi Arabia’s overall tourism strategy under Vision 2030 targets 150 million visitors per year by 2030, generating SAR 1 trillion in tourism revenue and contributing 10 percent of GDP. Tourism currently contributes around 3 percent.

The Red Sea Project is expected to contribute one million visitors annually at full development, generating SAR 22 billion per year in direct revenue. It is also projected to create 70,000 direct and indirect jobs — a figure that gives some indication of the long-term workforce requirement the destination will sustain.

These are targets, not guarantees. But the trajectory since the first resorts opened in 2023 — strong early occupancy, international press coverage, confirmed pipeline of hotel openings — suggests the direction is right.

Conclusion

The Red Sea Project started as an announcement that stretched credibility. A net-zero luxury destination the size of Belgium, built from scratch, on a coastline most of the world had never heard of.

What is extraordinary is not that the ambition was announced — Saudi Arabia announced many things in 2017. What is extraordinary is that a significant part of it has been built, and what has been built is genuinely world-class. The first guests at Shebara did not arrive at a compromise. They arrived at one of the most remarkable resort settings anywhere.

The second, third, and fourth waves of development are coming. For travellers, investors, and businesses, the window to engage with this destination before it reaches full scale is now — not five years from now when every travel publication in the world has run their Red Sea cover story.

For the complete picture of everything the Red Sea region offers — beaches, hotels, the film festival, Red Sea Mall, the airport, and the full infrastructure story — read our complete Red Sea Saudi Arabia guide.

Related: Saudi Vision 2030: Progress, Projects & Key Partners — The national strategy behind the Red Sea Project and every other giga-project in the Kingdom. Red Sea Beaches, Resorts & Hotels — 2025 Guide — Planning a visit? Everything you need to know about the best places to stay on the Saudi Red Sea coast.

Frequently Asked Questions About the Red Sea Project

The Red Sea Project is a luxury tourism mega-destination being developed on Saudi Arabia’s northwestern Red Sea coast by Red Sea Global, covering 28,000 km² of coastline, islands, and inland terrain. It is the centerpiece of Saudi Arabia’s Vision 2030 tourism strategy.

Yes. The first phase is operational. The Red Sea International Airport is receiving flights. Shebara Resort, Six Senses Southern Dunes, and Nujuma — A Ritz-Carlton Reserve — are all open and taking bookings. More properties will open through 2025 and 2026.

Red Sea Global is the company. The Red Sea Project (and AMAALA) are the destinations it is developing. Red Sea Global is the developer, operator, and long-term custodian of both projects.

Yes. International tourists can book directly through the individual resorts — Shebara, Six Senses, Nujuma, Jumeirah Red Sea — or through travel agents. Saudi Arabia’s tourist e-visa is available to citizens of 49 countries and is straightforward to obtain online.

AMAALA is Red Sea Global’s second mega-project, located further north on the Saudi Red Sea coast. It targets the ultra-luxury wellness and arts tourism market and is currently under construction, with initial properties expected to open from 2026 onwards.

It is one of the flagship projects within Vision 2030’s tourism diversification strategy. Red Sea Global is wholly owned by Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund, which is the financial vehicle through which Vision 2030 investments are made.

Large-scale hospitality and infrastructure developments require specialist workforce and operational support. Seerah provides both across the Saudi market — get in touch to discuss specific requirements.

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