Haunted Hotels in New Orleans: The Most Haunted Places to Stay
New Orleans may have more haunted hotels per block than anywhere in America. Here are the thirteen with the strongest ghost stories, which rooms to ask for, and how much of each story holds up.
Founded in 1718, New Orleans has lived through two great fires, yellow fever epidemics, war, hurricanes and three centuries of parties, and almost every old building in the French Quarter has a story to go with it. That is why the city tops lists of the most haunted cities in America, and why so many of its hotels are part of the legend. Some tell their ghost stories proudly, like the Monteleone, the Bourbon Orleans and the Dauphine Orleans. Others keep quiet while guests and tour guides do the talking. Every hotel below is open to guests and has a ghost story told by staff, guests or published sources, and we have checked names, dates and addresses against current sources. Where a famous story does not match the records, we say so. Most are in the French Quarter, with Le Pavillon in the Central Business District and the Columns out on St. Charles Avenue in the Garden District. For the rest of the city’s ghost spots, see our guide to haunted places in New Orleans.
$$ · $150 to $300Haunted room bookableGhost tours or eventsHotel embraces its ghosts
Address 717 Orleans St, New Orleans, LA 70116
Where to look The Orleans Ballroom, Room 644, the sixth and third floors, the lobby
Reported ghosts A dancer in the ballroom, a nun, children from the old orphanage, a wounded soldier
Booking the haunted room Call the hotel after booking and request Room 644 or a sixth-floor room. Specific rooms are requests, not guarantees.
The Bourbon Orleans wraps around the 1817 Orleans Ballroom, where Creole society once danced, and the convent and school of the Sisters of the Holy Family, who owned the property from 1881 until it became a hotel in 1964. The hotel’s own history page names its ghosts: a Confederate soldier, nuns, children and a lonely dancer.
Guests describe a woman in a gown dancing alone under the ballroom chandeliers, children laughing and tugging at clothes on the upper floors, and a limping soldier in the halls. Room 644 is the room most often linked to a ghostly nun. It sits one block off Bourbon Street, behind St. Louis Cathedral.
Haunted Rooms tip: Ask the front desk if you can peek into the Orleans Ballroom when it is not booked for an event.
$$ · $150 to $300Haunted room bookableGhost tours or eventsHotel embraces its ghosts
Address 214 Royal St, New Orleans, LA 70130
Where to look The 14th floor and Room 1462, the elevators, the lobby restaurant doors, the Carousel Bar, the rooftop, the lobby grandfather clock
Reported ghosts Maurice Begere, a toddler who died in the 1890s; a former employee known as Red; ghostly children
Booking the haunted room Request a 14th-floor room (Room 1462 if you can) by calling the hotel after booking. Floors are requests, not guarantees.
Family owned since 1886, the Hotel Monteleone on Royal Street is the grand dame of French Quarter hotels, home of the revolving Carousel Bar and a National Literary Landmark. It is also one of the most talked-about haunted hotels in America, and the hotel tells its ghost stories itself.
The best known is Maurice Begere, a toddler said to have died of a fever while his parents were at the opera in the 1890s. Guests report a small boy on the 14th floor (really the 13th), especially near Room 1462. In 2003 the International Society for Paranormal Research reported more than a dozen spirits here, and staff talk of doors that open by themselves and elevators that stop on 14.
Haunted Rooms tip: Ask for a 14th-floor room when you book, then have a nightcap at the Carousel Bar.
$$ · $150 to $300Haunted room bookableGhost tours or eventsNo pets
Address 1003 Bourbon St, New Orleans, LA 70116
Where to look Room 21, the mirror outside Room 21, the second-floor hallway
Reported ghosts Marie, a young daughter of the Gleises family, and her grieving mother
Booking the haunted room Call the guest house on 504-581-2678 and ask for Room 21 by number.
Built in 1849 as the family home of Paul Gleises, the Lafitte Guest House is a three-story Creole mansion with lacy cast-iron galleries at the quiet, residential end of Bourbon Street. It has just 14 rooms, filled with antiques, and some booking sites now list it as Lafitte Hotel & Bar.
Its ghost story centers on Room 21. Local legend says a young daughter named Marie died in the house, possibly of yellow fever, and that her mother never recovered and died in the same room. Guests report crying and sobbing in Room 21, and a little girl seen in the mirror outside it.
Haunted Rooms tip: Room 21 is the one to ask for. Call the hotel directly to request it.
Where to look The lobby and elevators, Room 221, Room 930 on the ninth floor and Rooms 301 and 302
Reported ghosts Ada (also called Eva or Ava), a 1920s couple, a third-floor prankster
Booking the haunted room Book a standard room and ask the front desk for Room 930 or a ninth-floor room. Requests are not guaranteed.
Le Pavillon opened in January 1907 as the New Hotel Denechaud, became the DeSoto Hotel a few years later and took its current name after a 1970s revival. Its columned Poydras Street portico, crystal chandeliers and late-night peanut butter and jelly sandwiches make it one of the city’s best-loved grand hotels. A $19 million renovation has since brought it into Marriott’s Tribute Portfolio.
It is also one of the most reported haunted hotels outside the French Quarter. The best-known ghost is a young woman called Ada, Eva or Ava, said to have been struck by a carriage on Poydras Street and seen near Room 930. Guests also describe a smartly dressed 1920s couple who stroll into the elevators and vanish, and a prankster on the third floor who pulls sheets off beds.
Haunted Rooms tip: Come down to the lobby in the evening for the free peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, then keep an eye on the elevators.
$$ · $150 to $300Haunted room bookablePet friendly
Address 919 Royal Street, New Orleans, LA 70116
Where to look Room 208, the second floor, the courtyard and Rooms 107 and 109
Reported ghosts Five boys from a 1790s boarding school, a boy called Armand, a housekeeper, Andrew Jackson
Booking the haunted room Book any room, then call the hotel and ask for Room 208. Requests are noted but not guaranteed.
This small Royal Street hotel stands on the lot of the old federal courthouse where General Andrew Jackson was fined $1,000 for contempt of court in 1815, weeks after the Battle of New Orleans. The courthouse came down in the late 1880s and the present two-story brick building, with its iron gallery and Creole courtyard, replaced it. Local legend says a boys’ boarding school stood here earlier and burned in the great fire of 1794.
Those boys are the hotel’s best-known ghosts. Guests report children laughing in the courtyard at night, a boy sitting in front of a TV that switched itself on, and covers tugged off beds. Room 208 is the room people ask for, linked to a boy remembered as Armand. A tidy-minded housekeeper and, some say, Old Hickory himself complete the cast.
Haunted Rooms tip: Ask for Room 208, or a second-floor room off the courtyard, when you book, and take a coffee out to the courtyard after dark.
Where to look The 500 Building, its second-floor elevator landing, guest-room beds
Reported ghosts Wounded soldiers and army surgeons, a young woman who nursed the sick
Booking the haunted room Ask for a room in the 500 Building when booking by phone (800-535-7922). Buildings are requests, not guarantees.
The family-run Hotel Provincial is a cluster of restored Creole townhouses and courtyards on Chartres Street, a few steps from the Old Ursuline Convent. Its buildings are on the National Register of Historic Places, and the land was once part of the French colony’s Royal Hospital grounds and herb garden. The hotel itself says one building stands where a military hospital once stood.
That is Building 500, the heart of its ghost stories. Guests describe walking in to see wounded soldiers moaning on the beds, who vanish when the lights go on, and bloodstains that appear on sheets and fade away. One famous story says the elevator opened on the second floor onto a full hospital ward.
Haunted Rooms tip: Ask for a room in the 500 Building when you book.
Sleeping in a haunted hotel is one thing. Investigating one after dark is another. On a Haunted Rooms ghost hunt our team takes you through the building with professional ghost hunting equipment, runs EVP sessions and lets you explore on your own during free roam.
Where to look Upper-floor guest rooms, the seventh floor, the hallways at night
Reported ghosts A helpful ghostly maid, a Confederate soldier, unexplained moans
The Omni Royal Orleans fills a block of St. Louis Street, a short walk from Jackson Square. It opened in 1960 as the Royal Orleans on the site of the St. Louis Hotel, which the 1915 hurricane wrecked. Before that, the City Exchange on this spot was used for slave auctions until the 1830s, a history the city has never forgotten and many visitors find hard to sit with.
Its best-known ghost is gentle. Historic Hotels of America, which the hotel belongs to, says many accounts describe a maid who walks the halls at night, and one guest woke to find her trying to change the sheets around them. Other guests talk of tucked-in blankets, taps and lights turning on, moans in empty corridors and a uniformed soldier on the seventh floor.
Haunted Rooms tip: Ask for an upper floor and leave the light on if you would rather not be tucked in.
Where to look May Baily's Place bar, the courtyards, the Hermann House rooms
Reported ghosts Millie the phantom bride, a Confederate officer, bar pranksters
The Dauphine Orleans is a cluster of Creole buildings one block from Bourbon Street, and the hotel tells its ghost stories itself. Its bar, May Baily’s Place, takes its name from one of the city’s early licensed bordellos, which the hotel says ran here in the mid to late 1800s. Hotel tradition also says John James Audubon worked on Birds of America in what is now the breakfast room.
The famous ghost is Millie, said to be May Baily’s sister, whose Confederate fiance was shot in a gambling brawl on their wedding day. Guests say they see her in a lace gown near the bar. Others report a uniformed officer pacing the courtyard, glasses sliding off the bar, a barstool lifting off the floor and televisions flicking on by themselves.
Haunted Rooms tip: Have a drink in May Baily’s Place, look for the 1857 license on the wall and ask the bartender for the latest story.
Where to look The Peyroux House rooms, the carriage house, the main entrance
Reported ghosts An 18th-century carriage master, heavy footsteps, a Confederate soldier
Booking the haunted room Call the hotel after booking and ask for a room in the Peyroux House or the carriage house. Requests are not guaranteed.
Hotel St. Pierre is a budget-friendly group of Creole cottages and courtyards at Burgundy and Dumaine, with two small pools. Its oldest building, the Gabriel Peyroux House, dates to about 1780 and is one of the few survivors of the city’s early French colonial building style. The jazz museum that opened next door at 1017 Dumaine in 1961 was described as the first in the world.
Ghost City Tours says the Peyroux House is where guests feel icy hands and a weight at the foot of the bed. Staff say footsteps are the most common report, including heavy steps above a carriage house room when no one was staying overhead. A man in a blue shirt and black boots, said to be the family’s old carriage master, is seen near the entrance.
Haunted Rooms tip: Ask for a room in the Peyroux House when you book; it is a request, not a guarantee.
Address 3811 St. Charles Ave, New Orleans, LA 70115
Where to look Room 10, the third floor near Room 21, the ballroom, the grand staircase
Reported ghosts A courteous ghostly host, a sick little girl, a woman in white
Booking the haunted room The hotel has about 20 rooms; call after booking to request Room 10 or a third-floor room. Requests are not guaranteed.
Out on St. Charles Avenue, on the streetcar line, The Columns is an 1883 Italianate mansion designed by Thomas Sully for tobacco merchant Simon Hernsheim. It became a boarding house around World War I and a hotel in 1953, played a bordello in the 1978 film Pretty Baby, and is on the National Register of Historic Places. Its porch bar is a local favorite.
Ghost City Tours collects the stories: a well-dressed gentleman who appears at guest room doors offering help, then vanishes; a little girl who looks ill on the third floor near Room 21; and a woman in a long white dress drifting across the old ballroom. Room 10 is the one people ask for, with a woman seen sitting on the bed, cold spots and a toilet that flushes by itself.
Haunted Rooms tip: Ask for Room 10 when you book, then have a drink on the front porch as the streetcars pass.
Where to look The hallways of the main house, the courtyard, guest rooms in the side buildings
Reported ghosts A woman in red, children heard laughing, a mother searching for them
The Lamothe House is a circa 1839 Creole double townhouse on oak-lined Esplanade Avenue, at the quiet downriver edge of the French Quarter. It is listed on the National Register of Historic Places, and its five Grand Antique Suites keep the original high ceilings, cypress floors and antiques, around a flagstone courtyard and pool.
Its ghost stories are quieter than the big Quarter hotels, but persistent. Guests describe a woman in a red dress who steps out of a room and vanishes, children laughing late at night, and a woman walking the halls as if looking for them. Online guest reports also mention lights switching on by themselves and toys rattling.
Haunted Rooms tip: Ask for one of the Grand Antique Suites in the 1839 main house, where the house’s story began.
Where to look Courtyard rooms, upper hallways, empty rooms
Reported ghosts A girl looking for her grandmother, a bearded man in colonial dress
The Place d’Armes Hotel sits just off Jackson Square, a block from Cafe du Monde, in restored 18th and 19th century buildings around shady courtyards and a pool. The name comes from the old parade ground in front of St. Louis Cathedral, the colonial Place d’Armes. It is one of the best-placed hotels in the Quarter for a first visit.
Ghost bloggers and French Quarter tour guides say a school once stood here and burned in the Great Fire of 1788, killing the headmaster and several pupils. Guests report footsteps, voices and laughter from empty rooms, furniture moved overnight, a little girl in old-fashioned clothes who asks where her grandmother is, and an old bearded man in 18th-century dress who nods politely and fades away.
Haunted Rooms tip: Book a courtyard room and take a late walk around Jackson Square, a one-minute stroll away.
Where to look The courtyard, the small bar, bedroom mirrors
Reported ghosts Spanish soldiers in uniform, a dark gray figure, small handprints
Le Richelieu is a small, 88-room hotel in the quiet residential end of the French Quarter, a few blocks from the Old Ursuline Convent. It is made up of two buildings around a courtyard with a saltwater pool, and it is one of the few Quarter hotels with its own parking. SmarterTravel notes that Paul McCartney once lived here for a few months.
Its ghost story is a local legend: a band of Spanish soldiers is said to have been executed on this ground, and guests describe men in full uniform marching through the courtyard or standing in the bar. Culture Trip adds child-sized handprints that appear on mirrors and a dark gray figure seen in bedrooms. We know of no record of executions here, so treat it as a story.
Haunted Rooms tip: Sit out in the courtyard late in the evening, where the soldiers are said to march.
The Villa Convento, the Ursulines Avenue townhouse rumored to be the House of the Rising Sun, has been closed for a full renovation. Its website said it planned to welcome guests again in October 2026, so check there before you plan a stay. Room 209 is the room ghost hunters ask for.
More New Orleans hotels with ghost stories
These hotels also turn up on ghost tours and in haunted hotel lists. We could not find enough reliable published detail to rate them, but they are worth knowing about.
Cornstalk Hotel, 915 Royal Street: a small Victorian hotel behind its famous cast-iron cornstalk fence, a few doors from the Andrew Jackson Hotel. Culture Trip says guests report a woman in a black dress and children laughing.
The Pontchartrain Hotel, St. Charles Avenue: built as apartments in 1927, with stories of two sisters on the 11th floor and ghostly piano music in the old Bayou Bar, according to Cajun Encounters.
Olivier House Hotel, 828 Toulouse Street: a former Creole mansion where We3Travel says Room 308 has the most activity.
The Haunted Hotel, 623 Ursulines Avenue: a guesthouse that leans fully into its ghosts. Haunted Rooms has run overnight ghost hunts there in the past, so check the listing for new dates.
More haunted New Orleans and Louisiana
Hotel Monteleone: full guide to Maurice, the 14th floor and Room 1462
Bourbon Orleans: full guide to the ballroom, the nuns and Room 644
What changed in this guide: We kept every hotel from our previous list that still takes guests and added the Hotel St. Pierre’s Peyroux House history, the Place d’Armes Hotel and The Columns in the Garden District. The Dauphine Orleans appeared twice in the old list and is now one entry. The Hotel Villa Convento has moved to the closed section while it is being renovated. We removed the Hotel St. Marie: we could not find a reliable published account of the 1940s murder and ghost described in our old list. We no longer say the Hotel Provincial dates to 1722 (that is when a military hospital stood nearby; the hotel’s buildings date from 1825 to 1874), and we now flag the Andrew Jackson Hotel’s boys’ school fire and Le Richelieu’s executed Spanish soldiers as legends.
Stayed in one of these hotels? Tell us what happened
We collect first-hand accounts from guests and add the best ones to our guides, with your first name and the date of your stay. We read every story before it’s published.
The Bourbon Orleans and the Hotel Monteleone are the two named most often. The Bourbon Orleans has a ghostly dancer in its 1817 ballroom, a nun linked to Room 644 and a Confederate soldier, and the hotel talks about them itself. The Monteleone is famous for Maurice, a little boy said to haunt the 14th floor.
What is the most haunted room in New Orleans?
Room 644 at the Bourbon Orleans, Room 1462 on the Monteleone’s 14th floor, Room 21 at the Lafitte Guest House, Room 208 at the Andrew Jackson Hotel and Room 930 at Le Pavillon are the rooms guests ask for most. You can request all of them by phone after booking, but requests are not guaranteed.
Which New Orleans hotels talk about their own ghosts?
The Hotel Monteleone, the Bourbon Orleans and the Dauphine Orleans all tell their ghost stories on their own websites, and the Omni Royal Orleans shares its ghostly maid through Historic Hotels of America. At the others the stories come from guests, staff and tour guides.
Are there haunted hotels in New Orleans outside the French Quarter?
Yes. Le Pavillon on Poydras Street in the Central Business District is one of the most reported haunted hotels in the city, and The Columns on St. Charles Avenue, an 1883 Garden District mansion, has its own stories about Room 10 and a ghostly host.
Is there a cheap haunted hotel in New Orleans?
Hotel St. Pierre on Burgundy Street is usually the best value, with rooms in Creole cottages that date to the 1780s. The Lamothe House on Esplanade Avenue is another good-value choice.
Was the Andrew Jackson Hotel really a boys' school?
That is local legend. Records show the site held the federal courthouse where Andrew Jackson was fined for contempt in 1815, and the story of a boarding school that burned with five boys inside has not been confirmed. Treat it as a story, which is how we tell it.
Sources and how we research
Every hotel in this guide is checked against the hotel’s own website, historic register listings and news coverage. Ghost stories are reported as the hotels, guests and local historians tell them; we note where a story can’t be confirmed. Read how we rate haunted hotels.
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About the authors
The Haunted Rooms Team runs public ghost hunts and overnight investigations at historic venues across the United States. We research every hotel in our guides using hotel histories, local archives, news coverage and the accounts of guests and staff, and we review each guide regularly so you are not booking a hotel that has closed or changed its name. Spotted something out of date? Let us know.
Booking links on this page are affiliate links. If you book through them we may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you. It never affects which hotels we include or how we score them.
