The Cheapest Way to Wake Up in the Middle of Paris
Step out of the door and you are two minutes from Rue Montorgueil, three from a metro interchange serving three lines, and eighteen from the Louvre. That is the entire case for Hotel Aboukir, and it is a genuinely strong one: almost nothing else at this price puts you inside the 2nd arrondissement, on the Sentier fringe, with the Right Bank on your doorstep.
The hotel occupies a traditional Parisian block on rue d'Aboukir with around 37 rooms, from small doubles and triples up to a quad, plus an eight-bunk women-only dormitory. Rooms are plain and white with tiled floors, a flat-screen, a wardrobe and a radiator, and every one has its own shower and basin. Reception is staffed all night and will store your bags for free for a few hours after you check out.
It is officially non-classé, meaning unrated rather than one-star, and it makes no claim to be anything else. Its guest rating, across well over a thousand reviews, is among the lowest we have published. The next two sections explain exactly why, because you should book this place knowing, not hoping.
Shower in the Room, Toilet on the Landing
This is the fact that catches more guests out than anything else. Listings show a private bathroom, and there is truth in it: every room has its own shower cubicle and basin, sometimes standing right in the room beside the bed. What most rooms do not have is their own WC. The toilet is on the landing and shared with the other rooms on that floor.
Some rooms do have their own toilet. If that matters to you, ask for one when you book and ask again at the desk, because guests who did were given one and guests who did not found out at ten at night. It is the single most useful question you can put to reception here.
The other structural fact is the stairs. There is no lift and rooms go up to five flights; one guest counted around eighty steps to their door. Pack light, and if you cannot manage stairs, this is not the hotel for you, because there is no ground-floor alternative on record.
What the Low Score Is Actually About
Cleanliness is the lowest-rated thing here and it is the reason the overall rating sits where it does. Guests report cockroaches often enough that we are not going to soften it: several 2026 reviews mention seeing them. One guest reported a strong sewage smell in room 13, apparently from a drain pipe running through the corner, and advised avoiding that room specifically. Others describe rooms as small, worn and not much like the photographs, and the street outside is noisy late.
Set against that, and consistently, is the staff. Even reviewers who rated the place poorly stop to say the men on the desk were great, that they were lent a fridge for something perishable, that their bags were kept free of charge. Location, staff and Wi-Fi are what hold the rating up. Comfort and facilities are what pull it down.
Two practical things before you arrive. Payment is cash only in euros, so withdraw before you get here. And the only extra charged on arrival is the Paris tourist tax, which for an unclassified property is calculated as a small percentage of the nightly rate per person, subject to a city-wide cap, with under-18s exempt.
Why Book Hotel Aboukir?
This is a cheap, unrated walk-up in one of the best-connected spots in central Paris, and it is one of the lowest-scoring properties we have ever written about. We are going to be straight with you about both halves of that sentence.
Three minutes to three metro lines
Strasbourg-Saint-Denis, where lines 4, 8 and 9 all meet, is about 180 metres away. Bonne Nouvelle is four minutes, Châtelet-Les Halles and its RER lines fourteen, and Gare de l'Est and Gare du Nord are both walkable with light bags. Location is the highest thing on the score card and it is genuinely earned.
Rue Montorgueil is two minutes away
The cobbled market street with Stohrer, the oldest pâtisserie in Paris, opened in 1730, is a two to three minute walk south. The covered passages are five to eight minutes, the Grand Rex is on the boulevard, and the Louvre is an eighteen-minute walk. You are properly in the middle of it.
The desk is staffed all night, and people are kind
Reception runs 24 hours, which matters on a late arrival, and bags can be left free for a few hours after check-out. Guest after guest, even the ones scoring it four out of ten, goes out of their way to say the staff were good to them.
And now the part you need to read
Cleanliness is the weakest thing on the score card and guests repeatedly report cockroaches, damp and smells. Rooms are small and worn. There is no lift and up to five flights of stairs. The toilet is usually on the landing. Payment is cash only. If any of that is a dealbreaker, book somewhere else, and we would rather you did.
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Interesting Points About Hotel Aboukir
- The hotel is officially non-classé under the French system, which means unrated rather than one-star
- Every room has a shower and basin inside it, but the toilet is usually shared on the landing, despite listings labelling it a private bathroom
- Alongside the private rooms there is an eight-bunk women-only dormitory; men must book a private room
- Strasbourg-Saint-Denis, where metro lines 4, 8 and 9 meet, is about 180 metres from the door
- Listings showing a forest and bus stops twelve kilometres away are mis-geocoded to a different commune entirely
- The Roissybus from Opéra to Charles de Gaulle stopped permanently on 1 March 2026, so any advice to use it is out of date
- Two other properties on this street muddle the search results: Hôtel Royal Aboukir at number 106 and Sweet Inn Aboukir II at number 130. Neither is this hotel
Rooms & Accommodation at Hotel Aboukir
Double Room with Shared Toilet
13 m², shower in the room, shared WC
Thirteen square metres with a double bed, a flat-screen, a wardrobe and its own shower and basin, with the toilet shared on the landing. Best for a couple who want the cheapest central Paris bed they can find and will be out all day. Ask at booking whether a room with its own WC is available, because some are, and the difference matters more than the size does.
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Triple Room with Shared Toilet
15 m², sleeps three
Fifteen square metres for three people, which one guest described as small but genuinely enough room for three. Best for friends splitting the cost of a central Paris base rather than for anyone planning to spend time in the room. The toilet is shared on the landing unless you have specifically been given a room with its own.
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Quadruple Room
18 m², four beds
Eighteen square metres with four beds, which is the family and small-group option here. Best for four people travelling on a tight budget who are prepared for the stairs and can share a landing toilet. There are no extra beds available beyond the four, and a cot can be requested free for children under two.
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Single Bed in Female Dormitory
One bunk, women only
A single bunk in an eight-bed women-only dormitory, which is the cheapest bed in the building. Best for a solo woman traveller who wants a central Paris base at hostel money and does not mind sharing. Men cannot book this and must take a private room instead. Note that one listing quotes eighteen twin beds for this dorm, which appears to be a data error rather than the reality.
Check PricesIs Hotel Aboukir Right for You?
Best Suited For
- Price-led travellers who want a genuinely central Right Bank base and will be out of the room all day
- Solo women travellers, thanks to the eight-bunk women-only dormitory
- Anyone arriving very late or leaving very early, given the 24-hour desk and free short-term luggage storage
- Light packers who can carry a bag up five flights without complaint
Worth Considering Alternatives If
- Anyone who is not prepared to encounter cockroaches, which recent guests report regularly
- Guests who need their own toilet, unless they have confirmed a room that has one
- Anyone with mobility limitations, since there is no lift and no ground-floor room on record
- Travellers without cash, because no cards of any kind are accepted
Amenities and House Rules
In Your Room
- Shower and basin inside the room
- Private toilet
- Free toiletries, towels and a hairdryer
- Flat-screen TV
- Heating and a fan
- Wardrobe or closet
- Iron and ironing facilities
- Tile or marble floor
- Free Wi-Fi
The Building
- Reception staffed 24 hours
- Free luggage storage for a few hours
- Express and private check-in and check-out, invoice on request
- 24-hour security, CCTV and smoke alarms
- Not available: Lift
- Not available: Step-free access
Food and Drink
- Not available: Breakfast
- Not available: Restaurant or bar
- Tea and coffee facilities in some rooms
- Fridge
Getting About
- Strasbourg-Saint-Denis, metro lines 4, 8 and 9, about 180 m away
- Bonne Nouvelle, lines 8 and 9, about 350 m
- Châtelet-Les Halles with RER A, B and D, about a 14-minute walk
- Gare de l'Est about a 14-minute walk and Gare du Nord about 18
- Not available: Parking
- Not available: Bike storage
House Rules
- Not available: Cards
- The Paris tourist tax is payable on arrival and is the only extra charged
- Not available: Pets
- Non-smoking throughout
- Children of any age welcome, and a cot is free on request for under-twos
- Not available: Extra beds
- The dormitory is women only; men must book a private room
Location and Getting There
Rue d'Aboukir runs through the Sentier, the old garment district of the 2nd arrondissement, and the hotel sits at its eastern end near Porte Saint-Denis. This is the smallest and most central arrondissement in Paris, walkable end to end in about twenty minutes, and this particular corner of it is workaday and lively rather than genteel: wholesalers, market streets, theatres and a good deal of night-time noise.
The transport is the reason to be here. Strasbourg-Saint-Denis, where metro lines 4, 8 and 9 meet, is about 180 metres away, roughly three minutes on foot. Bonne Nouvelle is four or five minutes, Sentier six. Châtelet-Les Halles, with RER lines A, B and D, is a fourteen-minute walk, and both Gare de l'Est and Gare du Nord are walkable with light luggage.
On foot from the door: Rue Montorgueil in two or three minutes, the Grand Rex and the Grands Boulevards in two to five, the covered passages in five to eight, the Bourse de Commerce in fifteen, the Louvre in eighteen and Sainte-Chapelle in twenty-two. The Eiffel Tower is about five kilometres away and takes thirty to forty minutes by metro, whatever some listings imply. Ignore any listing showing a forest or bus stops twelve kilometres out: those entries are mis-geocoded to another commune.
- Strasbourg-Saint-Denis metro, lines 4, 8 and 9: About 180 m, a 3-minute walk
- Rue Montorgueil market street: About 200 m, a 2 to 3 minute walk
- Grand Rex and the Grands Boulevards: About 200 to 400 m, a 2 to 5 minute walk
- Passage du Grand-Cerf and Passage des Panoramas: About 400 to 600 m, a 5 to 8 minute walk
- Châtelet-Les Halles, RER A, B and D: About 1.1 km, a 14-minute walk
- Bourse de Commerce, Pinault Collection: About 1.2 km, a 15-minute walk
- Centre Pompidou: About 1.3 km, a 16-minute walk
- The Louvre: About 1.4 km, an 18-minute walk
- Sainte-Chapelle: About 1.7 km, a 22-minute walk
- Musée d'Orsay: About 2.6 km, roughly 12 minutes by metro
Getting to Key Locations
Within a 15-minute walk: 2 of the 3 places below.
Photo: Jean-Christophe BENOIST, CC BY-SA 3.0
Rue Montorgueil
3 min walk
A 3-minute walk south takes you onto the cobbled market street that feeds this whole quarter, lined with fishmongers, cheese shops, café terraces and Stohrer, the oldest pâtisserie in Paris, which opened in 1730 and claims the rum baba as its own. L'Escargot Montorgueil, listed and serving Burgundy snails since 1832, is a few doors along.
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Photo: Chabe01, CC BY-SA 4.0
The covered passages
6 min walk
A 6-minute walk gets you into the Passage des Panoramas, one of the oldest glass-roofed arcades in Paris, and the Passage du Grand-Cerf is closer still. Stamp dealers, tiny wine bars and bistro tables under an iron and glass roof: on a wet Paris afternoon these arcades are the best thing in the arrondissement.
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Photo: Benh LIEU SONG, CC BY-SA 3.0
The Louvre
18 min walk
An 18-minute walk south-west, or a couple of stops on line 4 and a change, brings you to the most visited museum on earth. Going on foot is the better plan from here: the route runs down through Les Halles and past the Bourse de Commerce, and you arrive at the pyramid rather than at a metro exit.
View on MapHow to Get to Hotel Aboukir
- From Charles de Gaulle Airport: Take the RER B towards Paris and get off at Châtelet-Les Halles, then metro line 4 two stops to Strasbourg-Saint-Denis, or walk the last fourteen minutes. Allow forty-five to fifty-five minutes and buy the Paris Region to airports ticket. Do not look for the Roissybus: it stopped permanently on 1 March 2026. A taxi to the Right Bank runs on a regulated flat fare of €56, the same day or night.
- From Orly Airport: Take metro line 14 straight into central Paris to Châtelet, then line 4 to Strasbourg-Saint-Denis; forty to fifty minutes with the same airport ticket. The regulated taxi flat fare to the Right Bank is €45.
- From Gare du Nord or Gare de l'Est: Both are close enough to walk, roughly fourteen to eighteen minutes with light luggage. Otherwise take metro line 4 southbound a couple of stops to Strasbourg-Saint-Denis and walk from there.
- Getting around once you are here: Buy a Navigo Easy card or use the Bonjour RATP app rather than paper tickets, which are being retired through 2026: they stopped working on buses in May and come off the rail network in June. A single metro journey is €2.55 and a bus or tram €2.05.
The 2nd Arrondissement and the Rest of Paris
The 2nd is the smallest arrondissement in Paris and one of the least touristed given how central it is. It wraps the old Bourse, holds most of the surviving covered passages, and runs from the Grands Boulevards down to Les Halles. Rue Montorgueil is its spine and the Sentier, historically the garment trade, is its working half. The stretch nearest this hotel, by Porte Saint-Denis, is the grittiest part of it and it is busy late.
Late spring and early autumn are the best months to be here. Budget travellers do notably better between December and March, when Paris rates soften and this address gets cheaper still. Nuit Blanche in autumn and the European Museum Night in late May are both worth timing a trip around, and the Grand Rex on the boulevard hosts premieres and concerts through the year.
Eat local. Stohrer on Rue Montorgueil has been making pastry since 1730 and L'Escargot Montorgueil has been doing snails since 1832; both are six or seven minutes on foot. The passages have small wine bars and bistros under glass. You are also fifteen minutes from the Bourse de Commerce, whose contemporary art sits inside a domed eighteenth-century rotunda reworked by Tadao Ando, though note the Paris Museum Pass is not valid there.
Watch: Two Days in Paris
A two-day run through the city on your doorstep, covering the sights and the food, most of which is within a short metro ride of rue d'Aboukir.
Is Hotel Aboukir worth it?
Only if you are buying position and price and nothing else. Three minutes from three metro lines, two from Rue Montorgueil, eighteen from the Louvre, with a desk staffed all night and staff who are genuinely kind. Against that: cockroaches reported regularly, a shared landing toilet, five flights of stairs and cash only. Book it if that trade is one you are making deliberately. If reading this made you wince, spend more.
What Guests Say About Hotel Aboukir
Scores and review counts are aggregated from verified guest bookings on major travel platforms.
Poor
There is no version of these reviews that flatters the building, and we are not going to construct one. Location, staff and Wi-Fi hold the score up; cleanliness, comfort and facilities pull it down, and cockroaches come up often enough in 2026 reviews to count as a pattern rather than bad luck. What is equally consistent is that guests keep praising the people on the desk, often in the same breath as describing a room they did not like. Read these before you book, and if they put you off, that is the reviews doing their job.
Summed it up as getting what you pay for. Loved being a step from the metro and buses with shops and restaurants everywhere, counted having a shower in the room as a plus even with shared toilets, and found the staff kind enough to let them use a fridge overnight for something perishable. Against that: room 13 smelled of sewage and felt musty, possibly from the drain running through the corner, and she advises saying yes if you are offered a room with its own toilet. The five flights of stairs were the other downside.
Had nothing but good words for the men at the counter. Everything else was miniature: a cramped room, a disappointing little shower, a tiny toilet and a doll-sized basin, reached after roughly eighty steps.
Rated the location and nothing else. His four words for the room were small, unclean, loud and smelly.
Called the location good and the room small, with very little space to move around in.
Thought it decent for the money: the space was small but there was genuinely enough room for three of them, and she rated the location highly.
Rated the location as the redeeming feature, and noted that what he found was not quite what the photographs online had shown.
Said the price and the location were fair and that was the end of the positives. He described rooms as decaying, with bare patches and cockroaches they kept away from, and added that the staff were very kind.
Valued the central position. His complaint was the same one others make: it did not quite look like the pictures online.
Was grateful the team kept the family's luggage for a few hours free of charge and liked the location. What spoiled it were cockroaches and people talking loudly outside late at night.
Rated the location. Found the room quite small and the bathroom especially tiny, which made the stay less comfortable than she had expected.
Good to Know Before You Book
Cash only, so bring euros
The bill is settled in cash at the desk. No cards of any kind are accepted, whatever some listings claim, so withdraw enough before you arrive. Beyond the room rate the only extra is the Paris tourist tax, charged per person per night, calculated as a small percentage of the nightly rate for an unclassified property and subject to a city-wide cap. Under-18s are exempt.
Five flights, and no lift
Rooms go up to the fifth floor and there is no lift; one guest counted about eighty steps to their door. Pack light, and if stairs are difficult this is not the right hotel, because no ground-floor room is documented.
Ask for a room with its own toilet
Every room has a shower and basin, but the WC is usually shared on the landing. Some rooms do have their own, and guests who asked were given one. Request it at booking and mention it again at check-in; it is the single most useful thing you can do here.
The desk is open all night, and bags can be left
Reception is staffed 24 hours, so a late arrival is genuinely fine, and staff will store luggage free for a few hours after check-out. Guests also report being allowed to use the reception fridge for perishables.
Cancellation terms depend on the rate
Conditions vary by room type and rate, and some rates are non-refundable. The terms that apply show before you confirm, so read them against your dates rather than assuming there is one policy.
Photos of Hotel Aboukir
Frequently Asked Questions
Both, in a way that catches people out. Every room has its own shower and basin inside it, but the toilet is usually on the landing and shared with the rest of that floor. Some rooms do have their own WC. Ask for one when you book and again at the desk, because guests who asked were given one and guests who assumed were not.
No. The building has no lift and rooms go up to five flights of stairs, with one guest counting around eighty steps to their door. There is no ground-floor room on record, so if stairs are a problem this is not a workable choice.
Strasbourg-Saint-Denis is about 180 metres away, roughly a three-minute walk, and it serves metro lines 4, 8 and 9. Bonne Nouvelle on lines 8 and 9 is about 350 metres, and Châtelet-Les Halles with the RER is a fourteen-minute walk. This is the single best thing about the hotel.
No, there is no parking on site and none can be arranged, and there is no bike storage either. Paid public car parks sit around Bourse and Réaumur-Sébastopol, five to ten minutes away, at central Paris rates. Given the metro is three minutes from the door, driving here is the wrong plan.
No breakfast is served, and there is no restaurant or bar. Some rooms have tea and coffee facilities. Rue Montorgueil, with Stohrer and a run of bakeries, is a two to three minute walk, which is a considerably better breakfast than any budget hotel buffet.
Check-in runs from 14:00 until midnight and check-out is between 11:30 and 12:00. Reception is staffed twenty-four hours, so arriving outside those hours is genuinely fine, and bags can be left free for a few hours after you check out.
Yes. The bill is settled in cash, in euros, at the desk, and no cards are accepted. Some listings claim otherwise and they are wrong. Withdraw before you arrive. The Paris tourist tax is also payable on arrival and is the only other charge.
No, pets are not allowed, and the property is non-smoking throughout.
About five kilometres, which is thirty to forty minutes by metro and not a walk. Some listings imply it is close by; it is not. What is close is the Louvre at an eighteen-minute walk, the Centre Pompidou at sixteen and Sainte-Chapelle at twenty-two.
No, and the confusion is common because they are on the same street. Hôtel Royal Aboukir is a three-star at number 106 with a lift and a pool. Sweet Inn Aboukir II at number 130 is a serviced apartment operation. This hotel is at number 134, is unrated, has no lift and is a different business entirely.
Other Great Stays in Paris
Hotel Berkeley
Another central Paris budget option, if this one's reviews have put you off.
Hotel Savoy
A step up in comfort while staying inside walking distance of the Grands Boulevards.
Au Royal Mad Hotel
A small Paris hotel with more polish, for travellers who want the city without the trade-offs.
Know What You Are Booking
Three minutes from three metro lines, two from Rue Montorgueil, cash only, five flights up and honestly reviewed. If that is the trade you want to make, check the dates.
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