New hotels in Center City, Philadelphia

Center City is the part of Philadelphia that fits between the Schuylkill and the Delaware, laid out on William Penn's grid, with City Hall planted in the middle of it at Broad and Market. Nine hotels in our guide have opened here since 2017, with 2,218 rooms between them. Their sizes run from a twelve-room Victorian rowhouse on Locust Street to the 499-room Notary Hotel behind City Hall.

What they share is a building story. Five of the nine occupy old buildings: a 1925 bank tower, a 1926 courthouse, a 1904 Broad Street landmark, a 19th-century office building and a Victorian rowhouse. The other four are new construction, from a 15-story tower on the Avenue of the Arts to a skyscraper that, at 1,121 feet, is the tallest building between New York and Chicago.

What to do in Center City

For a weekend

Begin at City Hall, which you will be seeing from most of the hotels below anyway. The tower is 548 feet to the top of the William Penn statue, and a small elevator, four visitors at a time, takes tour groups up to the observation deck just beneath his feet. Tours run on weekdays, so check the schedule before planning a Saturday around it. Dilworth Park, on the west side of the building, has the fountain and the ice rink in winter, and Love Park, the plaza with the LOVE sculpture, is a block northwest where the Parkway begins. In the weeks before Christmas, the Christmas Village, a German-style market, sets up in Love Park and around City Hall.

Eat at Reading Terminal Market, at 12th and Arch, which has been open since 1893 under the old railroad shed. The Pennsylvania Convention Center now sits on top of it. Canopy by Hilton Philadelphia Center City is a few blocks south, and The Notary is a two-minute walk from the same doors. The market is open daily from eight in the morning to six in the evening, and the lunch counters are full by noon on weekends, so go early or go late.

Walk Broad Street south after dinner. The Avenue of the Arts starts around City Hall and runs down past the Academy of Music, built between 1855 and 1857 and the oldest opera house in the country still used as one. A block or so further sits the Kimmel Center at Broad and Spruce, where the Philadelphia Orchestra plays in the 2,500-seat Marian Anderson Hall.

For a longer stay

Give a day to the Benjamin Franklin Parkway. It leaves City Hall at an angle and heads northwest to the Philadelphia Museum of Art, a little over a mile from the tower. On the way you pass the Franklin Institute, the Barnes Foundation and the Rodin Museum, and the Four Seasons stands a few blocks from Logan Square, the Parkway's first stop. Walking the whole stretch takes half an hour without stops; with a museum or two, it takes the day.

The Wanamaker Organ, in the former department store at 13th and Market, plays most days and costs nothing to hear. Chinatown begins just north of Market around 10th Street, a short walk from the Convention Center.

Independence Hall is the other direction, east along Market Street, about a mile from the Aloft and a little less from the hotels around 12th Street. For the colonial sights and the riverfront bars, see Old City. For restaurants, boutiques and the park, go west to Rittenhouse Square, about fifteen minutes on foot from City Hall.

Getting around from Center City

Most of the nine hotels need no transit at all. When you do need it, two stations matter. Suburban Station, under 16th Street and John F. Kennedy Boulevard, is where the SEPTA Airport Line starts, and trains to the airport take roughly 25 minutes. Amtrak and the rest of the regional rail network use 30th Street Station, about a mile west of City Hall across the Schuylkill.

Underground, the Broad Street Line runs north to south beneath Broad, with a City Hall station in the middle of the district. Heading south, it ends at the stadium complex, which makes it the plain way to reach a Phillies, Eagles or Sixers game from the Avenue of the Arts hotels. Along Market Street, the subway-surface trolleys and the Market-Frankford Line cover the east-west axis between Old City and University City.

The grid helps. Streets running east-west carry names, such as Market, Chestnut, Walnut and Locust, and the north-south streets are numbered, rising from the Delaware to the Schuylkill. A hotel at 1439 Chestnut is therefore between Broad (14th) and 15th, a block off City Hall, and one at 219 South Broad sits just south of Walnut.

Where to stay in Center City

East Market and Chestnut Street

East Market is the stretch of Market Street east of City Hall that spent decades half empty and was rebuilt in the 2010s. Canopy by Hilton opened here in August 2020 in the Stephen Girard Building, at 12th and Ludlow, with AvroKO designing the interiors and BLT Architects the building work. It has 236 rooms, with starting rates around $170. The facade is old, the interior was rebuilt, and Reading Terminal Market and Chinatown are both a few blocks away.

W Philadelphia went up on Chestnut Street at number 1439, in a new tower built alongside an Element hotel as a $280 million dual-branded project. It opened in August 2021 with 295 rooms, 39 of them suites, a heated rooftop pool club and an Italian restaurant. Rates start around $220. It is W's usual nightlife-forward formula, in a new building rather than a retrofitted one.

A few blocks south and west, the Guild House Hotel opened in September 2021 at 1307 Locust Street, in Washington Square West. It is a Victorian rowhouse that once housed the New Century Guild, a women's organization, and has twelve rooms, each named after a Guild member. Rates start near $270. This is the quiet corner of the list. Washington Square West has the neighborhood restaurants and the rowhouse blocks, and not the office towers.

City Hall and the Convention Center

The Notary Hotel, Philadelphia, Autograph Collection sits on North Juniper Street, directly behind City Hall, in the former Municipal Court Building. The 1926 Classical Revival courthouse had been a Courtyard by Marriott before Braemar Hotels & Resorts spent about $20 million on the conversion and reopened it in July 2019 with 499 rooms. It keeps the original marble and the vaulted spaces. The Notary is the biggest hotel in this guide, and rates start around $190.

Aloft Philadelphia Downtown is on North Broad Street, attached to the Convention Center. The building went up in 1925 as the Liberty Title & Trust Building and stood vacant for about twenty years before HRI Properties and Realen Properties redeveloped it. Aloft opened in August 2017 with 179 loft-style rooms designed by Stonehill Taylor, and rates start near $150. Leisure travelers should know it favors the conference crowd; Independence Hall is a mile away.

Avenue of the Arts

Cambria Hotel Philadelphia Downtown Center City opened in March 2018 at 219 South Broad Street, a new 15-story tower with 223 rooms and a rooftop restaurant. It was Choice Hotels' first Cambria in Philadelphia. At around $130 a night to start, it is the least expensive hotel in the guide.

Close by, The Bellevue Hotel, in The Unbound Collection by Hyatt reopened in November 2024. The 1904 building, long known as the Grande Dame of Broad Street, had been Park Hyatt Philadelphia at The Bellevue. It closed for roughly a year for renovation and now has 184 rooms and 39 suites. Rates start around $330, and it is the newest opening here.

Rittenhouse edge and Logan Square

Hyatt Centric Center City Philadelphia opened in October 2020 at 1620 Chancellor Street, a 13-story tower with 332 rooms, five years in construction. Its rooftop restaurant, Patchwork, takes its quilt-pattern theme from the city's neighborhoods, with interiors by CRÈME. The location is just off Rittenhouse Square, so for an evening of restaurants the walk is short. Rates start around $155.

At the other end, Four Seasons Hotel Philadelphia at Comcast Center opened in August 2019 in the Foster + Partners tower. Guests enter through a ground-floor lobby shared with the Comcast campus and ride a dedicated elevator to the top. There are 219 rooms, 39 of them suites, a Jean-Georges Vongerichten restaurant on floor 60 and a full-floor spa with an indoor infinity pool. Starting rates sit near $400, the highest in the guide.

Which hotel in Center City for your trip

For a convention at the Pennsylvania Convention Center, the choice is between The Notary and Aloft, both a few minutes on foot. The Notary has the larger room count and more of a landmark building; Aloft is cheaper and physically connected.

For theater and concerts on Broad Street, the Cambria and The Bellevue put you within a few blocks of the Academy of Music and the Kimmel Center. Cambria costs less than half as much, roughly $130 against $330 at the Bellevue, and the Bellevue gives you a hotel that has stood on this corner since 1904.

For dinner on Rittenhouse Square, the Hyatt Centric is the nearest. For museums on the Parkway, the Four Seasons is. For a first visit built around Reading Terminal Market, Chinatown and the Convention Center district, Canopy sits closest.

Couples who want a small place should look at the Guild House, with twelve rooms. Anyone who wants a rooftop pool in summer should look at the W, whose pool club is heated.

Frequently asked questions

What is the newest hotel to open in Center City?

The Bellevue Hotel, in The Unbound Collection by Hyatt, which reopened in November 2024 after a roughly yearlong renovation. Before that came the Guild House Hotel and W Philadelphia, in September and August 2021.

Which Center City hotel is closest to the Pennsylvania Convention Center?

Aloft Philadelphia Downtown, which is attached to it. The Notary Hotel is about two minutes on foot, and Canopy by Hilton is a few blocks south.

Is Center City walkable?

Yes. City Hall, the Avenue of the Arts, East Market, the Convention Center and Rittenhouse Square all sit within roughly a fifteen to twenty minute walk of one another on the grid. The Parkway museums and Independence Hall are longer walks, around a mile from City Hall.

Which Center City hotel has the best views?

The Four Seasons Hotel Philadelphia at Comcast Center, whose guest floors and 60th-floor restaurant sit at the top of a 1,121-foot tower. Nothing else in the city sits higher.

Which is the biggest hotel in Center City among new openings?

The Notary Hotel, with 499 rooms. The Hyatt Centric follows with 332, then W Philadelphia with 295.

How far is Center City from Old City?

About a ten to fifteen minute walk east along Market Street into Old City.