Shanghai Hotels With Views

The clearest views of the Bund’s colonial facades belong to the hotels on the Pudong side of the Huangpu River. The Ritz-Carlton Shanghai, Pudong, positioned on the upper floors of the Shanghai IFC, looks across at the Bund from the west-facing Premier Bund View Suite. Park Hyatt Shanghai, between the 79th and 93rd floors of the World Financial Center, delivers the same panorama with additional elevation. Grand Hyatt Shanghai in the Jin Mao Tower has faced The Bund since the building opened in 1999 — Cloud 9 on the 87th floor remains one of the most direct Bund-facing venues in Lujiazui.

Regent Shanghai Pudong and Mandarin Oriental Pudong, Shanghai also face the Bund from Lujiazui, though at lower floors. On the Bund itself, Bvlgari Hotel Shanghai, positioned on Suzhou Creek slightly north, offers a longer angled view that puts both the Bund’s historic line and Pudong’s towers in a single westward frame.

J Hotel Shanghai Tower is the answer — floors 86 through 98 of the Shanghai Tower, China’s tallest building at 632 meters, making it the highest hotel in the world by altitude. At these elevations, the Oriental Pearl Tower sits at or below the guest room windows, and the full run of Pudong’s skyline spreads out in every direction. Heavenly Jin, the hotel’s restaurant on the 120th floor, is the highest restaurant within a building in the world.

Park Hyatt Shanghai holds the second position on this list: floors 79 through 93 of the Shanghai World Financial Center, with the infinity pool on the 85th floor and the 91st-floor restaurant delivering views that stretch to the Bund and beyond. Grand Hyatt Shanghai occupies floors 53 through 87 of the Jin Mao Tower, with the 87th-floor Cloud 9 bar positioned among the highest bars in Shanghai outside the J Hotel’s venue.

Shanghai’s top-tier view hotels divide cleanly between The Bund and Pudong. On The Bund, The Peninsula Shanghai is the benchmark: rooms and the Sir Elly’s rooftop terrace face the full Pudong skyline across the Huangpu, and the hotel’s position at the northern end of the waterfront gives both the river and the tower cluster in a single frame. Waldorf Astoria Shanghai on the Bund at No. 2 on The Bund adds a heritage building dimension — the historic Astoria Club, the 34-meter Long Bar, and 20 Tower wing suites with direct Bund views. Fairmont Peace Hotel on the Bund, whose pyramidal green roof has been part of the Bund’s own skyline since 1929, offers the Nine Nations Suites on floors five through seven with the same panorama.

On the Pudong side, J Hotel Shanghai Tower occupies a category of its own at altitude. The Ritz-Carlton Shanghai, Pudong delivers the Michelin-starred Jin Xuan and the FLAIR rooftop bar alongside the Bund view. Mandarin Oriental Pudong, Shanghai is the choice for a more contemporary aesthetic paired with the Premier River View Suite. Bvlgari Hotel Shanghai on Suzhou Creek, with Il Ristorante – Niko Romito on the 47th floor, offers the most design-forward experience among the luxury tier.

Yes. Grand Hyatt Shanghai in the Jin Mao Tower occupies the same Lujiazui corridor as the Park Hyatt and the Ritz-Carlton but typically prices lower, with 548 rooms across 18 room styles and the same Pearl Tower and Bund views from the upper floors. The 87th-floor Cloud 9 bar is accessible to guests without an additional surcharge. Rooms from the 70th floor upward deliver a clear Bund and Pearl Tower read.

Regent Shanghai Pudong is the comparable option at a step below the Mandarin Oriental in the same district. The 41st-floor infinity pool is available to all guests, and the Pearl Tower views from the standard rooms are equivalent to those in the category above at a meaningfully lower nightly rate. On The Bund, the Waldorf Astoria’s City wing rooms offer a lower entry price than the Tower wing suites while sharing the same address and amenities.

Several hotels on this page combine an elevated pool or bar with a confirmed skyline view. J Hotel Shanghai Tower’s 160-meter skyline pool on the 84th and 85th floors sits above the Pearl Tower and the Jin Mao Tower with a 130-square-meter viewing deck adjacent. Regent Shanghai Pudong’s jade-tiled infinity pool on the 41st floor faces the full Lujiazui skyline and is the most photographed hotel pool in Pudong. Grand Hyatt Shanghai’s Sky Pool on the 57th floor and The Ritz-Carlton Shanghai, Pudong’s heated indoor pool on the 55th floor both deliver Pearl Tower and Bund views while swimming.

For rooftop bars: FLAIR at The Ritz-Carlton Shanghai, Pudong on the 58th floor is the best-known, with the Pearl Tower filling the window and an outdoor terrace in warm months. Cloud 9 at Grand Hyatt Shanghai on the 87th floor is the highest bar outside the J Hotel. Sir Elly’s terrace at The Peninsula Shanghai is the definitive Bund-side rooftop, and the Bvlgari Bar at Bvlgari Hotel Shanghai on the 47th floor delivers the Bund and Pudong panorama from the Puxi bank.

Most of Shanghai’s hotel view venues are open to non-guests with reservations. FLAIR at The Ritz-Carlton Shanghai, Pudong on the 58th floor is the most accessible high-altitude bar in Lujiazui — reservations recommended at peak hours. Cloud 9 at Grand Hyatt Shanghai on the 87th floor of the Jin Mao Tower has been open to non-guests since the building opened in 1999. Sir Elly’s Restaurant, Bar, and Terrace at The Peninsula Shanghai is open for dinner and drinks without a room booking. The Bvlgari Bar at Bvlgari Hotel Shanghai on the 47th floor accepts walk-in and reservation guests.

Jin Xuan at The Ritz-Carlton Shanghai, Pudong, the Michelin-starred Cantonese restaurant on the 53rd floor, is a destination in its own right for non-guests. For Bund-side views without a hotel stay, Sir Elly’s at the Peninsula remains the clearest option; the terrace delivers the full Pudong skyline at close range.

The two views face each other across the Huangpu River. A Bund view, from a Pudong hotel such as The Ritz-Carlton Shanghai, Pudong or Park Hyatt Shanghai, looks west at the historic colonial facades that line Zhongshan Road — low-rise, ornate buildings from the 1920s and 1930s, lit at night by warm floodlights that make the contrast with the modern towers particularly sharp. A Pudong view, from a Bund-side hotel such as The Peninsula Shanghai or Waldorf Astoria Shanghai on the Bund, looks east at the contemporary skyline: the Oriental Pearl Tower, the Jin Mao Tower, the Shanghai World Financial Center, and the twisted Shanghai Tower.

Neither is a lesser view. The Bund view is unusual because it shows a preserved historical streetscape that few modern cities still have; the Pudong view is unusual because the three towers are readable as individual buildings at close range, not an abstracted cluster. Hotels at the northern end of The Bund, such as The St. Regis on the Bund, Shanghai and Waldorf Astoria, see both the Pudong skyline and the river bending south — a wider angle than hotels further down the waterfront.

The coexistence of two completely different skylines across a narrow body of water is unusual. The Huangpu River at the Bund is roughly 450 meters wide — narrow enough that the buildings on both banks are legible as architecture, not merely present as a distant panorama. From a room at Mandarin Oriental Pudong, Shanghai or Regent Shanghai Pudong on the Pudong bank, the Bund’s Art Deco and Gothic revival buildings across the river have visible detail. From The Peninsula Shanghai or Fairmont Peace Hotel on the Bund on The Bund, the Pearl Tower’s spheres and the Shanghai Tower’s distinctive twist are readable at close range.

The altitude range available in Shanghai is also exceptional. The same city can be experienced from the Bund at near water level, from the 40th floor of a Pudong mid-rise, and from the 98th floor of the Shanghai Tower — each a genuinely different view of the same geography. The contrast between the historical and the contemporary is what makes the night view from either bank consistently striking.

J Hotel Shanghai Tower opened in June 2021 as the highest hotel in the world, occupying floors 86 through 98 of the Shanghai Tower. It brought a new category to the city’s hotel landscape: rooms where the Pearl Tower and the other Lujiazui landmarks sit at or below window level rather than above.

The St. Regis on the Bund, Shanghai opened in October 2024, having been acquired and repositioned from a prior brand. The 192 rooms and suites deliver panoramic Bund and Pudong views, and the Shanghai John Jacob Astor Suite is the property’s most unambiguous view room. It added a fifth five-star hotel to the southern Bund corridor in a matter of months, making that stretch the most concentrated luxury hotel waterfront in Shanghai.