Howard University Guide: Where to Eat, Drink & Stay in Washington, DC (2026)

Whether you're a Howard student working out which places on Georgia Avenue are actually worth it, a parent in town for move-in or Commencement, an alum back for Homecoming, or a prospective student walking the Yard for the first time, this guide gathers the restaurants, bars, hotels, and campus landmarks worth knowing around Howard University in Washington, DC.

Howard was founded in 1867 and sits on the Pleasant Plains side of Northwest DC, running along Georgia Avenue, with roughly 11,500 undergraduates and about 14,500 students in total across 14 schools and colleges. In 2025 it became the first HBCU to earn Carnegie R1 research status. The practical things to know before you plan anything: the campus is compact and most of what surrounds it is walkable, Shaw-Howard U on the Green and Yellow lines is about a fifteen minute walk from the Yard, campus parking is permit only and enforced, and three weekends fill the city's hotels every year. Move-in in early August, Homecoming in October, and Commencement in May.

Howard's food geography is easy once you know the three strips. Georgia Avenue runs along the western edge of campus. Down the hill to the south are Shaw and LeDroit Park, where the closest sit-down meals are. Southwest of that is the U Street corridor, which is where a lot of DC's Black culinary history lives and where most of the institutions on this list sit. Two picks are worth leaving the neighborhood for, up in Columbia Heights and out at Union Market.

Going out at Howard means walking south. Florida Avenue and the U Street corridor hold nearly everything worth knowing, from a rooftop to one of the best music halls in the country to the kind of corner bar that fills with off-shift restaurant staff. There's no on-campus bar strip of the sort you'd find at a big state school, so the drinking here is a neighborhood affair, which most people end up preferring.

Howard sits in a dense part of Northwest DC without a hotel district of its own, so nearly everything here is a mile or two south and west, in Shaw, Dupont Circle, Logan Circle, or downtown. One is genuinely walkable; the rest are a short ride or a couple of Metro stops. Three weekends take the city's rooms, so if you're coming for move-in in early August, Homecoming in October, or Commencement in May, book well ahead.

Nearly everything a first-time visitor should see sits on or beside the Yard, the quadrangle at the top of campus where both Commencement and Yardfest happen. One caveat before you plan a walk: these are working university buildings, not museums. The federally landmarked ones aren't open for drop-in tours, so see them from the Yard, time a visit around a Sunday service or a ticketed show, or call ahead.