Star ratings for hotels have long been a gray area in Russia, and for years many properties claimed stars that bore little relation to their actual facilities, and even less to the expectations of foreign visitors. While there is now a single state-managed star system operating for hotels in Russia, far from all St. Petersburg hotels have signed up to it and many still award themselves stars with little justification (this is particularly common among supposedly "four-star" small hotels). Moreover, the system itself is overly concerned with at times obscure technical criteria rather - the speed of hotel lifts is actually taken into consideration - than the overall experience for guests. For this reason, we have designed our own classification system of St. Petersburg hotels, which we hope will give you a better idea of what hotels in St. Petersburg can offer. If, however, you prefer to follow the state hotel-rating system, click here to see St. Petersburg hotels by star-rating.
Best in class
Here you'll find the St. Petersburg hotels that we at SAINT-PETERSBURG.COM rate as the very best in each class. Whatever category or type of hotel you're looking for, you can be sure that these hotels, carefully selected and monitored by our editors and travel experts, will live up to - or even surpass - your most exacting expectations.
Luxury Hotels
St. Petersburg's Luxury Hotels are the properties that fully conform to international 5-star standards for accommodation and service, with a full complement of leisure, fitness, meeting, and fine-dining facilities. They also boast historic or designer interiors, and exceptional levels of comfort in guest accommodation. All St. Petersburg's luxury hotels are located in the downtown area, close to the city's top historic attractions.
Deluxe Hotels
Deluxe Hotels in St. Petersburg are those properties which don't quite live up to five-star status, usually due to a lack of some business of leisure facilities, but nonetheless boast luxurious accommodation and a unique character that sets them apart from more bland but possibly better equipped hotels. This category includes those small St. Petersburg hotels that can reasonably be classified as "boutique", as well as larger hotels that just fall short of the luxury mark.
Business Class Hotels
The main criterion for the hotels that we classify as Business Class is that they fully conform to international 4-star standards. This means that they are guaranteed to have a full range of business and leisure facilities, including fitness centre and a reasonable number of well-equipped conferencing facilities. Most hotels in this category are from well-known international chains, and they tend to offer reliable and familiar standards rather than atmosphere or local character.
Superior Hotels
St. Petersburg's Superior Hotels are all properties which, whether by dint of more extensive services or more attractive and better equipped accommodation, offer something more than the bare minimum required to meet international 3-star standards. This includes a number of stylish small hotels in the historic center, as well as some larger 4-star hotels where accommodation is less attractive but a full range of business and leisure facilities is available.
Standard Hotels
What we classify as Standard Hotels in St. Petersburg may not be luxurious, but they do offer international-standard 3-star accommodation, and many offer reasonable facilities for business and leisure. Some may even qualify for four stars under the Russian state system. Among the Standard Hotels featured here are several of the better-quality "mini-hotels", offering inexpensive accommodation in the city centre.
Budget Hotels
Our Budget Hotels are the cheapest hotel accommodation in St. Petersburg that we feel is of a quality that will be acceptable to our users. This can be found at older Soviet-era hotels, some of which offer aging economy-class rooms as well as more comfortable renovated rooms, and at some new "mini-hotels", most of which have better locations and more friendly staff, but which lack all but the most basic facilities for business and leisure.
If you would prefer to search for hotels according to their official star-rating, you can do so here.
