Premier Inn Gatwick: which of the seven to book

Premier Inn's own site lists seven hotels against a Gatwick search, and the names run from precise to hopeful. Distances below are the operator's own, measured to the airport; transfer notes are what the journey actually involves. Only the first two are walking propositions.

Operator distances and parking notes. Parking prices move; treat them as the going rate, not a promise.

The naming trap is the word South. Gatwick Airport South (London Road) is not at the South Terminal; it is a mile away at Lowfield Heath, on the far side of the runway from its name. The only Premier Inn at a terminal is the North Terminal hotel, and readers heading for a South Terminal flight should read the decision logic below before booking by name.

The North Terminal hotel is the flagship and the reason the brand ranks for Gatwick at all: 701 rooms on nine floors on airport ground, a five-minute covered walk from Gatwick's North Terminal guide territory, with a Thyme restaurant and bar inside, a Costa, express check-in desks in the lobby, runway views from the right rooms, and the option of quieter Premier Plus rooms. It has no car park of its own: drivers use the official short stay car parks 5 and 6 across the road, at a guest rate the operator quoted at about £25 per 24 hours, and the short stay car parks page explains how those buildings work. For anything longer than a night or two, that per-day rate is the wrong tool; see the parking note below.

The A23 Airport Way hotel, on Longbridge Way by the roundabout where the airport spur meets the A23, is the compromise pick: 220 rooms, its own Thyme restaurant, 98 on-site spaces at about £27 a night (or £12.50 for 12 hours), and an operator-claimed walk to the North Terminal of under ten minutes, uncovered and alongside main roads, but real. It usually undercuts the North Terminal hotel on price while staying inside the walkable ring; the trade is the weather and the kerbside stretch of the walk.

Gatwick Airport South (London Road) sits at Lowfield Heath, a five to ten minute drive from the terminals by the operator's own reckoning. Its distinguishing feature is 150 free parking spaces, validated on a tablet at arrival and covering the length of your stay, which makes it the cheapest way for a driver to sleep near Gatwick with the car outside the window. The catches are the transfer, a taxi or the local buses (the 24-hour Fastway network passes the corridor, with app singles from £2.20, and the paid Gatwick Hoppa also serves the strip), and the kitchen: the hotel serves breakfast but no evening meals, and rooms have fans rather than air conditioning.

Manor Royal, on the A23 at the Tushmore roundabout, is a business-district hotel with Premier Plus rooms that fills with contractors midweek and empties at weekends, which is when its prices tend to sag. Gatwick East (Balcombe Road) covers the airport's other flank at 1.69 miles. The Crawley Town pair, West and Goff's Park, are town hotels three miles out that happen to have an airport up the road: fine value the night before a civilised departure, a false economy before a dawn one once a taxi is added. The same distance-for-price trade runs across Travelodge's airport hotel and the rest of on-airport and nearby hotels.

For an early flight from the North Terminal, the North Terminal hotel is the point of the brand: wake at 05:00, walk five minutes under cover, and be at bag drop before the car parks wake up. For an early South Terminal flight, it usually still wins. The walk plus the free inter-terminal shuttle, two minutes terminal to terminal and running all night, beats arranging a dawn taxi from London Road, and no Premier Inn stands closer to South; the South Terminal guide covers what waits at the other end. Confirm which terminal your airline flies from before deciding how much the walk is worth; easyJet's North-only operation is exactly why this hotel fills first.

Drivers weighing a night plus a week away should ignore the per-24-hour rates at all seven hotels and price the trip properly: a bed the night before plus pre-booked long stay, or hotel and parking bundles, both beat feeding £25 to £27 a day to a car park for a fortnight. And for a midday flight with no car, the honest advice is that none of the seven may be needed: first trains reach the airport early from most of the region, and the money saved on the room buys a lot of coffee.

Rooms follow the national formula: the standard double, family rooms sleeping up to two adults and two children, accessible rooms, and at North Terminal and Manor Royal the Premier Plus tier with more space and a quieter floor. Breakfast is not in the standard rate; add it at booking or pay at the hotel, and up to two children eat free with each paying adult. The North Terminal and A23 hotels carry Thyme restaurants for evening meals; South (London Road) stops at breakfast, and the Crawley pair lean on the town around them.

Prices are dynamic and the flagship moves hardest: the North Terminal hotel on a school-holiday Friday can cost double its quiet-Tuesday rate, while the Crawley hotels barely notice the calendar. Premier Inn sells flexible and non-refundable versions of the same room, and for airport stays booked far ahead the flexible rate earns its small extra: flights move, and a room you can shift for nothing beats a cheap one you cannot. Book directly on the operator's site rather than through resellers; the rooms are the same and amendments are simpler.