State of bathing water

Quality of bathing water - 2021 bathing season

To allow Europeans to make informed decisions on where to go to best enjoy Europe’s inland and coastal bathing sites, an annual assessment briefing has been prepared by the European Environment Agency (EEA) in cooperation with the European Commission's DG Environment. The briefing assesses the bathing water quality in all 27 EU Member States, as well as Albania and Switzerland, in the 2021 bathing water season and thereby gives an indication of the areas where the quality of bathing is expected to be good this year. 

Details on all Member States bathing waters for the 2021 season can be found in the national bathing water reports:

Each report contains details on bathing water monitoring in the specific country and an assessment of the 2021 results and the trend in bathing water quality.

• Data download: Bathing Water Directive - Status of bathing water 2021

• Archive: National reports for 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015 , 2016,  2017, 2018 , 2019 and 2020 bathing seasons
• National or regional websites for bathing water quality
• Bathing water photo gallery

Bathing water quality interactive map

We all want to know the quality of 'our' local bathing area, beach or lake, and whether it conforms to EU standards. Below you will find a map viewer that will allow you to view on-line the quality of the bathing water in the almost 22 000 coastal beaches and freshwater bathing waters across Europe.

By using the map viewer you can check the bathing water quality on an interactive map. It also documents how bathing waters have changed throughout Europe in recent years and provides a full summary of Europe’s bathing water quality in 2021. Go directly to the map viewer

More information

• More information on the Bathing Water Directives
• See also EU Commission's Bathing Water Homepage

Cover image copyright © Marco Verch on Flickr