We are planning a trip to germany over christmas and were looking through the hotels and we kept coming across "Pension" hotels. I tried googling it an it appears to be a term rather than a hotel chain. Is it something like a hostel?

no, they use that term in Austria, also. It's more like a hotel, but is usually family-owned and not quite at the service level of a hotel. For example, there may not be a manned desk 24/7. I stayed in one that was on the second floor of a building that had other offices, and I was given my own key to enter the place, even during the day, as I recall. It's more like a budget small hotel, or maybe a B&B.

They generally are more like B&B's than hotels. Some have restaurants, too. They usually are a good value and quite comfortable. Generally, they tend not to be in the city center. The one negative may be that fewer of them have someone who speaks English.

A pension is usually between a hotel and a B&B. Generally small and family run and usually quite simple - without much fou fou but good for a bargain.

Though the terms "pension," "hotel," "B&B," etc. do sometimes blur. A place might be the "Pension Schmidt," but years ago Schmidt's grandson upgraded the place to a 4-star hotel and just retained the original name.

My info is a bit out of date but when we were in Germany a number of years ago, we stayed mostly in pensions and loved them. To me they are sort of guesthouse/B&B accommodation.

As treplow said, some of them may not have someone who speaks English - so as long as you are prepared for that.

At nicest pension we stayed at, the landlady could only speak about 10 words of English but she was lovely and somehow between her 10 words of English, my 20 words of German and my small Flemish vocabulary and hand signs, we communicated. At breakfast, the next day, her English speaking son stopped by to ensure that all was well.

I'm not sure if this applies to Germany, but in some countries, a pension also serves meals and requires that you pay for either one or both.

> but in some countries, a pension also serves meals and requires that you pay for either one or both.

There seems to be a confusion between "Half pension" resp. "full pension" which are meal plans of a hotel or b&B, and a Pension which is a accomodation business.