HBO renewed the series for a second season despite the show being intended as a limited one season mini-series. It is said that the show will be an anthology style series with new characters for each season. HBO has done this before (to widespread acclaim) with the series True Detective (2014).
Jake Lacy claimed that due to the COVID-19 production bubble, the season 1 cast all actually did stay in the same hotel and eat every meal together at the same restaurant just like their characters in the show.
In season 1, Mark says his wife (played by Connie Britton) studied Mandarin in college. In reality, Britton majored in Asian studies with a concentration in Chinese at Dartmouth College, and studied at the Beijing Normal University in Beijing. She speaks Mandarin during this episode on a Zoom call.
Mike White wrote the part of Tanya McQuoid with Jennifer Coolidge in mind. They had worked together on Gentlemen Broncos (2009), and later went on a trip together after White's partner canceled. According to Coolidge, a lot of the "unfiltered side" she exhibited on the trip served as inspiration for the series.
In an August 2021 interview with Kathryn VanArendonk in Vulture, Mike White said that he chose the title "The White Lotus (2021)" before he wrote anything else in the show. He said he chose it because of its references to the Alfred, Lord Tennyson's poem "The Lotus-Eaters" (which Armond quotes toward the end of the first season), white supremacy, and his own last name.