Where to Stay for Old Trafford, the Etihad & Co-op Live

Finding decent hotels near Old Trafford is not difficult. Finding one near the Etihad Stadium or Co-op Live is, and nobody selling you a room is in a hurry to say so. This guide covers all three venues — United’s ground, City’s, and the 23,500-capacity arena that opened beside it in 2024 — for anyone booking a night around a match, a gig or a Test at Emirates Old Trafford: which hotels are genuinely close, which “walking distance” claims fall apart on a map, and why the best base for the Etihad is usually a room near Piccadilly station.

Fix one thing in your head before anything else: these venues are on opposite sides of the city. Old Trafford is in Trafford, two miles south-west of the centre. The Etihad and Co-op Live share a campus two miles east. They are roughly five miles apart and no hotel is convenient for both, which matters more than it sounds if you are doing a derby, or a match on Saturday and a gig on Sunday.

The Short Answer

Going to	Closest hotel	Best base	Getting there from the base
Old Trafford (football)	Hotel Football, directly opposite	Salford Quays, or Deansgate and Castlefield	About 20 minutes on foot from the Quays; about 10 minutes by tram from the centre
Emirates Old Trafford (cricket and concerts)	Hilton Garden Inn, inside the ground	Deansgate and Castlefield	Tram to Old Trafford stop, beside the ground
Etihad Stadium	Travelodge Manchester Sportcity, about a mile away	Piccadilly, the Northern Quarter and Ancoats	Under 10 minutes by tram; 35–40 minutes on foot
Co-op Live	As for the Etihad	Piccadilly, the Northern Quarter and Ancoats	As for the Etihad, plus a canal towpath that runs right past the arena

If you want it in a sentence: sleep opposite Old Trafford if the ground itself is the point of the trip. Otherwise stay in the city centre, on the side nearest your venue, where the restaurants and bars are and where getting home at eleven at night is a walk rather than a queue.

Three Venues, Two Sides of the City

Old Trafford sits in Trafford, the borough south-west of Manchester proper, on the edge of Trafford Park — often described as the world’s first planned industrial estate — and a short walk from the Manchester Ship Canal. Across the water is Salford Quays, with the Lowry, MediaCityUK and a spread of mid-range hotels and serviced apartments. The city centre is two miles north-east along Chester Road. Around the ground itself there is very little beyond the stadium, Hotel Football, a few pubs and chippies, and terraced streets.

The Etihad Campus is a different animal. It was built on former industrial land in east Manchester for the 2002 Commonwealth Games, and it now holds City’s stadium, the club’s academy and training ground, the National Cycling Centre and, since 2024, Co-op Live, the largest indoor arena in the country. What it does not hold is anywhere to sleep. The districts around it — Beswick, Clayton, Openshaw — are residential, and the nearest branded hotel is a budget Travelodge about a mile away.

Hotels Near Old Trafford

Hotel Football — the one opposite the ground

Hotel Football is the obvious answer and, for a certain kind of trip, the right one. It stands on Sir Matt Busby Way, directly across from the stadium, close enough that on a match day the crowd flows past the front door. It was built by the Class of ’92, with Gary Neville and Ryan Giggs fronting the project, and opened in 2015. It now trades as Hotel Football, Old Trafford, a Tribute Portfolio Hotel — part of the Marriott family, which mostly matters because you can book it with Bonvoy points.

There are 133 rooms and the football theme runs right through the building, but the signature is on the roof: a five-a-side pitch called Heaven, under a retractable roof, with Old Trafford filling the view. Guests can use it free, and on match days it becomes a fan zone. The hotel also sells Stadium Suite matchday packages for the 2026/27 season.

The catches are worth spelling out. First, price: on a match weekend, and above all for a European night or a derby, rates climb steeply, set by what fans will pay rather than by what the room is. Second, the neighbourhood: on a non-match evening you are on a main road next to an empty stadium, a tram ride from any restaurant worth crossing town for. Third, the crowds and noise on the day itself, which are the point if you are going and a nuisance if you are not.

The verdict: worth it if Old Trafford is the reason for the trip — a first visit, a big birthday, a child who will never forget waking up opposite the ground. Not worth it if the match is one evening in a city weekend, when the same money buys a better room in town and a ten-minute tram ride.

Hilton Garden Inn Manchester Emirates Old Trafford

The other hotel with a stadium on its doorstep belongs to the cricket, not the football. The Hilton Garden Inn sits inside Emirates Old Trafford, Lancashire’s home ground, about a mile from United’s stadium — twenty minutes or so on foot up Warwick Road and Sir Matt Busby Way. It is right beside the Old Trafford tram stop, so the city centre is about ten minutes away by tram, and it is one of the few hotels on this side of town with secure parking on site.

It is a Garden Inn rather than anything glamorous — bar, 24-hour gym, self-service laundry — and it is at its best when there is cricket on. For football it is a calmer alternative to Hotel Football; for a summer concert on the outfield it is the only hotel you can walk back to in two minutes.

Salford Quays and MediaCityUK

For most United fans making a weekend of it, Salford Quays is the best base on this side of the city. It sits across the Ship Canal from the ground, it has a spread of chain hotels and serviced apartments around MediaCityUK and the Lowry — the Holiday Inn at MediaCityUK is the obvious landmark — and there is enough to fill a spare morning: the Lowry’s galleries and theatres, Imperial War Museum North, and the waterfront itself.

The walk to the ground is the selling point. Cross the footbridge from the Lowry to Imperial War Museum North, follow the water east along Trafford Wharf Road, and Old Trafford comes into view within about twenty minutes — a walk you will share with thousands of others on a match day. Afterwards you walk back the same way instead of joining the tram queue, which is the whole idea. The Quays are also on the Eccles tram line, so the city centre is fifteen to twenty minutes away when you want it. Our Salford Quays and MediaCityUK guide covers the area properly.

The catch is the evening. The Quays are pleasant and safe after dark but quiet, and if you want a proper night out as well as a match, the centre is the better base.

Deansgate, Castlefield and St Peter’s Square

The city-centre option for Old Trafford is anywhere close to the Altrincham tram line, which runs out to the ground from St Peter’s Square and Deansgate-Castlefield. Trams on this line come every few minutes, more often on match days, and the ride to Old Trafford stop takes about ten. That brings a good slice of the centre’s hotels into range. The Hilton in Beetham Tower is a couple of minutes from Deansgate-Castlefield stop; the YHA hostel on Potato Wharf is an easy walk from it; The Midland faces the St Peter’s Square stop across the road.

Castlefield also gives you the walking option. Chester Road runs from the edge of Castlefield straight out to the ground, and it takes roughly forty minutes on foot. It is not a pretty walk, but after the final whistle it is often quicker than queuing for a tram. Our Deansgate and Castlefield guide has the area’s bars and restaurants, which are the real reason to stay here rather than at the ground.

Getting to Old Trafford From Your Hotel

Three tram stops serve the football ground, and it pays to know which is which.

Tram stop	Line	Walk to the stadium	Good to know
Wharfside	Trafford Park line	About 5 minutes	The closest, and the busiest at full time
Old Trafford	Altrincham line	About 15 minutes	Beside the cricket ground; the traditional match-day stop, direct from the city centre
Exchange Quay	Eccles line	About 15 minutes	On the Salford side, over the canal; the natural stop from the Quays

From the centre, the Altrincham line from St Peter’s Square or Deansgate-Castlefield is the simplest route. A day’s tram travel between the centre and either football ground falls under the zones 1–2 contactless cap of £4.30 (£3.50 if every journey is off-peak), as long as you tap in and out with the same card or phone every time. Our Metrolink guide has the zones and fares in full.

After the match, the tram queue is the part nobody enjoys. Metrolink runs extra trams and marshals the crowd, but after a sell-out you will wait. The ways round it: walk back to the Quays, cross the canal to Exchange Quay, or walk the forty minutes into town along Chester Road and let the crowd thin behind you. A taxi is the worst option of the lot — the roads crawl for a long while after the whistle and ride-hailing prices surge.

Emirates Old Trafford: Cricket and Summer Concerts

“Old Trafford” means two grounds, and it catches people out every summer. Emirates Old Trafford, home of Lancashire County Cricket Club, is about a mile south of United’s stadium along Warwick Road. It hosts Test matches, Lancashire’s county and T20 cricket, the Manchester Originals in The Hundred, and big summer concerts on the outfield. On the rare days when the cricket ground and the football ground are both busy, the whole area seizes up.

For cricket, the Hilton Garden Inn inside the ground is the one to book — for a Test week, as soon as you have tickets. Otherwise the Altrincham line drops you at Old Trafford stop, beside the ground, about ten minutes from St Peter’s Square. After a concert, when tens of thousands leave at once, that line is under the same pressure as after a United game, and hotels within a walk of Deansgate-Castlefield come into their own. Our guide to sport in Manchester beyond football covers the cricket calendar.

Hotels Near the Etihad Stadium and Co-op Live

What is actually out there

Search for hotels near the Etihad and the results fill up with city-centre hotels described as “near the stadium”, and with short-let apartments. Here is what exists on the ground:

• Travelodge Manchester Sportcity — the only branded hotel anywhere near the campus, and it is about a mile from the stadium rather than next to it. Ninety rooms, budget and basic, with its own car park and a pet-friendly policy. Reviews are mixed. It will do for a bed after a match if the price is right, but do not pay a premium for it on the strength of its name.
• Short-let apartments around Sportcity and Beswick — listings “opposite the Etihad” do exist, and a few genuinely are five or ten minutes’ walk away. Quality varies enormously and cancellation terms are often strict. Read the recent reviews, check the address on a map yourself, and walk away from anyone who wants paying outside the platform.
• Nothing on the campus itself. At the time of writing there is no hotel on the Etihad Campus. If one opens, this advice changes with it. Until then the realistic choice is between a budget hotel a mile away and a city-centre hotel ten minutes away by tram.

Why Piccadilly is the real answer

The Ashton tram line leaves the city from Piccadilly station and reaches Etihad Campus stop — next to both the stadium and Co-op Live — in under ten minutes, with trams every six or seven minutes in normal service. That makes the streets around Piccadilly station, and the Northern Quarter and Ancoats just north of them, the closest you can sensibly get to the Etihad while still having somewhere good to eat afterwards — and Piccadilly is where most long-distance trains come in anyway.

A few hotels worth knowing on this side of town:

• Motel One Manchester-Piccadilly — on London Road by the station approach. The budget-with-style pick: compact rooms, a good bar, and the tram stop is underneath the station.
• Native Manchester — an aparthotel in the Ducie Street Warehouse, right where the Ashton Canal begins its run out to the Etihad. Useful for groups and longer stays.
• Dakota Manchester — also on Ducie Street, and the smarter choice, with a bar and grill that works for a pre-match dinner or a post-gig drink.
• Hotel Brooklyn — on Portland Street, five minutes from both the station and Piccadilly Gardens, in the middle-to-upper price bracket.

More options in every price band are in our city-centre hotels guide and our budget hotels and hostels roundup.

Ancoats and New Islington

If you would rather be a little closer and a good deal more interesting, look at Ancoats. The old mill district between the Northern Quarter and New Islington is now one of the best places to eat in the city, from the original Rudy’s pizzeria to serious tasting menus, and it is about half an hour’s walk from the Etihad. It is mostly aparthotels and short lets here, and New Islington tram stop is two stops from the stadium. Our Ancoats guide has the full picture.

Getting to the Etihad Campus

There are three good ways from a city-centre hotel to the Etihad or Co-op Live, and one to avoid on the way home.

1. Tram. The Ashton line from Piccadilly or New Islington to Etihad Campus stop takes under ten minutes from Piccadilly. Velopark, the next stop out, is roughly ten minutes’ walk from the stadium and a useful escape valve after events, when the queue at Etihad Campus is at its longest.
2. On foot along the canal. The Ashton Canal towpath starts at Ducie Street, behind Piccadilly station, and runs through New Islington and out past Co-op Live. It is flat, a little under two miles, and takes thirty-five to forty minutes. Before a match or a show, in daylight, it is a lovely way to arrive. After eleven at night parts of it are dark and empty, and the streets are the better choice.
3. On foot by road. The road route out through Ancoats and along Ashton New Road is direct, lit and busy, and on a match day it fills with fans walking both ways. Allow about forty minutes from Piccadilly.
4. Taxi home — don’t. Getting there by cab is fine. Getting back is not: campus roads jam after big events and prices surge.

On a City match day the crowds are bigger and start earlier; for the full routine, see our Manchester match day guide.

Co-op Live Nights: What Changes

Co-op Live holds 23,500 people and a sell-out empties it in one go. A few things about the venue shape where you should sleep:

• Doors open 90 to 120 minutes before the advertised start, and arena headliners tend to finish somewhere between half past ten and eleven. You will be leaving at the same moment as twenty-odd thousand other people.
• Some tickets include tram travel within the city zone around the show. It is not universal, so check your confirmation.
• The venue is cashless — contactless card, Apple Pay or Google Pay only.
• The bag rule is strict. One bag per person, no bigger than A4: no backpacks, travel cases or laptop bags. If you are coming straight off a train with luggage, drop it at the hotel first, which is one more reason to stay near Piccadilly. Paid bag storage in the official car park starts at around £15; most hotels will hold a bag for a guest for nothing.

A hotel you can walk back to from Piccadilly at half past eleven is worth more than one closer to the arena but in the wrong direction for everything else. Our Co-op Live guide covers seating, food and the venue itself. The city’s other big room, the AO Arena, is a completely different proposition, since it sits on top of Victoria station. And if you come out of the show hungry rather than tired, our guide to late-night food in Manchester has what is still open around Piccadilly and the Northern Quarter.

Match Days, Gig Nights and When to Book

Manchester hotel prices follow what is happening in the city, and on these nights a great deal is happening. A few rules of thumb:

• Football dates move. The Premier League publishes its fixture list in June, but dates and kick-off times are changed for television, often only a few weeks ahead, and European and cup runs shunt league games around. Book a refundable rate and hold it until the date is confirmed.
• Gig dates don’t. Arena shows are announced months ahead, so the hotel rush comes at the on-sale, not the week before. If you have tickets, book the room the same day.
• Check every calendar. A United home game, a City home game and a Co-op Live sell-out can land on the same weekend. When they do, rates rise across the whole city.
• Sunday is usually the cheap night. Manchester’s hotels lean on weekday business travel and Saturday leisure, so Sunday nights tend to be the best value — handy for a Sunday afternoon kick-off.
• The derby is its own thing. For a Manchester derby, book the moment the date is confirmed. Both sides of the city fill.

Our hotel booking tips cover the rest, including when rates tend to fall. If you have not got tickets yet, start with how to get Manchester football tickets — there is no point booking a room opposite Old Trafford for a game you cannot get into.

Families, Groups and Longer Stays

The hotels closest to either ground are built for couples. For a family of four or six friends, the maths usually favours an apartment.

• Families — the Quays for Old Trafford, with the stadium tour and Imperial War Museum North for the other day; a Piccadilly aparthotel with a kitchen for the Etihad. Our family hotels guide covers rooms that genuinely sleep four.
• Groups — serviced apartments and aparthotels in the centre sleep four to eight at a per-head price no hotel near a ground will match, and large group houses sleeping twelve run from roughly £200 to £350 a night. Our aparthotels guide has the options, and for birthdays and stag weekends built around a match, see groups and celebrations in Manchester.

If You Are Driving

Driving to either ground on an event day is a decision most people make exactly once. If you must, stay somewhere with parking and leave the car there. At Old Trafford the Hilton Garden Inn has secure parking on site, while around the football ground match-day parking is a patchwork of club car parks and private yards. At the Etihad Campus, Co-op Live’s official parking must be pre-booked — around £25 standard or £35 express, opening four hours before doors — and the Travelodge has its own car park. Otherwise, use a Metrolink park-and-ride further out on the Ashton line, such as Ashton Moss or Ashton West, and ride in.

Our driving and parking guide covers city-centre car parks and park-and-ride in detail.

What Is Not Worth It

• Paying extra for a listing with “Etihad” in its name. The stadium is a place, not a neighbourhood full of hotels. Check the map, not the headline.
• Hotel Football on a match day you are not attending. It is the busiest, loudest corner of Trafford that afternoon, and without a ticket you are paying for someone else’s atmosphere.
• A non-refundable rate before the TV picks are announced. A Saturday 15:00 kick-off can become a Sunday 16:30 one with a few weeks’ notice.
• A taxi home from either ground. Walk, take the tram, or walk to a tram stop one further out. The cab queue is where good evenings go to die.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the closest hotel to Old Trafford?

Hotel Football, directly opposite the stadium on Sir Matt Busby Way. The Hilton Garden Inn inside Emirates Old Trafford, the cricket ground, is about a mile away, and the Salford Quays hotels are around twenty minutes’ walk.

Is there a hotel at the Etihad Stadium?

No. At the time of writing there is no hotel on the Etihad Campus. The nearest branded hotel is Travelodge Manchester Sportcity, about a mile away. Most visitors do better staying near Piccadilly station, under ten minutes away by tram.

Where should I stay for a Co-op Live concert?

Near Piccadilly station, in the Northern Quarter or in Ancoats. Trams from Piccadilly reach Etihad Campus stop, next to the arena, in under ten minutes, and the canal towpath walk takes thirty-five to forty.

How do I get from Manchester city centre to Old Trafford?

Take the Altrincham-line tram from St Peter’s Square or Deansgate-Castlefield to Old Trafford stop, about ten minutes, then walk fifteen. On foot, Chester Road gets you there from Castlefield in about forty minutes.

Planning the Rest of Your Trip

• Where to stay in Manchester — every area of the city compared, for the nights that are not match nights.
• The Old Trafford stadium tour — the ground and the museum on a non-match day.
• The Etihad Stadium tour — City’s tunnel, dressing room and pitchside.
• United or City: which stadium tour? — if you only have time for one.
• Manchester football tourism — the museum, the pubs and the rest of the football city.
• Getting around Manchester — trams, buses and walking between it all.