Antalya, Turkey
A city beach with the Beydağları range as a backdrop — walkable restaurants, tram links and hotels you can actually leave on foot.
A sample of the properties we quote here. Tell us your dates and we shortlist the right ones for you.
Western Konyaaltı, by the yacht harbour
A long-established beachfront resort at the west end of Konyaaltı, with a private beach and a large pool area popular with families.
Konyaaltı beachfront
An all-white minimalist design hotel on Konyaaltı Beach, a well-known piece of modern Antalya architecture with a large pool and spa.
Konyaaltı shore, 100. Yıl Bulvarı
A large beachfront five-star on the Konyaaltı shore, formerly the Sheraton Voyager, with sea-view rooms and a spa.
Facing Konyaaltı Beach
A family-focused resort directly across from Konyaaltı Beach, with pools, children's facilities and the seafront Beach Park promenade nearby.
On the cliffs above Konyaaltı
A long-running five-star set on the clifftops above Konyaaltı, known for its sea-view terraces and city-edge location.
We quote these and many more. Prices depend on dates and board — the quote is free and there is no payment on this site.
Konyaaltı is Antalya's own beach and the residential half of the city that sits behind it. Roughly seven kilometres of shoreline run west from the cliffs below the old town to the foot of the Beydağları mountains, which rise to over two thousand metres directly at the far end. Behind the beach are ordinary Antalya neighbourhoods: apartment blocks, supermarkets, hospitals, a weekly street market, schools, and several hundred restaurants that exist for residents rather than for tourists.
That is the essential difference between Konyaaltı and the resort strips east of the airport. Lara and Kundu are enclosures you rarely leave. Konyaaltı is a city district with a beach in front of it, and the holiday you have here is closer to living somewhere for a fortnight than to checking into a resort. You buy your own water, you walk to dinner, you take the tram to the museum, and nobody puts a wristband on you.
It is also the cheapest of the four Antalya city-area destinations we cover, with an indicative anchor around 50 EUR per person per night, largely because the hotel stock is smaller, board packages are lighter, and the competition from apartments is real.
Konyaaltı is a pebble beach. Not shingle-and-sand, not sand with stones at the waterline: grey-white pebbles from the promenade to the water and for the first stretch under it. This matters in three practical ways.
First, bring water shoes. Walking in barefoot is uncomfortable and getting out of the water on a swell is worse. Every kiosk on the promenade sells them for a few euros.
Second, the shelf drops away faster than at Lara. Within a few metres you are out of your depth, which is excellent for swimmers and a genuine caution for small children and non-swimmers. Some sections have gentler entry than others; the Beach Park end is generally kinder than the western stretch.
Third, the water is noticeably clearer and colder than on the sandy eastern side, because there is no river silt here and the seabed is stone. On a calm morning you can see your feet in four metres of water.
The afternoon sea breeze that shapes the whole bay is stronger on this side. Mornings are usually flat; by mid-afternoon there is often a real swell, and on windy days the lifeguards fly a red flag and mean it. Pebbles plus swell also creates a backwash that will knock over a five-year-old. This is a good beach for competent swimmers and a mediocre one for toddlers.
Sunbeds and parasols on the municipal sections are inexpensive and paid separately; there is almost no natural shade. The promenade behind it, rebuilt in recent years, is genuinely pleasant: cycle lane, showers, cafés, playgrounds and a long line of restaurants.
Closest to the city, below the cliffs. This is where the Antalya Aquarium, the Beach Park entertainment complex and the busiest café sections are. Best transport links, most nightlife, most weekend crowds.
The residential middle. Ordinary Turkish neighbourhoods a few streets back from the water, with the best value eating in the district and a good supply of apartment-style accommodation. You will walk five to fifteen minutes to the sea.
Quieter, greener, closer to the mountains, with the largest of the beachfront hotels. The mountain views from here are the best on the whole Antalya coastline.
At the eastern end the cliffs begin and Kaleiçi is a fifteen-minute walk or a short tram ride away, which is why many guests base themselves in Konyaaltı and treat the old town as their evening.
Konyaaltı has fewer hotels than the resort strips and they are a different kind of building: city hotels of 80 to 250 rooms rather than resorts of a thousand. What exists:
All-inclusive here is worth less than it is in Lara, because a good meal in the neighbourhood costs a fraction of what a resort charges for the same food and you are two minutes from twenty restaurants. Half board or bed and breakfast usually works out better value and better eating.
Note that very few Konyaaltı hotels are literally beachfront. Most sit across Akdeniz Boulevard, a two to eight minute walk from the water, and none of them own the beach: the shoreline here is public and municipal, so nobody has a private section.
Around the 50 EUR per person per night anchor, in shoulder season with two sharing:
Summer raises everything, but less sharply than in the resort strips, because the city has a floor of business and domestic demand all year.
Antalya Airport is about 30 minutes away — the longest of the four destinations in the immediate Antalya area, because the route crosses the whole city. Allow more in the morning and evening peaks.
Airport transfers are the part of this trip we run ourselves, with our own vehicles and drivers since 2016: a driver meets you inside the terminal with a name board, the vehicle is private, child seats can be fitted, and the price is per vehicle rather than per person. Accommodation is different — we hold no hotel stock and take no payment on this site; a consultant prices your stay with partner agencies and sends it to you.
Once you are here, a car is optional. The nostalgic tram runs along the seafront to the Antalya Museum, the modern light rail crosses the city, city buses are frequent and cheap, and taxis are everywhere. Konyaaltı is the one destination on this coast where you genuinely do not need to book excursions to have days out.
Konyaaltı has the longest usable season of the four. April is already good for walking and sightseeing at 22-25 degrees, though the sea is around 19. May and June are excellent. July and August are hot, 34-38 degrees, and the beach is packed at weekends with residents as well as visitors, but the city keeps working: there is shade, air conditioning and food at every hour. September and October are the best months, with the sea at 26-28 in September and around 24 in late October. November stays around 20 degrees with rain and is fine for a city trip. December to March the city carries on normally; you will not swim, but you will pay a third of summer rates.
This is where Konyaaltı beats the resorts outright. Within a fifteen-minute walk of most hotels you will find fish restaurants, kebab houses, Turkish breakfast places serving fifteen plates, Syrian bakeries, cheap and excellent lokantas, a good coffee scene and supermarkets for self-catering. A full dinner in a neighbourhood restaurant costs a fraction of a resort à la carte supplement, and it is better food. Families on a budget notice the difference by the third day.
Good for families with children over about eight who can handle the pebbles and depth. Good for couples who want a beach and a city at the same time. Very good for long stays of a month or more, which is why the apartment market here is strong. Weaker for families with toddlers, who will be happier on the sand at Lara or Kundu.
Skip it if you want sand under your feet, if you have small children who need shallow water, if you want a resort bubble with animation and a private beach, or if the idea of buying your own bottled water sounds like work. Skip the beach entirely on August weekends unless you arrive before nine. And do not book here expecting a hotel that owns its stretch of shoreline; no hotel in Konyaaltı does.
Send your dates, guest numbers with children ages, and whether you want a hotel with board or a self-catering apartment. We check availability with partner agencies and reply with a shortlist and honest notes, normally within one working day. The quote is free, we take no payment on this website, and nothing is committed until you tell us to proceed.
This is the part we run ourselves. A driver meets you inside the terminal with your name on a sign and takes you straight to your hotel door, at a price fixed before you fly.
Pebbles, all seven kilometres of it, grey-white and continuing for a stretch underwater. Water shoes are close to essential and cost a few euros on the promenade. The upside is clarity: with no river silt and a stone seabed, the water here is visibly cleaner than on the sandy strips east of the airport.
About 30 minutes, the longest of the four Antalya city destinations, because the route crosses the whole city rather than skirting it. In morning and evening peaks allow more. We run these transfers ourselves with our own drivers, meet you inside the terminal, fit child seats on request and charge per vehicle rather than per person.
For confident swimmers over about eight, yes. For toddlers, it is a poor choice: the pebbles are hard to walk on, the seabed drops quickly, and afternoon swell creates a backwash strong enough to knock a small child over. Families with under-fives are much better served by the sand at Lara or Kundu.
Usually not. Unlike Lara, you are surrounded by ordinary restaurants where a full dinner costs a fraction of what a resort charges, and the food is better. Bed and breakfast or half board leaves you free to eat out and generally works out cheaper overall. All-inclusive here mainly makes sense at the few large beachfront five-stars.
No. The nostalgic tram runs along the seafront to the archaeological museum, the modern light rail crosses the city, buses are frequent and cheap, and taxis are everywhere. Konyaaltı is the one place on this coast where you can have full days out without buying an excursion. Hire a car only for Termessos or the Lycian coast.
September and October are the best combination of warm sea, 24-28 degrees, and manageable crowds. May and June are excellent too. July and August are hot at 34-38 degrees and the beach is packed at weekends with residents as well as visitors. Konyaaltı also works from November to March as a city trip, at roughly a third of summer rates.
Mostly not. A handful of five-star properties sit on the seafront, but most hotels are across Akdeniz Boulevard, two to eight minutes on foot. No hotel here owns a beach section at all: the shoreline is public and municipally run, so private beaches do not exist in Konyaaltı in the way they do in Lara and Kundu.
You send dates, guest numbers with children ages and whether you want board or a self-catering apartment. We do not own hotel stock and take no payment on this website. A consultant checks availability with partner agencies and replies with a shortlist and honest notes on each, usually within one working day. Free, and no obligation.
Rates here move a lot between low and high season, so we quote each request individually rather than publish a number that would be wrong most of the year.
Free, non-binding, answered by a person.
