Florida has four beaches where nude use is either officially sanctioned or openly tolerated by the agency that runs the beach: Haulover in Miami-Dade, Blind Creek in St. Lucie County, and Apollo and Playalinda inside Canaveral National Seashore. Everything else on the Florida coast is a textile beach, and being undressed there risks a citation under state law or a county ordinance.
The law first
Florida Statute 800.03 makes it a first-degree misdemeanor to expose the sexual organs in public or to be "naked in public" in "a vulgar or indecent manner," and it exempts anyone "merely naked at any place provided or set apart for that purpose." Courts have read the statute to require a lewd element, so simple nudity is not a state crime by itself, but the exemption is what gives a county-designated beach its legal footing. The gaps are filled locally: Brevard County banned public nudity by ordinance in 1995, and the state's Department of Environmental Protection prohibits nudity in state parks. The practical rule is that the four beaches below are legal because someone with authority said so, and no other Florida beach is. Our guide to US nudity law covers how to check an ordinance yourself.
Haulover Beach, Miami-Dade
Haulover is the beach everyone means when they say "Florida nude beach." The northern 0.4 mile of the 1.5 mile shoreline in Haulover Park, between Bal Harbour and Sunny Isles, has been clothing-optional since South Florida Free Beaches marked it out in July 1991; Miami-Dade County installed permanent signs in December 1993 and has run it as a sanctioned section ever since. It is the only nude beach in the country with county lifeguards on the nude section, a food and umbrella concession, and visitor numbers of around 1.3 million a year.
Park in the northern lots (the parking is paid; check the Florida beach listings for the current rate) and walk north past the signs. The crowd is mixed: couples, families, singles of every age, a large share of international visitors. Because it is busy and urban, the etiquette is enforced by the regulars with unusual energy: no cameras, no wandering the shoreline, towel under you at the concession.
Apollo Beach, Canaveral National Seashore (Volusia County)
Canaveral National Seashore is the longest stretch of undeveloped Atlantic coast in Florida, and its northern beach, Apollo, reached from New Smyrna Beach, is where naturists go for space. Apollo is in Volusia County, which has no ordinance against nudity, and the National Park Service has long tolerated nude use south of the last parking area; the understanding worked out between naturists and the park is that suits stay on until about 150 yards south of the last lot. There are no lifeguards and no concession, so bring water and shade. Entry is $25 per vehicle for seven days, $15 per person on foot or by bicycle, card payment only.
Playalinda Beach, Canaveral National Seashore (Brevard County)
Playalinda is the southern beach of the same seashore, reached through Titusville past the Kennedy Space Center launch pads. Its parking lots sit in Brevard County, which banned public nudity in 1995 after years of conflict between naturists and other visitors. The park has said there is no federal rule against nudity on the beach, but the Brevard Sheriff's Office has said parts of the beach are state property where it can enforce, and deputies decide case by case. Naturists therefore use the last parking lot and walk north, roughly a mile, to the Volusia County line, where Brevard's ordinance stops. If you are not sure which county you are standing in, you are too far south. Enforcement here has gone in waves for thirty years; read the listing before you go.
Blind Creek Beach, St. Lucie County
Blind Creek, on Hutchinson Island along A1A south of Fort Pierce, was a quiet, informally nude beach for decades before the St. Lucie County Commission voted 4 to 1 in March 2020 to designate about 36 acres of the 408 acre preserve as clothing-optional, the first sanctioned nude beach on the Treasure Coast. It is primitive by Haulover standards, which is its appeal: a long walk-in over the dune, no lifeguards, a volunteer naturist group that keeps it clean and has twice used it for national skinny-dip records. The county has closed sections for construction work in recent years, so check the listing for current access and parking before you drive.
What is not a nude beach
Florida's nude beach list is short, and the beaches that appear on internet lists beyond these four are either closed to nudity, never designated, or simply remote enough that nobody has been cited yet. That is not legal status. Nudity at a state park beach is prohibited by rule, Brevard's county beaches are banned by ordinance, and the Panhandle and Gulf coast have no sanctioned beach at all. Resorts fill the gap: the Florida resort directory lists the clubs around Tampa, Orlando and Palm Beach where nudity is legal because the land is private.
Practical notes
- Season. All four beaches are year-round. Summer afternoons bring lightning; Haulover's lifeguards clear the sand when it is close.
- Sun. Florida sun on skin that has never seen it is the most common first-timer injury. Sunscreen everywhere, hat, shade.
- Walk in dressed. At every beach above, nudity begins at the signs or the agreed line, not in the parking lot.
- Photography. Haulover has removed people for it; the seashore beaches treat it as disorderly conduct.
Florida has the largest naturist community in the country, and most of it is online here: Florida members list their home beach on their profiles, the groups for Haulover and Blind Creek organize regular beach days, and the Florida beach listings carry the enforcement and parking updates that change faster than any guide.