This was one of the most disappointing Hilton properties I've ever stayed at, for myriad reasons.
By way of background, I am a Hilton Gold member have stayed in dozens of Hilton hotels around the world. I read the mixed reviews on here and booked with a bit of hesitation, but I figured in the end the other negative reviews were probably too harsh. I'm not that picky and can let things slide that others won't.
I booked a standard room and was upgraded to a better room given my gold status. Normally that would be an executive room with access to a lounge, but this one - in the heart of the business area of San Francisco - for some reason got rid of its executive lounge years ago. That's ridiculous. The conference is filled with business people. So if this is important to you, not having a lounge is a major drawback. They do give you vouchers for the Starbucks downstairs for coffee, a danish and a piece of fruit. But you don't get the happy hour drinks or the business infrastructure you'd normally get with an executive room.
I understand that most people probably don't care about whether or not there is an executive lounge. I would say that the rest of the hotel is adequate, but definitely not worth the $220 a night price tag. The main lobby is odd: It seems to be busy at all hours of the day and night and reminded me of Grand Central Station. That's not always a bad thing, but it's certainly not very relaxing. The layout is strange, and the staff is not particularly nice.
The location is good if you have some business downtown, as I did, or want to be near the high-end stores. But the area around the hotel, as others have said, is not particularly nice. Take a left outside the front doors and you run smack dab into the seedy part of the city. I actually didn't like this aspect of the hotel at all, and my wife didn't feel comfortable walking in that direction at night or during the day. We saw other reviews about this and figured people were just being overly scared, but it is not a good neighborhood for sure. It's literally right on the line separating the nice area from the Tenderloin district, which if totally sketchy. Some of the other hotels charge the same rate as the Hilton but are another block or two into the nicer area.
When you're paying so much to stay in a hotel all of these little things add up.
But the biggest issue we had was with noise in the room. You can hear EVERYTHING in the hallways. Doors opening and shutting, cleaning staff chatting and laughing all morning, people talking while walking by, the elevator bell ringing, etc. And this was supposed to be a nicer room! From the hallway, you can actually see light coming from under the room doors and even from where the door meets the frame on the sides! It other words, it's not sealed at all. Never seen anything quite like that in a "fancy" hotel. No privacy and lots of noise.
All in all, I would only recommend this hotel if you get a good deal. The Nikko just down the block - where my conference was - looked a lot nicer and was the same price. On the bright side, the swimming pool is good and the hotel is pretty clean.
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