[€] Super-Cheap Hotels & Hostels in Venice (Under €50)
Foresteria Valdese–Palazzo Cavagnis ★ (Castello) - The only hostel-like accommodation in the heart of Venice (the official HI hostel is way out on a separate island with an early curfew and limited boat connections; don't bother) has two great things going for it, aside from low prices. (1) it's at the confluence of two canals, so most rooms get that coveted Venetian water view, and (2) this slightly battered old palazzo still sports 18th century frescoes in some of the rooms. And not just any old frescoes, but ones painted by the same dude who did the
Museo Civico Correr...
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Hotel Caneva (Castello) - Sure, it's an utterly basic one-star property—linoleum floors, modular units, ageing baths—but it also happens to be a one-star property that's just a few minutes by foot from
Piazza San Marco, and where the top rate for a room with bath is just €100 (without bath, the prices limbo as low as €40). What makes it truly special, though, is the fact that 17 of its 25 rooms open right onto a canal (eight from tiny balconies)...
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Hotel Ariel Silva (Cannaregio) - When I first walked into this little hotel, I thought I'd wandered into someone's house by accident. Seriously. If it weren't for the long table that looked like a reception desk and a shelf with dog-eared guidebooks and novels in three languages, I would have quietly snuck out, embarrassed. It didn't help that the address—ten minutes from the train station and just two blocks from the historic Jewish Ghetto—was well hidden. Then again, in over-crowded Venice, being so firmly off the beaten path can be a distinct blessing. The rooms are teensy, but manage to achieve the effect of "cozy" rather than "cramped," and though the overall look is...let's call it "Venice, circa 1986". Double rooms with shared bath cost as little as €45—with bath, they start at €50...
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Camping Miramare (Punta Sabbioni) - Yes, you can camp in Venice! Or at least, you can camp on Punta Sabbioni, one of the long barrier islands between the open Adriatic Sea and the Venetian lagoon (like the famous Lido—in fact, it's the next one up from the Lido in the chain of islands). It's actually quite a nice little seaside campground. You can sit out on the beach and watch the sunsets, and there's a pizzeria-bar and an Internet point. There are also free bikes for guest use, and a free ferry shuttle to the Piazzale on Punta Sabbioni (or a ten-minute walks) from whence you can catch a ferry to downtown Venice in about 40 minutes...
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Camping Marina di Venezia (Punta Sabbioni) - This is the biggest and one of the best of the dozens of campgrounds lining the Punta Sabbioni promontory separating the Venetian lagoon from the Adriatic Sea. This place is one of the largest campgrounds in Europe. It's literally like a mid-sized town made up entirely of campsites. It stretches over 173 acres, can comfortably fit more than 12,000 campers, and features 30 shops and 7 bars & restaurants (not counting beach bars). It has an impressively-sized water park with six swimming pools, and a fabulous beach or yellow sand 200 yards deep that stretches for miles (of which 1.2 km belong exclusively to the campground)...
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TIP: Where to find cheap hotels in Venice
There are loads of inexpensive hotels near the train station, especially along broad Lista di Spagna, and its narrow tributary streets, which heads toward the heart of town (take a left at the bottom of the train station steps).
Hotels on the Lista itself can be noisy, but those on the side alleys stretching north (left as you head towards San Marco) are amazingly quiet, and many—especially toward the ends of these streets—overlook tree-filled gardens.
The drawback to this neighborhood: Piazza San Marco and the central sights are a hearty 30-minute hike (or vaporetto ride) away.
[€€] Cheap Hotels in Venice (€50–€100)
Albergo Pensione Guerrato ★★ (San Polo) - Rarely will you find such an excellent marriage of price, atmosphere, and genuine warmth at any Venice hotel. What makes this small hotel one of Venice's best is not just the convenient location near the
Rialto Bridge and welcoming atmosphere—Roberto so friendly that departing guests often hug and cheek-kiss him goodbye (though this may have to do with the fact that he resemble a long-lost Baldwin brother). It's what you get for the low prices...
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Hotel Bernardi-Semenzato ★★ (Cannaregio) - The Pepoli family runs a stylish hotel in a 16th century palazzo with four-star amenities and class—wood-beamed ceilings, antique furnishings, A/C, free WiFi—at one-star prices (just €44 to €90 for a double—at least
online) just off the main drag between the train station and
San Marco. Upstairs rooms enjoy higher ceilings and more light...
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Hotel Galleria ★★ (
Dorsoduro) - The Hotel Galleria has one huge plus going for it: You can fling open your window and look right out onto the
Grand Canal and still pay only around $200 for the privilege. (I know: seems like a lot—but not in Venice). That's what you get—along with antique Venetian styling and breakfast served in your room—at Luciano Benedetti and Stefano Franceschini's 17th-century palazzo at the foot of the Accademia bridge, across a square from the
Galleria Accademia. Seriously: cross the Accademia bridge, turn to your left, and it's right there in front of you, the door just to the right of the cafe with all the outdoor tables...
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Locanda Fiorita ★★ (San Marco) - This place on its own tiny campiello off Campo Santo Stefano is like a postcard shot of Venice you can live in: a little 15th century palazzo plastered in deep red, the entrance swamped in flowering wisteria and spiking old-fashioned chimneys into the sky, the simple rooms fitted in 18th-century Venetian style with wood-beamed ceilings and light-filled windows. Ask for rooms 1 or 10 (with tiny terraces) when you check in...
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Antica Locanda Sturion ★ (San Polo) - This wonderful little inn has been taking in paying guests since 1290, making it one of the oldest hotels in Venice. Thoroughly renovated with modern amenities and furnishing in the ever-popular 18th century Venetian style by Scottish-born Helen and co-owner Flavia. Though it is right on the
Grand Canal, sadly only a pair of the 11 rooms actually offer views over the canal to the
Rialto Bridge (on the left). The rest of the guests can be satisfied with rooftop panoramas from their bedroom, and the
Grand Canal view from the breakfast room...
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Hotel La Residenza ★ (Castello) - If there's one place in Venice where you can almost feel as if you're living like a Doge without exceeding your budget, it's this little pensione installed on the
piano nobile (the second floor, where the noble family once lived) of the 15th century Palazzo Gritti-Bader. The façade—one block off chichi Riva degli Schiavoni—is the sort other tourists will stop to take pictures of—all pointy Gothic windows and 10th century Byzantine sculpture—and the reception/shared living rooms is a massive, dim, echoing hall slathered in 18th century plaster frippery, 17th century paintings, and crowded with antique furnishings...
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Hotel Ariel Silva (Cannaregio) - When I first walked into this little hotel, I thought I'd wandered into someone's house by accident. Seriously. If it weren't for the long table that looked like a reception desk and a shelf with dog-eared guidebooks and novels in three languages, I would have quietly snuck out, embarrassed. It didn't help that the address—ten minutes from the train station and just two blocks from the historic Jewish Ghetto—was well hidden. Then again, in over-crowded Venice, being so firmly off the beaten path can be a distinct blessing. The rooms are teensy, but manage to achieve the effect of "cozy" rather than "cramped," and though the overall look is...let's call it "Venice, circa 1986"...
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[€€€] Moderate Hotels in Venice (€100—€150)
Hotel Galleria ★★ (
Dorsoduro) - The Hotel Galleria has one huge plus going for it: You can fling open your window and look right out onto the
Grand Canal and still pay only around $200 for the privilege. (I know: seems like a lot—but not in Venice). That's what you get—along with antique Venetian styling and breakfast served in your room—at Luciano Benedetti and Stefano Franceschini's 17th-century palazzo at the foot of the Accademia bridge, across a square from the
Galleria Accademia. Seriously: cross the Accademia bridge, turn to your left, and it's right there in front of you, the door just to the right of the cafe with all the outdoor tables...
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Hotel Violino d'Oro ★★ (San Marco) - Heavy drapes, rich blues, golds, and reds, and a sumptuous 18th century style help define this relatively new boutique hotel on its own little campiello in a primo location: just off the main shopping street between
San Marco and the
Accademia. Given the plush surroundings, and the fact that six of the modestly-sized rooms overlook Rio San Moisé canal, it's surprisingly inexpensive, with winter rates dipping as low as €60 for a double room...
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Locanda Fiorita ★★ (San Marco) - This place on its own tiny campiello off Campo Santo Stefano is like a postcard shot of Venice you can live in: a little 15th century palazzo plastered in deep red, the entrance swamped in flowering wisteria and spiking old-fashioned chimneys into the sky, the simple rooms fitted in 18th-century Venetian style with wood-beamed ceilings and light-filled windows. Ask for rooms 1 or 10 (with tiny terraces) when you check in...
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Hotel San Cassiano Ca 'Favretto ★ (Santa Croce) - Call this red palazzo on the
Grand Canal the working-man's splurge. About half the rooms here look across the
Grand Canal to the gorgeous
Ca d'Oro. The consolation prize for most of the other rooms is that they at least open onto a side canal. Built into a 14th-century palace and steeped in dusty Old World elegance, the rooms are outfitted with antiques and reproductions, some under gorgeous wood-beamed ceilings. There's also a dining room porch overlooking the
Grand Canal...
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Antica Locanda Sturion ★ (San Polo) - This wonderful little inn has been taking in paying guests since 1290, making it one of the oldest hotels in Venice. Thoroughly renovated with modern amenities and furnishing in the ever-popular 18th century Venetian style by Scottish-born Helen and co-owner Flavia. Though it is right on the
Grand Canal, sadly only a pair of the 11 rooms actually offer views over the canal to the
Rialto Bridge (on the left). The rest of the guests can be satisfied with rooftop panoramas from their bedroom, and the
Grand Canal view from the breakfast room...
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Albergo Ai Do Mori ★★ (San Marco) - Want to stay half a block off
Piazza San Marco, perhaps even with a close-up view of the domes of
St. Mark's? What's more, want to do it for under $150? The beamed-ceiling rooms tend to be a bit cramped at Antonella's little gem of a hotel—though the lower-floor rooms are slightly larger (I like corner no. 6, with lots of light and a criss-cross of wooden beams). However, those offer mostly standard rooftop views. It's the rooms on the top floor that get the killer peek at
San Marco's cupolas and the
Torre dell'Orologio, whose two bronze moors ring the bells every hour...
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[€€€€] Premier Hotels in Venice (€150–€250)
Hotel Pensione Accademia ★★ (
Dorsoduro) - This classy Olde Worlde hotel in the 17th-century Villa Maravege is beloved by Venice regulars. You'll have to reserve far in advance to get any room here, let alone one overlooking the tiny triangular breakfast garden, which is snuggled into the confluence of two canals. The hotel is fitted with period antiques in first floor "superior" rooms, and the atmosphere is decidedly old-fashioned and elegant (Katherine Hepburn's character lived here in the movie
Summertime)...
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Hotel Metropole ★ (Castello) - It just doesn't get more Romantic 18th century Venetian than this: the former chapter house of La Pieta church where Vivaldi lived 1704–38 while he was the church's concert master. It has since become part quirky hotel, part top restaurant (with two Michelin stars), and part Victorian museum of the owner's curious collections and lavish furnishings. Plump an extra €100 for a room with a view over Bacino San Marco (and free parking). You can still get a water view—over side canal where the water taxis pull up—at the regular rate, but ask for it or you might get stuck with one on the garden courtyard...
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[€€€€€] Perfect Splurge Hotels in Venice (More than €250)
Hotel Danieli ★★★ (Castello) -In the 14th century, just a few doors down from the
Palazzo Ducale (Doge's Palace) , Doge Dandolo built one of the prettiest palazzi overlooking the bacino San Marco. It has been serving elite visitors to Venice since 1822 in posh, Oriental-tinged splendor. The
Danieli's best attribute—other than its prime location and those killer water views from rooms along the front—is its centerpiece: a four-story central atrium of Gothic arches and elegant balustrades, sky-lit and dripping with greenery and palm fronds. When it comes to choosing a room—tastefully fitted with a restrained decor of antiques, Oriental rugs, and oil paintings—those in the original wing have more atmosphere and old fashioned style but are smaller than accommodations in the 19th century wing next-door. (Avoid getting stuck in the bland 1940s addition)...
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Hotel Cipriani ★★★ (Giudecca) - It may not have been the first luxury hotel on the Venetian scene, but the Cipriani certainly ranks as the top these days, a sumptuous retreat for the truly rich and rather-not-be-bothered famous. The Cipriani occupies a series of Renaissance villas and palazzi right at the tip of Giudecca, the long curve of a residential island just south of Dorsoduro and accessible only by a ten-minute boat ride form San Marco. For the most discriminating visitors there are private-home lodgings in a 15th century palace complete with your private butler...
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Gritti Palace ★★ (San Marco) - You could argue that there are more flash five-star hotels (largely those lining the bacino San Marco), but if you're looking for old school glamour and
the classic luxury address on the
Grand Canal, it's got to be the
Gritti. In the 16th century, this was the palace of Doge Andrea Gritti, who set the precedent for the caliber of guests to come over the centuries: from international royalty and captains of industry to literary giants and rock stars. So long as you're going all out, plump for a room on the
piano nobile (the old "nobles' floor") with its high stuccoed ceilings and overwrought chandeliers; three of its suites have balconies hung over the Grand Canal itself...
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Hotel Metropole ★ (Castello) - It just doesn't get more Romantic 18th century Venetian than this: the former chapter house of La Pieta church where Vivaldi lived 1704–38 while he was the church's concert master. It has since become part quirky hotel, part top restaurant (with two Michelin stars), and part Victorian museum of the owner's curious collections and lavish furnishings. Plump an extra €100 for a room with a view over Bacino San Marco (and free parking). You can still get a water view—over side canal where the water taxis pull up—at the regular rate, but ask for it or you might get stuck with one on the garden courtyard...
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