Beach Holidays in the UK

Great Britain's coastline stretches for more than 10,000 miles¹, and as explored during the staycation boom of the past two summers, it's home to hundreds of brilliant beaches well worthy of being holiday hotspots. Our data indicates that the demand for coastal stays in the UK continues to grow in 2022, with searches for popular locations such as Tenby, Filey and Hunstanton seeing year on year increases of +55%, +154% and +259%².

With the summer season just a few months away, HomeToGo has swept Great Britain's superlative shores to find the best beaches for holidays in 2022. Looking for locations offering top quality and value for money, this index considers a shortlist of beaches rated at least 3 out of 5 stars by visitors, with a water rating of good or excellent, and where the median nightly price for holiday accommodation in the vicinity is below the UK median at £150 or less³.

Ready to dive into the HomeToGo 2022 Beach Index? Find out which beaches made it into the top ten, and see how they scored, in the table below:

2022's Top Beaches for Summer Breaks: Ranked

Learn more about Great Britain's Top 5 Beaches for 2022

Llandanwg Beach, Gwynedd

Median price per night for accommodation: £126.75

Visitor Rating: 4.1 ★

Water Quality: Excellent

A sheltered, scenic beach in prime position on the west coast of the Snowdonia National Park, with sand dunes, rock pools and Rhinog mountain views.

Whitesands Beach, Pembrokeshire

Median price per night for accommodation: £117.52

Visitor Rating: 3.6 ★

Water Quality: Excellent

This golden sand, Blue Flag beach - one of Pembrokeshire's most popular - has plenty for swimmers, surfers and wildlife watchers to enjoy.

Sandbanks Beach, Dorset

Median price per night for accommodation: £131.79

Visitor Rating: 3.9 ★

Water Quality: Excellent

Well-appointed and highly awarded, Sandbanks has held Blue Flag status for 30+ years and boasts a play area, crazy golf, volleyball nets, deckchairs and more.

Marloes Sands Beach, Pembrokeshire

Median price per night for accommodation: £135.98

Visitor Rating: 4.0 ★

Water Quality: Excellent

This serene, Green Coast awarded beach comprises sandy stretches and rugged rock formations - a top spot for bird watching and seeing seals.

Sheringham Beach, Norfolk

Median price per night for accommodation: £134.30

Visitor Rating: 3.9 ★

Water Quality: Excellent

Visit this Blue Flag Beach, surrounded by the Norfolk Coast Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, at low tide to enjoy its sandy shores and rock pools.

Great Britain's Best Beaches for Summer 2022: Mapped

¹ “The coastline length around mainland Great Britain is 11,072.76 miles.” - Ordnance Survey

² Search trends are based on HomeToGo internal data observing searches for holiday rentals via hometogo.co.uk taking place between 1st January - 21st March 2022 with a check-in between 21st June - 23rd September 2022, compared with the same period in 2021.

³ Based on HomeToGo internal data, the median nightly price for a holiday home in the UK during summer 2022 is £177.24.

⁴ HomeToGo internal price insight was used to find the median nightly cost of accommodation between 21st June - 23rd September 2022 in the surrounding area of each beach.

⁵ Information provided by thebeachguide.co.uk was used to source a visitor rating for each beach.

⁶ Data from the Department of Environment Food and Rural Affairs alongside insight from Natural Resources Wales, made available by the Environment Agency and coastradar.com, was used to find the bathing water quality at each beach.

⁷ Find out more about index methodology below:

We used HomeToGo inventory and price data to identify the beaches across Great Britain where the median cost per night of accommodation in the surrounding area during summer 2022 is £150.00 or less. We then created a shortlist of beaches with both a high visitor rating (three or more stars out of five) and good or excellent water quality. The shortlist was then ranked according to these data points (price, visitor rating and water quality). We assigned each data point a representative numerical value between 5 and 10, with 5 representing the lowest data point and 10 representing the highest data point. The hypothetical "perfect score" would be 30 out of 30. We used the following equation in order to calculate this for every factor:

Score(i) = 5 · (x(i) - xmin ) / (xmax - xmin ) + 5

Price: We used HomeToGo price insight to find the median nightly cost of accommodation between 21st June - 23rd September 2022 in the surrounding area of each beach. The area with the lowest median price per night was awarded a maximum score of 10, and the remaining areas were awarded a score of 5 or higher. Data was collected in March 2022 and prices are subject to change.

Visitor rating: We used information provided by thebeachguide.co.uk to source a visitor rating for each beach. The beach with the highest rating was given a score of 10, and the remaining beaches were awarded a score of 5 or higher.

Bathing water quality: We used data from the Department of Environment Food and Rural Affairs alongside insight from Natural Resources Wales, made available by the Environment Agency and coastradar.com, to record the bathing water quality at each beach. The beaches with a rating of excellent were given a score of 10, while those with a rating of good are were awarded a score of 5.