How we work

We show the hotels near big theme parks that one of our partners offers: in our hotel search around the park and – where our sample finds enough such hotels – on a dedicated page for the park, sorted by straight-line distance to the entrance. It is meant for families planning a visit to a park. This page explains how we find the hotels, how we measure the distance, where the travel information comes from, how up to date everything is and what we don’t know.

In short

• The hotel search asks Google’s hotel search for the park’s name and location and only shows hotels that one of our partners offers for your travel dates – in Google’s order or by price and rating. Each hotel shows the straight-line distance to the entrance; it doesn’t decide the order.
• A park page exists once our partners offer 8 hotels. It sorts them by straight-line distance to the entrance, which we looked up in OpenStreetMap, and gives the date of the query.
• Getting there – train, bus, car park, water park – comes from OpenStreetMap, each as the straight-line distance from the entrance.
• Prices are not stored by us; the hotel search checks them for your dates and your children’s ages.
• We make money from our partners’ commissions – for a booking, with some just for the click. You pay the provider the same price through us as you would directly.

Where the hotels on the park pages come from

For the park pages, our server regularly – roughly every one to two weeks – asks Google’s hotel search for “Hotels near Europa-Park” for each park (and the same for the other parks; for Serengeti-Park “Serengeti-Park Hodenhagen” and for Tivoli “Tivoli Gardens”, so that Google means the right place) and reads the first two pages of the list. What remains:

• a hotel whose location Google knows and that is no more than 15 to 25 kilometres from the entrance as the crow flies – the limit for each park is listed under “Evidence for each park”. Google’s hotels are usually much closer anyway.
• also a guesthouse, a holiday park or a campsite with accommodation – Google lists them as hotels. We don’t show individual holiday flats let by private landlords.
• only hotels with a photo.

Only hotels our partners offer

For up to 24 of these hotels per park, we check in Google’s hotel search whether one of our partners offers them – for a sample trip: two nights, two adults, arriving 9 days after the query (at Europa-Park 28 days, see below). The first twelve with a partner offer appear on the park page, sorted by distance. If you book through our link, we receive a commission; your price stays the same.

That is why hotels are missing: all those that none of our partners offers – often the parks’ own hotels – and all those that were fully booked for the sample trip. And because a page shows twelve hotels at most, they are the first twelve in Google’s order, not necessarily the twelve nearest.

How we measure the distance

The distance on every card on a park page is the straight-line distance – the shortest distance over the earth’s surface – from the hotel’s location, as Google gives it, to the park entrance. The route on foot or by car is longer. We looked up the entrance in OpenStreetMap on 11 October 2026: whatever is mapped there as the park’s main entrance – not the middle of the grounds, which at big parks can be a kilometre further away.

Within walking distance is what we call a hotel up to 1.5 kilometres from the entrance as the crow flies – that is how the list on each park page is divided. The straight line isn’t the route: a river, a dual carriageway or a fence can make the walk much longer. Before you book, it’s best to check on a map whether there is a footpath.

Entrance locations © OpenStreetMap contributors, available under the Open Database License (ODbL). We don’t embed a map from OpenStreetMap or any other service; the entrance locations are stored on our server. You’ll find each park’s entrance with its OpenStreetMap entry and the limit for its hotels below under “Evidence for each park”.

Getting there: station, bus, car park, water park

What the park pages list under “Getting there” comes from OpenStreetMap: on 11 October 2026 we queried the area around each park’s entrance via the Overpass API and chose by hand – the nearest railway stop, a bus stop, a car park for visitors and a water park nearby.

All distances are straight-line distances from the entrance. OpenStreetMap is maintained by volunteers; an entry may be missing or out of date. The entries the pages rely on are listed for each park under “Evidence for each park”.

For families

Prices with children. The search on the home page and “Prices for your dates” are preset for two adults and two children (both aged 8), for a weekend from Friday to Sunday, two weeks ahead at the earliest. The number and ages of the children are in the guest line of the search and can be changed – age matters, because it decides extra charges and extra beds with the provider.

“Child-friendly according to Google” is shown as the first feature of a hotel when Google’s information on facilities lists it as child-friendly. Google doesn’t say exactly what that means. If the label is missing, we don’t know – it doesn’t mean that children are unwelcome there.

Family rooms are not something we mention: Google’s information on facilities doesn’t include them in our data. Measured on 11 October 2026: among 5,507 facility entries for 924 hotels from Google’s lists for the parks, “family room” did not appear once – “child-friendly” appeared 398 times. Whether a hotel has family rooms is shown by the provider for your dates.

Frequently asked questions

We calculate the answers under “Frequently asked questions” on each park page from the same data as the page: the number of hotels and their straight-line distance, Google’s “child-friendly” label and the travel information from OpenStreetMap. For opening times and admission prices we refer you to the park’s website.

How up to date the information is

We query each park again roughly every one to two weeks; each page gives the date of the query (“Updated”). A page exists from 8 hotels. If a new query falls short of that, the page shows the last one that was enough, with its date, for up to six weeks; after that it disappears until there are enough again. We took the travel information from OpenStreetMap once and give its date.

Prices for your dates

We don’t store prices – they change every day, and an old price is no information. Since 13 October 2026, “Prices for your dates” on a hotel opens our hotel search around the park, straight to that hotel’s window. There our server asks Google’s hotel search for the offers for your travel dates, the number of adults and the children’s ages; the provider’s price applies. What the search shows, and in which order, is explained under “How we sort”.

The search looks for the park’s name and location (“Europa-Park, Rust”) – Google then lists the hotels nearby. Each hotel shows the straight-line distance to the entrance (from the location Google gives); the hotels on the park’s own page are sorted by it. The search asks Google about a child under one as a one-year-old – Google doesn’t accept anything else; the provider confirms the price.

Website and tickets

Each park page links to the park’s official website – an ordinary link, not an advertisement. We don’t give opening times or admission prices: they change with the season and are on the website. Where GetYourGuide offered tickets for the park on 11 October 2026 (for all parks here except Hansa-Park, Serengeti-Park and Karls Erlebnis-Dorf Rövershagen), a link takes you to a search for the park on GetYourGuide. It is an advertisement: if you buy there, we receive a commission.

What we don’t know

• When a park is open – that’s on its website.
• Whether a hotel has family rooms or children stay for less – the provider shows that for your dates.
• How long the walk is, whether it’s suitable for pushchairs and whether a hotel runs a bus to the park.
• Which trains and buses run when, and what parking costs.
• Whether Google’s ratings are accurate: we use them but don’t check them.
• Photos, hotel category, location and facilities come from Google; they may be out of date – as may entries in OpenStreetMap.

Measured on 11 October 2026

Before there were any pages, we checked whether the question to Google works for the parks – and how many hotels our partners offer.

Photos of the parks

The photos of the parks come from Wikimedia Commons, selected on 13 October 2026 – only with licences that allow this kind of use, and without people as the subject. We cropped and resized them; our server delivers them, so your browser doesn’t connect to Wikimedia. For Ravensburger Spieleland it is a detail from a 360° panorama, because the other photos on Commons show the logo or children. For Disneyland Paris the cards don’t show a photo yet, just a plain surface: photos from the park show almost only Disney’s own buildings and characters, and a photo from elsewhere would look like one of the park.

The photographer and licence are given briefly under each photo and in full, with links, for each park under “Evidence for each park”.

Evidence for each park

For each park: the entrance with its OpenStreetMap entry, the limit for hotels, the travel entries and the photo with photographer and licence.

Sources

• Hotels, photos, ratings, facilities and “child-friendly”: Google’s hotel search, roughly every one to two weeks, date on each page.
• Park entrances and getting there: OpenStreetMap, © OpenStreetMap contributors (ODbL), retrieved on 11 October 2026.
• Park websites: “website” entry in OpenStreetMap, accessed on 11 October 2026.
• Tickets: GetYourGuide, checked on 11 October 2026.
• Photos of the parks: Wikimedia Commons; the photographers and licences are listed above under “Evidence for each park”.