Where to live near Delft when the student town has no home for you

• Train · 4–5 minRijswijk to Delftdirect · 6× per hour
• Bike · 26 minRijswijk to Delft5 km
• Car · 9 minRijswijk to Delft5 km

Rijswijk grew from a farming village into a largely residential town through a postwar building boom, so planned neighbourhoods of family-sized homes are more typical than Delft's canal-side houses and student rooms. A large share of the municipality is public green space, with parks and a zone of former country estates, and the old centre around the Herenstraat survives. Rijswijk Buiten at the edge is newer. Compared with Delft, the tone is calmer and more residential, with generally fewer students and fewer day visitors.

• Train · 11–15 minDen Haag Centraal to Delftdirect · 8× per hour
• Bike · 55 minDen Haag Centraal to Delft10 km
• Car · 14 minDen Haag Centraal to Delft10 km

The Hague stretches out along long, wide, green streets of low-rise housing, often only a few storeys tall, with grand eighteenth-century residences in some quarters and postwar apartment blocks set among parkland. Delft's tight canal quarter, where student rooms tend to be common around the university, gives way to broader residential districts and a seaside resort district at Scheveningen. Neighbourhoods differ widely in character, from the affluent northwest near the coast to areas farther inland, so choosing the district matters more here than in compact Delft.

• Train · 7–9 minSchiedam Centrum to Delftdirect · 12× per hour
• Bike · 52 minSchiedam Centrum to Delft11 km
• Car · 15 minSchiedam Centrum to Delft14 km

Schiedam's old town centres on the Korte Haven and Lange Haven, with windmills standing above former warehouses and a jenever museum in an old factory. Around it lie several districts, among them Oost, West, Nieuwland and Groenoord, much of the residential growth having spread north after the town absorbed neighbouring villages in the first half of the last century. Because the town moved from shipbuilding and distilling toward commuter living, its housing tends to serve working households more than students, a different mix from Delft's.

• Train · 10–14 minRotterdam Centraal to Delftdirect · 14× per hour
• Bike · 65 minRotterdam Centraal to Delft14 km
• Car · 17 minRotterdam Centraal to Delft15 km

Delft is a town of canal streets and planned districts such as Tanthof and Voorhof; Rotterdam, rebuilt after wartime bombing, is a city of apartments and towers, with the Kop van Zuid on the south bank, the car-free Lijnbaan, historic Delfshaven and many differing districts. The centre is especially popular with singles and people born abroad, so flats of every size set the pattern, while suburban districts such as Overschie sit farther out. The shift from Delft is one of scale: taller blocks, more variety and a more international crowd.