The beaches of Rio de Janeiro

Rio's shoreline is three different coasts. The bay beaches inside Guanabara are for looking and running, not swimming. The south zone ocean beaches carry the swell and the crowds. West of Barra, the sand runs out past the city into rainforest and surf. These entries follow the coast from Flamengo out to Grumari and give the details that decide a beach day: how long each stretch of sand is, whether the water is fit to swim, what shelters it from the swell and how busy it gets on weekdays and at weekends.

Places in this collection

  • Praia da Bandeira — A named beach and neighbourhood of Rio with its own Wikipedia entry. Its length, orientation and water quality weren't confirmed by the sou…
  • Recreio dos Bandeirantes — About a kilometre of sand starting at the large rock that marks the end of Barra. The rock shelters the water for swimming. Don't try to sw…
  • São Conrado — Also called Gávea Beach, with its trendier western end known as Pepino. Hang gliders use it as their landing area and fill the sky at weeke…
  • Vidigal — A small beach of around 600 metres west of Leblon. The Sheraton hotel sits directly behind it and uses it as, in practice, its private beac…
  • Grumari — Prainha's quieter neighbour at the green western end of the city's coast. In good weekday traffic it is roughly a 45-minute drive from Ipan…
  • Prainha — About 150 metres of protected surf beach backed by rainforest, between Recreio dos Bandeirantes and Grumari. Young surfers fill it at weeke…
  • Botafogo — A curved bay beach about half a mile long, with Sugarloaf across the water. Like Flamengo, the water is not considered fit for swimming. Th…
  • Praia Vermelha — Under 245 metres long, below Morro da Urca and Sugarloaf. It's named for thick reddish sand found on no other beach in the city. The headla…
  • Arpoador — An 800-metre strip of sand where the eastern end of Ipanema meets the rocky point, backed by a small park. The sea here is always rougher t…
  • Praia do Pontal — Also listed as Praia do Pontal de Sernambetiba, this beach sits at the far western end of the Barra shoreline route. Past Nelson Mandela Pa…
  • Leblon — The beach runs about 1.3 km west from the Jardim de Alah canal and is more residential than Ipanema, though just as full at weekends. The B…
  • Leme — The northern tip of the Copacabana crescent. No canal or rock separates the two, but Leme stays quieter and has calmer water, which makes i…
  • Ipanema Beach — About 2.2 km of sand, with the Arpoador rock at its eastern end and the Jardim de Alah canal to the Lagoa marking its western edge. The Pos…
  • Copacabana Beach — A 4 km crescent facing the open Atlantic, with a paved beachfront path along its full length and hotels across the avenue. On Sundays the r…
  • Praia do Flamengo — Just over 1.7 kilometres of bay beach, fronting the park built on land reclaimed from Guanabara Bay. Few hotels sit close by, so it's mostl…

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