The best train lounges in America to relax before your journey

The train hall itself is a beautiful sight, but up a silver escalator tunnel you’ll find a glass overlook of the station with its enormous metal truss infrastructure. An impressive art installation by Karen Margolis titled Continuum covers one wall of the lounge, while the other side is an department store sized counter with an array of plated snacks, where you can also get beverages and local beers on tap. The “Acela” cocktail is a signature drink honoring the train, made of blueberry-infused vodka, tonic and rosemary.

While waiting for your train, you’ll have access to Tendedbar, an automated cocktail maker, fun to order from and imbibe. Brightline currently has five stations in Florida and is expanding. Each station offers a Premium Lounge for its first-class passengers, a fare category that is usually about $15 more than the regular business class fare and very worth it for the upgrade (plus, Premium seating on the train is in a 2-1 formation rather than the 2-2 seating you find in the Smart business class cars). Premium ticket holders get complimentary snacks and drinks, including beer on tap and fresh coffee drinks. The lounge is also a quiet, refined space to wait for the train with excellent Wi-Fi and a private conference room you can book for those can’t-wait meetings.

The Amtrak lounge at Boston’s South Station is, like New York’s, called the Metropolitan Lounge...and in fact, many Amtrak lounges carry that name. Considered one of the more beautiful stations in the country, South Station was built in 1899 and features an exterior clock inspired by Big Ben. Over the years, renovations and expansions, including a 51-story tower, have been undertaken. The lounge showcases the coffered ceiling with complex painted trim and embellishments. At one end, a clock surrounded by carved ornamentation keeps analog time.

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With a sage green, teal and gray design, the lounge has a relaxing tropical vibe. Large windows bring in natural light, and there are several seating areas to choose from, as well as work desks if your stay involves catching up on emails. This review praised the coffee machine’s dispensing of less common hot drinks like chai—and you can have up to two alcoholic beverages along with your snacks, such as a cheese board.

A bi-level lounge connected by a staircase, it is clean and bright and accessed through the stupendously beautiful Great Hall, restored in 2019 for $22 million with an enormous arching skylight. While the station itself is historical, designed by Daniel Burnham (read The Devil in the White City to know more about him), the 2016 lounge is modern and provides the free snacks and drinks you need to keep you occupied. Believe it or not, a red carpet leads you from the street to the lounge (while another entrance is inside the building near one of the two grand staircases). Access includes preboarding from the lounge to the train, showers, and even a children’s play space.

The station itself is a beauty, with terra cotta tile floors, glorious chandeliers and soaring, painted ceilings. The lounge offers a good assortment of snacks and beverages, which you can enjoy while sitting in armchairs with trays. Golf carts can bring you and your luggage to the train platform, according to this review. Inside the lounge is a children’s play area with...you guessed it...a train table.

Oddly enough, you must access the lounge—a long and narrow area—by a steep staircase, but a private elevator brings you straight to the platform to catch your train. Several large windows let you look out over the rest of the station, which is an impressive National Register building with an Art Deco concourse. The narrow pendulum lamps that hang from the high ceiling give dignity to rail travel and its history. This is Amtrak’s third busiest station, so the lounge allows you to retreat from the crowds and wait for your train in comfort.

This lounge was updated in 2019 with contemporary furniture and lighting fixtures, as well as an upgrade in food and beverage selections. The station itself is a pleasure to visit, with the Main Hall’s ceiling gilded in 23-karat gold. It too is a Daniel Burnham design, opened in 1907. At a low point in its history, a leaking roof combined with heavy rains caused parts of the ceiling to fall to the waiting room below, causing the closing of most of the building until rehab and redevelopment. Today, it’s a thriving mixed-use facility.

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A smaller lounge than you typically find, this one has the advantage of air conditioning when the rest of the station can run hot, according to this review. The refreshments are also more low-key: water and coffee. The furnishings seem like they may need a little updating, but the benefits are that you can relax in private with wifi and television, and board the train directly from the lounge.

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Situated between Miami and Orlando, this station is walking distance to a handful of museums, parks, gardens and a riverfront walk along the New River. But you’ll likely just want to chill in the Premium lounge and catch up on your phone while having a complimentary croissant and coffee. Then, catch your high-speed train and enjoy a quiet, luxurious ride.