Readers suggestions needed on beach European destination

I have no clue about beaches, but it might help others if you tell us what beach(es) you found in France that met your criteria.

Thank you so much for your quick response ... we visited Nice and Monte-Carlo but would love something smaller and a bit more quiet . Excited and thankful for all suggestions provided :-)

Perhaps one of the less touristy Greek islands?

July. Italy. Lonely beach.

I suspect you may be in search of a unicorn. However, just because I have never seen one does not mean it does not exist.

Good luck

I’m open to Greece... any suggestions ???

Everyone in the world wants to go to a beautiful beach, without tourist crowds.

There's your problem.

Sicily. Some places are very touristed (Taormina, some Aeolian islands) but if you have a car you can reach all sorts of beaches. I was in Scopello in June 2017 and found the Zingaro nature reserve lovely. You have to walk in and down a lot of stairs and the beaches are not “developed”. There’s no restaurants or lounge chairs for rent. Which is what I wanted. There were plenty of people especially at the first beach past the parking lot. But it wasn’t packed.

There are also beaches all around the island. Some on the south coast near Siracusa were supposed to be good. Didn’t get out there.

And I’ve heard Sardinia is good for this as well but haven’t been.

Haha... you may be right joe32f... but what is that saying, “hope is last to die” :-)
Hopefully there is something out there, maybe not Italy in July but somewhere else nearby would work as well.

Keep in mind that most of the wealthy European countries, whose residents can afford to take international vacations, are much more densely populated than the US, and a lot of that population lives in areas without much sun during most of the year. When summer rolls around, everyone seems to head south. There's also the issue of rocky vs. sandy beaches, which drives up the crowds at the spots that do have sand. Your best bet, as already noted, is somewhere that's not convenient to get to. But that can mean burning an extra day of travel time in each direction.

I wonder whether Puglia would work. I have no idea about sand, but none of the coastal towns I visited in late June or early July 2015 was grotesquely crowded. The area did seem popular with folks from the UK, but it's a bit awkward to get to.

Thank you Mira and acraven
I was thinking of sardina so I’ll look further into this as well as your other suggestions.
That’s a great point made acraven. It does make sense that these areas will be much more impacted for the reasons you listed.
Really appreciate your suggestions
Thanks

Sardinia or Corsica have beautiful beaches, and many of them are relatively quiet since there are no huge hotel complexes on these islands. But you need a car and do a little bit of planning to find them. The pics at Google Maps are a good start.

The best non-crowded beaches I've found are on the Costa de la Luz - from Tarifa, Spain to the Portuguese border. There are a few small cities where there will be summer tourist crowds but miles of isolated beaches with barely enough services to get by. There are also Roman ruins and Cadiz is arguably the oldest city in Western Europe (I didn't really like it much) going back to the Phoenicians.

I liked the beaches south of Arcachon, France a lot when I was there in June. I was there before the summer rush. I expect it gets pretty crowded in season.

If you want a nice place on the Riviera, I'd suggest Antibes. It's a smaller town not far from Nice with the best sand beaches, a great marina, a walled medieval center with an art gallery and square with restaurants/cafes.

Thank you so much for your such an array of suggestions. I will definitely look into them.
Much appreciated!