I live in Amsterdam, Noord is nice but not as nice as the old city. Definitely not my first recommendation for people looking to escape the centre.

Amsterdam Centraal sucks because it’s overrun by tourists and tourist traps, but if you cycle ~7min East, South or West then it’s a really nice relaxing old city, with small walkable streets and very little cars.

Noord is fairly newly build, and sadly the vast majority of it has big wide open streets focused around cars. (by Dutch standards)

Young british men, stay away! (https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-65107405)