Where to stay in Shanghai: the best neighbourhoods and hotels

The Bund is the picture everyone comes for. Its riverside promenade runs beneath a parade of neoclassical and art deco buildings, once the banks, clubs and hotels of the foreign concessions, and looks straight across the Huangpu to the Oriental Pearl Tower and Pudong's skyscrapers. Come at dawn for tai chi and kite-flyers, and again after dark when both banks light up.

Hotels here are an event. One occupies the old Shanghai Club, with its legendary long bar; another, in a pair of buildings just off the waterfront on Nanjing Road, has a rooftop for skyline cocktails. North of Suzhou Creek, newer luxury names add pools and spas with the full river panorama. You pay for the address, and most people think it is worth it.

People's Square is the middle of Shanghai in every sense. The old racecourse is now a park ringed by the Shanghai Museum, the Grand Theatre and a forest of towers, and three metro lines cross beneath it. From its north-east corner the pedestrian stretch of Nanjing East Road, all neon signs and department stores, runs down to the Bund.

For a first visit it is the most practical base: you can walk to the Bund one way and Jing'an the other. The hotels are tall and the views long. One landmark tower looks over Nanjing East Road, the Bund and the Pudong skyline; another puts 720 rooms a short walk from the square and the shopping street, with an indoor pool and spa.

Before the foreign concessions there was the walled Chinese city, and its heart is still here. Yu Garden is a Ming-dynasty maze of rockeries, carp ponds and pavilions; the bazaar around it is a noisy swirl of teahouses, snack stalls and queues for xiaolongbao. The southern end of the Bund, around the old Shiliupu docks, is a few minutes' walk east.

Staying here puts both the garden and the waterfront on your doorstep. One hotel beside the old town has an indoor pool and a free shuttle around the neighbourhood; a design-led hotel on the south Bund is decorated with rickshaws and shipyard metal salvaged from the docks; and a well-known five-star just inland has a spa, pool and three restaurants.

Jing'an is downtown Shanghai at its sleekest. Nanjing West Road is the city's premier shopping street, lined with luxury malls and flagship stores, and in the middle of it sits Jing'an Temple, gilded roofs gleaming among the glass towers. The side streets hide some of the city's best restaurants, coffee shops and bars.

Hotels are polished and well connected. One sits in the Kerry Centre on Nanjing West Road, 200 metres from the temple's metro station; a long-standing favourite nearby has both indoor and outdoor pools; another is a five-minute drive from the temple and People's Square. Between Nanjing and Huaihai Roads there are suite hotels with boutiques on the doorstep.

The former French Concession is the Shanghai people fall in love with. Its streets are tunnels of plane trees, lined with art deco apartment blocks, Spanish-style villas and shikumen lane houses, now home to boutiques, bakeries, wine bars and dumpling joints. Xintiandi and Tianzifang are the busy bits; the quiet joy is in wandering the roads between.

Places to stay reflect the neighbourhood. One hotel is a 1930s garden estate of classic buildings and lawns, with a spa and indoor pool; another hides among villas and old trees. On the district's south-west edge, in the Xujiahui shopping district, a new design hotel takes its inspiration from the city's lane houses.

Lujiazui is the cluster of towers you photograph from the Bund: the Oriental Pearl, the Jin Mao, the bottle-opener of the World Financial Center and the twisting Shanghai Tower, second-tallest building on earth. At street level it is wide, corporate and a little soulless. Go up, though, and the view back over the river and old Shanghai is extraordinary.

The hotels are built for that view. Several stand on or near the riverfront, overlooking the Bund, within a ten-minute walk of the promenade. Further into Pudong, a large family-friendly hotel faces Century Park, the city's biggest green space, with direct access to the exhibition centre. The Bund is one metro stop or a short ferry ride away.

Shanghai Disneyland is out in the east of Pudong, a long way from the Bund but handy for Pudong airport. If the park is the main event, or you are travelling with children who will be up at six regardless, a night or two here saves a lot of commuting.

Hotels in the resort zone are modern and good value. One is five minutes' drive from the park, with a frequent shuttle and airport transfers; another is within walking distance of the Disney Resort metro station; a third is a ten-minute drive away with a spa for worn-out parents. Do your sightseeing from a city hotel, then move here.

Hongqiao, on the western side of the city, is Shanghai's second transport hub. The older airport, which handles domestic and some regional flights, shares a site with one of Asia's biggest high-speed rail stations, with trains to Suzhou, Hangzhou and Beijing. The National Exhibition and Convention Center is next door.

It is a practical rather than a pretty place to stay. One hotel is connected to the airport itself and has a rooftop infinity pool; others sit in the business district with free airport shuttles and big-brand comforts. Useful for an early train, a trade fair, or a day trip to the canal town of Zhujiajiao.

Songjiang is Shanghai's leafy south-western fringe, where the flat city finally produces a hill. Sheshan has a forest park, a hilltop basilica and the Happy Valley amusement park; Chenshan Botanical Garden is nearby.

People come out here mostly for one remarkable hotel: built into the wall of a disused quarry, it descends 88 metres below ground level to a lake at the bottom. Other options include a resort steps from the amusement park with indoor and outdoor pools, and a waterside hotel inside a cultural park. Central Shanghai is a long drive, so treat it as a stay in its own right.