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Any beach on the Gulf coast faces west, so the sun goes down into the water the length of that shore.
The ones people gather at: Pass-a-Grille and Sunset Beach on Treasure Island in Pinellas County, Clearwater Beach, where the Pier 60 crowd turns it into an evening market, Siesta Beach and Caspersen Beach in Sarasota County, the beach beside Naples Pier in Collier (the pier itself is closed for rebuilding), Fort Myers Beach in Lee, and Grayton Beach in Walton County where the dunes are behind you. Cedar Key in Levy County looks west over marsh and islands rather than open water and is quieter than any of them. Key West faces southwest, which is close enough, and Mallory Square has made a nightly event of it.
Pinellas County. The City of St. Pete Beach's beach at 900 Gulf Way. Restrooms, parking, and the Paradise Grill for food and drink. Parking is pay-by-plate along Gulf Way, 541 spaces, and Pass-a-Grille Way, 186 spaces.
Open the guide →Pinellas County. The southern tip of Treasure Island, residential rather than commercial, with beach cottages and Key West-style houses behind the sand. A half-mile boardwalk runs around the point where Blind Pass meets the Gulf, used for fishing and for walking.
Open the guide →Pinellas County. The city's main beach, guarded seven days a week from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., with towers staffed according to season and weather. Pier 60 runs out from the middle of it.
Open the guide →Sarasota County. 948 Beach Road on Siesta Key, and the sand is why people come: TripAdvisor named it the number one beach in the United States. Lifeguards. Restrooms, picnic shelters, and a historic pavilion with raised seating looking over the water.
Open the guide →Sarasota County. 4100 Harbor Drive South in Venice. The Harbor Drive way in washed out during the 2024 storm season, and the main parking, the restrooms and the playground are closed because of it.
Open the guide →Collier County. The sand at the foot of 12th Avenue South, where the Naples Pier stands. The pier is closed and being rebuilt: Hurricane Ian destroyed about 460 feet of it in 2022 and the city is replacing the whole structure, higher and on larger pilings, with construction that began in January 2026 and that the city expects to take about 18 months.
Open the guide →Lee County. The Gulf shore of Estero Island. Seven walk-on accesses, numbered 37 to 43, sit along Estero Boulevard north of the Matanzas Bridge between Lynn Hall Memorial Park and Bowditch Point.
Open the guide →Walton County. Walton County opened a new regional beach access here in June 2026, the Bets "Beachmama" Haynes Regional Beach Access at 44 Hotz Avenue in downtown Grayton Beach, just west of the Red Bar: restrooms, rinse showers, an observation deck, a boardwalk to the sand and a stop for the county's Beach Park and Ride tram.
Open the guide →Levy County. A small beach in Cedar Key City Park at 192 Second Street, in a town that is more fishing village than beach resort. A roped-off swimming area with calm, shallow water, though the bottom is muddy and sandspurs grow nearby, so wear beach shoes.
Open the guide →The whole Atlantic coast, from Amelia Island down to Key Biscayne. The ones worth setting an alarm for are the undeveloped stretches, where nothing stands between the dune and the horizon.
Florida has more standing lighthouses than any other state and about a dozen let you climb them.
Sanibel Island in Lee County is the reason people fly in with a bucket.
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