2025 Boston Travel Guide | Hotels, Dining & Attractions

From fresh-shucked oysters in the Seaport to hidden fashion gems in Allston, the best places to visit in Boston are full of flavor, culture, and character. This curated collection—handpicked by Yankee editors—highlights the city’s most exciting spots to eat, stay, and play in 2025. Whether you’re brunching in Brookline, catching an indie flick in Coolidge Corner, or exploring world-class art in unexpected corners of the city, there’s something here for every kind of urban explorer. Consider this your insider guide to Boston at its boldest and best.

Best Places to Visit in Boston | 2025 Editors’ Picks

2025 Best Boston Hotels

Best Affordable Overnight: Hotel 1868, Cambridge

To find a quality stay priced consistently under $300 per night—even on peak summer weekends—head to Cambridge’s Porter Square, situated within easy reach of adjacent Harvard and Davis squares and their abundant restaurants, shops, and theaters. Located across the street from a subway stop, this chic 50-room hotel offers a gym, business facilities, concierge service, and modestly sized but generously comfy rooms.

Best Boutique Hotel: The Newbury Boston, Boston

Rebranded and completely reimagined in 2021, The Newbury continues the luxe heritage of its original incarnation as the nation’s very first Ritz-Carlton hotel, circa 1927. Its refined rooftop Italian restaurant, Contessa, keeps foodie guests fully sated, while its more lounge-y street-side bar offers a perfect place to linger. With in-room tea service and your very own fireplace “butler,” you can’t help but feel you’ve landed someplace truly special. If at all possible, splurge for a park-side room: The sweeping views of the Public Garden are worth it.

Best Hotel Lobby: Four Seasons Hotel Boston, Boston

Superstar designer Ken Fulk refreshed the common areas of this downtown stalwart to highlight its location across from the Public Garden, with an ethereal Maxfield Parrish–esque mural behind the front desk and a series of lobby “living rooms” inspired by grand country houses. Guests and visitors alike can dine in style at the Fulk-envisioned Coterie, a sleek bar-café with botanical-inspired cocktails and both French and New England classics (e.g., steak frites and lobster rolls).

2025 Best Boston Dining

Best Affordable Seafood: Yankee Lobster Co., Boston

Located at the far eastern end of Northern Avenue, this Seaport District standby does quality seafood at reasonable-for-Boston prices: Fish sandwiches, fish and chips, and fried clam strips come in at $20 or less, and the abundant fisherman’s platter, heaped with enough fried seafood to feed two, is about $40. It helps that the restaurant fronts a wholesale operation that moves thousands of pounds of fresh lobster on any given day.

Best Bagels: Bagelsaurus, Cambridge

Greater Boston has seen a bagel renaissance these past few years, with a number of excellent spots graduating from pop-ups to full-fledged brick-and-mortar operations (Exodus Bagels in Roslindale and Brick Street Bagels in the South End, to name two). But Bagelsaurus still rules them all, thanks to bagels blessed with tender-but-chewy interiors, crackling exteriors, and just-right coatings—delicious on their own or as the foundation for an astoundingly good breakfast sandwich.

Best Bakery: Colette, Boston

Baguettes, croissants, éclairs, macarons, quiches—there isn’t a single thing at this South End bakery-café that fails to delight us. Of particular note are the canelés and the classic flan Parisien, brimming with custardy goodness, and the brioche filled with chocolate-hazelnut praline. Small and charming (mignon, as the French would say), Colette is the neighborhood spot we all wish we had. Additional locations in Medford and Melrose.

Best Brunch: Bar Vlaha, Brookline

Prime-time dinner reservations can be tough to get at Bar Vlaha, whose superlative Greek cuisine has seen it consistently lauded as one of Boston’s best restaurants. Brunch, on the other hand, is a more relaxed affair—and it’s just as terrific. Standouts include saganaki, fried sheep’s milk cheese in a Metaxa brandy sauce with pistachios and a bit of jam or seasonal fruit; tsoureki, a Greek take on French toast with fruit, whipped cream, and fantastically creamy maple yogurt; and the tangy, spicy egg-lover’s dream known as shakshouka.

Best Coffee Shop: Ogawa Coffee, Boston

If the work-from-home trend has thinned out the crowd of coffee drinkers in downtown Boston, you’d never know it at this buzzing spot near Downtown Crossing. The only U.S. outpost of a three-quarter-century-old Japanese coffee company, Ogawa is most notable for its skill in coaxing maximum flavor out of its beans without adding acidity or bitterness, as its popularity proves.

Best Farm-to-Table Dining: Field & Vine, Somerville

The vibes at this seasonal-dining haven are downright Edenic: twinkling lights, abundant greenery, and a friendly mix of neighborhood regulars and visiting foodies. Savor the wood-fired seafood, the cheddar-scallion cornbread with miso butter, and any of the imaginative peak-produce salads (think: beets and berries, or peaches and purslane).

Best Italian Restaurant: SRV, Boston

Nine-year-old SRV always captivates us. How can a restaurant be this consistently great for so long? The menu is deeply Italian with a special focus on Venetian cuisine, yet it also surprises (think: pasta stuffed with beets and poppy seeds, a classic in Northern Italy but rare here). Plus, they have two outdoor patios for summer dining. With new chef de cuisine Jacey Vaccaro at the helm, we can’t wait to see what comes next.

Best Lunch: Sofra Bakery & Café, Allston and Cambridge

We have long loved Sofra’s contemporary spins on traditional dishes from Turkey, Lebanon, and Greece. But almost as soon as the original Cambridge location opened in 2008, it outgrew its small space. With its much larger second café now open in Allston, Sofra offers spacious comfort in which to enjoy classics like spinach falafel with beet tzatziki, lamb shawarma, and heirloom tomato galettes with feta. Don’t skip dessert: The sesame-cashew bars and chocolate earthquake cookies are signature treats.

2025 Best Boston Attractions

Best Bakers’ Mecca: Elmendorf Baking Supplies, Cambridge

The modest scale of this storefront belies its outsize appeal for carb lovers: a full-service café, kitchen supplies ranging from French whisks to proofing baskets to sanding sugars and sprinkles, a range of baking books, and knowledgeable staffers to answer any question. They even mill flour here from local grains, using it in the café’s pastries and also bagging up the good stuff for shoppers to take home and turn into the best bread they’ve ever made.

Best Hidden-Gem Museum: Nichols House Museum, Boston

If you’ve ever longed to peek behind the facade of a stately Beacon Hill townhouse, now’s your chance. The Nichols House Museum beautifully preserves the former residence of Rose Standish Nichols, a landscape architect and writer—and niece of legendary sculptor Augustus Saint-Gaudens—who lived here from 1885 until her death in 1960. Inside the rooms, you’ll find period furniture, Flemish tapestries, pieces by Saint-Gaudens, and mementos that tell the story of Nichols’s life as she moved through Boston’s literary, political, and artistic circles.

Best New Family Attraction: Museum of Ice Cream, Boston

The city’s latest entry in the “immersive experiences” category, this candy-colored ode to America’s favorite dessert invites visitors into a fantasy world that encompasses a ball pit filled with oversize ice cream sprinkles (sadly, nonedible), a simulated airplane flight on the “Creamliner,” interactive ice cream trivia, and a tasting lab where the samples include lobster ice cream (buttery and creamy, but not overtly lobster-y).

Best Small Art Museum: McMullen Museum of Art, Brighton

In 2021, Fidelity vice chairman and Boston College alum Peter Lynch donated $20 million worth of his personal art collection to this BC-owned institution on Commonwealth Avenue. The gift included works by such heavy hitters as Sargent, Cassatt, Picasso, and Homer, now on display on the museum’s first floor. Upstairs, special exhibits on topics such as illuminated manuscripts from the Middle Ages and Renaissance, the Irish Arts and Crafts movement, and the Cuban avant-garde are curated as expertly as in much larger museums, but on a more intimate scale.

Best Movie Theater: Coolidge Corner Theatre, Brookline

How rare it is to find a 1933 Art Deco movie palace selling out on any given night of the week—and rarer still that it should show a dizzying range of new releases, retrospectives, midnight screenings, documentaries, and films shot in 70mm (and serve up a mean tub of popcorn with real butter, to boot). With its long-awaited expansion finally completed, the Coolidge has added classes and seminars to the mix. Simply put, it’s a national treasure for Bostonians to call their own.

Best Nature Escape: Boston Nature Center & Wildlife Sanctuary, Mattapan

Sixty-seven acres in all, these woods, meadows, and wetlands offer blessed relief from urban life without the need to venture beyond city limits. Equally diverting are the various educational programs, spanning birding excursions and foraging walks to poetry workshops and crafting classes. (Where else can you make your own candles and herbal oils using plants harvested on-site?) Meanwhile, a mile-long universal-access trail welcomes nature lovers of all abilities.

Best New England Style Fix (Men’s): Sault New England, Boston

It’s not just the merchandise that makes this store so appealing—it’s the merchandising. In his South End shop (there’s a second location in Portsmouth, New Hampshire), owner Philip Saul evokes a world of oxfords and flannels, regattas, and striped silk ties with vintage New England–style home accessories and locally made leather wallets. Sault’s ever-growing lines for women and kids are worth a look, too.

Best New England Style Fix (Women’s): La Ligne, Boston

Among La Ligne’s founders is Boston native Meredith Melling, which may be why there’s more than a little New England style in this NYC-based clothing line. In La Ligne’s recently opened boutique on Newbury Street, modern takes on nautical stripes appear in many colors and fabrics, monogramming is encouraged, and cardigans get a star turn. But for all its nods to the classics, this is decidedly fashion-forward clothing, with silhouettes that tuck and swing in all the right places. Bonus: Many popular pieces come in sizes from XXS to 3X.

Best Secret Fashion Stash: Designers Circus, Allston

The Filene’s Basement era of deep discounts on designer fashion may be sadly over, but this nondescript shop in Allston Village is doing its best to fill the void. Owner Kathleen O’Neill had her own clothing line for decades and now sells clothing by about 80 independent designers from around the world for at least half off retail. Styles range from earthy to cutting-edge, and with a bit of digging, you’ll always find something that suits you—and that no one else has.

See More: 10 Best Things to Do in Boston This Summer 2025

Honorees were selected by Yankee editors led by senior food editor Amy Traverso, longtime Boston resident and the cohost of Weekends with Yankee.

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