When habitat-forming organisms such as trees, corals, or oysters are killed by disturbance, their structural remains, known as material legacies, can persist in an environment and influence processes that drive ecosystem recovery. Coral reefs, in particular, are affected by two primary forms of disturbance: those that remove entire coral colonies from the reef (e.g., tropical storms), and those that kill corals but leave their skeletons intact (e.g., coral bleaching). We explored how the potential for coral reef recovery differs following these two different forms of disturbance, finding that dead skeletons greatly diminish the capacity for coral reefs to recover.