Princes Street Hostel

Princes Street Hostel sits on West Register Street, the quiet pedestrianised cut-through that links Princes Street to the Café Royal at the back of the New Club — which means the front door is 60 seconds from Princes Street but the street itself is car-free and never rowdy. It's the most practical address in Edinburgh if you're moving on: Waverley Station (trains to London, Glasgow, Inverness) is a two-minute walk downhill, the Airlink 100 bus stop is at Waverley Bridge three minutes away, and the bus 26 to Portobello beach stops on North Bridge.

The building is Georgian, five floors, roughly 130 beds in 4, 6, 8 and 10-bed mixed dorms plus female-only dorms and a few private doubles. Bunks are wooden-frame, each with an under-bunk locker and a reading light, and the third-floor dorms have the best Princes Street gardens views — ask at check-in.

The shared kitchen is the social hub: four hobs, two ovens, three fridges, stocked with basics (pasta, oil, salt, pepper, tea) that previous guests have left behind. The chill-out lounge has a pool table, Netflix-equipped TV, and a book exchange. No bar on-site, but the Standing Order Wetherspoon is 40 seconds out the door and the Café Royal (Edinburgh's best oyster bar, surprisingly not expensive) is the next building over.

Reviewers flag the stairs (five floors, no lift), the bathroom-to-bed ratio in peak festival season, and the fact that the Princes Street tram line runs right outside — the bedrooms on the Princes Street side catch tram noise until midnight. Ask for a West Register Street-facing room. The big win here is the location for transit travellers: no other Old Town hostel is this close to Waverley, and if you're catching an early train to the Highlands or a 6 am Airlink bus to the airport, Princes Street Hostel buys you an extra 20 minutes in bed.