The 4 Best Beach Towels of 2025
Top pick
If you want a luxurious-feeling beach towel with maxed-out softness and absorbency, this Brooklinen towel is for you. After years of testing it on Oahu’s beaches, we’d pick (and pack) this towel over any other.
The Brooklinen Beach Towel, made in Portugal, measures 34 by 70 inches, and like most beach towels it has a velour face for you to lie on and an absorbent yet sand-shedding terry weave on the back.
The Brooklinen towel’s material, though, is rated at 600 GSM—higher than our other picks. (GSM stands for grams per square meter; most towels range from 300 GSM to 900 GSM. Anything above 600 GSM is considered premium.) This is a weight and class difference that you can feel in your hands, and when the towel is draped over your body, it’s a pleasure.
True, the Brooklinen towel is more expensive than our budget pick, the L.L.Bean Seaside Beach Towel, and a fancy towel is a luxury that may not be important to everyone. (Ultimately, this remains a piece of woven cotton that you spread out on the sand.) However, the Brooklinen Beach Towel is everything a towel should be, and it’s the one we reach for first.
