Top 10: the best casino hotels in Las Vegas
An expert guide to the best casino hotels in Las Vegas, including the top places to stay for sleek casinos, opulent suites, lavish restaurants, stylish pools and stunning views of the Las Vegas Strip.
Jet-setting celebrities and royalty, high-rolling gamblers and romantic couples celebrating anniversaries and weddings all get the VIP treatment here. This is one of the most elegant casino-hotels on the Las Vegas strip, in terms of both interiors and service, and the clientele reflects that. Splash out on a Tower Suite, which comes with perks like a private hotel entrance and check-in lounge. The most luxurious suites, such as the one Prince Harry infamously stayed in, are reserved for elite clientele.
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The Venetian resort next door trades on its gimmicky gondolas, canals, and faux Italian landmarks, but the Palazzo’s elegance is understated, with spritzing fountains and marble statues in the high-ceilinged lobby. Rooms border on palatial, with more than 3,000 posh suites featuring high-thread count linens, sunken living rooms with rich furnishings, and marble baths with spa robes and slippers to cosy up in. The pool club Azure and nightclub Lavo aren’t the heart of the Strip’s scene, but they draw a mixed-ages crowd. The Canyon Ranch SpaClub, inside the Venetian’s Grand Canal Shoppes, is top-flight.
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There's more to the Bellagio than its dancing fountains. There’s the obligatory big casino, of course, and it has plenty of the ostentation you’d expect in Las Vegas, but it is also a sleek, well-run and well-presented hotel. And despite having 3,933 rooms and suites, it doesn’t feel impersonal: while the public spaces are vast, the rooms are private, intimate and restful. The spacious entry-level Resort Rooms are pleasingly contemporary, rather than chintzy. “Tower” rooms offer the best city and desert views, but all rooms come with large picture windows.
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Cosmo breaks the casino hotel archetype, its cutting-edge contemporary decor (notice the digital new-media art collection on the walls) mixed with vintage touches like champagne-pink chandeliers, spacious rooms and an excellent choice of bars and restaurants. It's popular with Vegas fanatics, high rollers, foodies, fashionistas, and anyone who craves pampering and an arty atmosphere. The top-end Terrace suites possess private wrap-around patios with sparkling city views.
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This Greco-Romanesque casino resort is a Vegas classic and completely over-the-top, from the giant statuary and Colosseum concert hall to a sprawling pool complex where bronzed gods and goddesses laze in cabanas. Though kitschy, it’s also a touch glamorous. Movie-worthy crowds of beautiful people lounge at the gaming tables, and everything looks larger-than-life, even the roulette wheels. Thousands of rooms afford plenty of choice, right at the centre of the Strip.
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Formerly the world’s largest hotel, the MGM Grand towers over Las Vegas Boulevard. Its design looks futuristically modern, with glowing green neon outlining buildings guarded by a 50-ton golden bronze lion statue, a nod to the days when the casino was owned by a Hollywood movie studio company. Inside the ultra contemporary resort, everything appears larger than life, too. The boisterous party atmosphere continues around the clock.
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If you don't mind being off the Strip, this rock 'n' roll themed casino hotel is a blast. Legendary summer pool parties, cool concert venues for live bands, over a half-dozen restaurants and a svelte nightclub are what everyone is here for. Exuding brash, over-the-top attitude, the Hard Rock is a pin-up model of purple and pink neon, red velvet, and black and gold accents everywhere you look. You won't mistake this casino hotel for any other in Las Vegas, thanks to millions of dollars of authentic rock 'n' roll memorabilia that is stashed in glass display-cases all around the casino and the lobby.
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If you want to be in the thick of downtown Las Vegas, this 1940s-era hotel is where you should stay. It's got a vintage vibe, which includes frou-frou bedrooms, poolside cabanas, a shark-tank water slide and a steakhouse and seafood palace (complete with aquarium). The prices are also vintage. The Carson and Gold Towers’ standard-issue rooms are spacious, but slightly fussy in their design. Sleeker high-rise Rush Tower rooms offer oversized jewel-toned retreats with mod design and plasma TVs. Jazzy Gold Club rooms come with VIP perks like complimentary internet and spa access.
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Mandalay Bay is an all-encompassing casino resort at the southern end of the Strip, with restaurants, bars, shopping, entertainment and nightlife inside gold-tinted towers. Outside Mandalay Beach awaits. There's a vague tropical vibe inside the gold leaf-accented hotel towers, filled with gleaming marble and picture windows letting in the desert sunshine. The posh look appeals most to upscale travellers and business executives, but also to a younger crowd, some of whom stay at the Delano Las Vegas, a boutique hotel-within-a-hotel at Mandalay Bay.
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The lush, tropical Mirage is one of the prettiest illusions in this desert gambling capital. One of the Strip’s original luxury resorts, the hotel is a fantastical mix of tropical greenery and Vegas glitz. Parade by the exploding volcano out front and into the posh casino, with its airy atmosphere and exotic flowers and plants. The vibe is more refined than at the Strip’s younger party hotels. Day or night, you’ll be ready for anything here – gambling, shopping, drinking, dining or dancing. Spacious rooms are sophisticated, romantic hideaways, and the vast pool complex might make you swoon.