The coast
Somerset's Beaches
19 beach guides for planning your Somerset cottage holiday.
Each beach guide covers the rules that change a visit: seasonal dog restrictions set by the local council, RNLI lifeguard cover, parking and the walk down from it. Check the linked council or land-manager page before you travel, because dog zones and car park arrangements change from year to year.
Browse All Beaches
Berrow Beach
Berrow's wide beach between Burnham-on-Sea and Brean: dunes and a nature reserve behind, a shipwreck on the sand, dogs allowed all year, and fast tides over mud.
Blue Anchor Beach
A quieter beach beside the West Somerset Railway, at the end of a fossil-rich SSSI coast, with council life-saving equipment and big Bristol Channel tides.
Bossington Beach
A shingle ridge on the National Trust's Holnicote Estate, at the east end of Porlock Bay below Hurlstone Point, reached on foot from Bossington car park.
Brean Beach
Brean's long flat beach beside Brean Down: RNLI lifeguards in summer, dogs allowed all year, limited winter vehicle access and a wide mudflat at low tide.
Burnham-on-Sea Beach
A wide esplanade beach beside Burnham's jetty, with strict dog zones, summer RNLI lifeguards and council warnings about soft mud and no bathing at the jetty.
Clevedon Beach
A pebbled beach below Clevedon's Victorian pier and 1929 Marine Lake. Dogs are banned all year, there are no lifeguards, and the Bristol Channel tide runs fast.
Doniford Beach
A fossil beach in Helwell Bay between Watchet and Williton, known for rock pools and eroding cliffs, with a lime kiln beside it and Doniford Halt nearby.
Dunster Beach
A pebble shore half a mile from Dunster village, east of Minehead, backed by privately owned beach chalets, wartime pillboxes and a car park on Sea Lane.
Kilve Beach
A rocky foreshore on the Quantock coast, known for ammonites and rock pools, with a car park, toilets and tea room, and a tide that can cut the beach off.
Ladye Bay
A small pebble cove near Clevedon, reached down a flight of steps from the coastal path, with no promenade or pier and mud and tide warnings to heed.
Lilstock Beach
A pebbly shore at the eastern end of the Blue Anchor to Lilstock coast, with the remains of a 19th-century harbour, a nearby car park and cliff-foot tides.
Minehead Beach
Minehead's seafront beach by the station and harbour, rebuilt with imported sand in 1999, with a summer dog ban on its main stretch and a big Bristol Channel tide.
Porlock Weir
A small tidal harbour and pebble beach on the Exmoor coast, 1.5 miles west of Porlock, with a village car park, coast path walks and tides of up to 15 metres.
Portishead Beach
Portishead has no sandy beach: a grass and shingle shore across Esplanade Road from the Lake Grounds, with muddy flats at low tide and Battery Point beyond.
Sand Bay
Sand Bay at Kewstoke, two miles north of Weston: dogs allowed all year, dunes behind the sand, a council car park and the mud and tide warnings to know.
St Audries Bay
A bay below the Quantock Hills with a waterfall on the beach, on a coast path section that is impassable at high tide and rich in early Jurassic fossils.
Uphill Beach
A quiet sandy beach at the south end of Weston Bay, beside the River Axe and Uphill Nature Reserve, with a car park and soft mud at low tide.
Watchet Beach
Pebble beach beside Watchet harbour, with Helwell Bay's fossil-rich ledges just east of the marina, four town car parks and a tide that cuts the shore.
Weston-super-Mare Beach
Weston's long sandy seafront between Knightstone Island and Uphill: dog rules by stretch, no lifeguards, and the mud and tide warnings to read first.