After our absolutely relaxing Thai couple’s spa (nostalgiaaaaa, I so want to go againnnnn! Also, a detailed blog on this coming soon 👀) and a beautiful chai-maggi evening at Zuri Restaurant, we decided to head to Central Phuket Mall because we had kept the last day for SHOPPINGGGGG. Yayyyy!
Shopping is such a therapeutic word. Isn’t it?
I am imagining myself holding a mic in the middle of the street asking people to describe shopping in one word.
What word would you have chosen? Please drop in a comment. I’d love to know. Genuinely curious! 🙂
Anyhow…
On the Way To Central Phuket Mall
It was around 6:45 PM when we booked a cab for Central Phuket Mall.
It was that soft hour when the sky can’t decide whether to stay gold or slip into blue.
The video below is testimony to the same. 🙂
The cab ride took 30 mins, but the kind of 30 mins where you lean your head against the window, city lights playing peekaboo through palm trees, and the world outside feels half-asleep, half-magical.
And then we reached. The doors slid open, and I remember looking at my husband, both of us standing there like… how did we miss this? HOWWW! And WHYYY! Why did we not come here before?
Because Central Phuket wasn’t just another mall (which I thought it would be). But. No. Absolutely not!
It felt like a world someone had dreamt up after 4 cups of coffee and a lot of imagination.
Luxury brands gleamed on one side, a whiff of luxury cuisines floated from the other, and somewhere beneath us, an aquarium quietly bubbling with life (which I didn’t know existed until I started writing this blog).
Imagine being at a magical place and missing out on the magic. 😭
Big Boss, MUJHE HURT HO RHA HAI, BIG BOSS! 💔
In that one evening, the place made us feel indulgent, curious, and a tiny bit guilty because we had found it a little too late.
Inside Central Phuket Mall
While we couldn’t explore much, I’ll tell you what you can based on the research I did, WHICH I SHOULD HAVE DONE BEFORE VISITING THE MALL, but… well… Idkwts.
After this, I’ll tell you what we did, which will be limited to shopping. Hehe. But the mall is so much more than just a shopping place. So let’s start.
Central Floresta + Central Festival = Central Phuket Mall
Central Floresta and Central Festival are two interconnected buildings forming the Central Phuket shopping complex.
| Attraction / Feature | What It Is | Location (Floresta / Festival) |
|---|---|---|
| Aquaria Phuket / Underwater Aquarium | The biggest aquariums in Southern Thailand. Missed it! 🙁 In fact, I didn’t know it existed when I visited the mall. | Beneath Central Floresta |
| SU VA NA Phuket – Underwater Restaurant & Lounge | Winner of World’s Best Underwater Restaurant 2024! Imagine being at a magical place and missing out on the magic. 😭 I have to like HAVE TOOOOOO GO AGAIN HERE. UNIVERSE, are you listening!!!!!!!!! | Beneath Central Floresta |
| AR Trick Eye Museum | Phuket’s 1st interactive 3D Museum. It’s a world of optical illusions. Haven’t experienced it, but I’m sure it’s AMAZING. I’ll write about it someday for sure. 100%. But 2025 isn’t the year, unfortunately. | Beneath Central Floresta |
| Tribhum Theme Park / Fantasy Adventure Zone | Fantasy-inspired theme park with 3D walkthrough experiences inside the mall. Missed it! 🙁 Didn’t know it existed when I visited the mall. | Central Floresta |
| Tales of Thailand / Floating Market & Food Paradise | A vibrant zone reflecting the four regions of the Kingdom. Missed it! 🙁 | Central Festival Phuket Mall |
| Thailand-Made Crafts & Souvenirs | You’ll find traditional silk fabrics, nakha fabrics, bags, hats, shoes, jewelry, perfumery products, cosmetics, Thai medicine, painted bowls, loincloth products, Thai elephant products, Thai Tham masks, and tin decorations decorated with crystals. Nope! | Central Festival Phuket Mall |
| Beauty, Spa & Wellness Floors | Spas, salons, aromatherapy and wellness centers scattered across the mall. Saw this! Were beautiful. 🙂 | Both |
| International & Local Restaurants | Food courts and sit-down restaurants: Thai, Japanese, global cuisines. Saw this! Didn’t eat because they all got shut down. More on this below. | Both |
| Sports & Fashion Stores | Stores like SuperSport, Adidas, Puma, and other popular brands. Shopped from one of these. Yayyy! More on this below. | Both |
| Cinema (SF Cinema) | Multiplex cinema with premium seating and comfy lounges. Didn’t experience, of course! | Central Festival Phuket Mall |
| Bookstore / Stationery Corners | Curated bookstores with tarot cards, unique stationery, and local reads. Happpppppyyyyyyyyy that I could get into one of these before they shut it down for the day. One of the books… okay, saving it for later. 🙂 | Central Festival Phuket Mall |
| Interactive Kids & Family Zone | Indoor playgrounds and activity zones for kids and families. Nope. 🙁 | Central Festival Phuket Mall |
| Event Spaces & Seasonal Exhibits | Rotating pop-ups, seasonal decor, and cultural showcases inside the mall. Thank God, got to see this! | Both |
Now, hopping on to what we did at the mall.
ZARA Shopping
So the first store we entered in the Central Mall Phuket was ZARA. Even though I always prefer buying local stuff, my husband has stark opposite views. He loves brands.
And that’s probably why, for the first time ever, I came back from a trip without a fridge magnet or local cutlery. Just 2 bowls I picked up on our Phi Phi Island Tour (a blog on this coming sooooooon; there’s so much I want to write about I feel, but lifeeeee happens. Manifesting more “FREE” time! Amen.)
So we ended up spending a bomb here. Bought stuff for ourselves and for our loved ones.
And now, this dress! Isn’t this beautifullllllllllll???? I knowwwwww.
I was such a stupid person to not get it along. *Silent sobs* And here’s a little gyaan from Heena “Gyaan”otra – straight out from experience.
When in a foreign land, buy whatever you like that is a little more likable than your normal standard of liking. ALWAYSSSS.
If I had this in mind, there would have been no regret. But there is! 🙁
And to this dress, you are lovelyyyy! Just not mine. But please beeee mine. Travel and magically sit in my wardrobe, pleaseeee, can you?
Insight: VAT Refunds On Purchase Of Over 2k
So, Thailand charges a 7% VAT (Value Added Tax) on most items, but tourists can get a part of it back. Yesssss, you heard that right!
Calculation For Better Understanding
So if you shop for 4000 THB, VAT included for this purchase is 7% i.e, 4000 × 0.07 = 280 THB.
After airport handling fees and processing, you will get about 4–6% of the total purchase back.
- 4% of 4,000 THB = 160 THB
- 6% of 4,000 THB = 240 THB
So for a 4,000 THB shopping spree, your refund would be roughly 160 – 240 THB.
Now, we had absolutely NO CLUE about this. No clue whatsoever. But my husband is smart. Like he is a SUPERB observer!
I am assuming he saw something somewhere, read about it, and got everything done while I was wandering in my wonderland.
Haha! Aren’t we the perfect couple! Touchwood. 🧿
Conditions To Get The VAT Back
So the refund happens when you shop at stores that display the “VAT Refund for Tourists” sign.
To qualify, you must spend at least 2,000 THB in a single day at one store, show your passport at checkout, and ask the cashier for a VAT refund form (P.P.10) along with the original receipt. Keep both safe and don’t use the items until after your trip, since they need to be shown at the airport. (Last bit is research-based!)
However, we didn’t show what we bought from the Central Phuket Mall at the airport. So chill scenes on the last part!
Procedure To Get The Refund Back
- Before checking in your luggage, visit the Customs counter at the airport with your purchases, receipts, and forms to get them stamped.
- Once that’s done, go through security and immigration, and then head to the VAT Refund Office (usually near the departure gates) to collect your refund, either in cash, on your credit card, or via bank transfer.
- The cash option usually has a small handling fee of around 100 THB, and the final refund is typically about 4–6% of your total shopping amount, since some processing fee is deducted.
- If you’ve shopped across multiple stores, keep all your forms together and make sure your total shopping is under 60 days old by the time you leave.
With a bit of planning, it’s a simple process and totally worth doing because even a few hundred baht back feels good after a shopping spree! 🙂
LEGO Shopping
So my nephew (6 months back) was obsessed with LEGO. He had collected 100+ LEGO boxes, not kidding. So I had to get it from him. And back then, there was no LEGO store in India. We used to get it from Hamley’s.
But guess where the store was! Yessss. Central Mall Phuket.
Book Store Shopping
Every time I travel to a new place, I make it a point to visit a local bookstore. It’s like my little ritual.
While Phuket didn’t have bookstores, unlike Nepal, which had plenty, I’m glad I found one in the mall. But as I went through the shelves, most books were the same ones I see everywhere: Atomic Habits, Subtle Art, Think Like a Monk. I sighed. I wanted a Thai author. Something that felt like here. But… no!
But but… then I saw: The Little Book of Joy. Wow! It made me soooo, soooo happy.
BUTTTTTTT. As I reached the counter, the staff smiled and said it wasn’t for sale. That hurt a little.
It’s funny how a book you NEVER owned can still feel like a loss.
So I wandered around, pretending I wasn’t disappointed. And that’s when I saw them: tarot decks. So many of them. Beautifully displayed, like small pieces of art.
I didn’t buy one (something about tarot feels too personal, too alive; they’re “energy-heavy”), but I loved that they were there.
A quiet reminder that magic exists, even in unexpected corners of a mall bookstore. 🙂
Puma Shopping
As I mentioned earlier, my partner has an insane love for brands, and shoes? That’s his ultimate weakness. We were meandering through the mall, half-running, half-drifting (because everything was shutting down), when our eyes landed on the PUMA Palermo Harry Potter Slytherin Edition.
We were stuck for a second. “Should we…?” We both looked at each other, because, of course, we hadn’t even peeked into Onitsuka or Adidas yet.
Confusion
Whispered discussions, a couple of glances at each other, and the decision was made. Let’s take these babies home, we decided. Even though they were a little costlier than what we would have gotten in India, the shoe box (I’ll put up a picture below once I’m back in Mumbai) is what made us buy them. Just look at it! Just…
While Pratyaksh ran off to withdraw cash, I claimed a little corner bench, thinking whether the shoes could survive wizard duels – basically wandered in my wonderland. Haha!
As I watched the mall getting emptier, the mall lights dimming slightly as closing time approached, I thought, “This is peak vacation chaos… and I love it.”
When he came back, triumphant with the cash, we finalised the purchase.
Shoes Are Gorgeous
The shoes? Absolutely gorg! I couldn’t stop smiling, half because they were perfect for him, half because the whole little adventure felt so MEEE: a tiny adventure in a mall that ended in Slytherin-style magic. Hisssssssss sshhhoes are perfect! (Noticed what I did there, hehe, thanks!)
I’m TEAM Gryffindor, though, just saying! 🙂
And yes, we got the VAT Refund from here too. Yayyy!
Back From Central Phuket Mall
I haven’t ever like EVER seen an empty mall before. But this day, I did.
The PUMA staff girls were the last ones around, closing up for the night, so it was just Pratyaksh and me wandering through empty corridors, trying to find our way out.
We finally booked a cab home, and here’s the twist: our driver turned out to be a girl.
Not just any girl, she pulled up in a sports car. Woah!
So this was pretty much it from me on the Central Phuket Mall.
If you’re planning to explore Phuket beyond its beaches, this spot perfectly blends shopping, dining, and culture under one roof.
Definitely one to keep on your list!
More On Phuket Blogs
If you’re looking for more thrilling ways to spend your Phuket time, you’ll love my Tiger Kingdom Phuket guide, which unpacks timings, tips, and what to expect when you meet real tigers in the wild (well, sort of!)
Planning a full itinerary? Start with my detailed Phuket Day 1 travel itinerary, where I share everything from hotel stays and budget insights to vegetarian eats and tuk-tuk rides through Patong.
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