Iceland · Suðurland
Where to Stay in Selfoss, Suðurland
Selfoss is the largest town in southern Iceland, set on the Ölfusá river in Suðurland east of Reykjavík.
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Where to stay in Selfoss
The right area depends on your trip — here's what each neighbourhood is best for.
Most beds in Selfoss gather near the bridge over the Ölfusá, where guesthouses and hotels stand within a short walk of the shops, the pool, and the new old-style square that the town has built along the riverbank. This centre suits travellers who want a comfortable base for the south, close to the ring road yet a step back from the rush of it, with restaurants and services that many smaller villages around Suðurland cannot match. It serves those touring by car well.
Rooms here fill fast through the warmer weeks, when the town fills with people bound for Gullfoss, Geysir, and the wider country east of Reykjavík. Across the river the streets thin toward the farms of the valley. Quieter guesthouses and self-catering rooms lie out toward Laugardælakirkja and the open land beyond the edge of town, away from the through traffic of the centre.
Reserve early through the summer weeks. Travellers who want the largest choice of hotels still often base themselves in Reykjavík and drive the short way east to Selfoss, using it as the gateway stop before the long roads of the south.
Things to do in Selfoss
Ranked by global recognition; descriptions from Wikidata (CC0).
Museums & Galleries
3- Bobby Fischer Center biographical chess museum
- The Árnesinga Folk Museum
- Rjómabúið á Baugsstöðum
Churches & Religious Sites
3- Selfosskirkja
- Laugardælakirkja
- Kotstrandarkirkja
worth knowingacross 2 categories in Selfoss
About Selfoss
The river and the road define Selfoss.
What is Selfoss known for?
The town grew where the ring road crosses the Ölfusá, the broadest river of the south, and that bridge made it the trading and service hub for the farming country of Suðurland and the place most travellers pass through on the way east. It is a working town first. The Bobby Fischer Center keeps the memory of the chess champion buried nearby at Laugardælakirkja, while the falls of Gullfoss and the springs of Geysir lie a short drive inland.
What are the main landmarks in Selfoss?
The Bobby Fischer Center sets out the life of the chess champion who is buried nearby at Laugardælakirkja, the small church standing among farms east of the town. Two churches anchor the place. Selfosskirkja rises beside the centre, while the Árnesinga Folk Museum gathers the old trades and household life of the surrounding county, its collections held under the regional museum Byggðasafn Árnesinga that draws together the heritage of the farming country along the Ölfusá.
What is the history of Selfoss?
Selfoss grew up around a bridge. For centuries the wide Ölfusá split the farming districts of Suðurland from the roads west, and a ferry crossing here served the traffic between the southern lowlands and the rest of the island long before any town stood on the bank. The river was the obstacle.
It was also the reason a settlement gathered. When a suspension bridge was thrown across the Ölfusá in the nineteenth century, a permanent crossing fixed the place, and shops, a dairy, and services clustered at the eastern end of the span to serve the carts and herds passing through. The town that rose became the trading and administrative hub of the surrounding county, the largest in southern Iceland and the seat of services for a wide stretch of farms.
Trade followed the road. The Árnesinga Folk Museum now keeps that working story, tying the modern town back to the river crossing and the farming country of Suðurland that first drew people to this bank of the Ölfusá.
Where is Selfoss?
Selfoss lies on the Ölfusá in the central part of Suðurland, in southern Iceland. The town spreads along both banks of the river where it runs broad and slow across the flat farmland of the south, the wide lowland plain reaching away to the coast and the ring road carrying traffic east from Reykjavík through the heart of the place. Mountains ring the horizon.
Inland the rivers gather toward the falls at Gullfoss and the hot ground at Geysir, while the lava and ash country of the volcanic interior rises behind the green farms around the town.
What is the climate of Selfoss?
Selfoss has a cool maritime climate softened a little by its inland river setting. Winters are changeable rather than harsh, with spells of rain, wind, and wet snow rolling in off the North Atlantic across the open lowland of Suðurland, and the Ölfusá running grey and full between the banks. Summers stay cool and green.
The long northern daylight stretches the evenings late around midsummer, the mildest and busiest weeks for the farms of the plain and for travellers heading on to Gullfoss and Geysir. Wind sweeps the open valley often.
How do you get to Selfoss?
Selfoss sits on the ring road a short drive east of Reykjavík. From the capital the route climbs over the heath and drops to the bridge across the Ölfusá, with buses serving the town from Reykjavík along the same road that carries most traffic into the south. That crossing runs right through the centre.
The nearest airport lies back near Reykjavík, so most visitors arrive by car or bus, the town a natural first stop before the longer roads east toward Þingvellir, Gullfoss, and Geysir.
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Updated June 2026