The Best Beaches in Los Angeles: A Local Transportation Guide

Santa Monica — best for first-time visitors

Santa Monica is the most complete beach experience in Los Angeles: a wide sand beach, the Santa Monica Pier and its amusement park, the beachfront bike path, and Third Street Promenade and Ocean Avenue dining a short walk inland. It is also the easiest beach to combine with the rest of a sightseeing day.

It is busy, particularly on summer weekends, and the beachfront lots fill early. Drop-off along Ocean Avenue or at the pier avoids the lot circuit entirely. See Santa Monica car service.

Venice Beach — best for atmosphere and people-watching

Venice is the counter-culture end of the coast: the Ocean Front Walk boardwalk, Muscle Beach, the skate park, street performers and artists. Two blocks inland, Abbot Kinney Boulevard is one of the city's better restaurant and boutique streets, and the Venice canals are a quiet surprise for anyone who walks them.

Venice suits visitors who want character rather than calm. Parking is difficult and often distant from the boardwalk, and the area is livelier after dark than most Los Angeles beaches. See Venice car service.

Manhattan Beach — best for a relaxed beach-town evening

Manhattan Beach is polished, residential and walkable: a compact downtown of restaurants and shops that runs downhill to the pier and a wide clean beach. It attracts a professional, family-oriented crowd, and it is a short drive from LAX, which makes it a natural stop on an arrival or departure day.

Street parking downtown is metered, limited and strictly enforced. Drop-off at Manhattan Beach Boulevard near the pier puts you in the middle of everything. See Manhattan Beach car service.

Hermosa and Redondo Beach — best for a casual South Bay day

Hermosa Beach is the most casual of the South Bay towns, built around the Hermosa Pier and the pedestrian Pier Plaza with its bars, taco spots and volleyball courts on the sand. Redondo Beach, immediately south, is more family-oriented, with King Harbor, the horseshoe-shaped Redondo Pier, sportfishing and harbor-side seafood.

Both are easy, unpretentious beach days rather than sightseeing destinations. Parking near either pier is the usual summer-weekend problem. See Hermosa Beach and Redondo Beach.

Malibu — best for a scenic coastal drive

Malibu is less a single beach than a 34-kilometer stretch of Pacific Coast Highway with coves, state beaches and landmarks along it: Zuma Beach for wide open sand, Point Dume for bluff views, El Matador for photography, Paradise Cove for a beachfront lunch, and the Malibu Pier and Country Mart for shopping and dining.

The drive is the attraction, which makes Malibu ideal as a chauffeured half-day rather than a self-drive. Parking at the smaller coves is scarce, PCH traffic is heavy on weekends, and being able to stop, look and continue without hunting a space changes the day completely. Our Malibu coastal tour is built around exactly this.

Will Rogers State Beach and other coastal stops

Will Rogers State Beach, between Santa Monica and Pacific Palisades along PCH, is a long, calm stretch popular with families and swimmers, with lifeguards and beachfront parking lots — a quieter alternative to Santa Monica just minutes away.

Further options worth knowing: Marina del Rey for harbor cruises and waterfront dining, Playa del Rey for a genuinely quiet local beach near LAX, Palos Verdes for dramatic cliff scenery and tide pools, and Long Beach for the Queen Mary and the aquarium. Each appears in our service areas.

Which beach suits which visitor

Rather than ranking the coast, match the beach to the day you want.

• First-time visitor with one beach day: Santa Monica.
• Restaurants, shops and walking: Manhattan Beach or Abbot Kinney in Venice.
• Relaxed beach-town atmosphere: Hermosa or Redondo Beach.
• Combining beach with sightseeing: Santa Monica and Venice together.
• Scenic coastal drive and photography: Malibu along Pacific Coast Highway.
• Quiet family beach with easy parking: Will Rogers State Beach.

Transportation and parking, honestly

Beach parking is the single most underestimated part of a Los Angeles coastal day. Lots at popular beaches fill by mid-morning in summer, street parking near piers is metered and enforced, and PCH between Santa Monica and Malibu slows considerably on weekend afternoons. Rideshare availability from the more remote Malibu beaches is unreliable.

A chauffeured beach day removes all of it: door-to-sand drop-off, belongings secured in the vehicle, multiple stops along the coast in one itinerary, and a pickup at the time you choose. Hourly chauffeur service is the usual format, and it pairs naturally with an LAX arrival when the coast is your first stop. Reserve your coastal day when you are ready — and if you are planning around traffic, our freeway rush hour guide explains the timing.