Cuba’s exquisite beaches are world-famous for their unpolluted sugar-white sands and warm, gemstone bright turquoise waters, safe for swimming and water sports.
Some beaches have been well developed for tourism with large resort hotels, mostly all-inclusive with international restaurants and facilities for families and water sports enthusiasts. They welcome a mostly European and Canadian clientele and only offer a mere glimpse of the life led by most Cubans. Among them are a growing number of more secluded, first class properties, popular among couples and honeymooners.
Elsewhere, further away from Havana and Holguín airports, there are small cliff-defined coves with pocket-sized beaches hosting a lower density of smaller properties.
Off the coast, a number of coral atolls have been left in their natural state and just one or two properties offer a more intimate and private beach experience.
Families, friends, romantic couples and individuals will all find a place to suit them on one of Cuba’s beaches.
This is a selection of our favourite beach hotels in Cuba.
Varadero is a long established international beach resort with over 20km of broad sandy beaches on a peninsula 140km east of Havana. There are a large number of not always attractive fully inclusive hotels but they are mostly not high rise and patches of vegetation remain between the properties.
Paradisus Varadero
Guadalavaca is a smaller but growing beach resort in the east of the island popular with all-inclusive hotel chains owing to its proximity to Holguín and Santiago airports. It’s a lively place although our favourite beach, Playa Esmeralda, is more peaceful and upmarket. Its outlying landscape is picturesque, with rolling palm-forested hills, sugar fields and nature parks.
Paradisus Rio de Oro
Convenient for visitors to the evocative colonial city of Trinidad, the Ancón Peninsula has extremely soft white sand and just a handful of international hotels. There is no shade here but it is a good base for boat trips, diving and snorkelling.
Brisas Trinidad del Mar
Cuba’s northern coast is sheltered by a necklet of until recently undeveloped palm-dotted coral islands connected to the mainland by causeway, Cayo Ensenachos, Cayo las Brujas and Cayo Santa Maria. The accommodation options vary from modest cabins to first class resorts. The islands are targeted for increased tourism but at the moment still offer a relaxing holiday in a natural environment.
Melia Buenavista
Hotel Las Brujas
Royal Hideaway Resort
The remote western and eastern tips of the island of Cuba, Pinar del Rio and Baracoa respectively, are more distant from airports and significant towns, but harbour some of the loveliest unspoilt beaches, with a rural backdrop of craggy hills sheltering quaint colonial villages.
Maria la Gorda, Pinar del Rio
Villas Baracoa
| |  Hotel Paradisus, Varadero
 Playa Ancon, Trinidad
 Baracoa
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