Shangri-La Hotel Sydney

I spent 5 nights at this hotel and cannot complain about it. The staff were attentive; they were checking in on me throughout the stay and things were mostly done in a timely manner. Housekeeping changed the towels and bedding daily. I had an issue with the shower which took a few calls to be sorted, but it was fixed. I believe the lady who answered my call when I dialed 9 one evening to place my room service order was called Jewel. She provided an amazing level of service - the quote time for the food was incorrect so she made sure to call me back to query if the wait time would be okay. Great location - would return.

Perfect location a few minutes from Central Quay, wonderful, happy staff and great facilities. Do the Horizon upgrade - certainly worth it - Annie and her team will look after you, particularly Sas, but they're all great. We were there at a difficult time with Dubai flights being cancelled but the hotel made sure there was no drama made out of a crisis as the saying goes. Keep it going! Only point I'd make is to GM Rob - stick with the day job and don't go into weather forecasting 😆

We first stayed at Shangri-La Sydney in 2019 and had a wonderful experience, which made choosing it again for our trip an easy decision. Unfortunately, this time the stay was far from perfect and didn’t quite live up to our previous memories. The hotel’s location remains a strong point. Positioned in The Rocks, it offers easy access to the Harbour area, Circular Quay, and surrounding attractions — although it’s worth noting that the walk back from the Harbour is quite steep. One of the undeniable highlights is the view. From the lounge, the outlook over Sydney Harbour and the Opera House is simply spectacular. Our room, while comfortable and clean, felt fairly standard and nothing particularly special. The bed was comfortable enough for a good night’s sleep, but the overall feel lacked the wow factor we remembered from our previous stay. The biggest disappointment was the lounge experience. In the evenings and at breakfast, it was overcrowded, with a busy, canteen-like atmosphere rather than the relaxed, premium environment we expected. During evening cocktails, children were running freely around the lounge. Overall, while the views and location are still excellent, this return visit didn’t match our fantastic 2019 stay, leaving us disappointed.

Our go to place when visiting Sydney. The Harbour View Executive Rooms are wonderful. Not everything is 5 star as the rooms show lots of wear and tear due to the popularity of the hotel. Staff are helpful and polite.

We have recently had a wonderful stay at the Shangri-la Sydney, but before we arrived, I read some of the negative reviews here which had me worried, but I’m very glad we ignored those reviews; I post very few reviews, but I felt the need to here to counter some of the negative reviews that were definitely not our experience: 1. Some reviews describe long waits at check-in and at breakfast, I guess if you were unfortunate to arrive at the same time as lots of people this could be slow, but our experience was that check-in went very smoothly and we never had to queue more than a minute or two to get into breakfast, we thought the breakfast was one of the best breakfast buffets we have had anywhere, and all the staff and the level of service were excellent. 2. Some reviews say the hotel is a bit dated. Well, yes it has an old-fashioned style, but we thought that was great, the Shangri-la has much more character than many more modern hotels, we really liked that. 3. Some reviews warn of the steep climb back up to the hotel from the harbour, we had no trouble with this. Yes, there are a lot of steps back up to the hotel and if someone did have difficulties walking I can see this could be a problem and you should think about this before booking. However we are both in our sixties and walked down and back up these steps sometimes several times a day without any great effort. For a healthy person if you can’t manage these steps then I think you would need to exercise more! The climb back up towards the hotel is a small price to pay for the superb location right in the heart of the Rocks area and very close to the ferry terminal. We thought the Shangri-la was a lovely hotel, the service was great, and the location could not be bettered, we would happily stay here again.