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The best luxury beach hotels in The French Riviera (or Côte d’Azur) include Four Seasons Cap Ferrat, Hotel du Palais, Hotel Royal Riviera, Hyatt Regency Palais de la Mediterranée, Monte Carlo Beach Hotel, Monte Carlo Bay Hotel and Resort, Tiara Miramar, Hôtel Martinez, InterContinental Carlton Cannes, Hotel du Cap-Eden-Roc, Hôtel Barrière Le Majestic.
The French Riviera (or Côte d’Azur) is the Mediterranean coast of southeastern France. It includes famously glamorous beach resorts such as Saint-Tropez and Cannes, the working city of Nice, and the independent state of Monaco.
If you yearn for days lazing under a brolly and dipping your toes into the sea… look no further, but be warned, much of The French Riviera has a rocky coastline with very poor beaches, so it’s important to pick your hotel carefully. We have selected the best luxury beach hotels in The French Riviera for you below!
1. Hotel Royal Riviera
Apparently, Hotel Royal Riviera is very popular with the Russians as it has one of the best beaches, The French Riviera. This is what the Russians look for. I would argue that this hotel also has one of the best pools on the French Riviera, which attracts as many British as Russians. However, when we stay here in the summer, I do notice a split between the Russian guests who head straight to the loungers on the beach and the British who plonk themselves on the loungers by the pool. Either way, the beach here is gorgeous, the sea is warm and steps from the hotel, just head away from the pool, and there it is!
Hotel Royal Riviera, a member of Leading Hotels Of The World, sits on the Beaulieu-sur-Mer side of the glamorous St-Jean-Cap-Ferrat peninsula on Côte d’Azur in France.
As you arrive, you may recognize the Casino in Beaulieu as one of the locations for the 1988 film “Dirty Rotten Scoundrels”, where Beaulieu-sur-Mer was depicted in the film as Beaumont-sur-Mer. Today, this small town, situated conveniently around the corner from Nice, remains as elegant and stylish as it ever was.
There’s a darling little path that winds adjacent to the beach and then up around the coastline of the St-Jean-Cap-Ferrat peninsula. You can walk for miles, with the sea sloshing to one side of you and expensive mansions to the other. If you like walking, beaches and pools, I cannot imagine there is a better hotel for you in the world!
The pool Hotel Royal Riviera is the perfect depth for children to play in without drowning (perhaps a meter in-depth for at least half of the pool). Yet the pool also maintains a balance of sophistication, with comfy loungers, which are regularly attended to by the pool staff.
The hotel has superb tropical gardens full of scents and flowers that are more reminiscent of the Caribbean or Hawaii than Europe. The hotel’s rooms, which sit behind a sunset-pink Belle Époque facade, offer stunning views across the pool to the sea beyond. And of course, unlike most of the luxury hotels on the French Riviera, this one even has its own private beach.
The hotel transports the sand each year to cover the more gritty natural beach beneath, so this beach is perfect and golden. There is also a watersports center near the beach if you want to indulge in a spot of jet-skiing.
You can’t use the beach in the winter, but the pool stays open all year round and is heated to 28’C so it can be used even in the colder months and is just 30 minutes taxi ride from the airport. This hotel is ideal for a weekend break at any time of the year.
2. Grand-Hôtel du Cap-Ferrat, A Four Seasons Hotel
Grand-Hôtel du Cap-Ferrat, A Four Seasons Hotel is the best hotel on the French Riviera. Set in Belle Epoque splendor, in a building that dates back to the 1800s. This ultra-luxury hotel offers everything you would expect of the very best Four Seasons hotel, but with a sprinkle of French chic.
The Grand Hotel Cap Ferrat sits on the very tip of the Cap Ferrat peninsula, in the prime position amidst gated luxury villas. The hotel is accessed by large pearly gates. Behind the gates lies immaculate, tropical grounds framed by the deep blue sea.
Rooms are either in the main historic building with views out to sea or back inland towards the pine woods or in a newer building that must have been modeled on the Thunderbirds house. The latter, more modern rooms, offer marvelous large balconies but lack the history.
Of course, you don’t come here for the rooms. You come here for the grounds, the restaurants, the views, the ambiance, and to immerse yourself in complete luxury. The gardens of Le Grand Hotel Cap Ferrat are a fragrant mix of pines, lush tropical bushes, cacti, and apparently, the climate is so mild that even bananas grow here.
Beyond the gardens is Club Dauphane, the beach club, which is accessed by crossing a tiny road and taking a glass cablecar down the cliff. This cable car is the absolute highlight for my son, like a glass bubble that takes you down to the pool below (and back up and down and up and down if you are 6 and like pressing buttons!). It is even air-conditioned!
The Beach Club has a super restaurant, plenty of loungers, and a fabulous saltwater infinity pool which is great for your skin but less so for your eyes (bring your goggles if you like to splash). Of course, the staff here are as brilliant as everywhere else in the resort, offering complimentary iced lemon water and setting up loungers for you so that you can bask and absorb the views out to sea.
As for the beach itself, there isn’t one as this club is located on a large rocky peninsula, so even though Club Dauphane is called a beach club, it is really a pool club which is connected, by a gate, to a rocket area which you can jump off and into the sea. To be honest, this beach club is the most glamorous on The French Riviera. It is definitely one of the best places in the world to pose in your designer swimwear and relax under a parasol, but because it doesn’t include any sand, we couldn’t, sadly, place it in position one of our best beach listing.
Wherever you are in the world, Four Seasons hotels are consistently one of the best hotels in that city or resort. There isn’t a Four Seasons loyalty program, so you will never be able to book a free stay by racking up and redeeming points, or by collecting points on your credit card and spending them at a Four Seasons hotel. It can’t be done. But you can get discounts at Four Seasons hotels and benefit from special rewards at Four Seasons hotels for no extra cost by booking your next stay via our luxury travel concierge.
3. Monte Carlo Beach Hotel
Monte Carlo Beach Hotel was built in the 1920s and sits on the Roquebrune-Cap-Martin peninsula, actually just outside the tax-free perimeter of Monaco and just beyond the Monte Carlo Bay hotel.
This gorgeous hotel is painted pink and pleasantly rounded in shape. It has an art deco feel and oozes Riviera glamour. Rooms look out over the sea and towards the Monte Carlo Bay hotel, and the hotel’s grounds house the famous Monte Carlo Beach Club with luxurious cabanas surrounding an Olympic-sized swimming pool.
Le Deck is an informal poolside café, open for lunch each day. Ground floor rooms here are like your very own beach house with floor-to-ceiling windows that open to give direct access, down a couple of steps, out to the small beach, and along to the pool. Room 34 is recommended. This Junior Suite is situated at the far end of the row, so it feels the most private. A complimentary shuttle takes guests to Casino Square for Café De Paris and all the surrounding restaurants and shops.
The Monte Carlo Beach Hotel hosts the largest and best beach club in Monaco. It offers loungers on the edge of the sea and around the pool. The beach itself, much like the rest of the South Of France, is fairly small. Instead, lounge on the concrete boulders and peninsulas that jut out from the club into the Meditteranean and absorb the French sunshine, or climb down from these artificial sunbathing platforms into the sea. There isn’t much sand here, but you can swim in those warm waters, and you can sunbathe on luxury lounges under parasols, so who cares!
4. Monte Carlo Bay Hotel & Resort
The impressive Vegas-style luxury Monte Carlo Bay Hotel and Resort has an immense cathedral-like foyer and sits on a peninsula, jutting out into the Mediterranean sea. The Monte Carlo Bay Hotel and Resort is a brilliant hotel for families as it boasts Europe’s only sandy-bottomed lagoon, which is surrounded by palms and tropical foliage and has loungers that dip their feet in the water.
This is truly the most impressive and largest pool I have experienced. Nothing beats cooling down in these waters, digging your feet into the sand at the bottom, or swimming through one of the many waterfalls.
The Monte Carlo Bay Hotel and Resort doesn’t actually have a beach connected to the hotel. The lagoon pool IS the beach. If you want to swim in the sea, you can jump in off an exclusive Monte Carlo Bay Hotel and Resort pontoon and swim in a cordoned-off safe area of the sea.
So this is another top choice without an actual beach which drops into the sea, but the lagoon pool has to be seen to be believed, it is incredible! Grab one of those loungers poking their legs into the water, and you will enjoy beach perfection.
5. Tiara Miramar
Set along the coastline of the glittering Cote D’Azur in the South of France, the chic Tiara Miramar hotel sits in a rocky cove looking out upon the glittering Mediterranean.
Tiara Miramar is located on the coastline between Cannes (just 7 miles away) and St Tropez, as well as being under a 2-hour drive from Nice Airport. You will find this beachfront hotel on a private cove on the edge of the pretty village of Theole-Sur-Mer.
Tucked into the cliffs with 59 rooms, Tiara Miramar is a boutique hotel with a touch of the Middle East in its decor. Dark ornate woods inside contrast beautifully with the lively colors outside.
From the main terrace, you can look down over the hotel’s infinity pool, jacuzzi, and tropical gardens, with sun loungers and cabanas dotted around. The hotel also has two restaurants, a spa, pool, and its very own private beach. The beach is a private concrete peninsula and pontoon stuffed with comfortable loungers and steps down to the Azur blue sea. Yes, once again, no sand, but climb down the steps, and you can launch yourself into the deep blue Mediterranean.
There are various room categories to choose from, and many of the rooms interconnect, ideal for families. Classic rooms have hillside views. Superior rooms boast garden views from a private terrace. Deluxe rooms enjoy sea views and a balcony where you can enjoy uninterrupted views of the Cote d’Azur coastline.
The waterside MoYa restaurant, located near the hotel pool and private beach, is the perfect place to enjoy a delicious buffet breakfast by the sea. For dinner, choose one of the tables right by the waterside for views of the pinky-blue sky as the sunsets. The crashing waves are so close that sea spray infiltrates your hair and tickles your face!
6. InterContinental Carlton Cannes
InterContinental Carlton Cannes is currently undergoing refurbishment and when it comes out the other side, this will undoubtedly be one of the best beach hotels on The French Riviera
For a start, the beach in Cannes is really brilliant and sandy (unlike much of this coastline). InterContinental Carlton Cannes has its very own beach club with lounges that are laid out right in front of the hotel and right next to the Mediterranean sea. If you get to the beach early, you can select one of the loungers closest to the water. These tightly packed beach club loungers cost a daily fee. I forget how much, maybe 25Euros per day, but this grand you a lounger all day long, a food and drinks service to your lounger all day long, and one of the best spots on this beach.
To get to the beach, you simply need to cross the road in front of the hotel, and you are there. Just pop on your flip-flops and spend your day in beachside paradise. This beach club also has a restaurant and toilet facilities, a must for a long day at the beach.
7. Hôtel Martinez
Hôtel Martinez is just up the promenade from InterContinental Carlton Cannes and is your best Hyatt choice on The French Riviera. Once again, it offers a beach club across the road from the hotel, and this beach club offers a similarly brilliant patch of beach right in front of the building (you just need to cross the road).
Beyond the beach club (also offering similarly comfy loungers right down to the water) are large decked areas with more loungers and places to sit on the hotel’s grounds.
Opened in the late 1920s, the Hôtel Martinez is the other place to see and be seen on the Croisette (the beachfront boulevard). Inspired by the Art Deco style of the landmark and the colors of the Côte d’Azur, interior designer Pierre-Yves Rochon breathes new life into this Green Globe-certified luxury hotel in Cannes which is also part of the Hyatt group.
8. Hyatt Regency Palais De La Mediterranée
F Scott Fitzgerald eulogized about the colors of the sea and the sky here on the Côte d’Azur, where he stayed to write The Great Gatsby. When you visit, you’ll see why. The mimosa in full bloom in beautiful Place Garibaldi, the little red roofs of the villages around the Golfe Juan provide a stunning tapestry of color set against this vibrant palette of aquamarine and the lapis tinted bay.
Hyatt Regency Palais De La Mediterranée has been at the center of life on the Promenade des Anglais, Baie des Anges for almost a century. Everyone who was anyone during France’s golden age of culture has stayed, played, or performed here, from Edith Piaf to Yves Montand and Johnny Hallyday.
Remodeled and reopened as a Hyatt hotel in 2004, le Palais retains its Art Deco, classically inspired façade. Within the shell, though, there now exists a separate world of luxury befitting its prime location on the seafront and across the road from the famous Nice beach on the Côte d’Azur.
Yes, this hotel doesn’t have its own private beach, but it sits in front of the famous and massive beach that spans the seafront of the city of Nice, so you just need to cross the road, and you’re there. if you are looking for beachside bliss in Nice, you won’t get much better than the beach in front of this Hyatt.
9. Hotel du Cap-Eden-Roc
Hotel du Cap-Eden-Roc has a stellar reputation and is the best hotel on the other peninsula from the Grand-Hôtel du Cap-Ferrat, A Four Seasons Hotel. This time, the hotel is on Cap d’Antibes, Côte d’Azur.
This grand 19th-century mansion sits in a huge nine hectares of landscaped gardens at the rocky tip of Cap d’Antibes. Like the Grand-Hôtel du Cap-Ferrat, A Four Seasons Hotel, this hotel has a pool by the sea but no actual beach on its grounds as this peninsula is rocky. At least, the very end of it is.
This hotel attracts Hollywood movie stars, and inside, you can enjoy sumptuous Louis XV and XVI furnishings and chandeliers. The heated infinity pool in front of the hotel and right next to the sparkling Mediterranean sea is an absolute highlight.
10. Hôtel Barrière Le Majestic
Le Majestic is one of the Côte d’Azur’s most luxurious hotels and is found on Cannes’ famous beachfront promenade, la Croisette. The hotel, like the others on la Croisette, has its own private beach just across the road from the hotel. This beach is the perfect place to relax on the sand and has a pretty jetty to the side of it.
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