Captiva is an unincorporated community and census-designated place (CDP) in Lee County, Florida, United States.

Many of Captiva's homes, condominiums, and businesses were destroyed during Hurricane Charley in 2004, but the island recovered shortly thereafter.

Captiva Drive is the main road on the island, running from the town center south to the Blind Pass bridge to Sanibel.

[7] Originally part of neighboring Sanibel Island to the southeast, it was severed in 1926 when a hurricane's storm surge created a new channel, Blind Pass.

Captiva was homesteaded in 1888 and a tiny cemetery next to The Chapel by the Sea has the grave of the original resident, William Herbert Binder (1850–1932), an Austrian.

Half the island is in private ownership, with "Millionaire's Row", luxury homes on the gulf and bay sides of Captiva Drive.

Reports indicate that the storm surge cut a path 491 yards (449 m) wide across the narrowest part of North Captiva, separating the island.

The separation of the two halves of the island began three years earlier during a series of tornadoes caused by Tropical Storm Gabrielle that passed through the area in September 2001.

Most of the invasive Australian pines on the island blew over in the hurricane, making room for native mangroves and sabal palms.

In September 2022, Category 4 Hurricane Ian made landfall in Upper Captiva with sustained winds of 150 mph.

[11] Both the Old Captiva House restaurant and a number of guest cottages have been designated historically-significant sites by Lee County, Florida.

The Bubble Room was one of the first establishments on Captiva Island to originate the bright pastel colors now widely used there.

[14] According to local folklore, Captiva got its name because the pirate captain José Gaspar (Gasparilla) held his female prisoners on the island for ransom.

However, the supposed existence of José Gaspar is sourced from an advertising brochure of an early 20th-century developer, and may be a fabrication.

Around 3000 B.C., the sands of Captiva started to erode, resulting in the eventual formation of Sanibel Island.

The men and boys of the tribe made nets from palm tree webbing to catch mullet, pinfish, pigfish, and catfish.

The women and children learned to catch shellfish like conchs, crabs, clams, lobsters, and oysters.

1850) was on a German freighter headed to New Orleans when the ship crashed and he was shipwrecked off Boca Grande.

(Survival, Evasion, Resistance, Escape) training for the fictional U.S. Navy Combined Reconnaissance Team.