Where to Stay in Amsterdam: The Best Areas from Three Trips (and One to Avoid)

Deciding where to stay in Amsterdam matters more than you expect. The city is small enough that you can walk between neighbourhoods in twenty minutes, which makes it tempting to book the first central hotel you find and assume location is solved. That’s exactly what I did the first time, and now I know better!

I’ve been to Amsterdam three times now, in three completely different ways: once as a student who hitchhiked there, once for a work conference, and most recently for a proper weekend in the east of the city. Between these trips, I’ve stayed dead in the centre, right out in the Docklands, and in a leafy pocket most visitors never reach.

This guide is what I learned about the best places to stay in Amsterdam.

In a Rush? Our Favourite Amsterdam Hotels

Where to Stay in Amsterdam at a Glance

Our favourite hotel in the city: Hotel V Oosterpark. It’s one of the best hotels we’ve stayed at anywhere in Europe.

• Best for first-timers — The Jordaan. Canals, bakeries and independent shops, still walkable to everything
• Best for a quieter, greener stay — Oud-Oost, around Oosterpark. Our favourite, and where we’d book again for future stays.
• Best for museums — Oud-Zuid / Museumplein.
• Skip — The Docklands and the Eastern Docklands, unless you have to.

Area	Best For	The Trade-Off
The Jordaan	First-timers, couples, cafés and canals	Popular, so book early and expect higher prices
Oud-Oost (Oosterpark)	Green space, local restaurants, better value	20–25 min walk to the canal ring
Grachtengordel / De 9 Straatjes	Classic canal views, central shopping	Busiest of the canal areas, priciest beds
Oud-Zuid / Museumplein	Museums, families, quieter evenings	Less atmospheric after dark
De Pijp	Food, markets, younger crowd	Lively at night; thinner on canal charm
Amsterdam Noord	Budget stays, something different	Ferry-dependent, feels separate from the city
Centrum / De Wallen	Transport links, one-night stopovers	Crowded, noisy, weakest restaurants in the city
Docklands / Oostelijk Havengebied	Conferences at the PTA — and nothing else	Cut off, road and rail noise, long walk in

Compare hotel prices in Amsterdam for your dates:

First, the Mistake We Made

My first trip was during university. I hitchhiked from Exeter to Amsterdam, which took most of three days and a lot of standing on slip roads. I booked the cheapest hostel I could find right in the middle of town, somewhere in the seam between the Jordaan and Binnenstad, a few minutes from Centraal Station.

On the criteria I had at the time, it was perfect. It was cheap, it was basic in a way that didn’t matter at all when I was 19, and it was so close to the station that I could walk in off the train and immediately drop my backpack. If you’re arriving late, leaving early, or only have one night, being that close to Centraal is a good idea.

But here’s what I’ve learnt since (and I’ve grown up a bit): staying in the main centre of Amsterdam is not the best option for most trips. It’s busy, and it wears you down over a few days. The streets around Damrak and the Nieuwendijk are wall-to-wall with people, the shopping is the same chains you get everywhere, and the restaurants are the weakest in the city. The best places to eat in Amsterdam are almost all a ten-minute walk further out, in neighbourhoods where locals live.

Amsterdam is compact, so you do not need to be in the centre to be central.

Where to Stay in Amsterdam: The Jordaan

If you’re coming for the first time and you want the Amsterdam with quaint canals you’ve pictured, stay in the Jordaan.

It sits just west of the centre, close enough that you can walk to Dam Square in about ten minutes, but far enough that the crowds thin out the moment you cross into it. The main draw is the back canals — the quieter waterways behind the main ring, lined with narrow gabled houses and houseboats, where you can wander for an hour without hitting a tour group. It’s the part of the city that most rewards having no plan at all.

The Anne Frank House is here, on the Prinsengracht at the Jordaan’s eastern edge, which means the streets immediately around it get busy in the middle of the day. Walk two blocks north or west and it’s quiet again.

What we love most about the Jordaan is the eating and drinking. It’s full of small independent places rather than anything that feels engineered for visitors:

• Luuk Coffee — good coffee spot
• Margo’s — good for a slower breakfast
• Oslo — reliably excellent coffee
• Café Twee Prinsen — a wine bar for the end of the day, and a lovely spot to sit outside with canal views

There are independent shops scattered through it too, and enough bakeries that you’ll find yourself building the day around one. For a first visit, this is the area that gives you canals, good food and easy walking.

Not for you if: You want the cheapest bed in the city.

Where to Stay in Amsterdam: Oud-Oost, Around Oosterpark

This is our favourite, and it’s the one you won’t find on most guides.

On our most recent trip we stayed at Hotel V Oosterpark, on the corner of Oosterpark itself, and it’s one of the best hotels we’ve stayed in anywhere in Europe. The rooms are properly big — a huge, plush king bed that we both slept better in than we do at home — and one entire wall was a big glass window, looking straight out over the park. We were six floors up, so the view was all leafy canopy with people cycling through the paths below. Quintessential Amsterdam!

There’s a café downstairs that’s one of the better places we’ve worked from on a trip: hipster in the good way, comfortable, not pretentious, and with park views.

What makes the area work, though, is everything around it. Oud-Oost is residential and green and almost entirely untouristed, but it’s still only a short walk or a few minutes on the tram from the canal ring. You get to see a part of the city where people actually live, and then be among the canals whenever you want.

The food nearby is a real strength:

• Tomatillo — Mexican, and very good
• Al Dente Pastalab — Very basic decor, but fresh pasta and homemade tiramisu that more than makes up for it
• Olaf Brood — The local bakery
• Kaffee — The neighbourhood coffee spot

If you want somewhere a little more suburban, with green space and local restaurants and a sense of a neighbourhood, stay here. It’s the recommendation we make to friends now.

Not for you if: You want to roll out of bed into the canal ring, or you’re only in town for one night.

The Areas We Haven’t Slept In

We haven’t stayed in these, so we’re not going to pretend otherwise — but they come up constantly and they’re worth knowing about.

Grachtengordel and De 9 Straatjes is the canal ring proper: the postcard Amsterdam of stacked gabled houses and bridges, with the Nine Streets running through it full of small shops and cafés. It’s the most classically beautiful place to stay and priced accordingly. Central, walkable, busy.

Oud-Zuid and Museumplein is where the Rijksmuseum, the Van Gogh Museum and the Stedelijk sit, backing onto the Vondelpark. It’s calmer, greener and better suited to families, with the trade-off that evenings are quiet and you’ll be walking or taking a tram in for dinner.

De Pijp is the foodie neighbourhood — the Albert Cuyp market, a dense run of restaurants and bars, and a younger crowd. Great if eating out is the point of your trip, less so if you want canal views from your window.

Amsterdam Noord is across the IJ, reached by a free ferry from behind Centraal. It’s the budget-friendly option and has a distinct, slightly industrial-creative character, but you’re dependent on the ferry and it doesn’t feel like part of the same city.

Oud-West sits between the Jordaan and Vondelpark and is a reasonable middle ground: residential, decent food scene, less expensive than the canal ring.

Where Not to Stay in Amsterdam: The Docklands

I can be specific about this one, because I stayed there!

One of my Amsterdam visits was for a work conference at the Passenger Terminal Amsterdam, the big venue out on the eastern waterfront. I stayed at the Mövenpick Hotel Amsterdam City Centre, which sits directly beside it. The name is doing a lot of work there. It is not the city centre.

The hotel itself is fine, and the views over the port are good, but the location isn’t great. It’s a 25-minute walk back into town, which is long enough that you don’t want to do it more than once. It sits right up against a main road and the train tracks, so it can be noisy and not aesthetically pleasing depending on which side of the hotel your room faces. The transport connections are fine, but not easy.

If you have a conference at the PTA, it’s the obvious choice and it works fine given it’s a ten-second commute. For a weekend away, or a first visit, or honestly any trip where you’re not contractually obliged to be there, stay somewhere else.

How Long to Stay in Amsterdam

Amsterdam works well as a long weekend. Three nights is enough to see the major museums, walk most of the canal ring, and still have an afternoon with nothing planned — which is when the city is at its best.

If you’re staying longer than four nights, I’d suggest picking a neighbourhood like Oud-Oost or De Pijp over the canal ring. The centre is more enjoyable to visit than to live in, and the further out you base yourself, the more the trip feels like a stay rather than sightseeing.

Getting Around from Each Area

Amsterdam is walkable, and the tram network covers everything the walk doesn’t. From the Jordaan you can reach the centre, the Nine Streets and Westerpark on foot. From Oud-Oost, it’s around 20–25 minutes to walk into the canal ring, or a few minutes by tram.

Cycling is the obvious option everywhere, and most hotels can arrange hire. If you’ve never cycled in Amsterdam before, be aware the bike lanes move quickly and the etiquette is real.

The one thing worth planning around is Centraal Station. If you’re arriving late at night or catching an early Eurostar, the ten minutes you save by being close to it is the strongest argument for staying central — and just about the only one.