Zuma Beach
Malibu · near Malibu · Los Angeles / SoCal
Surfing
At a glance
- Skill level
- intermediate
- Best season
- Summer for beginner-friendly peaks · Winter for power and size
Worth knowing
- Good for a first timer
- Yes
Surfing detail
- Break types
- beach
- Swell
- NW and combo · 2–10ft · Numerous sandbars, plenty of room to spread out
- Tide
- Works across tides depending on the sandbar
- Wind
- Morning offshore best · Exposed to afternoon wind
- Crowd
- Room to spread out over three miles of sand — less crowded than Malibu or the South Bay. Kid surf camps in summer.
- Board
- Shortboard, fish, or midlength · Depends on the day's sandbars
- Wetsuit
- 3/2mm most of the year · 4/3mm mid-winter · Water 58–66°F
- Intl tip
- Zuma is at the north end of Malibu's 27-mile coastline. Point Dume (dramatic cliffs, tide pools, winter whale watching) is just south. Nearby Leo Carrillo State Beach adds camping and tide pools. This is the scenic, less-frantic end of Malibu.
The guide
Zuma is Malibu's wide-open alternative to the crowded points — three miles of clean sand with numerous sandbars and consistent …
In the Guidebook
Everything above is yours for free. The written guide to Zuma Beach — what it is actually like, and what we would tell a friend before they went — comes with the Guidebook.
Getting there
- Coordinates
- 34.016, -118.821