France / Pays de la Loire
Tharon-Plage
Tharon-Plage is a coastal resort area in Pays de la Loire, France. The sea averages 18.5 °C in August, its warmest month, and 9.2 °C in February; it never reaches 21 °C on average.
Average sea surface temperature by month. Current month outlined.
The sea peaks at 18.5 °C in August. Most swimmers find water below 20 °C cold; a wetsuit is common here.
OpenStreetMap shows no lifeguard station within 1 km. Seasonal lifeguard posts are often unmapped, so check on site.
Services in the resort
- 16Restaurants, cafés & bars
- 5Public toilets
- –Showers
- 1Drinking water
- 7Car parks
- –Lifeguard stations
- 2Hotels & guesthouses
- 3Campsites
- 4Grocery shops
- 15Bus stops (1.5 km)
- 1Pharmacies & clinics
- 1Cash machines
- 2Viewpoints
Food and drink mapped within 1 km: 13 restaurants, 1 café, 1 bar and 1 fast-food outlet. Accommodation: 2 hotels and guesthouses.
Counted within 1 km of the beach (bus stops 1.5 km) from OpenStreetMap features and Overture Maps places, release of 2026-10. Unmapped does not mean absent.
Bathing water quality
The official EU bathing-water site “Tharon”, 290 m from the beach centre, was rated Excellent for the 2025 season. It was Excellent in 11 of its 11 classified seasons since 2015.
- 2015Excellent
- 2016Excellent
- 2017Excellent
- 2018Excellent
- 2019Excellent
- 2020Excellent
- 2021Excellent
- 2022Excellent
- 2023Excellent
- 2024Excellent
- 2025Excellent
Source: European Environment Agency, EU Bathing Water Directive assessments · national site profile. Classes are based on four seasons of bacteriological sampling.
Month by month
October at Tharon-Plage
Beach-day index 3.0/10 · France median 4.9
| Measure | Jan | Feb | Mar | Apr | May | Jun | Jul | Aug | Sep | Oct | Nov | Dec |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Sea °C | 9.5 °C | 9.2 °C | 9.9 °C | 11.8 °C | 14.2 °C | 16.6 °C | 18.0 °C | 18.5 °C | 17.4 °C | 15.8 °C | 13.5 °C | 11.0 °C |
| High °C | 9° | 10° | 13° | 16° | 19° | 23° | 25° | 25° | 22° | 17° | 13° | 9° |
| Low °C | 3° | 2° | 4° | 6° | 9° | 12° | 14° | 14° | 11° | 9° | 6° | 3° |
| Rain mm | 77 | 61 | 62 | 48 | 59 | 50 | 48 | 48 | 43 | 78 | 81 | 85 |
| Cloud % | 76 | 70 | 66 | 58 | 60 | 58 | 55 | 55 | 52 | 67 | 71 | 73 |
| Wind m/s | 5.1 | 5.2 | 5.0 | 4.5 | 4.4 | 4.1 | 4.2 | 4.0 | 4.1 | 4.5 | 4.9 | 5.1 |
| Daylight h | 8.9 | 10.3 | 11.8 | 13.6 | 15.0 | 15.9 | 15.6 | 14.3 | 12.7 | 11.0 | 9.4 | 8.5 |
| Record high/low | 16°/-10° | 20°/-10° | 22°/-5° | 26°/-3° | 30°/0° | 35°/4° | 37°/9° | 38°/8° | 31°/4° | 28°/-0° | 20°/-5° | 16°/-6° |
| Beach index | 2.4 | 2.6 | 2.7 | 3.0 | 3.7 | 6.0 | 7.3 | 7.4 | 6.1 | 3.0 | 2.5 | 2.4 |
Long-term monthly averages: air from NASA POWER (2001–2020), sea from NOAA OISST (1991–2020); records are the extremes of 2001–2020. How the index works.
When to go
The beach-day index peaks in July–August; August scores 7.4/10 with highs of 25 °C, sea at 18.5 °C and 48 mm of rain.
In August that is 0.6 points below the median of the 625 beaches in France covered by this atlas.
At its warmest the water here is 3.6 °C cooler than the France median for August (22.1 °C).
Across the year the sea averages 13.8 °C, cooler than 78% of the coastal beaches in the atlas.
December is the wettest month (85 mm) and September the driest (43 mm); the yearly total is about 740 mm.
Daylight runs from 8.5 hours in December to 15.9 hours in June; in mid-August the sun rises at 07:04 and sets at 21:22 local time.
Orientation, sun and shore
The shore faces north-west (305°). Open water fills about 39% of the horizon close by, which makes it an open stretch of shore.
The sun sets over the sea in every month; in mid-June it goes down at 22:05 local time on a bearing of 307°.
Straight out to the north-west the next coast is roughly 20 km away, so waves are mostly wind-driven sea rather than ocean swell.
About 1 km offshore the sea is roughly 1 m deep and 3 m at 3 km, a shallow, gently shelving sea floor. Behind the beach the ground is about 13 m above sea level 500 m inland and 16 m at 1.5 km.
Within 1 km, the land is 60% built-up land, 18% tree cover and 12% grassland (satellite land-cover map, 2021): an urban beach. Water makes up 42% of that circle.
- Built 60%
- Tree 18%
- Grass 12%
- Bare 9%
Land cover: ESA WorldCover 2021 (10 m). Orientation from OpenStreetMap land polygons sampled in 36 directions; depths and heights from the GEBCO 2020 grid (about 450 m cells), indicative only.
Getting there
| Airport | Code | Distance | Direction |
|---|---|---|---|
| Nantes Atlantique Airport Nantes | NTE | 42.2 km | east |
| Rennes-Saint-Jacques Airport Saint-Jacques-de-la-Lande, Ille-et-Vilaine | RNS | 106 km | north |
| La Rochelle Île de Ré Airport La Rochelle | LRH | 133 km | south-east |
Straight-line distances from the beach; road distance is usually 20–40% longer.
Local transport: 15 bus stops within 1.5 km and 7 mapped car parks within 1 km.
5 towns and villages of 1,000+ people lie within 10 km (about 30.6K residents); within 30 km there are 45 (about 259K).
From above
Around the beach
Campsites
- Camping du Vieux Chateau 460 m SE
- Aire Camping-Car Park 500 m SW
- Camping Le Soleya 540 m SW
Map
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Data on this page
- Air temperature, rain, cloud, wind, humidity: NASA POWER climatology 2001–2020, 0.5° grid.
- Sea temperature: NOAA OISST v2.1 monthly normals 1991–2020, nearest ocean cell 5.6 km away.
- Beach outline, surface, rules and public facilities: OpenStreetMap contributors (ODbL), feature n12556794118; restaurants, cafés, bars and lodging: Overture Maps places (CDLA-Permissive-2.0).
- Towns and time zone: GeoNames (CC BY 4.0). Airports: OurAirports (public domain). Sunrise and sunset: NOAA solar equations.
- Photos: Wikimedia Commons, author and licence under each image.
- Satellite view: Copernicus Sentinel-2 (ESA), scene S2B_30TWT_20260318_0_L2A.
- Orientation: OpenStreetMap land polygons (ODbL). Depth and terrain: GEBCO 2020 grid.
- Bathing-water quality: European Environment Agency (site FRG0144182M044450).
- Settlements: GeoNames places with 1,000+ inhabitants.
- Land cover: ESA WorldCover 2021, 10 m (CC BY 4.0).
- Search popularity: about 9.9K Google searches a month for the name (KeywordTool, October 2026).
Data compiled 2026-10-13. Something wrong? Report a data error.