Greece › Athens › Kid-Friendly Hotels
By Santorini Dave
The absolutely fantastic Four Seasons Astir Palace Hotel is on the Athens Riviera, a 30-minute drive from central Athens. The nearby Divani Apollon Palace & Thalasso is not directly on the beach (a small road separates it from the sea) but still very nice and not nearly as expensive.
Athens Family Hotels – My Advice
- Athens is packed with tourists from early May until late October – book hotels as early as possible.
- Plaka, Monastiraki, Syntagma, Makriyanni, Psirri, and the City Center neighborhoods are the best areas for families to stay in Athens. These areas are pedestrian-friendly and close to the city’s best-loved attractions. Akadimia, Kolonaki, Thiseio, and Koukaki are a little quieter with plenty of casual restaurants and shops, but a little farther to walk to the main sights. The Athens Riviera is a little outside of town but offers idyllic beaches just a short taxi ride away from the Acropolis.
- The farther north you go (closer to Omonia) the uglier and sketchier the city gets. The “bad” areas are generally safe but not terribly pleasant. Stay south of Sofokleous Street to avoid the least attractive areas.
- If you need to catch an early morning ferry then stay close to the Monistiraki metro station (quick direct trains to the ferry port). A for Athens is a good mid-range hotel steps from the metro station yet still a short walk to Plaka and Acropolis. Or plan on taking a taxi which can pick you up from any hotel and drop you directly at your ferry.
- Athens can easily fill two or three days of sightseeing but the highlights can be seen in one full (busy) day.
- The highlight of Athens is the Acropolis (GetYourGuide has a good skip-the-line tour). If you only have time to see one attraction then make it the Acropolis (and its most famous structure, the Parthenon).
The 15 Best Kid-Friendly Hotels in Athens
1. Ava Hotel and Suites
Hotel phone: +30 21032 59000
The service and amenities of a 5-star hotel with the friendliness of a family-run B&B. A perfect location on a quiet street in Plaka. Great breakfast and close to the Akropoli metro station. Some rooms have kitchenettes.2. Four Seasons Astir Palace Hotel
Hotel phone: +30 21089 01000
Stunning setting on a private peninsula on the Athens Riviera. Great beach, pool, restaurants, kids club, and every kind of outdoor activity you can name. 10 minutes to the shops, restaurants, and nightlife of Glyfada, 20 minutes to the airport, and 30 minutes into central Athens. A free shuttle bus takes you into Glyfada or Lake Vouliagmeni.3. St George Lycabettus
Hotel phone: +30 21074 16000
Five-star, family hotel with a seasonal rooftop pool, a playroom (supervised on request), and cartoon screenings in the private cinema on weekends. Sunday brunches offer a separate kids area with a nanny; pop up activities may include family cooking classes, kids’ theater, and more. Rooms and suites sleep up to three; interconnecting suites sleep up to four. Most include private balconies. Quiet location in Kolonaki at the foot of Mt Lycabettus a short walk to the cable car, a public playground, the Benaki Museum, and the National Garden.4. Grand Resort Lagonissi
Hotel phone: +30 22910 76000
Upscale beachfront resort set on sixteen sandy beaches. The resort offers plenty to keep kids entertained including two pools (one in the center and one at the main beach), a water sports center, an outdoor cinema, and a free kids club for ages four to twelve. Babysitting is available on request for a fee. Seven buffet and a la carte restaurants offer a wide variety of cuisines for bored or picky eaters. Breakfast is always complimentary, and room service is available 24/7. Sea view suites, bungalows, cabanas, and villas sleep three to nine guests; most have private gardens, jacuzzis, or pools. Located in Lagonisi, a quiet enclave around the center of the Athens Riviera. Everything you need is on site, but it’s a good idea to have a car handy for exploring the region.5. Grecotel Pallas Athena
Hotel phone: +30 21032 50900
Family-friendly, 4-star hotel with a play area and connecting rooms. Rooms, suites, and lofts all can have minimalist style or unique graffiti murals; kid favorites have Spiderman or Smurf-themed walls. Their Greek-Mediterranean restaurant has kids menus available and an especially great breakfast buffet. Located near Kotzia Square, just a 3-minute walk to the Central Market, less than a 10-minute walk to the Monastiraki Flea Market, and about a 15-minute walk to the Plaka neighborhood.6. Vincci EverEden
Hotel phone: +30 22910 60031
Relaxed resort with a playground set above a private, Blue Flag beach. Kid-friendly perks include a playground, a floating water park, a water sports center, and two outdoor pools (one with an attached kids pool), all overseen by lifeguards. Family Suites sleep up to four guests, some with private pools or jacuzzis. Residences add kitchenettes. Adjoining suites are on offer for larger groups. Breakfast is always complimentary, or opt for a half-board package to add daily lunch or dinner. Located in sleepy Anavyssos at the south end of the Athens Riviera; it’s a good idea to rent a car here.7. Ergon House
Hotel phone: +30 21001 09090
Upscale boutique hotel with an informal gourmet restaurant, rooftop lounge, and a major foodie focus. The entire ground floor is a full-sized market with locally source produce, meat, fish, a deli, a bakery, a vertical garden growing veggies and herbs, and an indoor ice cream truck in the summer months (seen above). Kid-friendly cooking classes are on offer, as well as communal kitchens on every floor. Family Rooms sleep up five, while Extra Large Rooms sleep up to three. An outstanding breakfast is always included. Great location near Syntagma Square.8. NEW Hotel
Hotel phone: +30 21032 73000
Quirky, contemporary, luxury hotel just a 2-minutes walk from Syntagma Square. Modern design and decor with helpful extras like electronic blackout shades. The hotel offers a casual restaurant inside and an excellent rooftop bar and restaurant. Interconnecting rooms comfortably sleep a family of 4. Review of NEW Hotel with Video.9. Athenian Riviera Hotel
Hotel phone: +30 21089 00000
Low-key boutique hotel with a pool just a short walk to two beaches plus a ton of restaurants, beach clubs, and ice-cream parlors. The hotel’s own restaurant serves crowd-pleasing Mediterranean dishes (with a kids menu) poolside or directly to your room. All rooms and suites have private balconies. Executive Suites have indoor jacuzzis, while some Deluxe Family Rooms have outdoor, private jacuzzis. Set in mellow Vouliagmeni, the best of the beach towns in the Athens Riviera.10. The Gem Society
Hotel phone: +30 21022 07777
Affordable luxury hotel in the City Center, near the National Historical Museum and the Central Market. Superior Suites sleep five to six guests with two bedrooms, two bathrooms, a freestanding bathtub, and a sunny terrace with a view of the Acropolis. Rooms can be booked on their own, with breakfast, half board, or full board with meals prepared in their gourmet, all-day bistro; room service is available 24/7.11. Ivis 4
Hotel phone: +30 21032 13340
Playful boutique hotel filled with an all-day Greek restaurant and patio garden. Suites sleep up to four guests with a king-sized bed and sofabed, all with private balconies and original grafitti murals. Family dining is fantastic at their casual Greek restaurant with kids’ menus, 24/7 room service, and a hearty complimentary breakfast. Wonderful Psirri location near the Ancient Agora and Ermou shopping street.12. The Foundry Suites
Hotel phone: +30 21118 24604
Families with older kids (10-years-old and up) will appreciate The Foundry’s wonderfully wild rooftop picnic garden with a pizza and snack menu in the summer months. These spacious self-catering apartments sleep up to four guests in one or two-bedroom spaces, some spread over two stories. All suites have fully equipped kitchens with dishwashers, stovetops, and ovens. Rooms come with a complimentary, fully-stocked minibar, and a rich daily breakfast is included. Be advised there are no TVs, so bring your own tablet or laptop if screen time is a necessity. Excellent location in Psirri near the Benaki Museum of Islamic Art and the Ancient Agora.13. Palmyra Beach Hotel
Hotel phone: +30 21089 81183
Good value hotel. Two-bedroom family rooms sleep a family of 5. Nice pool and close to shopping, restaurants, and Glyfada beach. The tram to central Athens (30 minutes) is just outside the hotel.14. A for Athens
Hotel phone: +30 21302 37244
Affordable boutique hotel with a popular, all-day rooftop restaurant with an Acropolis view terrace. Quadruple Rooms have a double bed, a bunk bed, and a sofa bed, while Triple Rooms have a double bed and sofa bed. Located at the border of Psirri and Monastiraki, just steps from the Monastiraki Metro station, perfect for catching early-morning ferries from Piraeus.15. City Circus Athens Hostel
Hotel phone: +30 21302 37244
Nice budget hotel/hostel with a large quadruple room perfect for families. Walking distance to Plaka.More Family-Friendly Hotels in Athens
- Athens Gate Hotel (large interconnecting double rooms)
- Plaka Hotel Athens (family room with interconnecting door)
- Athens Lotus Hotel (family rooms have three beds and two bathrooms)
- Centrotel (triple and family rooms)
- Divani Apollon Palace & Thalasso (great beach resort, 30-minutes outside of Athens
I'm Santorini Dave. I started this site in 2011 with a short article on tips for visiting Santorini with kids. We're now a small team of writers and researchers dedicated to providing the best travel content on the internet. We focus on 
Hello Dave,
We are family of four, kids 12 & 16, and are planning to visit Athens end of December for 4 nights. Looking for a midrange hotel. There is no availability in your listed hotels. Athens4 vs Amazon Hotel, any suggestions between these two?
Tanya
I think both are good midrange hotels with central locations. Amazon Hotel on a busier street and 10-minutes closer to Acropolis and other sites in Plaka. Athens4 down a small side street. But otherwise not a huge difference.
Hi Dave, wonderful website and thanks a lot for your overview. May I ask where do you get all the pictures from all the hotels? Do you visit them all or do you reach out directly to them and take the pictures?
We take almost all of the hotel photos when we visit and review. Occasionally, we’ll need to use photos provided from the hotel, but we really try to avoid this. I hope our pics are helpful.
Compliments on the website. Was wondering if you had any suggestions for a nice place to spend a couple of days, located between Athens and Kyllini. I will be flying into Athens, and travelling to Zakynthos, and would like to spend about 2 days somewhere enroute. I have two young girls, aged 5 & 7. They like water, so a place by the sea would be ideal. Thanks, Hugh.
From Athens to Kyllini it is 287 kms via the most direct route and for the most part it is served by a currently very disrupted major highway (between Corinth and Patra) Once they’ve finished the roadworks (turning it into a proper multi-lane highway), it will be once more be a fast route. Meantime the route is slow and frustrating for drivers. That’s the bad news.
The good news is that there is a picturesque coastal road (the original coastal highway) that links all the coastal villages between Corinth and Patra. If you don’t mind taking your time you can actually make quite a pleasant trip out of it. Half of 287 is 143.5 kms and that will get you as far as Stomio on the Gulf of Corinth local road. Now Stomio is not exactly earth-shattering, but it is half way. A little earlier you will pass through Xylokastro (120 kms) which is a bit of a resort town mainly for Greeks and is a lot livelier than Stomio. It has hotels, restaurants and a beach scene.
However, you may want to push on and make you night’s stop at Diakofto (161 kms) which has the advantage of being another busy seaside town AND has the additional advantage of being the terminus of the Diakofto/Kalavryta rack and pinion railway to the mountain village of Kalavryta. This is one of the Peloponnese’s more interesting traveller attractions though not well known to the international public. The train starts from the middle of town and heads on up through the narrow gorge before arriving in the pretty village of Kalavryta (33kms away) where you take have a stroll, take lunch and descend in the afternoon. Your daughters would surely enjoy that adventure! Diakofto has a small beach scene and enough restaurants to choose from plus accommodation options.
The road to Kyllini after Patra resorts to being a normal rural main road and is a reasonably easy run make sure you time your run to catch the ferry you want to Zakynthos.
A wild card thought: you could always take the northern Gulf of Corinth route and make your night stop at Delphi to see the ancient sites and Delphi is a magical, spiritual place. Descend to the coast for lunch and a swim at Galaxidi then make a relatively un-busy run to the pretty port of Nafpaktos for afternoon coffee and ice cream, then over the impressive Andirion-Rion suspension bridge to the Peloponnese before making a right to Kyllini. Apart from the initial busy freeway run to the turn off to Delphi from the main South-North highway via Thiva (Thebes) the route is generally rural and after Galaxidi relatively free of traffic. It will take you longer, though and the sea run is not as populated or scenically pretty as the old national highway along the south side of the Gulf of Corinth.
Hello there! We are a family of 4 with children ages 9 and 12. We are looking at staying at the Dorian Inn next month (October) for a 2 night stay in Athens. We love its proximity to all the sites and the fact that it has a pool. It also appears to be a clean hotel with breakfast included. However, some of the reviews have me concerned about the area that it is in. Can you offer any further information? Thank you!
Maxine
The area will strike you as shady, dirty, and unpleasant when you first pull in. But it’s not unsafe. Your kids are an age when they’re likely going out to explore on their own. Unfortunately even the most liberal parent probably wouldn’t feel comfortable sending their kids out the door in this neighborhood. But so it goes, you’re only there for 2 nights and probably won’t be spending much time at your hotel in any case. I think it’s a fine choice and a short walk from the Plaka and Acropolis.
Hello – would love some advice. My sister is going to be in Athens for a conference early March and we are thinking of joining her with our 3 year old. Would love to get to an island – but know many will be shut to tourists. We are not sun seekers (more food seekers). Can you recommend hotels (with separate room for little one). Also an island/ area to enjoy sites, eating, relaxing?
Thanks you,
Natasha
The two best areas at that time are Chania (on Crete) and Santorini. Both will be getting some tourists by March so a lot should be open. Chania also has a large local population and never shuts down like other Greek islands. Both are loaded with great restaurants.
Hello! Your website is very helpful! My husband I will be in Athens for 5 days and hope to do some sightseeing but also a lot of relaxing, we have a 3 year old and almost 7 year old.
We are torn between staying in the city at a place with a pool or simply staying in Glyfada and travelling to the centre for some sightseeing. Any guidance much appreciated!
Mary
Glyfada is a good a place to stay in Athens as any and apart from being away from the city bustle and noise you have at least the sense of being at a half decent seaside resort. So, yes, go ahead and book yourselves a place to stay in Glyfada. It’s only 14kms to the centre of Athens via the more direct Leoforos Vouliagmenis – take a cab if you are in a hurry, they are relatively inexpensive in Athens – or if you prefer a more leisurely segue to the city, take a modern tram along the coast and up through the ‘burbs which will take you right to Syntagma (Constitution) Square in about an hour or so. Alternatively you can take the tram as far as as the Stadium of Peace and Friendship and swap to the metro for the last leg to the Port of Piraeus. There are plenty of buses to/from Athens too, but they can get uncomfortably crowded at peak times.
Glyfada itself is a very pleasant seaside resort and along with Vouliagmeni further south it is where many of Athens’ well-heeled reside. Wikipedia calls it Knightsbidge-on-Sea, the Hellenic Hamptons or the Beverley Hills of Greece and the suburb certainly does have a rather chic feel to it with its upmarket cafés, restaurants, and boutique shops. There are plenty of hotels with pools to choose from, though the (pay) beach is very decent and you may care to spend some of your relaxation time on a lounger under an umbrella with a bar or café at your shoulder. So rest assured that your plan is a solid one, you will be in good company in a pleasant environment and not really all that far from the city.