Clearwater Beach named top beach in the States
Florida once again is home to the best beach in the U.S., with the title heading back to Clearwater Beach coming in at No. 1 in the TripAdvisor Travelers’ Choice Awards.
The Pinellas County beach won the accolade in 2016, but dropped to No. 4 last year as Siesta Beach down near Sarasota took the top spot.
Back on top again, the beach leads a hearty pack from the Sunshine State, which landed six of the top 10 and eight of the top 25 on the list, which is based on the quantity and quality of reader reviews in the TripAdvisor community.
Siesta Beach, which also was named the best beach in the U.S. in the 2017 Dr. Beach list fell to No. 2 this year. Other Florida beaches on the list are South Beach at No. 4, Fort Lauderdale Beach at No. 6, St. Pete Beach at No. 7, Hollywood Beach at No. 8, Panama City Beach at No. 11 and Fort Myers Beach at No. 14.
For the U.S. top 25, Florida landed eight, while Hawaii had one more with nine including No. 3 Ka’anapali Beach in Maui, No. 5 Hanauma Bay Nature Preserve in Oahu and No. 10 Lanikai Beach in Oahu. California landed four including Santa Monica Beach at No. 9 while Massachusetts, Georgia, South Carolina and Virginia had one beach each.
Florida beaches that rated in 2017, but not this year are St. Augustine Beach and Henderson Beach State Park near Destin.
Tops in the world is Grace Bay in the Turks & Caicos followed by Baia do Sancho, Brazil, Varadero Beach, Cuba, Eagle Beach, Aruba and Seven Mile Beach, Cayman Islands. Clearwater Beach came in at No. 7 in the world.
“Soft sand, clear waters and balmy temperatures are common threads among these Travelers’ Choice awardwinning beaches,” said Brooke Ferencsik, senior director of communications for TripAdvisor in a press release. “The Caribbean and Florida stake claims as the most decorated on the world and U.S. lists respectively.”
This is the sixth year of the TripAdvisor awards, and the fourth year in a row a Florida beach has topped the U.S. list.
The full list from the reader-review website covers 355 beaches in not just U.S. and global rankings, but also by region including Asia, Europe, Africa, South Pacific, South America, Middle East, Caribbean, Central America, Australia, Brazil, Costa Rica, France, Germany, Greece, India, Indonesia, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Mexico, New Zealand, Portugal, Spain, Thailand, Turkey and the U.K.
To view them all, go to TripAdvisor.com/TravelersChoice-Beaches Here’s the full top 25 for the U.S. and world: