Before you read on, we know there is one question on your mind: "What does a day at the beach actually cost?" In North Cyprus, the answer is decided not by how beautiful the sand is but by who is standing at the gate. In Famagusta you can leave your car in the Glapsides car park and walk straight onto the sand with nobody stopping you; that same morning in Alsancak you will have to pull out your wallet at a club's turnstile. When we talk about free beaches in North Cyprus, we mean the first group, and a single sentence of law separates the two. Among the beaches we looked at, two shores sitting side by side in the same area can swing between costing nothing and eating up a family's daily budget, so it pays to do the maths before you reach the gate. Here is our guide to "free" and "paid" beaches.
The Constitution Keeps the Coastline Free to Enter
The foundation of the whole calculation is Article 38 of the constitution. It states that citizens cannot be prevented from entering the hundred-metre coastal strip and that access cannot be made subject to a fee, meaning no business can fence off the sand and hang a price list at the gate. That does not mean "everything is free at every beach", of course. Stepping onto the sand is free; sunbeds, umbrellas, showers and parking are services, and services can be priced separately. The bulk of what a holidaymaker pays comes from exactly this second category. The rule is short; its application is long.
A Day's Bill Comes from Three Items
Pay attention: your money goes to three separate places, and telling them apart directly affects your wallet. The first is the entrance ticket: at hotel-style facilities you pay a single price at the gate, and the sunbed and umbrella are usually included in it. The second is the minimum spend: at some beach clubs entry is tied to food and drink, so even if the sunbed is included, whatever you consume is charged separately. The third is sunbed and umbrella rental alone, and almost every municipal beach runs on this model. These three items do not always stay separate either; a business can take a low entrance fee at the gate and then charge again for the sunbed inside.
Most of the time you can work out what you will pay just by reading the sign, as long as you look for the right word. A sign that says entrance fee and a sign that says sunbed fee are two different contracts, and learning the difference at the gate beats watching the bill double in the evening.
At Public Beaches, the Money Starts with the Sunbed
The model in its purest form is seen in Famagusta. At Glapsides entry is free and the three-hundred-car car park is included in that; right next door, Palm Beach, adjoining the closed-off Varosha (Maras), operates under municipal management and is accessible for visitors with disabilities. Silver Beach has been in the municipality's hands since 2016, so the same rule works the same way there. The rule holds at the other end of the island too: in Iskele, the roughly three-kilometre stretch of Long Beach belongs to Iskele Municipality, and nobody asks you for money at the entrance.
On the Kyrenia side the sums work out much the same. At Kervansaray Public Beach the entrance ticket has been scrapped entirely, with the municipality citing the principle that beaches belong to the public; anyone who wants a sunbed and umbrella pays for those separately. The same line stretches west: at Karaoglanoglu Public Beach, Alsancak Municipal Beach and Guzelyali Public Beach in Lapta, no money changes hands at the entrance, the showers or the car park. At Altinkum at the tip of the Karpaz Peninsula entry is free again, though sunbeds can only be rented on a limited section of the sand and the rest has no facilities at all. Lara in Catalkoy is a cove with no facilities, and there the idea of a fee never even arises.
Is Staying Free Guaranteed?
At Bafra Public Beach, run by Mehmetcik Municipality, entry is free, the beach is open seven days a week from nine in the morning, and a small fee is charged for sunbeds. So far there is no difference from the other public beaches; what sets it apart is this beach's history. The Bafra Platform filed a lawsuit against the decision to privatise the beach, and the case is still in court today, the argument being that there is no free alternative in the area apart from hotel beaches. The municipality renovated and reopened the beach in November 2025; the kiosk, car park, lifeguard and accessible sunbed came with that overhaul.
A beach being free is not a permanent possession. The list of free beaches in North Cyprus should not be read like a fixed chart, because one municipal decision can turn a beach into a paid one, one objection can turn it back, and caught in the middle is the family that went there with their child that morning.
Who Sets the Price at the Beach Club Gate?
West of Kyrenia, some of the signs pointing down to the sea carry a club's name, and behind those signs there is a turnstile. At Camelot Beach Club entry is charged and the sunbed is generally included in that price. At Denizkizi, guests staying at the hotel have entry included in their package, while walk-in visitors buy a ticket at the gate. Mare Monte has "public beach" in its name, but the facility is private and entry is charged, so do not let the name mislead you. At all three the price list is renewed at the start of the season, so building a budget on last year's figures can be misleading.
Yavuz Cikarma Beach, on the other hand, went through a fundamental change in 2024. The operating licence for the beach, run for years as a paid beach under the name Escape Beach, was revoked, the area was handed over to the Security Forces Command, and the shore is now being laid out as a memorial site. Despite this, the old era's sunbed and entrance figures are still circulating online, and those figures are absolutely no longer valid today. When a beach's gate changes, the internet's memory does not change at the same speed.
The Day-Visitor Sum at Hotel Beaches
Hotel beaches have no place on the free side of the list, so paying at the gate as a day visitor is almost unavoidable. At Acapulco, a hotel guest stepping onto the beach is not asked for money, while walk-in visitors buy a ticket at the gate. The hotel's water park sells a separate day ticket, and since the pool, beach and car park are included in that ticket, what you get is not simply the price of entering the beach but an entirely different product. The day packages at Limak Cyprus Deluxe and Concorde Luxury Resort in Bafra also come with meals included and are priced in euros, so they cannot be compared directly with a water park ticket.
At Caesar Blue Aqua Park there are separate rates for adults and children, and children under three enter free. Since the rates change with the season, it is worth calling the venue before you set off. What wrecks a family's budget is usually not the price of the ticket but wrongly assuming what that ticket covers. At a municipal beach nobody asks for money at the gate, but the sunbed, umbrella or car park can be a separate item; at a privately run beach entry is charged, and what that charge includes varies from one facility to the next. In both cases the sign at the gate is more accurate than the list on the internet. For tomorrow's beach day, do you want to pay nothing, or get a sunbed, pool and meal for your money? The answer shapes the rest of your holiday too.
Entry Status by Beach
| Beach | Area | Entry | Note |
|---|---|---|---|
| Long Beach public beach | Iskele | Free | Municipal beach, roughly 3 km |
| Glapsides | Famagusta | Free | Car park, run by the municipality |
| Palm Beach | Famagusta | Free | Municipal management |
| Bafra Public Beach | Bafra (Mehmetcik Municipality) | Free; 2019 privatisation attempt reversed, renovated in 2025 | Sunbeds separate, low fee |
| Kervansaray Public Beach | Kyrenia/Karaoglanoglu | Free | Entrance ticket scrapped, sunbeds separate |
| Guzelyali Public Beach | Lapta | Free | Extra services charged separately |
| Altinkum (Golden Beach) | Karpaz Peninsula | Free | Limited sunbed rental |
| Lara | Catalkoy | Free | No facilities, natural cove |
| Yavuz Cikarma Beach (formerly Escape Beach) | Alsancak | Status changed, current confirmation needed | Handed to the Security Forces Command in 2024, memorial site |
| Camelot Beach Club | Alsancak | Paid | Price unconfirmed, ask at the gate |
| Denizkizi | Alsancak | Paid (included for hotel guests) | Walk-in visitors pay at the gate |
| Mare Monte | Alsancak | Paid | Private facility despite "public beach" in its name |
| Acapulco beach | Catalkoy | Free for hotel guests, paid for walk-ins | Water park day-use is a separate ticket |
| Caesar Blue Aqua Park | Iskele/Bogaz | Paid, independently run | Separate adult/child rates, summer 2026 |
For the wider picture of the island's shores, see our North Cyprus beaches guide; to work out what a beach day adds up to, try the North Cyprus holiday budget calculator, and when choosing your dates, check the best time to visit North Cyprus.
