Edinburgh’s centre is small enough that nowhere central is inconvenient, so the choice is really about atmosphere, noise and price.
The Old Town
The ridge from the castle to Holyrood: the Royal Mile, the Grassmarket, Cowgate.
Suits: first visits, short stays, anyone who wants to walk out into it. Trade-off: the most touristed part of the city, restaurants of variable quality, and noise. The Cowgate and Grassmarket have late bars and clubs, and rooms above them are loud until three at weekends. Buildings are old, stairs are steep and lifts are often absent.
The New Town
The Georgian grid north of Princes Street: George Street, Queen Street, Charlotte and St Andrew Squares.
Suits: almost everyone. Handsome, quiet at night, ten minutes’ walk from the Old Town, with the better shops and a good run of restaurants on Thistle Street and around Broughton. Trade-off: more expensive than the outer districts, and George Street itself has a weekend bar scene.
Stockbridge
Fifteen minutes downhill from Princes Street, in the valley of the Water of Leith.
Suits: returning visitors, families, longer stays. Village feel, independent shops, a Sunday market, and the Botanics nearby. Trade-off: the walk back into town is genuinely uphill. Buses are frequent.
Leith
The port, twenty minutes by tram.
Suits: food, value, and anyone who wants a neighbourhood rather than a set. The city’s best restaurants are here. Trade-off: you are commuting to the sights, though the tram makes that trivial.
The south side
Newington, Marchmont and Bruntsfield: tenement districts near the university, full of students in term and Fringe performers in August.
Suits: budget, and being near the Meadows and Arthur’s Seat. Trade-off: twenty minutes’ walk to the Royal Mile, and a lot of it uphill.
The west end and Haymarket
Around Lothian Road and Haymarket station. Well placed for the concert halls and theatres, and for trains west.
Suits: anyone arriving by rail from Glasgow, or going to the Usher Hall.
What to check before booking
Stairs and lifts. Edinburgh’s tenements and Old Town buildings frequently have no lift, and a “second floor” flat can be four flights up a stone turnpike stair. Ask explicitly.
Noise, if you are anywhere near the Cowgate, Grassmarket or George Street. Ask for a rear-facing room.
August. Book months ahead — by January is not too early — and expect roughly double. Many residents let their flats and leave, so the supply of short lets is genuinely larger than at other times, but so is demand.
Short-term lets now require a licence in Edinburgh, and the council operates a control-zone scheme for the city. Supply has tightened as a result and enforcement is real; book through a platform that will rehouse you if a listing is pulled.
The visitor levy applies from 2026 as a percentage of the room rate.
The short answer
First visit: the New Town, or the Old Town if you want atmosphere over sleep. Everyone else: Stockbridge or Leith.
Hogmanay
The other date to plan around. Edinburgh’s New Year is a three-day event with a torchlight procession, a street party and a concert, and accommodation over 30 December to 1 January is priced like August. Book early or stay out of the centre.
Note that the street party is ticketed and the city centre is fenced on the night, which affects getting back to a hotel inside the cordon. Check where your accommodation sits relative to it.
Arriving by train
Waverley is in the valley between the two towns, with exits at both levels — Market Street at the bottom and Princes Street at the top via ramps and steps. It is central to the point of being under the city.
Haymarket, a mile west, is more convenient for the west end and for the Usher Hall. Most services from Glasgow and the west call at both.
A note on stairs
This deserves repeating because it is the most common Edinburgh accommodation complaint. Old Town tenements and New Town townhouses were built before lifts and many still have none. A stone turnpike stair with a suitcase, on the fourth floor, in the rain, is a specific and avoidable experience.
Ask the property directly: how many flights, and is there a lift.
Staying longer
For a week or more, Stockbridge, Bruntsfield, Marchmont and Leith all become sensible in a way they are not for two nights. You get a local high street, a supermarket, ordinary prices and a bus or tram in, and after three days that is worth more than being able to walk to the castle.
Edinburgh’s short-let licensing has reduced the supply of whole-flat rentals considerably since 2023, so book earlier than you would have needed to a few years ago.