Ibiza and Formentera beaches by water quality: each beach's record since 1990

On Ibiza, 3 beaches have had their water graded excellent in every season since 1990: Cala Sant Vicent, Cala Tarida and Salines. On Formentera, all 7 sampling points have been excellent every season since 1993. Ibiza as a whole looks weaker: 25 of its 41 points were excellent in 2025. The grade is about bacteria in the water, not sand, crowds or views.

The register counts the two islands together, and counted that way they come second from the bottom in Spain for the share of excellent points: 32 of 48 in 2025, or 67 %, against 91 % nationally. Spain's coast has 31 areas in the register: provinces, islands and the cities of Melilla and Ceuta. No point on either island was graded poor in 2025.

Two islands in one register entry

In the European register, Ibiza and Formentera are a single area. We split it by latitude: everything south of 38.8° N is Formentera. The split was checked against the municipality code built into each point's number: every point south of the line carries Formentera's code, and none to the north does. In the register of municipalities, the island of Formentera is exactly one municipality. Municipalities by island.

A sampling point and a beach are not the same thing. The two islands have 48 points on 43 beaches, since a long beach can have several. A beach with several points is only as good as its weakest one. D’en Bossa has two points listed under different municipalities; we count it as one beach.

What the grade means

The European Environment Agency gives every official bathing point one of four grades: excellent, good, sufficient or poor. It rests on water samples tested for intestinal enterococci and E. coli over that season and the three before it. One dirty week does not move it, while a few bad seasons keep it down for years. The EU directive.

Water graded good or sufficient still passes the standard; poor water does not. With that grade, the authorities are expected to act, for example by banning bathing or advising against it, and to warn the public. The agency on poor water.

Formentera: excellent since 1993

Formentera has 7 points on 6 beaches, and every one of them has been excellent in every season since 1993. Anything lower came in the first seasons of the record. The shortest unbroken excellent run among them is 33 seasons.

• Cala Sahona: excellent for 35 seasons in a row; graded since 1990.
• Es Pujols: excellent for 35 seasons in a row; graded since 1990.
• Illetes: excellent for 35 seasons in a row; graded since 1990.
• Llevant: excellent for 35 seasons in a row; graded since 1991.
• Sa Roqueta: excellent for 35 seasons in a row; graded since 1991.
• Migjorn: excellent for 33 seasons in a row, at both points; graded since 1990.

Water is one side. In winter the island nearly shuts: by social security data for 2025, Formentera runs at 30 % of its summer peak in January, with a winter score of 1 of 5.

Ibiza, municipality by municipality

The island of Ibiza has 5 municipalities, and their water differs. Formentera is in the last row for comparison.

A beach counts as always excellent if it was graded excellent in every season since its first grade, however late that was; a beach with points in two municipalities counts in both. Sant Joan de Labritja covers the north of the island: all 7 of its points lie north of any point in our places.

The bay of Sant Antoni

On Ibiza the slide from excellent is not spread across the island; it gathers in one corner. Within 4 km of the point our base uses for Sant Antoni de Portmany there are 9 sampling points. In 2025, 8 of them were below excellent; the only excellent one was Cala Salada.

• Calo des Moro (0.5 km): good in 2025, below excellent since 2017, after 26 excellent seasons in a row.
• Playa de s’Arenal, point 2 (0.7 km): good in 2025, below excellent since 2015, after 8 excellent seasons in a row.
• Playa de s’Arenal, point 3 (1.1 km): sufficient in 2025, below excellent since 2019, after 13 excellent seasons in a row.
• Cala Gracio (1.4 km): good in 2025, below excellent since 2021, after 31 excellent seasons in a row.
• Playa des Pouet (1.5 km): good in 2025, below excellent since 2021, after 17 excellent seasons in a row.
• Es Pinet (1.6 km): sufficient in 2025, below excellent since 2020, after 11 excellent seasons in a row.
• Badia Sant Antoni (1.7 km): good in 2025, below excellent since 2021, after a single excellent season in 2020.
• Port des Torrent (3.3 km): sufficient in 2025, below excellent since 2021, after 14 excellent seasons in a row.

They did not slip at once: the first left excellent in 2015, the last in 2021. The most recent poor grade on either island is here too: Badia Sant Antoni, 2018. The grade does not say why: it reports what was found in the samples, not where it came from.

Ibiza town's beaches

The island's capital is listed in our base as «Ibiza (Eivissa)». Its municipality has 4 points on 3 beaches, and their stories differ:

• D’en Bossa: the town's point — excellent in all 35 seasons since 1991; the Sant Josep de sa Talaia point — good in 2025, below excellent for the first time in 2025, after 6 excellent seasons in a row.
• Figueretes: good in 2025, below excellent since 2019, after 15 excellent seasons in a row.
• Talamanca: point 1 — excellent for 2 seasons in a row, before that good in 2023; point 2 — sufficient in 2025, below excellent since 2020, after a single excellent season in 2019. Last poor grade: 2007.

The slide and the partial return

On Ibiza, the share of excellent points first fell and then partly recovered. In 2016, 36 of 41 graded points on the island were excellent. The low came in 2021, at 20 of 40. In 2025 it was 25 of 41. On Formentera, every point was excellent in every one of those seasons.

Points graded in each season. The table starts in 2016: the agency treats 2010–2015 as transitional, and seasons from those years are not fully comparable. The agency on the transition.

Long runs also ended outside the bay of Sant Antoni: 3 more points lost a run of 25 or more excellent seasons.

• Cala Llonga: excellent for 31 seasons in a row until 2020, good in 2025.
• Portinatx: excellent for 30 seasons in a row until 2019, good in 2025.
• Cala Vadella: excellent for 25 seasons in a row until 2015, good in 2025.

Long records on Ibiza

Besides the 3 beaches excellent in all 36 seasons, the island has 9 more that have never had a lower grade, but whose record starts later: Cala Llenya since 1992, Cala Comte since 1993, Cala d’Hort since 1993, Cala Jondal since 1993, Cala Xarraca since 1993, S’Illot since 1993, Es Figueral since 2004, Cala Moli since 2009, Es Cavallet since 2009.

An almost clean record since 1990: Cala Salada, which fell below excellent only in the first seasons and has been excellent without a break since 1991.

A short record is not a long one: Es Niu Blau has been graded only since 2022. A few excellent seasons are a start, not a history: in so few years a bad one may simply not have come up.

Sea and winter in our places

Our base has 5 places on the two islands. Sea temperature is the 2015–2024 average by month from NOAA satellite data, on a grid of about 25 km: a cell that size mixes the shore with open sea and does not see a single bay. Primary source.

The sea is at 20 °C or warmer from June to October at all our places on the two islands, 5 months a year. The «January» column is the share of cafés, hotels and shops operating in January against the summer peak, by social security data for 2025. Here the places differ far more than in the sea: Ibiza (Eivissa) 63 %, Formentera 30 %.

All 43 beaches on both islands

Longest excellent run across all of a beach's points first, then by the 2025 grade. «All 36» means excellent in every season since the first grade.

Further

Our places on the two islands, with full data, are on the Ibiza and Formentera coast page, and one by one: Ibiza (Eivissa), Santa Eulària des Riu, Sant Josep de sa Talaia, Sant Antoni de Portmany, Formentera.

Bathing water for every place in our base is in our dataset; how many months a year people swim on each coast is in our piece on the swimming season; how the January share is counted is in the winter openness dataset.

The neighbouring island from the same register is in our piece on Mallorca's beaches by water quality; all of Spain is in our piece on Spain's cleanest beaches. Where the islands are, and how their winters differ, is in our piece on where the Balearic Islands are.

Read next

Menorca's beaches by water quality: excellent across the island, except near Ciutadella

Cost of living in Mallorca, Menorca and Ibiza: spending, rent and pay from government data

Renting long-term on the Spanish coast: what the law says and what tenants pay