Tulane University Guide: Best Restaurants, Bars & Hotels Near Campus (2026)

Whether you're a Tulane student working out your regular spots, an admit walking Uptown for the first time, a parent flying in for move-in or Wave Weekend, an alum back for a game at Yulman, or a family here for graduation, this guide pulls together the restaurants, cafes, bars, hotels, and campus landmarks worth knowing around Tulane University.

Tulane started in 1834 as the Medical College of Louisiana, was renamed in 1884 for the merchant Paul Tulane, and moved to its Uptown campus in 1894. It runs about 8,000 undergraduates and roughly 13,000 students in total across 110 acres, which is small enough that you can walk the whole thing in an afternoon. Only 14 percent of the most recent entering class came from Louisiana, so this is a school where nearly everyone's family is flying in, and where the hotel question matters more than it does almost anywhere else. The campus fronts St. Charles Avenue directly across from Audubon Park, with Loyola immediately next door and Freret Street running right through the middle. Audubon Park, Freret, Maple Street and the streetcar are all a walk. Magazine Street is a long one. The French Quarter and the CBD are four or five miles away and a separate trip.

New Orleans is one of the best food cities, and the problem Uptown is choosing rather than finding. The geography sorts itself into four strips. Freret Street runs through campus and is where students eat on a weeknight. Oak Street and Riverbend, about a mile out, hold the eccentric classics. Magazine Street is the parent dinner corridor. And the Garden District is where you go when the occasion is real. Everything below is on the map, sorted roughly from the special-occasion end down to the everyday.

Tulane's coffee geography is simple: Freret for the daily study cafe, Oak Street for the late one, and Carrollton for the one with room to spread out. There are PJ's outlets on campus, including one inside Howard-Tilton Memorial Library, which is where most students actually get their coffee between classes, but the three below are the ones worth walking to.

Tulane has something most campuses do not, which is a genuine student bar on the edge of campus that everyone from every graduating decade recognises by name. Beyond The Boot, the drinking spreads out in three directions: Maple Street and Oak Street for the neighbourhood bars, Freret for cocktails, and Magazine and Tchoupitoulas for the late ones. The music venues are the thing to build a night around if you are visiting rather than living here.

This is the section that matters most at Tulane, because almost nobody's family lives here. The short version: Park View is the only hotel you can genuinely walk to campus from, the Alder is the practical one for a longer stay, and the St. Charles Avenue string between them and the Garden District all sit on the streetcar line. Downtown and the Quarter are a real option too, especially for graduation, since commencement is held at the Superdome rather than on campus. Every one of these sells out for move-in, Wave Weekend and Carnival, so book the moment you have dates.

Tulane's Uptown campus is 110 acres and 89 buildings, which means you can see the whole of it comfortably in an afternoon and still have time for Audubon Park across the street. Start at Gibson Hall, since that is where tours begin, and work back toward Freret. Visitor parking is genuinely tight: the Diboll Garage is the one to aim for, a day permit runs six dollars, and there are only two visitor spaces in Cowen Circle outside Gibson. Construction on the new Residential Village is ongoing, so expect fencing in places.