Fuerteventura beaches by water quality: excellent almost everywhere, except one harbour

On Fuerteventura bathing water gets the top grade almost everywhere. In 2025, 30 of 31 sampling points on 30 beaches were graded excellent. There is one exception, right in the centre of Corralejo: the point by the old harbour, Muelle Viejo. It is also the only point on the island ever graded poor in 36 seasons of the register, in 6 of them. The grade counts bacteria in water samples; wind, sand and waves are not part of it.

That is 97% of points, against 91% for Spain as a whole. Among the Canary Islands, El Hierro, La Gomera and La Palma had every point excellent. Fuerteventura, Gran Canaria and Lanzarote had one point each below excellent.

What the grade means

Through the summer, samples are taken at every official bathing point and tested for E. coli and intestinal enterococci. A season is graded on its own samples together with the three summers before, so a grade is closer to four years than one. A single bad week hardly moves it; a long run of bad samples keeps a point down for several years. The EU bathing water directive.

Excellent, good and sufficient mean the standard is met. Poor means it is not: the authorities must tell people, and may close the water to bathing or advise against it. The European Environment Agency.

Corralejo's old harbour

The Muelle Viejo point has been tested since 1999. It lies 0.1 km from the centre our base uses for Corralejo, that is, in the town itself. Of the 27 seasons on its record, 6 were excellent, the last in 2016. The whole record by year: excellent 1999, sufficient 2000, excellent 2001, sufficient 2002, poor 2003–2004, excellent 2005, sufficient 2006–2011, good 2012–2013, excellent 2014–2016, sufficient 2017, poor 2018–2021, good 2022–2025.

The record before 2011 needs care: water was measured under older rules then, and the Spanish series has no «good» grade yet. From 2011, under today's rules, the record runs: sufficient 2011, good 2012–2013, excellent 2014–2016, sufficient 2017, poor 2018–2021, good 2022–2025.

Yet within 2 km of the harbour the register keeps 3 more points, and all of them were excellent in 2025:

• Clavellina (Norte La Goleta), 0.3 km from the harbour: excellent 1991–2025.
• Corralejo Viejo (Sur La Goleta), 0.5 km from the harbour: excellent 1991–1996, sufficient 1997–1998, excellent 1999–2025.
• Charco de las Agujas, 1.9 km from the harbour: excellent 2005–2009, no grade 2010, excellent 2011–2025.

A grade describes the spot where samples are taken, not the town's whole shore. It does not say why the harbour does worse: the register reports what was found in the water, not where it came from.

The rest of the island: last below excellent in 2010

Apart from the harbour, 7 beaches on the island have ever dropped below excellent, always to sufficient and never for long:

• Gran Tarajal (Tuineje): 1992.
• Tarajalejo (Tuineje): 1995.
• Corralejo Viejo (Sur La Goleta), La Oliva: 1997–1998.
• Grandes Playas (Grandes Playas), La Oliva: 1997.
• Pozo Negro (Antigua): 1999.
• La Lajita (Pájara): 2009.
• Giniginamar (Tuineje): 2010.

Since 2011, every other point on the island has been excellent in every season it was tested. 6 points have been excellent without a single break since 1991, all 35 seasons: Playa Blanca (Puerto del Rosario); Caleta Fuste (Castillo), Antigua; Clavellina (Norte La Goleta), La Oliva; El Matorral (Morro Jable), Pájara; La Concha (Chica), La Oliva; Puerto Lajas (Las Lajas), Puerto del Rosario.

The records differ in length. 6 beaches have been tested for fewer than twenty seasons, since 2010 or later: El Muellito, 2010; Esmeralda, 2010; Los Pozos, 2010; Piedras Caidas, 2010; Costa Calma, 2012; La Guirra, 2012. 3 points have a season with no grade; a gap is not held against a beach, but the register knows nothing about the water that year.

Five municipalities

Five of the island's six municipalities have points; inland Betancuria has none. La Oliva has the most, 11, and that is where Corralejo's harbour is.

At our four places

• Puerto del Rosario: 3 points, all excellent in 2025. Nearest to the centre: Los Pozos, 0.7 km, excellent.
• Corralejo (municipality of La Oliva): 11 points, 10 of 11 excellent in 2025. Nearest to the centre: Muelle Viejo, 0.1 km, good.
• Pájara: 9 points, all excellent in 2025. Nearest to the centre: Ajuy, 7.3 km, excellent.
• Antigua: 4 points, all excellent in 2025. Nearest to the centre: Ajuy, 14 km, excellent.

Distances are in a straight line from the point our base uses for each place. For Antigua and Pájara that point is inland, so the sea is further from it than from the resorts of the same municipalities. Each place's beaches with distances are on its own page: Puerto del Rosario, Corralejo, Pájara, Antigua.

The sea by month

The water at our four places is nearly the same: in no month do they differ by more than 0.2 °C. It is coldest in March, at 18.6–18.7 °C, and warmest at the end of summer and the start of autumn, up to 23.2 °C. It stays at 20 °C or above for 8 months, from May to December; from January to April it is below. These are NOAA satellite averages for 2015–2024: a cell a quarter of a degree across, centred 3.3–13.9 km from the place; open water, not a reading at a beach. NOAA OISST.

All 30 beaches on the island

Further

Our places on the island, with prices, winter and population, are on the Fuerteventura page. The island against its neighbour is in Lanzarote or Fuerteventura. Another island's beaches on the same grades: Tenerife beaches; the whole country: Spain's cleanest beaches. Water at every place in our base is in our dataset.

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