Ostia Beach (Lido di Ostia) | As Close to Rome as It Gets

If you are in Rome during summer and you want to visit Rome’s ancient harbor, Ostia Antica, consider taking your bathing suit and your flip flops with you. After you finish with the archeological park, go back to the train station and take the train to Ostia Lido Centro to go to the Ostia Beach. You’ll love bathing in the sea under the mild afternoon sun and laying down on the black sand of this beach resort near Rome.

A great souvenir product for your beach sunbathing and Roman beach time. You can custom pins for your travel moments and show off the best views with them. Collect this joy in your collection.

How Close Is Ostia Lido to Rome?

Located about 30 km away to Italy‘s capital city, Ostia Lido is the closest beach resort to Rome. It is also the best connected of all beaches near Rome. You can reach Rome’s beach resort by car or by local train.

If you’d like to spend one day relaxing by the beach within your exploration of Rome, choose Ostia. Whatever your hotel in Rome, you’ll reach Ostia Beach in less than one hour, provided that you wake up early to avoid the rush hour.

Ostia can be a great idea also on your departure day, should you take off on Fiumicino airport. If you have an evening flight, you can use the first half of the day to relax by the beach. There are less than 10 km from Ostia to Fiumicino and you can get there by bus, taxi or Uber.

How To Get to Ostia Beach from Rome?

To take the local train from Rome to Ostia Lido, you need to get to the Piramide train station, which is on Metro Line B (you may also find it under the name of Porta San Paolo).

The regular public transport ticket (or the daily or weekly pass) is good for these local trains that take you to towns and villages near Rome. You’ll find these tickets and passes at every kiosk, all over Rome. I’ve got my seven days public transport pass at a kiosk in Termini, right on arrival from the airport.

At Piramide, take the train in the direction Laurentina and get off at Ostia Lido Centro station. Please note that Ostia Antica is just one stop before (just in case you want to visit the archeological site before your beach fun moment).

From Ostia Lido Centro, you can either take a bus or walk to the beach. Beware, though, this is quite a long walk (20-40 minutes). I’ve done it on the way back from the beach and I’ve found it long, particularly after spending more than half of the day walking through Ostia Antica.

How To Get Around Ostia

You can catch the bus 07 just in front of the train station.

Bus 07 goes alongside the beach and the beachfront promenade to Ostia Marina. After a few minutes, you’ll already see the beach.There are many bus stops alongside the beaches of Ostia.

I got off the bus one stop before the terminus. I didn’t have any booking for a beach club, so I didn’t really care where on this long sandy beach I was going to end up.

Stabilimenti: Private Beaches & Beach Clubs

Beaches near Rome (and maybe all beaches in Italy for that matter) are different than everything I’ve seen in Greece, Turkey, Romania or Bulgaria. Most of them are enclosed, the access being allowed only to those who pay a membership fee. Some of these venues accept one-day payments.

These private beaches and beach clubs in Italy are called “stabilimenti” – you won’t be able to enter and take the beach chair you want. First, you have to register at the check-in desk and to pay for your day. After that, someone will show you to the beach. These beach areas feature changing rooms and private beach cabins for regular members.

No Reservation? Public Beaches for the Win!

In Ostia, there are public beaches between these stabilimenti.

I spotted two such public beaches. I decided to skip the first stabilimenti and head over the end of the promenade.

One stop before Ostia Marina, there’s a public beach which is nice and clean. You won’t have beach chairs and umbrellas, but you won’t need to pay anything to sit on the beach. Locals bring their own umbrellas and chairs, and even food and drinks. There are some changing rooms on the beach and they are free of charge.

There is a lifeguard service on all beaches in Ostia, as they are blue flag beaches.

Things To Know Before Taking One Day Off Rome To Spend It on Ostia Beach

The sand on Ostia Beach is black. This makes it extremely hot. Make sure you put on your flip flops to walk around, to protect your soles. The bottom of the sea is also sandy, so you don’t really need water shoes.

The water is shallow. You have to walk quite a lot if you want to enjoy a proper swim. However, the shallow water is perfect for those who come with their kids or for those who can’t swim very well.

There’s free drinking water on the promenade by the beach. You’ll only need a reusable bottle, if you don’t want to go back and forth all day long.

Public beaches near Rome are clean. I didn’t see any garbage on the sand or in the water. The water was also clear, free from algae. I read some opinions of other people saying that Rome beaches are dirty. The one I saw was not, but I can’t speak for all of the beaches near Rome. Anyway, this public beach was way cleaner than the streets of Rome, where garbage sits in piles, with brown liquid spills all around them.

You can walk through the sea to pass through all private beaches but you won’t be able to leave the beach unless you find a gate. I didn’t know it, so I took all my stuff and walked through the water to get back to Ostia Lido train station. To my surprise, I had to jump a fence to exit. If this is your first time on a beach in Italy, you’ll want to keep this in mind.

There’s no way to know when the next bus is going to come. I walked all my way from the beach back to the train station without seeing any bus. In fact, the bus schedules are crazy all over Rome – I had to wait for bus H for about 45 minutes to get to Termini from my accommodation.

Day Trip from Rome to Ostia Beach or Hotel Accommodation?

A day trip from Rome has the advantage of not needing to bother about moving your luggage and checking in and out of hotels. On the other hand, if you want a beach vacation near Rome, you should get accommodation in Ostia.

I chose a half-day stop, after the visit to Ostia Antica. The following photo shows my travel gear for the day (yes, I used my dress as beach towel and I wore it again to get back to Rome):

Here are a few deals on hotels in Lido di Ostia you can find on booking.com:

Booking.com

Also, this is the geographical location of Ostia beach on the map.

If you want to find this article about Ostia Beach again, you can pin it for later, here:

 

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