In Florida, the beach has two owners. Everything below the mean high water line belongs to the state, held in trust for the public under the Florida Constitution. Everything above that line — the dry sand where people set up chairs and umbrellas — is usually private property owned by whoever holds the deed to the adjacent coastal lot. So the short answer to who owns the beach in Florida is: the public owns the wet sand, and private landowners generally own the dry sand, with some important exceptions that have shifted again under a 2025 law.
The Public Owns the Wet Sand
Article X, Section 11 of the Florida Constitution gives the state title to “lands under navigable waters, within the boundaries of the state, which have not been alienated, including beaches below mean high water lines.”1Online Sunshine. Florida Constitution Article X Section 11 That land is held “for all the people.” Walking, swimming, fishing, and general recreation on the wet sand are public uses the state cannot casually hand away.
The boundary is not wherever the tide happens to be when you look. Florida law defines mean high water as the average height of all high tides over a 19-year period.2Florida Senate. Florida Statutes 177.27 – Definitions That window, called the National Tidal Datum Epoch, is long enough to average out storms and seasonal swings so a single event does not move the legal line.3National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. NTDE – National Tidal Datum Epoch When a dispute or coastal project requires a precise answer, licensed surveyors use NOAA tidal data to locate the line on the ground.4National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. About Tidal Datums
The Dry Sand Is Usually Private
Above the mean high water line, most Florida beach is privately owned. Coastal deeds typically run down to the high water mark, so homeowners, hotels, and condominium associations hold title to the upland sand. They pay taxes on it, maintain it, and insure it. They also have the same right to exclude people that any other property owner has.
That right is enforceable. Under Florida’s trespass statute, entering private property without authorization after notice is trespass, and refusing a direct order to leave from the owner or an authorized representative turns the offense into a first-degree misdemeanor.5My Florida Legal. Regulation of Dry Sand Portion of Beach You can be standing legally on wet sand and be a few feet from committing a crime on dry sand if the owner has posted notice or asked you to leave. Private owners can also reserve chairs, umbrellas, and other amenities on their own sand for guests or residents only. The result is a patchwork coastline where public and private zones alternate, often without a visible marker showing where one ends and the other begins.
When the Public Can Use Private Dry Sand
The main exception to a dry sand owner’s right to exclude is the common law doctrine of customary use. If the public has used a specific stretch of dry sand for recreation for a very long time, a court can rule that the public has earned a continuing right to keep using it. The owner still holds title but cannot fence people out of the customary uses.
The test is demanding. Courts look for use that is ancient, reasonable, continuous, and free from significant dispute. “Ancient” generally means historical records, old photographs, and testimony from long-term residents showing the community treated the sand as shared for generations. A few years of tourist traffic is not enough. When a court does find customary use, the effect works like a permanent public easement attached to the parcel: subsequent buyers take the land subject to the same public right.
What the 2025 Law Changed
From 2018 until 2025, Florida Statute 163.035 made it hard for local governments to protect customary use. Counties and cities could not simply pass an ordinance recognizing public use on private dry sand. They had to adopt a formal notice of intent, give certified mail notice to every affected property owner at least 30 days before a public hearing, and then file suit in circuit court within 60 days, with the government carrying the full burden of proving the ancient, reasonable, continuous, and undisputed standard parcel by parcel.6Florida Senate. Florida Statutes 163.035 – Establishment of Recreational Customary Use
In 2025, the legislature passed Senate Bill 1622, and Governor DeSantis signed it. The bill repealed Section 163.035 entirely.7Executive Office of the Governor. Governor Ron DeSantis Signs Legislation to Protect Local Beach Access and Expedite Coastal Restoration Florida is now back to the framework that existed before 2018: local governments can adopt customary use ordinances without first winning a lawsuit, and a property owner who disagrees has to go to court to challenge the ordinance.8Florida Senate. SB 1622 Bill Analysis and Fiscal Impact Statement The underlying common law test is unchanged. What flipped is who has to bring the case.
Renourished Beaches Give the Public More Room
Many of Florida’s most popular beaches have been rebuilt at least once with sand pumped in by state or federal projects. On those beaches, the mean high water line is not the whole story. Before a restoration project begins, the state sets an erosion control line, usually at the existing mean high water mark.9Florida Senate. Florida Statutes 161.161 – Erosion Control Line Procedures That line then becomes a fixed boundary and replaces the naturally shifting high water line for ownership purposes.
Once the erosion control line is in place, any sand added seaward of it belongs to the state. Sand that ends up landward of the line stays private, but the upland owner gets no right to increase building density, and the restored sand carries a public easement for the traditional beach uses that would have been allowed before the beach eroded.10Florida Senate. Florida Statutes 161.141 – Beach Restoration and Property Rights If people were sunbathing or playing volleyball on that stretch before it washed away, the renourished version stays open for the same activities. On any renourished beach, the practical question is not just where the water line sits but where the erosion control line was drawn and whether the sand you’re on came from a government project.
Getting to the Beach
A legal right to the wet sand does not help if private lots block every path to it. Florida handles this through dedicated public access points maintained by state parks, counties, and municipalities, with parking areas, walkovers, and marked pathways that reach the shoreline without crossing private land. The spacing is uneven. Some stretches have access every few blocks; others have none for miles. Daily parking fees vary, and popular lots fill early on weekends.
The Coastal Zone Management Act conditions federal funding on state coastal programs including public access provisions for recreation.11National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. Coastal Zone Management Act Florida participates, which keeps pressure on the state to maintain and expand pathways to the shoreline. That federal requirement does not create a right to cross private land, but it does oblige the state to keep opening public ways to the water as the coast develops.
So when you’re standing on a Florida beach, the honest answer to who owns the sand under your feet depends on three things: whether you’re above or below the mean high water line, whether a local customary use ordinance applies to the dry sand, and whether the beach has been renourished behind an erosion control line. Get those three straight and the patchwork starts to make sense.