The attackers next stormed a concert hall, the Bataclan, which was hosting the American rock band Eagles of Death Metal. They opened fire on the panicked audience and took members hostage. As police closed in, three detonated explosive belts, killing themselves, according to Paris police chief Michel Cadot.
Another attacker detonated a suicide bomb on Boulevard Voltaire, near the music hall, the prosecutor's office said.
The Bataclan was the scene of the worst carnage.
Video shot from an apartment balcony and posted on the Le Monde website Saturday captured some of that horror as dozens of people fled from gunfire outside the Bataclan down a passageway to a side street.
At least one person lies writhing on the ground as scores more stream past, some of them bloodied or limping. The camera pans down the street to reveal more fleeing people dragging two bodies along the ground. A woman and two others can be seen clinging to upper-floor balcony railings in an apparent desperate bid to stay out of the line of fire.
Le Monde said its reporter who filmed the scene from his apartment balcony, Daniel Psenney, was shot in the arm after he stopped filming, when he went downstairs to help someone who had collapsed in the alley.
Sylvain, a tall, sturdy 38-year-old concert-goer, collapsed in tears as he recounted the attack, the chaos and his escape during a lull in gunfire.
"I was watching the concert in the pit, in the midst of the mass of the audience. First I heard explosions, and I thought it was firecrackers.
"Very soon I smelled powder, and I understood what was happening. There were shots everywhere, in waves. I lay down on the floor. I saw at least two shooters, but I heard others talk. They cried, 'It's Hollande's fault.' I heard one of the shooters shout, 'Allahu Akbar,'" Sylvain told The Associated Press. He spoke on condition that his full name not be used out of concern for his safety.
He was among dozens of survivors offered counseling and blankets in a municipal building set up as a crisis center.
Jihadis on Twitter immediately praised the attackers and criticized France's military operations against Islamic State extremists.
Hollande declared a state of emergency and announced renewed border checks along frontiers that are normally open under Europe's free-travel zone.
In a televised Friday night address he appealed to citizens to maintain "a determined France, a united France, a France that joins together and a France that will not allow itself to be staggered, even if today there is infinite emotion faced with this disaster, this tragedy, which is an abomination, because it is barbarism."
President Barack Obama, speaking to reporters in Washington, decried an "attack on all humanity."
A U.S. official briefed by the Justice Department says intelligence officials were not aware of any threats before Friday's attacks.
The Disneyland Paris theme park announced it would not open for business Saturday but billed the move as a matter of sympathy, not security.
"The big question on everyone's mind is: Were these attackers — if they turn out to be connected to one of the groups in Syria — were they homegrown terrorists or were they returning fighters?" said Brian Michael Jenkins, a terrorism expert and senior adviser to the president of the Washington-based RAND Corporation. "That will be a huge question."
Officials said a Syrian passport was recovered from the remains of one suicide bomber outside the stadium and that a suicide bomber at the concert hall was identified as a young Frenchman flagged in the past for links with an Islamic extremist activity.
(Related stories on pages 2, 4&5)