Review: The Ritz-Carlton Vienna Club Lounge

Published Mar 22 2025, 7:14 AM, Updated Mar 22 2025, 7:47 AMWe enjoyed The Ritz-Carlton Vienna Club Lounge on our most recent trip to Vienna in the Summer of 2024. This executive lounge can be found on the hotel’s top floor and is set in a cozy, long room in the eaves of the building. Big, angled skylights are set into the ceiling and run across the room, letting in plenty of natural light.

This club lounge is the best club lounge in Vienna, with plenty of private sections so you can sit and enjoy the complimentary food and beverage offered in your own space.

I noticed on check-in that you could upgrade to add the lounge for €120 EUR (this price is correct for summer 2024). This seemed like a great deal, and if you eat meat, I think you would be thrilled with the food offerings.

Location

The Ritz-Carlton Vienna is located on Schubertring, around a 5-minute walk from the main shopping street of Vienna, and is an easy walk to most of Vienna’s central palaces and gardens.

The hotel is housed in a huge building that lines a cobbled side street parallel to the Ringstrasse, the circular boulevard forming a ring around Vienna’s center. It is two blocks up from the Hotel Imperial Vienna, which is also part of Marriott’s Luxury Collection, and a few blocks in the opposite direction is the Marriott Vienna. McDonald’s is just a block away, which is useful if you’re traveling with kids.

Vienna airport is outside the city, and you can take a taxi or train to the center. The City Airport Train (CAT) from Vienna Airport to Wien Mitte only takes 16 minutes, so it is worth considering for a cost-effective transfer. The hotel is a 20-minute walk or 5-minute taxi ride from this station.

Style & Character

The club lounge is at the top of the building in the eaves, giving it a cozy but airy feel and wonderful views across the city through the skylights. The decor is modern and pleasant, with loads of sofas in partitioned areas, meaning you could always find a private place to sit without feeling overwhelmed by other guests.

We never found the lounge to be too full, and there was always plenty of space and seats available.

Food & Drink

One minor disadvantage of the food in this club lounge and the food across Vienna is their love of meat. The famous wiener schnitzel dish that is served at most Vienese restaurants is a thin, breaded, pan-fried veal cutlet, usually served with vegetables, and although it’s undoubtedly tasty, it’s not ideal for those of us who err on the side of vegetarianism.

The same is true of the food in this Vienna club lounge. The spread is excellent, but it is heavy on meat, and as an almost vegetarian, I found it challenging to create a meal in the evening. The salad offerings were limited, and most of the platters contained an element of meat.

This lounge is, however, a dream for a meat eater. The main hot dishes in the evening we stayed were veal schnitzels, meatballs, and beef tartare. There was plenty to go around, and you could easily fill up on the saucepans full of delicious Viennese food.

We enjoyed the club lounge in the afternoon and the evening. It was popular but not overly busy throughout the day, with five daily food offerings.

In the afternoon, there was an array of hot dishes on heated plates, including delicious white fish fillets, vegetables, and potatoes, as well as smaller items like little plates of olives, veggies, sandwiches and wraps, and so forth. Their puddings included pots of chocolate moose, crème brûlée, and a rather lovely raspberries and cream pastry, which I highly reccomend. The range of food in the afternoon was enough to delight any palette, including those who have specific requirements like myself.

Review: The Ritz-Carlton Vienna

Reviews

The Ritz-Carlton Vienna is a slice of American charm set in palatial Austrian buildings on the treelined ring road surrounding Vienna's old town. It has a spa, a decent-sized pool, which is big enough to swim lengths in, a popular rooftop bar with views across Vienna, and an Italian and a steak restaurant. In terms of facilities, this hotel ticks most, if not all, of the boxes. The Ritz-Carlton Vienna is very well located on Schubertring, around a 5-minute walk from the main shopping street of Vienna, and is an easy walk to most of Vienna's central palaces and gardens.

There was also a bowl of fresh cookies that our son enjoyed. While the cakes were lovely in this lounge, they were not a patch on the cakes in the Ritz-Carlton club lounge in Budapest, which excelled in chocolate moosey cakes like nowhere else I’ve experienced.

The food became meatier in the evening, with hot meatballs, veal schnitzel, and cold beer tartare. Of course, this is very much in line with Austrian food, which is also heavy on the meat. There are numerous schnitzel restaurants when we walked through the center of town, so I liked how this club lounge embraced local food. This is just what I want to experience when I go to a luxury hotel, even though I am more of a vegetarian.

Beyond the hot dishes, there were some impressive rounds of cheese, bread, and nibbly dishes like olives, as well as plenty of sandwiches like salami. There was more than enough to fill up if you are happy to eat meat. There was a tasty bowl of Caesar salad but no hot dishes for vegetarians.

I must not forget to mention the drinks. There was a hot drinks machine, and there were also numerous fridges with unlimited drinks throughout the day until 10 pm when the lounge closed. This includes all the main branded drinks as well as juices and alcoholic drinks. There was also a bar area with all the spirits you might like.

Conclusion

If you have an early flight arrival or a late flight departure, I would, without any doubt, reccomend this club lounge. If you are open to trying the local delicacies, this lounge is great, too, and at €120 EUR upgrade, it’s frankly too good to miss!

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