Every beach club in this guide sits on a beach that, under Spanish law, is public property — not a loophole a club exploits, but the starting point the whole industry works within, set out in Spain's coastal law since 1988. That law explains why a club can charge for a lounger but can't turn a beach into private property, and why councils, not the club, increasingly decide who's allowed to "reserve" a patch of free sand with a towel.
The law behind it: Ley de Costas
Spain's Ley 22/1988, de Costas — still in force in a consolidated, amended form on the official BOE register — establishes the shoreline as dominio público marítimo-terrestre: state-owned maritime-terrestrial public domain. Article 31 states that beach use for bathing, walking and similar activities is "free, public and gratuitous." Article 33 goes further: beaches "shall not be for private use," and any permitted installation must preserve free public access unless a specific public-interest exception applies. A 2013 amendment (Article 33.6) tightened limits on how much of a natural beach any installation can occupy.
In practice, this is why a beach club operates under a limited concession — sunbeds, a restaurant platform, a bar — rather than owning or sealing off the beach itself. The law caps how much of a beach's total surface any combination of installations can occupy, and requires occupied sections to stay spread along the shore rather than concentrated in one block.
What this looks like on the ground
The Ley de Costas is a national framework, but many of the everyday beach rules tourists run into come from local town councils. Torrox's own beach-use ordinance, in force since 2014, bans reserving space with an umbrella, chair, towel or similar item while nobody is physically present; anything left this way can be confiscated, and reclaiming it costs €30 within a 14-day window. Local press has reported fines reaching €300 for people who do this repeatedly, which lines up with the ordinance's own general penalty scale of up to €300 for minor infractions — a local by-law addressing crowding, sitting alongside, not replacing, the national principle that the beach itself can't become private property.
GOV.UK's Spain travel advice makes the broader point that local laws and enforcement vary by municipality, and that fines for beach- and public-space-related conduct are a growing part of how Spanish coastal towns manage tourist crowds — worth bearing in mind on any beach, club-adjacent or not.
What a club can and can't do
A licensed concession can charge for a lounger, a cabana or table service on the section it operates — the model this whole guide is built around. What it cannot do is claim the entire beach as private, block public access along the shoreline, or exceed the proportion its concession legally covers. A stretch of sand that looks entirely taken over with no free public access is either a different legal arrangement — a private hotel beach on privately owned land is a separate case — or worth a second look.
See the beach clubs hub for how the payment side of a beach club works, and the Spain beach clubs page for specific, checked venues.
Questions people ask
Can I put my towel down anywhere on a Spanish beach, even near a beach club?
The sand itself remains public domain under the Ley de Costas — a beach club cannot legally claim the whole beach as private. In practice, most clubs occupy a licensed section with their own loungers, and a free public strip usually runs alongside it, but the exact layout varies by beach and by concession.
Is it legal to reserve a sunbed with a towel and leave?
Not in every town. Torrox, on the Costa del Sol, bans reserving beach space with an umbrella, chair, towel or similar item when nobody is physically present, under its own beach-use ordinance. A first offence means the items are confiscated, with a €30 charge to reclaim them within 14 days; local press has reported fines of up to €300 for repeat offenders, the ordinance's general ceiling for minor infractions. This is a local rule, not the national coastal law, so the position — and the exact fine — varies by municipality.