Stayed here with a large group of adults and youngsters for one night only.
Definitely in need of refurb and i agree with other comments re shabby but adequate.
The staff were very welcoming and the food served was really good.
About 20 mins walk into town centre in the evening.
Beds comfortable and bedding clean.

YHA Cambridge is conveniently located near to the train station. The property is tired and shabby in places but it is generally adequate. The main issues are that the kitchen extract fan is very noisy and this is near to the bedroom windows. You should bring earplugs if you want to sleep. The staff on reception actually gave me a pair for free, which was very kind of him. The bathroom areas need refurbishment.

The breakfast is good with plenty of choice. The communal areas are, again, quite shabby but functional. I found the hostel to be clean.

There is 24 hour access so it is good if you go on a night out and can come back when you want.

Overall this hostel is acceptable value for money. It just needs refurbishment and redecoration.

I don't normally write reviews on websites but on this occasion I felt I had to to warn everyone else what to expect when booking a stay at this hostel.

My colleagues and I were attending a 3 day conference in Cambridge, and having used YHA hostels before, I booked us all in to a 6 bed dorm in the YHA in Cambridge. We weren't expecting the Hilton, but we did expect to at least have clean and well maintained facilities.

First of all, our room stank of feet and was uncomfortably hot, however, when we opened the window we were above the kitchen which meant the room smelt of fried food and all we could hear was a really loud buzzing from the extraction fan.

The room was filthy - the floor obviously hadn't seen a vacuum in years and one of us even noticed an old toenail clipping on the floor - lovely. It was incredibly noisy all day and night - doors constantly banged and it sounded like a herd of elephants had checked in to the room above us - not great when you have to be at a conference at 8:45AM.

The showers looked dirty and smelt of damp, and very basic maintenance work had not been undertaken - like fixing locks on doors - it's quite embarrassing when someone opens the door to the shower as none of them have shower cutains so you are left exposed! When toilet roll or paper towels ran out they were not replaced.

The only saving grace for this hostel was that the (included) breakfast was good (choice of cooked English/continental/fruit/cereal), and they gave you fresh bedlinen when you arrived, but there's no way this made up for having to stay there for 3 nights.

I know that it wasn't expensive to stay here, and I realise that it was never going to have all the facilities of a hotel, however, what I did expect was a clean, comfortable bedroom and clean odour-free washing facilities, of which we had neither. I travelled across South America for 2 months in 2005 and this rivalled some of the worst there.

My husband and I had stayed here before and apart from the room being too hot then, we didn't remember much else - we ate out. This time we were back with two kids (7 and 9) and stayed in a/the family room on the ground floor. This was good because we didn't have to haul our bags (we were away for 7 weeks) upstairs, but bad because the main door to the hostel area (just outside the room) slammed all the time, and there were some VERY noisy German teenagers and French kids there, shouting at each other while thumping up the stairs at all hours.
The reception area isn't very inviting, and most of the staff are a bit off hand. The girl who greeted us did apologise when I told her our room had not been cleaned, but all she did was take the bedding and refold the duvet. The floor was still filthy with dirt/lolly wrappers, and there was next to no storage space. There were also no lockers for our valuables, and the room faced the footpath with a large window. The ensuite was tired and bits were broken, but it was functional.
The lounge area is completely different - very large, clean and comfortable. The dining area was quite nice too, but their cutlery was often dirty and the drinking glasses were disgusting!
The one good thing about this hostel was the chef, who made sure we got fed before the French kids came in, and only charged our kids a portion of the price. Other hostels all had kids menus or prices - Cambridge did not. And the food was far better than all the other hostels we stayed in.
Overall, a disappointing end to a month in the UK.