Home » Latest » Beaches » Top 5 Beaches for Families – Travel Channel

Top 5 Beaches for Families – Travel Channel

4

InfoSearched 115 0 Beaches

7.8

SaveSavedRemoved 2

Five beaches, one mission: keep the kids happy without drowning in a strand full of undertow warnings.

Travel Channel’s rundown of the “Top 5 Beaches for Families,” posted to YouTube on April 16, 2018, skips the influencer bait and sticks to the stuff parents actually care about: shallow surf, clean sand, lifeguards on duty, and enough on-site distractions to burn off a six-year-old’s energy before dinner. The countdown ranges from the Gulf Coast of Florida to the boardwalks of Maryland and the resort shores of Hawaii, judging each spot on safety, calm water, and amenities built for multigenerational trips rather than solo surf missions.

• Clearwater Beach, Florida takes a top spot for its shallow, gentle water and daily draws like the Sunsets at Pier 60 festival and dolphin-watching boat tours.
• Kiawah Island, South Carolina makes the list for its 10 miles of uncrowded beach, tidal-flat wildlife viewing, and extensive bike paths rather than nightlife or amusement rides.
• Ocean City, Maryland earns its ranking on three miles of lifeguarded beach paired with a classic wooden boardwalk loaded with amusement rides and beachside eateries.

Clearwater’s Formula for Toddlers and Teens Alike

Clearwater Beach anchors the list because it solves the two things that wreck a family beach day fastest: rough surf and boredom. The water stays calm and shallow well off the shoreline, which lets parents relax while younger kids wade without a rescue drill. Around the sand itself, there’s beach volleyball, parasailing, and dolphin-watching charters that run daily out of the marina, plus a short drive to the Clearwater Marine Aquarium — the rehab facility that shot to fame as the real-life home of Winter the dolphin from Dolphin Tale.

Every evening closes the same way: Pier 60 fills up for its sunset celebration, part street fair and part nightly ritual, with local artists, musicians, and food vendors setting up as the sky turns orange over the Gulf. For families staying multiple nights, that’s a built-in, free activity that doesn’t require planning — just showing up before dusk.

Kiawah Island’s Quieter Pitch

Kiawah trades boardwalk noise for space. Ten miles of beach with almost no crowding gives families room to spread out, and the island’s tidal flats turn into a natural classroom at low tide, with kids able to poke around for crabs, shells, and shorebirds without a guide. Bike paths stretch across the island, connecting the beach to golf courses and tennis courts, so a family that wants to skip the sand for an afternoon still has plenty to do.

Ten miles of pristine coastline, and barely a beach umbrella in sight — that’s the pitch that puts Kiawah on a list otherwise dominated by boardwalks and water parks.

Families looking to spot more than shells can book kayak tours through the marshes, where dolphins and alligators show up regularly, or catch a sunset cruise off the coast — a slower, more nature-driven counterpoint to the ride-heavy destinations elsewhere on the countdown. Anyone comparing notes on other alligator-adjacent swimming holes in Florida’s less-charted waters will recognize the same trade-off between wildlife and convenience.

Ocean City’s Boardwalk Economy

Ocean City makes the list for going the opposite direction from Kiawah’s quiet — it’s the boardwalk pick. Three miles of clean, lifeguarded beach back up to a stretch of amusement rides, mini-golf courses, arcade games, and beachside eateries that keep teenagers occupied long after the younger kids have tired of the water. It’s the classic Mid-Atlantic family shore town, built around the idea that a rainy afternoon or an overheated toddler always has somewhere else to go besides back to the hotel room.

Rounding out the countdown, the segment lands on Maui, Hawaii for its crystal-clear water and activities like snorkeling, whale watching, and beginner-friendly surf lessons, and Myrtle Beach, South Carolina for its Splashes Oceanfront Water Park and the animal-filled Carolina Opry Theater. Families weighing an island trip against a boardwalk town might find similar planning notes in budgeting advice for family travel, since flights to Maui and a week on the Ocean City boardwalk land on very different ends of a vacation budget.

What ties all five together isn’t luxury — it’s logistics. Every beach on this list solved the same problem families actually deal with: what happens between the hours of 10 a.m. and dinner when the kids get bored of just sitting in the water.