For the 2025 bathing season, 84.4% of 22,289 bathing sites in the EU, Albania and Switzerland were rated excellent by the European Environment Agency's data, and 1.6% poor. Each rating covers the 2022 to 2025 seasons, so it is not a reading of the water today.
How clean is the bathing water in each country?
Each bathing site the EU countries, Albania and Switzerland report is classed excellent, good, sufficient or poor, or left not classified. For the 2025 season, 84.4% of the 22,289 sites were excellent and 1.6% poor. In the EU alone, 18,655 of 22,010 sites were excellent (84.8%).1
Each class is based on the current season and the three before it, so the 2025 class reflects 2022 to 2025. It says nothing about the water on the day you swim: check local notices at the beach.1
| Country | Sites | Excellent | Good | Sufficient | Poor | Not classified |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Albania | 119 | 16.8% | 37.8% | 21.8% | 23.5% | 0.0% |
| Austria | 260 | 96.5% | 2.7% | 0.4% | 0.4% | 0.0% |
| Belgium | 131 | 67.9% | 26.7% | 3.1% | 0.8% | 1.5% |
| Bulgaria | 96 | 96.9% | 2.1% | 1.0% | 0.0% | 0.0% |
| Croatia | 1,039 | 86.2% | 1.9% | 0.6% | 0.4% | 10.9% |
| Cyprus | 123 | 100.0% | 0.0% | 0.0% | 0.0% | 0.0% |
| Czechia | 153 | 79.7% | 12.4% | 3.3% | 0.0% | 4.6% |
| Denmark | 1,040 | 92.4% | 5.0% | 0.4% | 0.2% | 2.0% |
| Estonia | 65 | 56.9% | 23.1% | 12.3% | 4.6% | 3.1% |
| Finland | 304 | 84.5% | 9.2% | 3.0% | 1.0% | 2.3% |
| France | 3,378 | 74.4% | 15.8% | 3.6% | 3.3% | 2.8% |
| Germany | 2,291 | 90.9% | 5.9% | 1.1% | 0.1% | 1.9% |
| Greece | 1,734 | 97.1% | 2.4% | 0.1% | 0.0% | 0.4% |
| Hungary | 292 | 64.0% | 21.9% | 2.7% | 1.4% | 9.9% |
| Ireland | 153 | 78.4% | 15.0% | 4.6% | 0.7% | 1.3% |
| Italy | 5,535 | 89.8% | 6.1% | 1.9% | 1.3% | 0.8% |
| Latvia | 59 | 84.7% | 8.5% | 5.1% | 0.0% | 1.7% |
| Lithuania | 120 | 86.7% | 5.0% | 6.7% | 1.7% | 0.0% |
| Luxembourg | 17 | 94.1% | 5.9% | 0.0% | 0.0% | 0.0% |
| Malta | 87 | 88.5% | 9.2% | 2.3% | 0.0% | 0.0% |
| Netherlands | 757 | 70.9% | 16.6% | 6.7% | 4.1% | 1.6% |
| Poland | 779 | 58.7% | 14.4% | 5.3% | 1.9% | 19.8% |
| Portugal | 682 | 82.0% | 11.0% | 2.8% | 1.8% | 2.5% |
| Romania | 50 | 84.0% | 16.0% | 0.0% | 0.0% | 0.0% |
| Slovakia | 40 | 70.0% | 5.0% | 0.0% | 0.0% | 25.0% |
| Slovenia | 49 | 75.5% | 18.4% | 0.0% | 0.0% | 6.1% |
| Spain | 2,296 | 86.6% | 8.9% | 1.7% | 2.1% | 0.7% |
| Sweden | 480 | 77.7% | 11.7% | 4.0% | 2.1% | 4.6% |
| Switzerland | 160 | 84.4% | 8.8% | 0.6% | 2.5% | 3.8% |
Shares are of all sites a country reported for 2025, including those not classified, as the EEA does. The figures cover coastal, lake and river sites together.
For sea temperatures by month, see sea temperature by month.
Key takeaways
- 84.4% of sites excellent, 1.6% poor, for 2025.
- A rating covers four seasons; it is not today's water.
- What we would skip: treating an excellent rating as a guarantee for the day you swim; check the notices at the beach.
Sources
Counts from the EEA dataset; shares are ours. See how we research.
- Bathing water: European Environment Agency, Bathing Water Directive – Status of bathing water, 2025, version 1.0 (data reported by the EU Member States, Albania and Switzerland), EEA report page, accessed 6 October 2026. Licence: CC BY 4.0; copyright holder: Directorate-General for Environment and the European Environment Agency. We counted the sites in each class and worked out the shares.
Modified data: we counted the sites in each class per country and turned them into shares. The EEA is the original source and does not endorse this site.