A few years ago we stayed at Yotel in New York, a strange hotel with a luggage robot and waitresses running around on roller skates. Returning from France we had a 10 hour layover during the night in Schiphol and decided to try out one of their other hotels located inside the airport.

Having a hotel inside an airport is rather brilliant. There is no need for shuttles to the terminal, no (additional) security check and the gate is literally just a few meters away.

Yotel is known for their strange, yet modern and efficient rooms. Yotel in Schiphol is no exception, although it is not as strange as the one in New York. Size, on the other hand is unrivalled. Our hotel room was a mere 7 square meters, yet it features a bed, shower, toilet, sink and a kind of shelf with a mirror. In other words exactly what you need to spend the night comfortably. Although there are smaller hotel rooms like the Japanese pods we have never seen a fully equipped room including a bathroom this small!

Free tea, coffee and hot chocolate is available in the reception, as well as access to Internet and tables with power outlets where you can sit and work.

The only downside we found is that the hotel is located outside the Schengen-area in the international part of the airport. This means that if you have a European flight you need to pass through the passport control before reaching your gate. In the morning  the passport control queue can be quite long, but if you have an electronic EU passport you can use the automatic machines and skip the whole line.

Practical

Yotel has 3 room types:

• Single bed/standard cabin (can be used by two if you don’t mind squeezing together in the bed): 92 euro
• Double room/premium cabin: 115 euro
• Family cabin (up to 4 people): 135 euro

Rooms can be booked here and they have an image explaining how to locate the hotel at the airport.