The court also ruled to set aside three of his 30 convictions but said he will remain in federal prison for the rest of his life.
The appeals judges ruled US District Court Judge George O'Toole, who oversaw Tsarnaev's trial, "fell short" of his promise to question jurors thoroughly enough to identify prejudice, "providing sufficient ground to vacate his death sentences."
Tsarnaev's legal team had pushed to change the venue of the trial to a courthouse that wasn't so close to the site of the bombing, in the heart of a town so affected by the tragedy.
Two of the three judges from the US Court of Appeals didn't agree with that argument, citing a defense expert's poll that showed that only 36% of people in Boston favored the death penalty for Tsarnaev before the trial.
Part of the ruling was a decision to reverse three convictions for charges that Tsarnaev was carrying a firearm in connection with his possession of a pressure cooker bomb. Tsarnaev's attorneys had filed a post-trial motion for judgments of acquittal on these convictions that the district court judge denied.
The court ruled Tsarnaev should be given a new penalty phase trial and will remain incarcerated.
"And just to be crystal clear: Because we are affirming the convictions (excluding the three ... convictions) and the many life sentences imposed on those remaining counts (which Dzhokhar has not challenged), Dzhokhar will remain confined to prison for the rest of his life, with the only question remaining being whether the government will end his life by executing him," the opinion, authored by Circuit Court Judge Ojetta Rogeriee Thompson, says.
The ruling states that the judges make no judgement about whether Boston is a "proper venue" for a sentencing retrial, and says it is a decision that should be left to the US District Court for Massachusetts, where the initial trial was held.
The US Attorney's office said: "We are currently reviewing the opinion and are declining further comment at this time."
He was convicted in 2015, including for the deaths of Krystle Campbell, Martin Richard, Lingzi Lu at the marathon and police officer Sean Collier.
Tsarnaev is being held in federal prison in Colorado. Tsarnaev was 19 years old when he and his brother, Tamerlan, who was 26 years old at the time, went to Boston's Boylston Street shortly before 3 p.m. on April 15, 2013, to carry out their plot.
Surveillance video showed the brothers carrying the pressure cooker bombs in backpacks and moving through the crowd near the marathon finish line in what federal prosecutors called a coordinated attack.
Tamerlan set off the first bomb, a 6-quart pressure cooker that contained gunpowder, nails and BBs, prosecutors said. The bomb killed Campbell, a 29-year-old restaurant manager, and permanently injured several other people who lost their legs.
The second pressure cooker bomb, carried in by Dzhokhar, went off 12 seconds later and killed two people, Martin and Lu, a graduate student from China.
The bombings sparked a manhunt for days that shut down the city. The brothers, while on the run, killed Massachusetts Institute of Technology police officer Sean Collier. After they stole an SUV, the two were chased by police.
Tamerlan died in an explosive firefight with police in nearby Watertown. Dzhokhar was arrested a day later.
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Appeals court vacates Boston Marathon bomber's death sentence, orders new penalty trial - CNN
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