What kind of rating are the places getting on tripadvisor? And how many reviews?

For example, if a place has 5 stars but only a handful of reviews, I'd still be wary.

If it has 4.5 or 5 stars and over a hundred reviews, you're probably safe (but still check it out on other websites too).

Look at the traveller photos and read all of the 1 and 2 star reviews.

I'd never book a hotel with less than 4.5 on tripadvisor unless I wanted to risk it being poor (e.g. if it was just one night or if I'd barely be there I might go for a 4).

I'm quite fussy about hotels/b&bs.
I'll do shitloads of research and as others said don't just use trip advisor.

I stayed in a couple of horrible places for work trips and hated it.

I have a friend who is the total opposite and never reads reviews. We went away recently and the place he found was awful and I wouldn't book it. It took me 5 minutes to find all the awful reviews. I don't think he reads reviews at all which is fine for them but I'm not staying in a dump because it's 50 quid.

I usually start with Booking.Com because you can't post a review there until after you have checked out. So at least you can be sure reviewers have actually stayed there.

Next I check bad reviews and see what has upset people. A lot of the time it's one-offs but I'd be wary of noisy building work, dodgy locations or leaky showers.

I also look at the good reviews to see if that is important to me too. I ignore food reviews as I'm unlikely to eat there, and I'm not interested in a pool or gym, but comfy bed comments and quietness are important.

I tend to book apartments not hotels if I can (too inflexible) so I then check Airbnb reviews if there are any. They are often more in depth.

When I've whittled it down I try to find info on Trip Advisor which is trickier with apartments. As a PP said, I focus on the traveller photos and room numbers if available.

Final check nowadays is Google street view, to see if the area is full of graffiti, tower blocks etc. This can be really important as I'm often looking at city apartments. Being in a nice location is important to me so this bit is the decider. Ten minutes walk from a key location can vary a lot.

I found a gorgeous turn-of-the-century apartment in Dresden with a balcony. But the view from said balcony was over a run down housing estate. The lovely interior couldn't make up for that. I would have been better off further out in a leafy suburb.

The key is don’t just use reviews. Use a search like The Telegraph Travel too. We are going to Buenos Aires later in the year. We’ve been before. We loved where we stayed before but wanted a change. We shortlisted from the Telegraph Travel section. Ditto Chicago where there are many fantastic hotels.

I filter out anywhere less than 8/10 or 4:5. I’m
not a huge fan of older large hotels. Never stay in a Holiday Inn or similar. I like something a bit more eclectic and personal. On Booking.com and Hotels.com and Expedia I always filter by rating but I know some hotels won’t be my taste or where I want to be.
Lonely Planet often gives decent recommendations too.

Trip advisor has never failed me. Take the time to read up properly.

I try to use the same chains really, i.e. mostly Holiday Inn, or similar, simply for the consistency - you know exactly what you're going to get. I like the "new build" hotels as you know they're going to be relatively modern, have decent heating/air con and showers/hot water, etc.

I really can't do with private B&B type places as I've found the owners are usually far too "in your face" and don't leave you alone. I know some people like that, but I don't. I want the anonymity.

I also avoid the older/"historic" hotels as they're usually pretty crap, i.e. no or faulty air con, poor hot water, etc., simply due to the age of the infrastructure. That is unless you go to the most expensive ones that have been virtually rebuilt/re-fitted. But your typical "x-town Grand Hotel", no way!

No Holiday Inn in Buenos Aires. I don’t like formulaic hotels. I want character and style. I’ve stayed in wonderful hotels that are old.

One thing I have found useful - and vital lately - when using a source like tripadvisor is to sort reviews by most recent date. Lots of things have changed since COVID lockdowns came in and some haven't changed back even if relevant restrictions have been officially lifted.

Just for example: I recently travelled around North America, and had three separate occasions (one in Canada, two in USA - none in Mexico, to their credit) where I booked a hotel based on the claim that it had a shuttle operating from and to a nearby airport, and in fact the shuttle didn't run and hadn't run in months/years.

In one case, when I dug into the hotel's own site, it prominently advertised an airport shuttle, but the T&C - in fine print far below - said that the shuttle was suspended until futher notice. In the second case, the hotel's site said they had a shuttle; they'd suspended it for COVID and never reinstated but didn't update their website and there was no fine print on third party websites which they had no idea the shuttle wasn't running. In the third case, when I called the hotel they said they had never had an airport shuttle - even though they advertised on several third party sites that they had a free one - and hung up on me when I asked for more information. There was no recourse in any of these cases.

Now I call the hotel to check on any amenities I need before I book. Which means I don't use opaque options like Priceline or Hotwire if I need a particular amenity. This was NOT the case before COVID; occasionally there would be an amenity listed on a third party site that the actual hotel did not support and the situation would be promptly corrected and compensation given.

Be careful out there.

As others have said look at online reviews. I focus on recent ones, have a scroll through them all to get a feel for current experiences, then I filter to 1 and 2 stars and see what the issues are - sometimes they are specific things that won't effect me, sometimes they are clearly sour grapes, and sometimes it will put me off. As a rule of thumb on TripAdvisor or Google reviews anything 3.5 star or below would set my alarm bells ringing as people tend to rate 5 stars if they get what they expect, not necessarily for a 5 star experience.

The system of rating hotels 1-5 stars is not based on visits by an inspector and determining what star it "feels" like, it is based on facilities offered. Like a concierge, or gym, on site restaurant.... If a hotel ticks the right boxes they could be god awful but be rated officially 5 star. However, generally the cost of having these extras means the hotel has to charge more, and people will not pay unless it is up to scratch so it normally is ball park about right. That being said there are alot of very tried grotty 4/5 stars around.

I've had the opposite experiences I research diligently for the right place and location and have been surprised that it has received bad reviews when we loved it. There isn't a place out there without a bad review so as long as the overwhelming reviews are positive it's a go with me. I'm not concerned about it being dated as long as it's clean and if u want a budget price it's the risk you take

Why would you be happy with a dated hotel? My home isn’t dated. I don’t want significantly worse on holiday. I’m prepared for some hotels in far flung places to be basic, with a low price to match, but I would feel really very disappointed with a dated hotel here. I hate grotty old furniture and carpets. I don’t have rat at home and I don’t want it in a hotel. However I’m prepared to pay for a decent experience and have little difficulty finding it.

Because some people genuinely don’t care about decor? I have a dated flat and no interest in decorating it or buying new furniture as it’s not a priority for me. It wouldn’t bother me if the carpet or the hotel decor was old, as long as it’s clean and comfortable. I’m not going to hotels to admire the walls, I literally just need a space to plonk my suitcase during the day and sleep during the night.

Im with Eileen GC and dated furniture isn't that important to me. As long as its clean and comfortable I'm not bothered about decor. If dated means falling apart that's obviously a different matter. Good food and a quiet nights sleep are more important to me than decor. Couldn't stay in a noisy hotel no matter how deluxe the rooms are.

I use Booking.com and filter so I never even look at hotels that score less than 8 out of 10. If there's lots of choice still I will look at 9/10 only. As mentioned by pp - you have to have stayed in order to do a review.

As a pp said look at the reviews and photos taken by customers. Also do a street view to get an idea of what's close by.

I booked a hotel in London recently and done just that. I knew the room was small but modern and had everything I needed for my stay. It was also close to several chain restaurants and two minute walk to a tube station. Staff were always at reception and if I needed something then I dropped them a quick WhatsApp message and they were at the door within minutes.

Also look up the hotel on Instagram and see who has tagged them and their reviews.

The problem with reviews is that one man's hovel is another man's palace. I stayed at a hotel in Majorca I thought was awful (food awful, parts of the hotel smelt of drains) but other people loved and it's because I'm used to something of a higher standard. The reviews were good but would have been from people to whom that hotel was a good standard. I prefer personal recommends

I'm put off when posters write about individuals.
Yes! The rave review mentioning the names of all the staff. You just know the kind of person who has written that review.
Ignore the odd bad review if the majority are good.
Book the best room you can afford. The cheapest room will always be smaller / poor location / noisier.

I saw one the other day that took this to extremes, naming people in the local shops and restaurants too, saying ‘tell them the tall bloke and his missus say hello - they’ll know who you mean!’.

One of very few positive reviews of an otherwise gruesome sounding place.

Anyone love reading the really bad trip advisor reviews just for the fun.

My family always scan through them from time to time and nearly always end up having real belly laughs.

My personal favourite was the hotel where the chef could only cook Mongolian food and the restaurant closed at 8pm sharp as that was the time the “nightclub” in the hotel opened and the chef was the DJ
In the morning there wasn’t any breakfast as non of the staff were up (too hungover
But when all the guests came to leave the doors were locked. In the end someone found that if they climbed out of a 1st floor window onto a flat roof there was a metal ladder attached to a wall and they could climb down. Their luggage they lowered down using all their dressing gown cords tied together.

There were many bad reviews citing similar experiences and some equally dreadful things. But the way they were written made it even funnier.

i tried to look it up recently but I don’t think the hotel exists anymore.

I hear you!

In the UK, we either go high end with v v good reputation (rarely) or stick to premier inns, when you know what to expect. A couple of times I have gone off piste and been disappointed!