Choose Menorca if you want unspoilt coves, quiet villages and an island you can explore entirely from one base; choose Mallorca if you want mountains, a big city like Palma and more nightlife. Menorca covers about 700 km² and has about 100,000 inhabitants; Mallorca is five times larger and has more than 900,000.
Size and distances
Menorca is about 50 km end to end and no drive takes more than an hour; Mallorca, about 3,640 km², makes you pick an area or spend more time on the road.
In Menorca the Me-1 road links Maó and Ciutadella in 45–50 minutes, so a week is enough to see all of it without changing hotels. How to plan it, in Menorca in a week.
Beaches: unspoilt coves or beaches with services
Menorca has more undeveloped coastline: coves such as Macarella, Turqueta or Pregonda are protected natural areas reached on foot or by bus. Mallorca has more town beaches with services, and coves too, but busier ones.
In summer you reach several Menorcan coves by bus or on foot because their roads close or their car parks fill up early: it is all in summer access rules and in the best beaches in Menorca.
Recommended itinerary
5 days
Beaches and coves
Southern Menorca: coves and talayots
The turquoise southern coves and 3,000-year-old villages, without crossing the island: five days from Binibeca to Macarella.
€€ €45–90 a day in Menorca
Atmosphere: peace and quiet or nightlife
Menorca has been a UNESCO Biosphere Reserve since 1993 and its nights are about terraces, harbour bars and the odd club; Mallorca offers more partying, more culture in Palma and the Serra de Tramuntana, World Heritage since 2011.
Where to go out in Menorca, from Ciutadella to the Cova d’en Xoroi, in Menorca nightlife. Its oldest history, the Talayotic villages, has been World Heritage since 2023: see Talayotic Menorca.
With kids or as a couple
With young children, Menorca is usually easier: short drives, shallow sandy beaches such as Son Bou or Es Grau and less traffic. As a couple both work; Menorca wins on coves at sunset and Mallorca on boutique hotels in the mountains.
Easy coves for little ones are in Menorca with kids and plans for two in Menorca as a couple.
Recommended itinerary
7 days
Beaches and coves
Menorca’s coves with the family
A week of beaches: one area a day, short drives and a plan for every rainy day.
€€ €40–80 a day in Menorca
Without a car
Both islands have public buses, but in Menorca almost every line starts in Maó or Ciutadella and in summer reaches the best-known coves, so you can see the essentials without a car by staying in those two towns.
Which line reaches each beach, in Menorca buses, and a three-day plan by bus in Menorca without a car.
Recommended itinerary
3 days
Beaches and coves
Menorca without a car
Three days by bus and on foot: Es Grau, Ciutadella, Macarella, Cala Galdana and Cala Mitjana.
€€ €40–85 a day in Menorca
How to combine Menorca and Mallorca
With ten days or more you can do both: a ferry links Alcúdia (Mallorca) and Ciutadella (Menorca) in just over an hour. Give Menorca at least four days to see its four areas.
Timetables and ferry companies, in how to get to Menorca. A four-day plan, in Menorca in 4 days.
Take it organised
Itineraries with the order of each day, how to get there and where to eat, ready on your phone.
6 days
Charming places
The best of Menorca in 6 days
The whole island in six days: Maó, the south-east, the north, the southern coves, Ciutadella and Macarella.
€€ €45–90 a day in Menorca
7 days
Beaches and coves
Menorca’s coves with the family
A week of beaches: one area a day, short drives and a plan for every rainy day.
€€ €40–80 a day in Menorca
