Sun, sea and stats!
You sun of a beach…
Beaches dream up beautiful images of palm trees, warm ocean water and soft sand. But which countries have the most, and best, beaches?
The longest beach in the world is the Praia do Cassino, located in Rio Grande do Sul (southern Brazil), at over 254km (158 miles). The US has the second longest beach (Padre Island Beach, in Texas, at 182km) and also 4 of the top 10 longest beaches globally
Canada, Norway and Indonesia have the most beaches, but this is because they have the longest coastlines, which is proportional to the total number of beaches (including the rocky or pebbly variety)
A better form of measurement is using the “Blue Flag” Award — the gold standard of high quality beaches (which measures a range of environmental, educational, safety, and accessibility criteria):
- Based on these criteria, Spain holds the world record for the highest number of beaches at 621
- Greece and Turkey comes next with 581 and 531, respectively
- England, by comparison, only has 80 beaches that meet this stringent criteria while Mexico has the highest number outside of Europe at 70
However, the number of beaches (or their size) is not the most important factor when assessing their allure - a beaches beauty is often a more powerful factor in attracting tourists
An analysis of the 186 million Instagram photos tagged with #beach showed that Whitehaven beach, Australia, is the most photographed (and hence trendy, if not popular) with 129,585 photos taken. The next highest, Lanikai beach in Hawaii, only had 115,000 photos
The longest beach in the world is the Praia do Cassino, located in Rio Grande do Sul (southern Brazil), at over 254km (158 miles)
What else don’t you know about beaches?
- 31% of the Earth’s shoreline¹ is sandy, although this varies by continent (Africa’s coastlines are 66% sandy)
- An American survey in 2017 showed that the most disliked person at the beach was “The Slob” who left their rubbish on the beach (65% of respondents)
- The same survey showed that 20% of respondents had had sex on the beach (and not just the cocktail)
- American nude beaches aren’t catching on as much as they are in Europe. 28% of Austrian’s reported to have been naked on a beach in a similar 2016 survey (vs. 18% of American’s and 2% of Malaysians and South Koreans)
- Plus, 70% of US respondents said they didn’t feel comfortable around beach nudity, in contrast to Europeans - 53% of Spaniards and 47% of Germans were tolerant of such behaviour
Did you enjoy this article? If you did, why don’t you check out some of our other GoodStats about our planet and the Environment:
Note¹: only includes the “ice-free’ world”
Source: Nature; Travel Nine; All top everything; Coastal Dream Life; Guinness World Records; The Beach Guide; Blue Flag; Flip Flop survey 2017; Flip Flop survey 2017 pt2; Flip Flop Survey 2016
