On first impressions this hotel and location is a little off-putting. This impression doesn't last very long. As soon as you get your bearings, you very soon realize how well located this property is. The via Urbana (street that hotel is on) leads down to some nice restaurants and also an Irish pub. In the other direction it leads to the Termini station where you can get the bus or metro. An all day multi use ticket costs just 4 Euro. In yet another direction is the Piazza Republica. So as you can see the location is good.

The hotel itself is small with a lift that accommodates two people. The rooms are small but big enough and I believe that by Roman standards they are of an average size. Staff are very helpful and gave us lots of helpful tips.
There was also nice coffee/tea, juice, cereal, bread, meat and cheese breakfast. The bread was very tasty. The breakfast room is nice and bright and is on the roof of the building with a covered and open air area.
There is a very small bar which I used while waiting in the lobby for the rest of our group to come down and it was adequate for this. Staff speak very good English. There is also somebody at the desk day and night.

An encouraging observation was when two well dressed men came in and went straight for the lift, the woman on the reception challenged them to make sure they were staying there.

Unless you want to spend a lot more money for some of the other centrally located hotels, I would not hesitate to recommend this one and as I said on the heading this place grows on you.

We stayed in this hotel three nights in October 2007. The room and the bathroom were very small but clean. The bathroom did not have any hooks for the towels and the toilet seat was loose. In addition the fridge and the safe did not function. The hotel was not able to correct these things during our stay.

The breakfast room at the roof terrace was nice, the breakfast, however, was OK but not more than that. The location is good, close to the Santa Maria Maggiore.

It is possible that one should not expect the same standards from a 3-star hotel in Rome as elsewhere in Italy. If you can afford it, you should try to find a 4-star hotel instead.

I was there with my mum in early September. Hotel Canova is a perfect stay in Rome. It probably is the most decent room you can get for that price. Rooms are small but very clean, so it's the bathroom (only shower). We stayed at room 204. It did not have a view but that meant is was very quiet. Beds were remarkably comfortable. We had air con and TV as well, not that there is anything good to see at Italian TV!!! Good breakfast served in a lovely (I enphasize "lovely") terraze. (Apart from the sulky breakfast girl that told us off for arriving at 9:20 when serving finished at 9:30! Beware! Don't make her mad!!:) ) Rome is such a great city that you won't be staying at the hotel for long, so it really is a great choice. We booked it because we read the reviews here and we are very happy with our choice. I definitely recommend it!!

This hotel is a good citybreak choice - based on price and location in Rome, just off the Via Cavour, in a quiet street yet within minutes of the Termini railway station, so no need for taxis...and great for exploring Rome and its art and architectural historic sights, conveniently on-foot. We had sent an email requesting a balcony room but when we arrived we were told that the one balcony room had already been taken but instead we were offered what the receptionist described as the best room in the hotel. Later, we discovered that no rooms have balconies. Given some over reviewers' comments about small rooms, this is something to expect in Rome but we were very satisfied with our first-floor room and can recommend room 101 because it is a suite, with views over the street (yet we had booked only for a double/twin room!) This is ideal if your partner or travelling companion snores, as one of you can sleep on the sofa-bed! Each room also has satellite tv (but not BBC World) so 2 separate televisions can be watched. If we are being hyper-critical, a deserving little moan would be about the shower which was more like a tap...and a rather unpleasant-looking (and too short) shower curtain causing water easily to be sprayed on the floor. The breakfast is quite basic with both coffee and juice-drinks from a machine (not great!) with the main criticism being that breakfast finishes at a rather unnecessarily early 10.30a.m. The bar is a bit-of-a-joke being grossly understocked and with the receptionist doubling as bar staff (valiantly putting on a brave face given the bar's inadequacies)... so don't count on the bar as a great place for ambience and good choices of drinks because it most certainly will fail you.
These minor criticisms are more than compensated for by the hotel's good location and we found the staff to be both efficient and friendly.
For a choice of restaurants close-by, we'd recommend taking a left turn out of the hotel, and right into Via Panisperna (but avoid at all costs one of the closest: 'La Carbonara' which was our big mistake of our trip, if not the worst we had come across in Italy(!) - but the rest were very good, especially 'Do Do' on the right of Via Serpenti, further on. (Turning left is the Colosseum...)
So, on balance we would both recommend this hotel - principally for its location it has to be said - and relaxed, human-scale style - and we'd consider staying again, in the future.