Affordable Hotels in Central London: Where to Stay in W1
Looking for cheap hotels in central London and refusing to move out to Zone 3 is a reasonable position, and it is more achievable than the average nightly rate suggests. The trick is knowing what you are actually buying. Inside W1 the affordable stock is almost entirely compact-room hotels: small, well-run, extremely central rooms where the saving comes out of the floor area rather than the address. This page names the ones that are genuinely inside the postcode, the ones a short walk outside it, and the booking decisions that move the rate most.
Wardour Street, Soho. Photo: Soho - Wardour Street by Oxfordian Kissuth (CC BY-SA 2.0), via Wikimedia Commons.
What you are trading away
W1 is one square mile of some of the most expensive land in Europe, and hotel rates follow land values. A cheap room here is not a cheap room in the way a chain hotel on a ring road is cheap. It is a small room in a very good position, run by an operator whose whole model is fitting more rooms into a Georgian townhouse than a traditional hotel would.
That is a genuinely good trade for most trips. If you are in London to be out, the room is where you sleep and shower, and ten minutes saved on every journey across four days is worth more than three extra square metres. If you are working from the room, or travelling as a family, it is a bad trade and you should look at the second list further down instead.
The other thing to know is that the discount comes off a high base. W1 compact rooms are cheap relative to Mayfair, not cheap relative to Britain.
The affordable hotels actually inside W1
These five are all within the W1 postcode, verified on their own published addresses.
The Z Hotel Soho, W1D
The best known of the compact-room hotels and the most central of the group, spread across converted Georgian townhouses off Wardour Street with a small internal courtyard. Rooms are small, quiet for Soho, and the location is as good as it gets: Leicester Square, Piccadilly Circus and Covent Garden are all a few minutes on foot. Book a room with a window unless you genuinely do not care, because the windowless categories are cheaper for a reason.
The Z Hotel Tottenham Court Road, W1F 7NH
The same format on the north eastern edge of Soho, which is the practical choice if you are arriving on the Elizabeth line or the Northern line. It is a shorter walk to the British Museum and Fitzrovia's restaurants than the Soho branch, and it is usually a little cheaper for the same room type on the same night.
The Z Hotel Gloucester Place, W1U 8JF
Marylebone, and the quietest of the three Z addresses in W1. Gloucester Place is a wide Georgian street a few minutes from Baker Street and Marylebone High Street, and it suits anyone who wants central London without Soho's noise. Regent's Park is a ten minute walk north.
The Resident Soho, W1D 3BR
A step up in size and price from the Z Hotels, on Carlisle Street just off Soho Square. The distinguishing feature is that the rooms have a small kitchenette with a microwave, fridge and coffee machine, which makes a real difference on a longer stay or with children, because breakfast and a couple of meals stop being restaurant meals. Not budget, but good value for what it is in this location.
The Piccadilly London West End, W1D 6EX
A larger, more conventional hotel on Great Windmill Street between Piccadilly Circus and Shaftesbury Avenue, aimed squarely at theatre visitors. Rooms are normal sized rather than compact and rates move a lot with the calendar, so it is worth checking even if it looks out of range at first glance: midweek in the low season it competes with the compact hotels.
Just outside W1, and worth it
The W1 boundary is an administrative line, not a distance. These four are outside it and close enough that you would not notice.
Premier Inn London Leicester Square, WC2H 7BP. A short walk from the southern edge of W1, full sized rooms, and the most predictable product on this list. If you want a normal hotel room rather than a compact one at a central London address, this is usually the cheapest way to get one.
The Z Hotel Covent Garden, WC2E 9ED. The same compact format, one district east, on Bedford Street. Better for theatre and the river, slightly worse for Oxford Street.
The Z Hotel Victoria, SW1W 0NR. Further out and priced accordingly, with the compensation of Victoria station on the doorstep for Gatwick trains and the coach station.
Premier Inn London County Hall, SE1. Across the river at Waterloo, with some rooms facing the Thames and Westminster. It adds about fifteen minutes on foot to anywhere in W1 and takes a noticeable amount off the rate.
How to actually cut the rate
Move the dates before you move the hotel. The same room in the same hotel varies enormously by night. January and February are the cheapest months in central London by a distance, and a Sunday to Thursday stay is usually cheaper than a Friday to Sunday one in the Soho hotels, though the pattern reverses at the business hotels.
Read the room category, not the star rating. Compact, cabin, inside and interior all mean small, and some mean no window. That is a fine thing to buy deliberately and an unpleasant surprise to discover on arrival.
Check the direct rate against the aggregator. The compact-room operators run their own booking engines and frequently match or beat the aggregators, sometimes with a flexible cancellation the cheap aggregator rate does not include.
Do not pay for breakfast. You are in the middle of one of the best breakfast cities in Europe. Book room only.
Ignore parking entirely. Nowhere in W1 is worth driving to. The Congestion Charge applies, on-street parking is metered and scarce, and car parks here cost more per day than the room discount you were chasing. Our guide to parking in W1 sets out the numbers if you have no choice.
Where not to book
Two patterns are worth avoiding. The first is anything advertising itself as central London while sitting on the Bayswater or Paddington fringe at a rate that seems too good: the saving is real but the walk is not what the listing implies, and the stock in that belt is very variable. The second is a hostel dormitory booked as a private room upgrade, which frequently ends up costing more than a compact hotel room while giving you a shared bathroom.
If a rate inside W1 looks dramatically below everything around it, look at the cancellation terms. In this market the very cheapest rates are almost always non-refundable and non-changeable, which is fine if your plans are fixed and expensive if they are not.
Frequently Asked Questions
Are there genuinely cheap hotels inside W1?
Yes, but the saving comes from room size rather than location. The compact-room operators, principally Z Hotels and The Resident, have several addresses inside W1 and price well below the district's average because the rooms are small and efficient rather than because they are on the edge of it. If you want a large room in W1 at a low rate, that combination does not exist.
Which is the cheapest area of W1 to stay in?
Fitzrovia and the northern edge of Soho around Tottenham Court Road, usually. Mayfair is the most expensive part of the postcode by a wide margin and there is very little budget stock in it at all. Marylebone sits in between, and the streets north of Marylebone Road are cheaper again while still being a walk from Oxford Street.
Is it cheaper to stay just outside W1?
Often, and the walk is shorter than people expect. Leicester Square, Covent Garden and Victoria are all WC2 or SW1 rather than W1 but are minutes from the W1 boundary on foot. Waterloo and the South Bank are cheaper again and add about fifteen minutes and a bridge.
What is a compact or cabin room?
A deliberately small room, typically around 10 to 12 square metres, with a fixed bed, a wall-mounted television and a compact en suite shower. Some categories have no external window at all and are priced accordingly. They are perfectly comfortable for sleeping and short stays and cramped for anything longer, so read the room category name before booking rather than after.
When are central London hotel rates lowest?
Sunday to Thursday outside the summer and the run-up to Christmas. Weekends are leisure-priced and midweek is business-priced, so which is cheaper varies by hotel: the Soho and Covent Garden hotels are often dearer at weekends, while the ones aimed at business travellers can be dearer midweek. January and February are the two genuinely cheap months.
Do I need to book breakfast with the room?
Almost never in W1. Every hotel in this guide is surrounded by cafés that will serve you breakfast for a fraction of a hotel rate, and the compact-room operators mostly do not have a restaurant anyway. Book the room only and eat out.
Where to look next
Pick the district before the hotel, because the character of W1 changes street by street. Our guide to where to stay in W1 covers the areas in more detail, the best boutique hotels in Soho covers the next tier up, and cheap eats in Soho and Chinatown is where the rest of the budget should go. The W1 London homepage has the full set of guides. Confirm current rates and room categories on each hotel's own site before booking.