Atlanta Marriott Marquis

I was expecting much worse after reading some reviews. This is not a bad place for a mega-​convention type hotel. Nice room, friendly staff, no problems w/​elevators or check-​in. Here for a company conference, so I didn’t pay. Would not stay here on my own.

The staff is very helpful and friendly and the rooms are clean BUT there were ropes hanging down the entire length of the hotel that kept crashing into my window. I thought a bird flew into the window when I heard the first loud thump and then I saw the rope swinging by. I complained multiple times. Every time I complained they apologized and secured the rope but the wind would inevitably loosen it and would bang into the window again.
**update this place is awful! I would not ever recommend! They added charges to my room after check out which I did not realize until after receiving my credit card statement. I tried calling to dispute but they gave me the run around of having to call in to their finance office at a different time. My coworkers informed me that several people had to dispute their final bill as well.

I’ve never reviewed a hotel before on Unilocal but thought this one deserved a little attention. We were just here for a conference and while I’d typically say ‘a hotel is a hotel’, I can’t say enough about the staff here. Everyone was super friendly, always stopped to say hello or see if we needed anything, and were just super personable. I definitely didn’t expect that friendliness or attention from such a large place but we definitely got it. This place is run extremely well.
The fitness center here is top notch. Great selection of high quality equipment. Next time i’m in Atlanta, this is without a doubt where I’ll be staying

A beautiful vibrant hotel with newly renovated rooms that are so nice and modern! The staff was wonderful and went above and beyond. I forgot a phone charger and they let me borrow one to use for the night.
The onsite restaurant, Sear, was wonderful! I highly suggest the flatbreads!

The hotel was very nice and the hotel staff were very friendly an accommodating. However, we were only staying at the Marriott for 18 hours and we spent 2 hours waiting on elevators! I’m not exaggerating. It was at least 20 – 30 minutes any time of day in any direction to be able to fit onto an elevator. They were packed BEYOND capacity at all times. It should be a priority of hotel management to not book their hotel beyond what they are capable of servicing. If you can stay on the first few floors and don’t mind taking the stairs this hotel would be fine, but if you are on the 21^st floor like we were don’t bother. You will just end up disappointment frustrated before you even make it up to your room with luggage — if you can fit in an elevator that is!

Great except they cleaned out my room day earlier & took ALL my stuff!?! This has never happened to me in any hotel I’ve ever been in. I did finally get most of my stuff mailed back to me, so that’s pretty good. But they did toss/​lose a couple of my clothing items. And it took a few phone calls and emails to finally get my stuff.
Basically: BEWARE leaving ANY of your items in room when gone! Including toothpaste, brush, etc. clothing (both clean and dirty)! I was there two nights. Day after 1^st night, I ordered more coffee packets/​creamer sent up while I was out for concert. When I came back at 11pm — whole room was changed, wiped clean (I had do not disturb sign on door!) — and ALL my personal items were gone! I went down to front desk and was treated rudely by clerk. She called security to take report. No apologies, or no attempt to contact housekeeping (cause I explained probably an error when they cleaned room and took my stuff). Claims department in Texas was useless, they said not responsible for anything left in room (even though the employees are ones that took it?!?). But complaint to other contact at hotel had them «find» most in the lost-​in-​found/​room service whatever (like I suggested week before!). bleh. I feel safer staying at a hostel and using their locker w/​padlock than fancy hotel like this! More details about this available on request, or if I ever come back here to add.

I mean, it’s a corporate business traveler’s hotel in the downtown of a major city. Staff are well-​trained and helpful, walking bridges to the surrounding hotels and shops are useful, the gym is well above-​average for a hotel, and the view from the 49^th floor down the bottomless cylindrical well down to the lobby is impressively terrifying. (The interior of the hotel is shaped like the Imperial Senate chamber from those shitty Lucas Star Wars prequels.) There are bars and restaurants aplenty in the place.
But it’s $ 8 to try to buy a carryout beer from the «convenience» store, meaning it’s no cheaper than going to a bar, it’s $ 15 a night for the basic internet (I’ve never understood why all the things you get free at cheap hotels cost a ton at expensive hotels – can someone explain?), and the desk only answers the phone about 35% of the time. The bottle of water in your room costs $ 6. There are no mini fridges. I was not in any way hugely displeased, and since I reverse-​engineered Priceline’s Express Deals to get this specific hotel across the street from my academic conference, it was certainly convenient. But I could imagine significantly better value had I paid full price.

I’ve visited Atlanta many times, and usually stay in a Marriott hotel, this hotel and experience was by far the worst I’ve ever had. The valet was full, so we had to park off site at a location that charged $ 25 a night, in addition to hourly every time you take out your car. It took us over 40 minutes to check in, the staff was rude and not very helpful. We had a hard time finding our room, weren’t instructed on what elevators to take. Upon check out i was told the hold on my card would be released, but in fact it takes up to 2 weeks to have the funds returned to you. The staff failed to inform us of the policies, were dismissive and rude. I will never return to this hotel again, nor would i recommend it to anyone i know.

Very nice hotel. Been stay there for Dragon Con for 7 years. My first choice when staying in Atlanta.

Though it’s an older property it’s well maintained and the staff here is great too. If I am in Atlanta this Is where I want to be. I’ve stayed here several times and it’s always great

Really beautiful hotel. Staff was extremely nice and helpful. The view from my hotel room of downtown Atlanta was stunning. The hotel bars were some of the best I’ve ever been to. Love having the sports bar and swanky cocktail bars and options.
Overall great experience.

This hotel is a business traveler and conference center property on steroids.
Love the customer service here. When I checked in there were no elite concierge level «standard» rooms ready/​available. So, front desk gal said: «do not worry, I will get you a premier butler suite…» Boom! Thx Marriott.

Every aspect of this hotel makes me feel like I’ve been scammed. Scammed on par with the the random guy who fleeced me out of $ 40 in the parking lot next to the hotel that I felt I had to park in, since the hotel only had $ 35/​day valet parking.
Being in this hotel feels like going in to a car inspection with a perfectly fine car, only for the mechanic to say you have to fix something immediately before it can pass, but is vague about what needs to be fixed, the price, and pressures you to do it immediately. Essentially, a scam for your money.
1) Parking: the only parking is valet only parking beneath the hotel. It’s not immediately clear when you pull into the parking garage so then you have to quickly assess whether you’re going to have to pay $ 35/​day (even if you don’t move your car apparently) just for parking. I’ve never stayed at a hotel with such exorbitant parking prices. Sure, Atlanta is a city, but I’ve stayed in cities before that weren’t nearly this expensive.
2) There are very limited amenities for such an expensive room. No mini fridges in the rooms — I guess the massive TV is supposed to replace that. And of course there’s a bottle of water next to the glasses that as a label in tiny print that if you open it, it is $ 6. Again, this feels like another cheap trick to scam us out of money.
3) Additionally, I’m here for a conference with catered food and drink. I have never encountered such overpriced, manipulative catering in my life. At dinner, they would not serve any water of any sort, instead requiring guests to pay for bottled water. Or, they could choose to pay $ 8 for a domestic beer (ex: Bud Lite, lol), $ 12 for a VERY small class of mediocre quality wine, or $ 11 for a mixed drink of about 1 shot volume. This is crazy. I’m aware that hotels may mark up some prices, but nearly doubling the cost of what it is actually worth makes it immediately obvious that this is just fleecing guests out of their money.
4) Lastly, it’s still absurd that wifi is not included in the expensive cost of the room. Neither was it available in the conference rooms. In 2016, these are basic necessities especially when you’re hosting business conferences.
In summary: don’t pay overpriced, shady businesses for what amounts to a fancy-​looking bed and bathroom. Host your conference literally anywhere else and individuals should look to airbnb for their needs. At least with airbnb you get accurate pricing and can get a significantly cheaper room with a kitchen and wifi.
Seriously, pass it up. It’s a flashy hotel with no substance and a used car salesman strategy of business.

This hotel is HUGE!
Was just staying here for a business trip and definitely enjoyed myself. It’s central to everything downtown ATL. If you take the MARTA, it takes you directly to the hotel & back. There are taxis and the valet is super fast.
47 floors. The views are incredible! They filled many scenes from the Hunger Games here which is kind of fun. The front desk staff was nice and polite.
The rooms are nicely updated and really cute too. Would definitely stay here again! I had the 37^th room and loved it.

I enjoyed my stay here. As far as those saying the elevators are confusing… they’re clearly marked on where you need to go…
The lines at the front desk can get pretty long and intense but it seems to be a high traffic hotel so that’s to be expected.
Side note: the architecture/​layout with the 50+ floors makes for a great photo.

I would rather stick shards of glass into my eye while standing in a pit of snakes than have to relive the experience of this hotel.
When we first arrived, we were told that the valet is full and that we would have to self park at a bank a block away. I asked if I could leave my car while we checked in and removed our luggage and was met with an eye roll and a reluctant, «yes.» Eventually, they found a space for us after we had checked in and allowed us to valet the car. Magic.
Once we got to the front desk we were greeted by a woman who was about as friendly as Cruella de Vil is to Dalmatians (if you’ve never seen this Disney classic, I’ll spare you the trouble: this woman was pretty gosh darn awful). You would have thought that with every check-​in she performed she was slowly losing a piece of her soul.
The bell hop who assisted me to the room was absolutely delightful. He is the ONLY part of this hotel that was positive, and I wish I could swoop him up and save him from this horrid establishment.
Once we arrived in the room, I was a little disappointed, as we had paid extra for a room with a view and my view was mostly of an office building. Clearly we have differing opinions of what «view» means. The air conditioner came on and made a horribly loud noise — and random thumping — while running, which was so loud we would have to go without the AC while we slept. After calling down to the front desk to see if it was possible to switch rooms, they let us know there were no king bed rooms with views, and that we could switch to a double bed room with a view. The idea of cramming into a double bed sounded less than ideal, so we decided to stay…
…until I went into the bathroom. I lifted the lid on the toilet, and there was wadded up toilet paper in the toilet and stains on the seat. It had clearly not been cleaned. I then turned on the shower water and watched the water come out brown. Ew, ew, ew. Then we found a leftovers container from Publix chicken on the desk. We called down to the front desk and they offered to switch us to a room with the double bed, and offered to send someone up with a key.
Thirty minutes later, my better half just decided to go downstairs and get the key himself as no key had been delivered. They handed him the key without any word. No, «I’m sorry for the inconvenience,» or even, «I’m sorry your room had water that looked like poop coming out of the faucet,» but just a blank stare.
After over an hour of inconveniences we finally arrived at our new room. Luckily, there were two double beds, because one of the beds contained a nice collection of short dark hairs from what I can only assume was from an intimate cuddle session with Chewbacca that had never been cleaned. Luckily, the second bed passed inspection — Chewbacca only used one bed, thank God.
Overall, the entire stay was my personal version of hell. I wouldn’t recommend this hotel to my worst enemy, or Justin Bieber, which is pretty much the same person.

The short of it is cleaning staff are lazy and dishonest and customer service on the phone was terrible and rude.
Longer story is I stayed here one night in October on business. Hotel seemed nice and the location is great and front desk staff were fantastic but that’s where the good ends. Every time I walked out of my room the cleaning staff were sitting on the floor so they they couldn’t be seen and on their phones. It has a huge open atrium through all 30ish floors so when below the rail you can be unseen.
When I left I made the mistake of forgetting my gps attached to the window (so it could get its coordinates). I realized as soon as I was at the airport but I was about to board so couldn’t go back. I called the hotel and the staff on the phone were terrible but they did eventually send someone to the room (which had been cleaned but was unoccupied) to look for gps and promptly told me it wasn’t there. I know precisely where I left it and they stated that only cleaners and security had been in room since I left so one of those two are dishonest thieves. Explained repeatedly that I knew 100% that it was there and was accused of lying. So after some back and forth I concluded my stay had cost me an extra $ 200for gps (which is my fault) and asked for forms to be mailed so I could file official complaint. It’s now almost 3 months later and still no forms.
In short what could be a good review is not and I have stayed 50 – 75 nights a year in Marriott branded hotels up until a job change this year and this is by far my worst experience and I will not stay nor do I recommend anyone else stay as staff can’t be trusted and when that happens who cares if the place is nice.

Atlanta Marriot is ginormous. This place can house about 1,500 guests? Their conference and ballroom were huge! It felt endless. Their staff here was just excellent. They even prepared shuttles for our entire group to the airport so all we needed to do was get on the bus! I must also share that their hospitality team especially their dining team was just fantastic. My hats off to all the staff at the Atlanta Marriot Marquis for their awesome service. You are all rock stars!
PS — review #700 (Woot-​woot)
Until then, Cheers! ~ :p

My first impression was not good as I parked where the valets park the cars and later found out this hotel is valet only. Then after a long check in line wait, I had to figure out which of three elevators to take to my room. If you go to the concierge room you need to play frogger and jump onto a different elevator on the 10^th floor.
But I started liking this place better once I settled in. The concierge area is nice and so is the hotel. My room was clean and it worked well to plug in my devices. The price is great from what I normally pay for a full service Marriott.
Streets look rough after dark and I got asked for money too many times to feel safe out.
Went from 4 stars to 3 as two nights in a row is an announcement that’ it is safe after someone sounded an alarm,

The only reason I am giving this 2 rather than 1 star is that a Tonya (sp) was so terrific when I finally got to her after a miserable two hours.
I hate this hotel. But this must be seen in the context of my *glorious* two nights at the Georgian Terrace Hotel. I will Unilocal about that late, r but it’s absolutely magical and after two nights there, only the Ritz or St Regis or IC Buckhead would be acceptable. Best boutique hotel ever and if the pool were just 70 or 72 degrees rather than 60 (unheated), I would never have left. I paid only 131 plus tax, but even at 240 it’s well worth the money.
But Tonya credited my bill for the WiFi I was led to believe came with the room (15 or 18 otherwise). And the jacuzzi is out of order so I got a pass to enter the steam room in the spa, which is not for all hotel guests but rather the Elite members (I guess the Marriott equivalent of Hilton Honors).
Otherwise this would have been a 1 star review. So here’s what you need to know about the MM Atlanta (which in 1986 was a nice conference hotel when my father came here for a bankruptcy panel for federal judges):
1) It’s a behemoth. Not just a convention hotel along the lines of Chicago’s Hyatt Regency. It’s old an while they’ve updated some rooms, it’s ugly and institutional and the feng shui is terrible. I’m not even into feng shui but the hotel has a *horrible* vibe from the minute you walk in.
2) Check-​in is a nightmare. I went to the ugly bar with annoying music (the «sports bar») to have a glass of wine hoping that the line would dissipate. It did not. They have five people checking in what I learned were 600 total people for the various conferences beginning today.
3) There is nothing to like about the room except that I got 70% off on Travelzoo, so it was 129. The mattresses are too soft. The view is ugly (parking lots and the boring buildings on this side of downtown. The ceilings are popcorn and the wood is cheap. The bathroom is unremarkable but it does have a tub (which my exquisite bathroom at the Georgian did not and because I have some injuries, I needed a tub after a few days). The lamps are ugly. The cabinets are no better. It’s just tacky and the sun mural behind the beds is uglier than a white wall would be.
4) You have to wait 15 or 20 minutes even to reach a human at the front desk. I called room service and eventually got to Tonya.
5) There is no nice place to eat or drink in the hotel. The food may be okay but you feel like you’re in the middle of an airport.
6) The pool is WAY too hot. It’s a bathtub and the interior portion (the pool is part indoor, part outdoor) is a sauna. Very unpleasant indeed. The outdoor area sounds like the freeway is running under or beside it. Not a nice place to sit at all.
7) I cannot BELIEVE anyone would pay over 200 for this hotel, in spite of easy airport transport. Travelzoo put this in the mid-​400s and you’d have to have head examined to spend that. The Westin was about 30 more and I should definitely have picked that if a pool/​tub mattered that much to me.
NEVER AGAIN.
P. S. I am stunned that anyone thinks the inside of this Mall of America-​scale hotel is nice, much less «beautiful.» I may be a snob, but I would seriously question the taste and judgment of anyone who regarded this place as either nice or beautiful.

The good:
Clean. Odd, funky architecture. Sports bar stays open til 1am with food. Lots of rooms. Centrally located downtown.
The bad:
An average hotel. Expensive. Small rooms. A musty odor. 4 towels total in the small bathroom, why be so cheap with the towels? $ 35 cab ride to the airport. Slow service. Expensive vending and no place to get late night water and snacks if you arrive late.
Not a premier property.

I stayed a few nights at the Hyatt Regency and then moved over here so I’ll do a compare contrast review.
This hotel is much taller and has many more rooms not only in total but on each floor compared to the Hyatt. Thankfully, unlike the Hyatt, to which this hotel is connected, this hotel has many more elevators. Not only that but the lifts are locked out to certain floors so if you need to get to 41 you won’t be stopping at anything in the teens. That makes for a quicker elevator experience and the taller height allows for better views.
The rooms were about equal at both hotels. The Hyatt has balconies, this hotel doesn’t, but room quality was fine here. Both hotels are atrium hotels with rooms only on the exterior side of the hall. There were fewer outlets here though and we had to unplug the alarm clock between the two beds to open up a second outlet for phone charging. The bathroom here was more spacious, but the shower was in a converted tub instead of like the Hyatt where it was a walk in shower.
The Concierge lounge here was much larger than at the Hyatt. I found the seating styles and options to be better here — more suited to individuals than large groups. There were also more hot food options at both breakfast and dinner here than at the Hyatt, though the appetizers at dinner were less creative. Our room as well as the lounge faced north which is the best view. Staff in the lounge were friendly and attentive. We were greeted as we walked in and plates were cleared quickly. There was a cash bar set up at dinner time.
If I had to come up with cons I would say the hotel appeared a bit old — the hallways seemed aged. The carpeting throughout the walkways also made pushing luggage a bit of a challenge — it was too plush.
I’m not a Marriott guest usually, but for a one-​off experience I cannot complain. All things being equal, there are such small differences between the Hyatt and the Marriot it really doesn’t matter which you stay at.
Location of the Marriott is great. It is a bit farther of a walk from the MARTA Peachtree Station than the Hyatt, but you can get to the station without going outside. There is also a Streetcar station at MARTA Peachtree. The hotel is within walking distance to many places to eat and shop and a few blocks from Centennial Olympic Park’s attractions. This is a good home base for a vacationer.