The Most Beautiful Nature Reserves in Europe
8 places in 5 countries · updated 14 October 2026
In short: By our ranking, the most beautiful nature reserves in Europe are Cabo de Gata-Níjar Natural Park (Spain), El Torcal de Antequera (Spain) and Adršpach-Teplice Rocks (Czech Republic). The list covers 8 nature reserves in 5 countries. Spain has the most, with 4. Last updated 14 October 2026.
Europe's nature reserves often protect a single extraordinary formation rather than a whole region: a karst plateau, a sandstone labyrinth, a field of dunes, a volcano or an island of seabirds. Many are small, but they preserve geology and wildlife that would not survive in a crowded continent without protection, from Atlantic outposts to the cliffs of the Mediterranean.
El Torcal de Antequera, near Málaga, is a limestone plateau that once lay under the sea, now weathered into stacks that look like piled plates. Adršpach-Teplice Rocks in northeastern Bohemia is a rock city of sandstone towers and narrow gorges. On the southern coast of Gran Canaria, the Maspalomas Dunes form a small desert of moving sand beside the sea, with a lagoon and lighthouse at its edge. Scandola, on the west coast of Corsica, protects red volcanic cliffs and sea caves that can only be seen from the water.
The Atlantic adds two remote extremes. St Kilda, far beyond the Outer Hebrides, has the highest sea cliffs in the United Kingdom and vast colonies of gannets and puffins; its last residents left in 1930, and the archipelago is one of the few places on the World Heritage list for both its nature and its culture. Mount Pico in the Azores is a volcanic cone rising from the ocean and the highest mountain in Portugal, while along its shores a maze of black stone walls once sheltered vines from the wind.
In this list
| # | Place | Type | Country | UNESCO |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Cabo de Gata-Níjar Natural Park | Nature reserve | Spain | |
| 2 | El Torcal de Antequera | Nature reserve | Spain | ✓ |
| 3 | Adršpach-Teplice Rocks | Rock formation | Czech Republic | |
| 4 | Maspalomas Dunes | Nature reserve | Spain | |
| 5 | St Kilda | Nature reserve | United Kingdom | ✓ |
| 6 | Mount Pico | Volcano | Portugal | |
| 7 | Scandola Nature Reserve | Nature reserve | France | ✓ |
| 8 | Picos de Europa National Park | National park | Spain |
01 Cabo de Gata-Níjar Natural Park
Parque natural del Cabo de Gata-Níjar
Spain · 36.5 km from Almería36.900° N 2.030° W
- UNESCO Global Geopark
- biosphere reserve
Image by WildFox from Pixabay The Sierra del Cabo de Gata is volcanic, and the park is essentially an old volcanic field worn down by sea and wind: lava flows, domes and the hollows of calderas, with cliffs up to about 100 metres dropping into the water. That geology earned it a place in UNESCO's Global Geoparks Network in 2006; it has also been a Biosphere Reserve since 1997. Between the village of San Miguel and the cape itself, the salt pans of Las Salinas lie behind a sand bar, a Ramsar wetland, and near the Cabo de Gata lighthouse rise the rocks of the Arrecife de las Sirenas, one of the best-loved images of the province.
02 El Torcal de Antequera
Torcal de Antequera
Spain · 29.2 km from Málaga36.964° N 4.546° W
- UNESCO World Heritage
Image by Makalu from Pixabay The stone is Jurassic limestone laid down about 150 million years ago on the floor of a sea channel that once linked the Atlantic and the Mediterranean between Cádiz and Alicante. Uplifted to over 1,300 metres, the beds stayed almost horizontal, which is unusual in Andalusia. Rainwater then worked along two sets of fractures crossing at right angles, opening narrow corridors between the blocks, while dissolution and frost split the horizontal layers into the stacked, rounded shapes seen today. Many formations carry names from their shapes, such as the Sphinx, the Jug, the Camel and the Screw (El Tornillo), the best known. Caves riddle the rock; the Cueva del Toro has yielded Neolithic finds.
Did you know? In 1929 it became the first protected natural area in Andalusia, recognised as a site of national interest.
03 Adršpach-Teplice Rocks
Czech Republic50.611° N 16.115° E
Lestat (Jan Mehlich) · CC BY-SA 3.0 In the Adršpach rocks the paths run through narrow clefts between pillars, past a waterfall and two small lakes. The formations have names that go back centuries: the Mayor and his Wife, the Lovers, the Sugar Loaf, Rübezahl's Organ. The Teplice rocks are more austere, with sheer walls along the Skalní potok stream, the ridge of the Čáp at 786 metres, and a rocky maze of plateaus and passages. Three medieval rock castles, Střmen, Adršpach and Skály, stand in the area in ruins.
Did you know? For centuries local people entered the maze of towers only when they needed a hiding place from danger.
04 Maspalomas Dunes
Dunas de Maspalomas
Spain27.743° N 15.583° W
Image by hikersbay from Pixabay The reserve is more than sand. On its western edge lies La Charca, a brackish coastal lagoon where stilts, little ringed plovers, coots and moorhens nest and migrants such as little egrets, grey herons, whimbrels and even flamingos stop on their way between Europe and Africa. Beside it grows a palm grove of native Canary Island palms, where the Gran Canaria giant lizard is common. Among the dunes live sand-dwelling insects, some found nowhere else, with close relatives across the water in Africa. The climate explains the desert look: rainfall is well under 100 mm a year, falling on only ten to fifteen days.
Did you know? Sediment studies show the sand feeding the dunes arrives from Playa del Inglés to the east, then marches south-west across the field toward Maspalomas beach.
05 St Kilda
United Kingdom57.815° N 8.588° W
- UNESCO World Heritage
- UNESCO natural beauty
Hugh Venables · CC BY-SA 2.0 People lived here for at least two thousand years, and probably far longer: pottery found in 2015 points to Neolithic settlers. The islanders lived on seabirds, taken by men who climbed the cliffs and stacks, on a few sheep and cattle, and on barley and potatoes grown in Village Bay. Adult men met each morning in the street to decide the day's work, a gathering outsiders called the St Kilda parliament. Everything was stored in cleits, dry-stone huts with turf roofs that let the wind through but kept out the rain; some 1,260 of them still stud Hirta, with about 170 more on the other islands. The curved street of cottages dates from a rebuilding in the 1830s.
Did you know? Islanders sent mail by casting messages adrift in floats, a method begun in 1877 when nine shipwrecked Austrian sailors were stranded on Hirta.
06 Mount Pico
Montanha do Pico
Portugal · 22.6 km from Horta38.469° N 28.399° W
José Luís Ávila Silveira/Pedro Noronha e Costa · Public domain Pico is a young stratovolcano, built up within the last 230,000 years, and part of its slopes are younger still. At the top lies Pico Alto, a crater about 500 metres across and 30 metres deep, from which a small secondary cone, Piquinho or Pico Pequeno, climbs another 70 metres to form the true summit. The volcano is dormant rather than extinct: in historical times flank eruptions sent lava flows down to the sea in 1562–1564, 1718 and from July to December 1720, and gas still escapes near the summit. Since 1972 the upper mountain has been protected as a nature reserve covering about 13.4 km², and an atmospheric observatory has operated at 2,225 metres since 1998.
Did you know? The nearest higher summit is Roque de los Muchachos on La Palma in the Canary Islands, about 1,450 km away.
07 Scandola Nature Reserve
France42.357° N 8.567° E
- UNESCO World Heritage
- UNESCO natural beauty
Image by jackmac34 from Pixabay The reserve was created in 1975 and was among the first in France to protect both land and sea together. It covers a little under 20 square kilometres, roughly half of it marine, with a strictly protected core at its north-western tip. Its value for scientists lies partly underwater: calcareous algae build pale ledges along the waterline, and deeper down coral formations and seagrass meadows shelter a wealth of fish and invertebrates. On land, the cliffs hold dozens of endemic plants and give nesting room to ospreys, shags, peregrine falcons and gulls. Scandola was once a last refuge in Corsica for the Mediterranean monk seal, which has since vanished from these waters.
Did you know? The reserve was created by decree on 9 December 1975, becoming the first in France to protect a stretch of land and sea together.
08 Picos de Europa National Park
Parque nacional de Picos de Europa
Spain43.250° N 4.917° W
- biosphere reserve
Image by javierAlamo from Pixabay The mountains are built of thick Palaeozoic limestone, carved by glaciers during the Ice Ages and riddled since by the dissolving action of water into sinkholes, deep shafts and enormous cave systems. Three massifs are separated by gorges of startling depth, the most famous being the gorge of the river Cares, whose path cut into the cliff between Poncebos and Caín threads along the wall high above the water.
Did you know? The Torre de Cerredo, at about 2,648 m, is the highest summit in the Picos de Europa.
How this list is ranked
Places are chosen for how they look, not for how famous they are: each one has its own description and a photograph credited to its author. The order is a single world ranking that weighs the beauty of the place in curated photography together with how widely it is documented — the number of language editions of its encyclopedia article and how often that article is read in a year. The list is rebuilt as places are added, so the order and the counts on this page are always current.
Questions people ask
- What are the most beautiful nature reserves in Europe?
- On our list, Cabo de Gata-Níjar Natural Park (Spain) ranks first, followed by El Torcal de Antequera (Spain) and Adršpach-Teplice Rocks (Czech Republic).
- Which country has the most nature reserves in Europe?
- In our collection, the most come from Spain (4), the Czech Republic (1) and France (1).
- Why was St Kilda abandoned?
- By the early twentieth century the island community had dwindled and become increasingly isolated, and in 1930 the remaining islanders asked to be evacuated to the Scottish mainland.
- What is the highest mountain in Portugal?
- Mount Pico on the island of Pico in the Azores, at about 2,351 metres. It is a volcano, and its summit is higher than any peak in mainland Portugal.
- How did El Torcal de Antequera get its shapes?
- The rock is limestone laid down on a sea floor during the Jurassic, later raised into a plateau. Rain and frost have dissolved and split it along its horizontal layers, leaving stacks that resemble piled plates.
- How many nature reserves are on this list in Europe?
- The list covers 8 nature reserves in 5 countries. Spain has the most, with 4.