Fairmont Austin Gold Experience

There are things to like about the Fairmont, very quiet rooms, nice public spaces, gym is fantastic, but they get all the details wrong. For example, they aggressively police the pool--I had to return to my room with a forbidden can of Diet Coke--but then the pool deck is absolutely littered with empty beer cans and bottles (trying to squeeze the last dollar out of their guests I guess). Shower has no water pressure, wifi is a hot mess, lack of USB ports in room, very limited sundries shop for a massive hotel. Staff are like zombies. No character, no charisma to this place. There's a W, JW Marriot and FourSeasons in view of the hotel, I'd go to any of those before going back to the Fairmont.

From the moment I checked in, the Fairmont Austin took good care of me. Kemal, who handled my check in, was amazing and informative! He even got me a great room with an excellent view (and a huge soaking tub), the perfect location from which to enjoy my time in Austin! I can't wait to go back and visit again!

Everything was very clean and well-organized, but someone who truly stood out was Valeria from the Front Desk. She was incredibly attentive, polite, and provided us with such helpful recommendations and tips. We truly enjoyed our stay, but having Valeria as our first point of contact at the Fairmont made a huge difference — she really set the tone for an exceptional stay at Fairmont.

Stayed for 6 nights for a business trip in late March. The staff was friendly and helpful. The property is beautiful. The rooms are nice. Fairly standard room, with a slightly nicer bathroom than most. The decor was nice, and the showers are large with good water pressure. Beds are comfortable, albeit a little too warm for my preference. Location of hotel was great...just sort of out of the way, but a short walk to everything. Rooftop pool area is really great - shame I only got once chance to use it. If i had one main gripe it would be the lack of complimentary wifi. In 2025 it's weird to have to pay $14USD per night for decent internet. The public wifi there is not good at all, so I had to upgrade, which was expensive. I also wish there were mini fridges in the room. They can provide one if requested, however. This hotel does get a bit busy. I had to be strategic any time I needed to see the front desk as there were often line-ups. Still, it's a large space, and plenty of room, and didn't feel crowded even at peak times. In general it's a very nice hotel and I would stay there again.

Headline: This Fairmont was the only low point of an otherwise great getaway. 1. The big thing... They were changing key card readers and our room got one that was cursed. We got locked out of our room multiple times all 3 days we were there and had trouble accessing the pool area. IMO management should have reached out to apologize and offer something to improve our experience, but the only unsolicited offer we got was to pack our things and move to another room (we declined). They comped some of our food and beverage charges (amounting to about 17% of our total bill), but it took me standing in the lobby in my bathrobe asking for a Manager on the 3rd day. It didn't help that he uttered the words "this isn't fun for us either" during that conversation... not the sort of polished customer service I hoped for when I picked the Fairmont. Two bright spots: Chris and DJ were very pleasant in trying to fix the card reader on our door, and I think they genuinely wanted to get it right. 2. Felt generally understaffed and strained. Slow/difficult to get service at the bar near the pool, poolside, and in the casual restaurant. The upscale restaurant had better service. Bartender in the casual restaurant was borderline unpleasant in every interaction I witnessed. 3. If I search for positives, I can say that we liked the location, had no noise issues, found the property to be well-maintained and the food was good. Unfortunately, these didn't outweigh the problems and we would avoid Fairmont in the future.