Sofitel hotels

Accor ranks Sofitel in its Luxury segment, the tier it shares with Raffles and Fairmont, whose London hotels are Raffles London at The OWO and The Savoy. The brand has its own site, sofitel.accor.com, but its bookings run through Accor's, and its hotels are listed on all.accor.com like any other Accor address.

Accor's London city page lists 52 hotels, and two of them are Sofitels: Sofitel London St James and Sofitel London Heathrow. Both also appear on Accor's page of London hotels with a spa. They are run in different ways: since July 2008, Sofitel London Heathrow has been owned and operated by The Arora Group under a franchise agreement with Accor.

A few threads tie the two hotels together. Each spa works with Sothys, which the Heathrow spa page describes as luxury French skincare. Each hotel gives its grandest rooms the names Prestige Suite and Opera Suite. Both sell a Le Petit Prince family offer and a Signature Escapes offer, and both open check-in at 15:00 with check-out by 12:00.

Sofitel London St James is first in our ranking of the best hotels for couples in London, because the table and the spa are in the same building. Wild Honey St James, chef Anthony Demetre, holds one MICHELIN star in the 2026 selection and serves modern British food in a Grade II listed former banking hall; dinner runs Tuesday to Saturday from 17:00 to 21:30. The Sofitel Spa, over three floors, has four treatment rooms according to the hotel's brochure, one of them a private couples' suite, with a private Turkish hammam, a steam room and a jacuzzi for two. It opens Monday from 10:00 to 17:00 and Tuesday to Sunday from 10:00 to 18:30.

For the room, look for a view. The 29 Premium Luxury Rooms, 32 m², face Waterloo Place or Pall Mall, and the suites, from the 35 m² Studio and Junior Suites to the 109 m² Opera Suite, look onto Waterloo Place. Pierre-Yves Rochon designed the rooms and led the 2020 renovation. The hotel holds One MICHELIN Key and a Forbes Travel Guide Four-Star rating, both for 2026, and Piccadilly Circus station is 300 m from the door.

Sofitel London Heathrow is the other Sofitel in London, and the one for the night before or after a flight. Accor calls it the only hotel with direct access to Terminal 5, by a covered walkway of about five minutes, and it has 605 rooms. It opened in July 2008, and Skytrax named it Best Airport Hotel in Europe in 2019.

Its spa has one more treatment room than St James's: five, with a relaxation space, a steam room, a sauna and a thermal vitality pool with hydropath features, open every day from 09:00 to 21:00, with Sothys and Temple Spa products. The official page says use of the facilities is for adults only and charged per person, and guests aged 16 and below may not use the hydro bath, the steam room or the sauna. No couples' room or ritual for two is named there.

For dinner, La Belle Époque describes itself as the only fine dining restaurant at Heathrow, cooking British and French dishes with seasonal British produce, and Accor counts it with Vivre among its two AA Rosette restaurants. Le Bar Parisien pours Champagne, fine wine and gin, and the Sphere Bar & Lounge has a fireplace. Some Classic rooms look onto an internal Zen garden, and the 165 m² Imperial Suite onto the runway.

At St James, the gaps are plain. There is no pool and no sauna listed, the Sofitel FIT gym is for hotel guests only, and Wild Honey St James is closed on Sunday and Monday, so the starred dinner has to fall between Tuesday and Saturday. The hotel's own pages name no treatment designed for two, so the couples' suite has to be asked for when you book. The hotel also welcomes families, with kids' baking classes and a Kids' Afternoon Tea in The Rose Lounge, and publishes no minimum age for its spa. Accor and the MICHELIN Guide disagree on whether pets are allowed.

At Heathrow, the limit is the location. Central London is a train ride away: 21 minutes on the Heathrow Express to Paddington, or 40 minutes on the Elizabeth line to Bond Street. None of its restaurants holds a MICHELIN star, and the hotel has no MICHELIN Key. It is also a large conference hotel, with 45 meeting rooms and a ballroom for up to 1,300 delegates, and a family one, with family rooms and many connecting rooms. Only Sofitel London St James appears in our ranking of the best hotels for couples in London.