Best arrondissement to stay in Paris

Most visitors ask the question by number: which arrondissement should I book? The number is a useful shortcut, because the spiral makes the 1st to the 4th the historic centre and the 20th the outer edge. It is also an imperfect one. An arrondissement can hold two very different neighbourhoods (the 9th stretches from the Opéra to South Pigalle), and one neighbourhood can straddle two (the Marais is half in the 3rd and half in the 4th). This page therefore starts from the number, then ties each arrondissement to the area guide that covers it.

Which arrondissement for whom

These shortcuts are our reading of the data and not measurements; the table and sections below give the figures behind each one.

Photo: Uoaei1, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

• First visit: the 1st, the 2nd, the 3rd and 4th together, and the 6th, with the Louvre between 12 and 17 minutes from the reference points of those areas; also the 5th and, around the Gare Montparnasse, the 14th and 15th, at 24 and 23 minutes.
• Families: the 7th and 15th around the Champ-de-Mars, the 12th around Bercy and the 5th around the Jardin des Plantes.
• Small budget: the 14th and 15th around Montparnasse, the 10th, the 11th, the 18th and the 12th, which hold the five areas with the most 1★ and 2★ hotels in our counts (31, 27, 17, 12 and 11), then the 2nd and 9th around the Opéra for 3★.
• Nightlife: the 11th around Bastille and Oberkampf, and the 9th around Pigalle.
• Luxury: the 8th, with 45 hotels rated 5★ and eight of the thirteen 2026 Palaces, and the 1st, with 17 rated 5★.

The 20 arrondissements in numbers

The counts come from the Atout France register of classified hotels, exported on 4 October 2026. They cover hotels only. The register holds 1,588 hotels and 85,805 rooms for the whole of Paris, and the 8th and 9th arrondissements hold the most rooms. Where an arrondissement has its own page on this site, its number links to it. The 5th, which is our Latin Quarter, and the 3rd and 4th, which are the Marais, also have a sister guide each.

Photo: Maria Eklind, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Reading the stars is the quickest way to read the table. The 8th, 1st and 16th have the highest share of 5★ hotels (45 of 154, 17 of 71 and 13 of 76), the 9th and the 17th the largest 3★ and 4★ stocks (158 and 105 hotels), and the 10th and the 14th the most 1★ and 2★ hotels (27 and 22), ahead of the 11th and the 18th with 17 each. The 19th and 20th have few hotels at all.

From arrondissement to area

The table at the top of this page lists the thirteen areas and the arrondissements they cover, with the travel times from one reference point per area to the Louvre, the Eiffel Tower and Notre-Dame. Two practical rules follow. First, the Eiffel Tower area and the Champs-Élysées are the two where the tower is a shorter trip than the Louvre (14 and 19 minutes against 21 and 20), and the Eiffel Tower area pays for it in distance from Notre-Dame; Montparnasse is level, at 23 minutes to each. Second, the 9th is two areas: the Opéra side, with metro lines 3, 7, 8 and 9 and the RER A and E, and the Pigalle side, which is livelier at night. Third, Montparnasse straddles the 14th and 15th, which are counted whole in that area: 206 classified hotels, 31 of them rated 1★ or 2★.

Photo: Polymagou, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Left Bank, Right Bank

The Left Bank gathers the 5th, 6th, 7th, 13th and 14th and nearly all of the 15th. For a visitor the bank changes one price: the airport taxi flat fares, in 2026, are €56 from Roissy to the Right Bank and €65 to the Left Bank, and €45 from Orly to the Right Bank and €36 to the Left Bank. The 1st, the 2nd and the 9th are on the Right Bank. The comparison of the two banks as places to sleep is a separate question that our home page answers area by area.

If you are looking for somewhere to live

This guide is about a stay of a few nights. Rankings of arrondissements to live in answer other questions (schools, rents, local life), and none of the figures here is meant for that purpose.