The 32 Best Places to Drink and Stay in Iceland

You ring a brass lion's-head doorbell to get in, which sets the tone. ÓX is a 17-seat tasting counter in Reykjavík where a four-hour dinner unfolds inside what feels like two grandmothers' homes colliding: a retro cocktail bar and a kitchen hung with upcycled cupboards. The cooking leans into intensity over prettiness, Icelandic ingredients pushed hard for flavour rather than dressed up for Instagram. It holds a Michelin star.

Sitting on the Old Harbor next door to the Harpa concert hall, this sleek design hotel channels Iceland's landscape and Reykjavik's edgier creative energy into one building, which is a harder trick than it sounds. Rooms are modern, there's a spa and a nightclub on site, and most of the city's landmarks are a short walk away. The kind of place that makes you feel like the trip was a good idea before you've even unpacked.

One of the buildings here used to be the Prime Minister's residence, which is either a fun fact or a reasonable standard to set for your lodging. This apartment hotel sits a single block from Laugavegur, Reykjavik's main drag, with studios, suites, and full apartments spread across a small cluster of buildings. Even the smaller rooms have kitchenettes, useful when you're close enough to the city's best restaurants to walk home with leftovers.

Seven houses stitched together on Laugavegur make up this boutique hotel, which sits next door to Sandholt Bakery and a venerable local tailor, so the neighborhood does its part before you even check in. The rooms lean toward spare Nordic cool rather than saga-hall kitsch, and the on-site bistro and bar give you a reason to stay put. The selected hotels list from Michelin notices it, which tracks for one of the more thoughtfully designed places to sleep in Reykjavik.

Guests-only geothermal lagoon, floor-to-ceiling lava-field views, and a spa drawing on Iceland's volcanic geology: this is what it looks like when a famous tourist attraction builds a genuinely serious luxury hotel around itself. Minimalist suites come with robes you'll end up wearing to dinner at Lava, the all-day restaurant. Moss, the flagship, holds a Michelin star. The Retreat holds a Michelin Key.

The postal code "101" doubles as both address and identity at this boutique hotel in central Reykjavik. The former home of Iceland's Social Democratic Party now runs black-and-white interiors, open-plan rooms with sleek Nordic furniture, and bathrooms where the claw-foot tub sits right in the room with you. A glass roof reveals a permanent mural overhead, and the gallery rotates work by Icelandic artists. The lounge draws a crowd that didn't come here to stay in.

The bartenders at the in-house bar wear white pharmacists' coats, which tells you something about how seriously this hotel takes its own concept. The building, designed by the architect behind Hallgrímskirkja, wraps Art Nouveau bones around 45 contemporary rooms in central Reykjavík, a block from parliament. An Argentine grill anchors the open kitchen downstairs, so there's a decent argument for staying in on a cold night.

The pitched skylights in the top-floor suites are a good argument for upgrading. This four-star hotel sits on one of central Reykjavík's older streets, steps from Lake Tjörnin and the art museum, with 130 rooms finished in warm taupe, dark grid-patterned headboards, and forest green cushions. The in-house restaurant does modern Northern European cooking in Art Deco surroundings, and two rooftop terraces plus a steam-and-sauna spa keep you from spending too much time outside in January.

Parked beside the Icelandic parliament on an old-school Reykjavík square, Kvosin is a boutique hotel that feels more like a well-appointed city apartment than anything fussy. Rooms run from Normal to Bigger to Biggest, which is either refreshingly honest or a mild act of genius. The interiors lean modernist, the spaces are airy, and the ground-floor restaurant hands you off to the town, or at least to the in-house wine bar, by seven.

A 1940s industrial building quietly renovated into a minimalist, monochrome boutique hotel by Icelandic-born, L.A.-based designer Gulla Jónsdóttir. The 52 rooms and suites sit a block from Laugavegur, Reykjavik's main shopping strip, with a day spa on-site for when the wind off the harbor reminds you what latitude means. No restaurant, but the neighborhood handles that without much effort.

Two helipads on a former sheep farm in a Troll Peninsula valley sets the tone pretty fast. Eleven Deplar Farm is a 13-room all-inclusive lodge where the geothermally heated pool has a swim-up bar and the heli-ski excursions depart from the backyard. The chef leans into local culinary traditions, the spa is serious, and Iceland's general allergy to ostentation keeps the whole thing feeling grounded, which is no small trick given the price of admission.

A brass lion knocker on Laugavegur 55 answers your entry question: press its tongue and you're into a speakeasy tricked out like a 1960s living room, brown and beige, with kitsch paintings on textured wallpaper and old talk shows murmuring on the TV. The name means "grandmother is the boss" in Icelandic, which tells you everything about the vibe: warm, slightly chaotic, deeply un-flashy. The 50 gave it a Discovery nod.

A log-cabin lodge on Iceland's southern coast, an hour east of Reykjavik with a volcano at its back and nothing much else for miles. The Michelin Guide awarded it one Key. Rooms are wood-paneled and tucked under the eaves; the themed suites go further, each dedicated to a different continent, which sounds odd until you see the tatami room. The real draw, though, is the sky after dark during aurora season.

Eyjafjallajökull, the volcano that grounded half of Europe, sits right outside the window of this 28-room modernist hotel on Iceland's southern coast, earning it a Michelin Key. The low-slung design hints at something sleek, but inside it leans warm and practical, very much in the Icelandic spirit. The restaurant leans on free-roaming local lamb, and the bar views are the kind that make you forget what you were drinking.

Thirty-five low-slung rooms designed by Basalt Architects sit among volcanic rock on the Reykjanes Peninsula, where the landscape looks borrowed from another planet. This small, spare hotel is part of the Blue Lagoon complex but quieter and more private, with large windows framing the lava fields and direct access to the Silica Lagoon. The interiors run warm but uncluttered, quality textiles and not much else competing with the view outside.

Sitting on the edge of Þingvellir National Park in a sprawl of lava fields and lichen, this adventure hotel is heated geothermically by water pulled from underground at 190°C, so the showers are not in danger of going cold. Rooms are monochrome concrete and reclaimed driftwood, the outdoor hot tub has panoramic views of the otherworldly surroundings, and the activities range from horseback riding to diving between two tectonic plates.

Less than an hour from Reykjavík, this boutique hotel takes its name from the indoor plants that soften what is otherwise a very Icelandic piece of modern, utilitarian architecture. Rooms aside, the building also holds a food hall spanning global cuisines and a handful of shops stocking local Icelandic clothing and provisions, which makes it more of a small village than a place to sleep.

The black-sand beach outside isn't decoration; it's the whole point. This minimalist hotel on Iceland's south coast, forty minutes from Reykjavík, keeps its profile low and its interiors spare, warmed mostly by good textures and DUX beds in fine linen. The restaurant faces the beach through floor-to-ceiling glass, and the surrounding south coast puts waterfalls, geysers, and the Northern Lights within reach.

The name is literal: floor-to-ceiling glass wraps the whole building on a hilltop outside Selfoss, so the southern Icelandic countryside, mountains, distant water, and occasional Northern Lights are basically the decor. This boutique design hotel pairs that view with plush-meets-industrial interiors and a spa fed by a mineral spring a thousand feet underground. The restaurant runs a set dinner menu built on local Icelandic ingredients, which is the right move when the larder looks like this.

The utilitarian exterior on Thingvallastraeti gives almost nothing away, which makes the Nordic clean lines, blonde wood, and above-average artwork inside feel like a genuine surprise. This boutique hotel in Iceland's northern capital sits well for the ring-road crowd, and in winter it's a solid base for Northern Lights watching. Rooms run from simple doubles to bunk-bed family setups and full suites, with a few apartments tucked into the older buildings on site.

The name is literal: a black sand beach sits about a mile away, and the low-slung modern buildings here are designed with that stark volcanic landscape squarely in mind. Black Beach Suites is a self-contained apartment hotel, 36 studios and suites with kitchenettes, heated floors, and very little pretense of being a resort. A bar handles drinks and light bites, breakfast runs daily, and then you're on your own to explore glaciers, waterfalls, and narrow canyons across the Mýrdalur region.

The front desk will wake you at 3 a.m. if the Northern Lights show up, which tells you most of what you need to know about this hotel. Fosshotel Glacier Lagoon sits on Iceland's south coast, close to the glacier lagoon and a black-sand beach that earns its reputation. Rooms have the floor-to-ceiling windows you'd expect, warm Nordic finishes you might not, and the restaurant leans into local Icelandic produce without making a fuss about it.

The Vatnajökull glacier fills the windows here, which is the point of making the long drive out to Höfn. This contemporary hotel sits on the far edge of the national park, with 66 rooms, modernist furnishings, and a restaurant that leans hard into the langoustines pulled from local waters. The silhouette reads traditional; the interior reads Scandinavian catalogue. Selected by the Michelin Guide, it draws travelers willing to do the math on Iceland's circumference.

Two glass cottages placed so far apart from each other that you'll wonder if the designers were making a point. This rural Icelandic retreat near Seljalandsfoss waterfall has no lobby, no reception, and no restaurant, which is either a selling point or a dealbreaker depending on who you are. Each cottage has a private sauna, a hot tub, and a glass ceiling angled for Northern Lights viewing. You stock the kitchenette yourself and spend your days on the South Coast.

Four buildings stitched together on the south side of town, Hotel Akureyri is a boutique hotel that punches well above what you'd expect this far north. Rooms run from trim, efficient doubles to genuinely roomy suites, and the hotel holds one of the better bars in Akureyri plus a proper restaurant, so you could honestly skip venturing out on a cold evening and lose nothing.

The oldest church in Iceland stands just outside the window, which should give you some sense of the neighborhood. This small, remote hotel sits on the Snæfellsnes Peninsula, two hours from Reykjavík, with glaciers, lava fields, and mountain peaks filling the gaps. Rooms are comfortable and traditionally styled; the master suite leans modernist and somewhat extravagant. The restaurant leans into local ingredients, and every conceivable outdoor adventure begins at the front door.

A glass-fronted modernist hotel on Iceland's south coast, a four-minute walk from a black-sand beach and well-placed on the Ring Road for anyone finally making good on their promise to leave Reykjavík. The 46 rooms are clean-lined and light-filled, which sounds modest until you've seen what the competition looks like out here. The restaurant leans on lamb, char, and Icelandic beef without veering into anything that would alarm a nervous tourist.

Turf-roofed cabins with private heated basalt-stone pools sit along the Golden Circle route, and the furniture was made in the hotel's own workshop. The Viking-style longhouse where dinner is served is lined with actual salmon skins, the menu shifts daily from whatever the surrounding landscape offers, and the property runs on geothermal and hydroelectric energy. A herd of Icelandic horses is available if you'd like to feel appropriately heroic about the whole thing.