Megeve Ski Resort France

Megeve ski resort is centred on the charming & refined village of the same name in France's renowned Haute Savoie. Megève is known for its protection of history, tradition & authenticity, characteristics which in many French ski resorts have been laid to waste. The lovely, lively village is connected to St Gervais les Bains, via a huge network of lifts & mainly beginner-intermediate ski trails with a quadricep-melting local skiable vertical of over 1,450m. Part of the vast Evasion Mont Blanc ski pass region, and close to the Chamonix valley & Les Contamines, there is no shortage of mountain splendour and ski adventure.

Megeve is for families, couples & groups that are looking for long, easy slopes, comfortable accommodation, diverse non-ski activities and a fabulous food experience. Hardcore powder hounds should venture here for a look and taste some fun skiing when the snow level is below 1,000m altitude.

Pros & Cons for Megève St Gervais Ski Resort

Pros

• Authentic French Alps village & ski resort.
• Long vertical of over 1,500m, with the longest actual skiable vertical around 1,050m.
• Enormous network of lifts & ski trails.
• Quality on-piste trails for, novice, beginner & intermediate skiers & snowboarders.
• Excellent value lift pass (Evasion Mont Blanc) that covers a vast amount of terrain, including neighbouring ski areas like Les Contamines-Hauteluce.
• Public transport access by a combination of train & bus is good.
• Village bus transport is excellent.

Cons

• Low elevation villages and some ski terrain may not have natural snow (or any snow) for much of winter.
• Lift system on the Megève side of the broader resort is generally quite dated and includes numerous surface tows.
• Can get quite busy in and around Megeve, including the main road through the town.
• Limited advanced on-piste & quality off-piste terrain (unless it snows quite low!).

Pro or Con (depending on your perspective!)

• Lift & piste connections to/from the village are not the best.
• Will often require a lift download (or two or three!) to get back to the village.
• Accommodation can be relatively expensive & hard to get at short notice (but good alternatives are nearby that interlink with Megève.
• Close to Chamonix & Mont Blanc.

Skiing & Snowboarding, Lift & Terrain

Megeve's ski area is a vast, tangled mass of lift, piste & pass interlinked confusion with neighbouring resorts including St Gervais, St Nicolas, & Jaillet-Combloux. Thankfully, most skiers & snowboarders will remain blissfully ignorant of the ski resort boundaries due to the seamless & all-inclusive nature of the local Evasion Mont Blanc ski lift pass. The pass is excellent value & covers a massive 445km of ski trails and over 1,500m of skiable vertical - how typically French. The ski area is lacking in challenging terrain both on & off-piste, but most of the skiing public don’t really care for that, hence the resort’s popularity!

Check out the ski trail map for Megeve - Evasion Mont Blanc below.

Megève - Evasion Mont Blanc Ski Trail Map

Whilst much of the ski lifts & terrain are best suited to beginner & intermediate skiers & snowboarders, the St Nicolas - Mont Joly sector has the tastiest & snow-sure offerings for the real powder hounds. To get to it from Megeve is a long journey made worse by the indirect lower lifts coming out of the village. The best access to the more advanced terrain is via Mont d'Arbois and involves a walk or free ski bus ride to the Chamois gondola base, then a gondola, a cable car traversing the valley, and one more gondola - just to climb 715m vertical. Alternatively, one could just get a bus down the valley to the 'La Princesse' base and achieve the same outcome on one gondola! Once on Mont d'Arbois the best terrain is easily accessed in all directions.

From the ski lift base at the Mont d'Arbois gondola, 530m vertical extends above and is perfect terrain for novices & beginners. Despite adequate snowmaking infrastructure, the low altitude at the base (1,290m), despite being higher than Megève village, is still the biggest concern. The last 200m vertical has increasingly limited cover. The higher slopes have a multitude of surface tows that will probably exhaust novices quickly, but at least the slopes are well snow covered.

The Princesse sector has some long skiable verticals and steeper pistes of up to 760m back to the valley, plus the classic Alps rural off-piste through meadows & farms when the snow is down too low levels. Sadly it will have to very low levels, because the base of Princesse is at only 1060m…….. the perennial problem for Megève!

We didn’t ski the Cote-2000/Rochebrune sector, but it looks to have some nice terrain for more advanced skiers & snowboarders, particularly higher up the valley where modern chairlifts are planned to be installed in the coming seasons, replacing the current surface tows.

Lift passes

The lift pass at Megeve is the Evasion Mont-Blanc Ski Pass and includes 445 km of slopes, not all of which are linked by ski trails. The pass gives access to the following areas: Les Contamines / Hauteluce, Saint-Gervais, Megève, Combloux, St Gervais & Saint-Nicolas de Véroce, plus La Giettaz. The local interlinked ski trail network is around 260km. With some short bus rides, one can access to excellent Les Contamines ski area, located a few km south of St Gervais, plus a few smaller resorts.

Megève is also part of the Mont Blanc Unlimited ski pass area, which is valid in all the nearby Chamonix ski resorts, but at around €20+ extra a day, it is generally over-priced & of dubious value.

Where is Megeve France?

The Megève ski resort is in the Haute-Savoie region of the French Alps, only 90km by road from Geneva (GVA) international airport. The iconic mountain town of Chamonix & the towering Mont Blanc are only 20km away as the local pigeons’ fly! Closest major town is Sallanches, 13km north of Megeve by road. Public transport to the region is good via the Gare-de-Sallanches Combloux Megève (Sallanches train station!). Regular buses on route 83 travel from Sallanches to the centre of Megeve in 25min. Alternate access to the broader Evasion Mont Blanc ski area is via the St Gervais - Le Fayet train station. Search & book here for train tickets to Sallanches or St Gervais-Le Fayet.

Anyone allergic to public transport may prefer to take a private transfer direct from the airport their hotel. Search & book here for all direct airport transfers from Geneva to Megève.

Megeve is also a wonderful stopover in a ski safari of the region and so having a rental car can be advantageous. In the town of Megève, if your hotel has no car-parking, or if you are a day visitor wanting to start in the village, vehicles are best parked in one of the underground parking garages (requires payment), and then use the free local buses. Other day trippers to the ski area will best to use the free open air car par at the base of La Princesse gondola, not only for its is less hectic atmosphere, but also its more direct access to higher elevation terrain on Mont d’Arbois & beyond.

Megève Accommodation

The village of Megève has retained much of its regional charm & is a wonderful base from which to experience the ski resort, but with a couple of notable question marks. For a start, it is not a village anymore, it is a rather large town. And whilst the combination of traditional architecture, luxury accommodation & fine dining are hard to beat, but those travelling on a budget may struggle & are probably better off looking elsewhere (like St Gervais, Combloux, Les Contamines or even distant Les Houches) & enjoying a day trip across to Megeve. After dark, the village has magical 'Christmas' lighting throughout. Strolling through at night is must. Whilst traffic is well controlled through the village, it is nonetheless quite busy. Walking or using the local buses to get around is recommended.

The questions marks surrounding the village as a ski base are around its low elevation (not so much a problem if it was in Austria, but it isn't) and lift access from the village to the slopes. Whilst undoubtedly beautiful under a blanket of snow, the village is only situated at an altitude of only 1,110m. It is increasingly without snow through much of the season and can thus be disappointing to those seeking the full white winter village atmosphere. Access to the ski lifts & slopes from the village is more inconvenient than expected, as previously mentioned in the lifts & terrain paragraph.

As to where to stay in town of Megève, it depends on what one is after. For 5-star luxury in town the Grand Hotel Soleil d'Or or Hotel Le Chalet Blanc are probably the picks. Above town, the Four Seasons Hotel Megeve definitely rules the roost. Lodgings that won’t break the bank include the Hôtel Au Vieux Moulin & the intriguingly named Hôtel Rent. for something different & affordable, try staying on a working farm near the Jaillet ski lifts at the Auguille Guesthouse & Farm Stay. Between these ends of the scale are a host of mid-range 3, 4, & 5-star hotels, chalets & apartments available for rent.

Above the village next to the important Mont d'Arbois gondola base is the wonderfully located Hotel La Ferme du Golf. It, and several other nearby hotels are possible the best located in the entire resort.

Search & book here for all Megève ski accommodation.

An immediate overflow for Megeve is the village of Combloux. Whilst lacking Megeve's liveliness & opulence, Combloux is more affordable, smaller & retains its traditional village charm, plus is ski-lift connected via a circuitous route, & only 5½km north of Megeve village by road. A couple of lovely hotels, one in town, one on the outskirts offer wonderful alternatives to staying in Megève, particularly for those with a rental car. In the village try Hotel Le Coin Savoyard and out of the village, but close to the Princesse gondola base, the Logis Hôtel Le Caprice Des Neiges is even ski-in across the rural landscape during a 'normal' winter.

Search & book here for all Combloux ski accommodation.

Away from Megève & Combloux, and on the opposite side of the mountain, centrally located St Gervais les Bains may appeal to visitors to the region. Whilst perhaps not as pretty as Megève and lower in altitude (850m), St Gervais is more affordable, has its own railway station nearby, plus is convenient to the Chamonix resorts & Les Contamines, as well as the Evasion Mont Blanc lifts & slopes via the Bettex cable car. Les Houches ski resort is connected to St Gervais via the Tramway du Mont Blanc station in town. For central lodgings try the Le St Gervais Hotel & Spa & Hôtel La Féline Blanche. Further up the valley from St Gervais toward Les Contamines, the hamlet of St Nicolas de Veroce is our pick of the locations for a quant & quiet French Alps experience, plus it has fantastic lifts (& a few old clunkers!) for the quickest access to the region's best ski terrain around Mont Joly & Épaule. For ultimate alpine pleasure, stay at the Armancette Hôtel.

Search & book here for all St Gervais & St Nicolas ski accommodation.

For more information on the best places to stay, see our Megève Accommodation Info page (coming soon!).

Ski Rentals, Lessons, Guiding & Services

Ski rentals are available in the region via our local partners in Megeve, St Gervais, Combloux & Les Contamines-Montjoie. Receive a discount when you search & book via our Megeve Ski & Snowboard Rental page.

For powder days, an initial on-mountain orientation, guiding or ski & snowboard lessons at Megeve, there are loads of fantastic instructors & mountain guides. For more info & options, see our Megève Ski Lessons & Guiding page.

Non-Ski Activities

Part of the reason guests flock to Megève in winter (and indeed throughout the year) is for its fine dining & high-end shopping experience. Each to their own! Suffice to say that visiting here without doing either of those is easy. There is plenty of affordable shopping & dining as well, including a few sneaky crepe restaurants & kebab shops hidden away!

For other non-ski activities, the village has horse-drawn sleigh rides, a large pool complex and ice skating. Beyond the village activities that involving snow & ice tobogganing/luge runs (including the 3km long 'La Luge' trail off the top off the Princess lift, AND the Apéri’ gliss, an après ski toboggan run from the top of Rochebrune), ice-climbing, dog-sledding, show-shoe trails, snowmobiles, ski joering (get towed around by a horse!), fat bikes & snow scooters. More than enough to keep everyone occupied.

Review

The Powderhounds were intending to review Megeve in season 2019/20, but even though we visited 16 French ski resorts in early 2020, Megève did not make the cut. We finally visited in March 2023, and didn't regret it! Despite a lack of snow down low, there is plenty here for everyone, particularly when including the interlinked St Gervais & St Nicolas. We will return after the Cote-2000 sector surface tows have been upgraded to chairlifts, hopefully not too far in the distant future. Click on the review link in the left column (or top of the page if on a mobile) to read all the reviews.

See how Megève compares to the rest of the French ski resorts on the France ski resort ratings page, or compare to the rest of Europe on the European ski resort ratings page.

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