This is a great hostel with a wonderful situation -- very central and very cheap ! Having stayed in some pretty dire hostels in my time, some of them in Paris, I was surprised to see such negative ratings for this place.
It's basic but proper and clean, and really very friendly. The staff are lovely and I had no problems during my stay.
For seventeen euro a night with no lockout, I recommend unreservedly !

It's disappointing to read several unfavourable reviews about this place. My partner and I stayed here at the end of a long European holiday (after a recommendation from a friend), and we found the place excellent for the price.

Breakfast is basic, but honestly, what do you expect for 15 euros a night?! Ironically, more expensive places often serve something very similar or nothing at all.

As far as cleanliness goes, I haven't stayed in a more thoroughly cleaned hostel. The cleaners come banging on the doors right on 10am, and proceed to mop and tidy the place up - every day. Sure, it's a bit annoying if you're still sleeping, but the 10am lockout is fairly standard throughout Europe, and at least your room is neat when you get back.

I admit their booking proceedures need an overhaul, but send them an email in advance or fax your credit card number - no big deal. Security is also a big plus - yes, you have to show your receipt every time you walk in the door - but it means NO strangers get into the place, and that's worth the security measures.

Last but not least the location is excellent (within a walk of the Ledru Rollin metro), and there's a cheap supermarket around the corner.

I've recommended this place to many people since getting back home, and they've enjoyed staying there too. Give it a chance.

We are a finnish family (children 11 and 13 years) and we stayed at Auberge Internationale des Jeunes 24.-27.3.2007. Ibooked our stay by e-mail and paid one night beforehand. The hostel had an excellent location. We had a room for 4 (one bunk bed on the ground floor and one on the second floor)with own toilet and shower.Hot water was available in shower in the evening and in the morning. We slept wery well (I needed earplugs one night). The beds were too soft, sheets and pillow cases were clean. There weren`t fitted sheets on the blankets, which is ok if you use your own sleepingbag, but otherwise take sheets for blankets with you.You can`t expect luxury for this price: 15 euros/person/night. The breakfast was coffee, tea or hot chocolate and bread with marmelade or butter. We are used to a little larger breakfast so we took a watercooker with us and I made some porridge every morning in our room. We were wery pleased with aij hostel.After these 3 nights we took the RER train to Disneyland and stayed 2 nights at Disneyhotel Cheyenne. I try to put here some fotos of aij.
I´m sorry for my poor english writing.

I'm a bit surprised to read that many bad reviews. Maybe I was just lucky the night I spent there.

First, every place in the hostel was pretty clean to me, including the showers/bathrooms. Had no hot water problem there, I didn't even remember the "push" button.

Had a 3 people room to share with a German and a Brasilian (both real friendly, we had very interesting discussions and shared a lot). We had plenty of space and the bed was OK, clean enough and I slept really well. I admit it's a bummer to share a key for the room, but it didn't cause me any real problem.

The breakfast was not extraordinary I admit, but it was good and filling (one large piece of bread, jam, and bottomless coffee, chocolate that was OK). You have so many cafés in town so if you want a better coffee, you know what to do...

With a cheap rate like that I was expecting the worse, but I think I got plenty for my money. I remember that it was the cheapest you could get in Paris I think.

One negative aspect : their web site sucks and hasn't been upaded for years. They should have on-line reservation or at least make it possible to book on other websites such as -------.com.

It depends on your expectations for an hostels, if you can afford it, go to a fancier place. I had a great time there and experienced much worse places than that. Moreover, I think that many hotels in Paris are more expensive and much less clean than this hostel. I'd go back there next time.

Another thing : why would someone want to take a nap in the afternoon in Paris ???? Come on ! You have all the rest of your life to sleep, back home ! Don't waste your time sleeping while in one of the most beautiful city in the world ! What are you ??? 70 years old ?