"
- the hip will prefer Mitte
- the even hipper will prefer Friedrichshain
- the retro-hip which have NO IDEA will prefer Kreuzberg
- punks who are old enough to remember May 1st 1984 are leaving Kreuzberg
'cause it's not the real thing anymore
- those who seek for workaday multi-culture will love Wedding
- those who seek for workaday multi-culture with a harsh breeze of gentrification
will love Neukölln
- those who are attracted by their own gender are welcome in Schöneberg
- the bourgeois go to Charlottenburg / Wilmersdorf
- the older and richer bourgeois go to Zehlendorf or Dahlem
- the bourgeois which are almost dead or billionaires live in Wannsee.
Prenzlauer Berg: You should move there, if you are interested in consumption (and fashion, as long as its not too individual), like to present yourself in public, have money and like being surrounded by mothers, moving babies around (while their husbands make money in advertisement agencies & other media related stuff). Also good if you want to get to know single mothers.
Wedding: Actually its a cool and cheap neighborhood. And there are even 2 (TWO!) good bars that i know of. So if you like going out around the corner, Wedding is not for you, although the other Parameters are great.
Kreuzberg: If you want to see high speed Gentrification (and contribute to it by paying overpriced rents which, depending where you come from, still will appear cheap for you) thats the place. You will hear more spanish and english on the street than german. you should consider buying a folding bike, race bike (or maybe BMX) before moving there or you are not following conventions. Skateboard skills are a plus. If you are a musician or artist, welcome among your fellow suffering artists.
Friedrichshain: If you are an erasmus exchange student, this is your place. There is still the notion of a political adventure, volxküchen and the like, which will make you feel like a little revolutionary. Avoid talking to the people or it will spoil the illusion as you will quickly notice they are stuck in 90's political dogmatism. Then there are the people who consider "Pub Crawls" a worthwhile activity, the bars have no personal style as they just opened last week and will close again in 2 weeks.
Mitte and Neukölln are REALLY diverse. Around Alexanderplatz you will find places cheaper than anything you would get in Kreuzberg. And there is the center of consumption and luxury as well as you move closer to hackesche höfe and the government area. Neukölln, depending on how deep you explore it, covers everything i wrote about the other neighborhoods, depending where you go. Its huge, actually the biggest neighborhood of Berlin."
I live in Kreuzberg.
Credit: the above comments are taken from an online travel forum. The authors real names are unknown, but they do sure know Berlin