Brighton seafront and the two piers: a walk from the Palace Pier to Hove

Brighton's seafront is the heart of the city and its most misunderstood feature, because it has two piers and only one of them works. This guide walks you along the front from the Palace Pier west toward Hove, explains what you are looking at, and tells you when to come for the thing most visitors miss entirely.

Start at the working pier

Brighton Palace Pier, which opened in 1899, is the lit-up, candy-floss-smelling pier most people picture. It is free to walk onto, and you only pay for the rides, the arcades and the fairground at the far end. It gets loud and busy on summer weekends, so come early morning if you want photographs without the crowds, or in the evening for fish and chips as the light drops. From the end of the pier you get the best view back along the beach and west toward the West Pier ruin and the i360.

The ruin offshore

The blackened iron skeleton standing in the water to the west is the West Pier. It opened in 1866 and was once one of the most admired piers in Britain, but it closed to the public in 1975, and storm damage and two fires in 2003 gutted what was left. It has been deliberately left standing as a ruin rather than demolished, and it is now one of the most photographed things in the city, especially at sunset. Do not expect to walk on it. It is a view, not an attraction, and a strangely beautiful one.

The tower and the railway

Beside the West Pier stands the Brighton i360, a slim observation tower with a glass pod that glides up for wide views over the city, the Downs and the Channel. It is worth knowing its recent history, because it went into administration and closed at the end of 2024, then reopened in March 2025 under new ownership and now trades simply as Brighton i360 rather than under its old airline sponsor name. Go on a clear day, since the view is the entire point, and book a timed ticket online. Heading the other way from the Palace Pier, Volk's Electric Railway, the oldest operating electric railway in the world, runs along the front to Black Rock on a seasonal timetable from roughly Easter to the end of September.

The walk to Hove

Keep walking west along the promenade and the crowds thin quickly once you cross into Hove. The path is flat, fully paved and easy for buggies or wheelchairs, and it runs about two and a half miles from the Palace Pier to Hove Lawns, past the colourful Hove beach huts. Cafes dot the route, and buses run the same line if you do not want to walk both ways. Remember the beach itself is shingle, not sand, so wear shoes you do not mind on pebbles, and check the flags before swimming, because lifeguards patrol only certain sections and only in season.

The arches, the beach and the marina

The stretch of seafront between the piers is worth slowing down for. Built into the sea wall are the arches, a run of vaulted spaces that now hold independent bars, cafes, galleries and studios, and the small Brighton Fishing Museum, which tells the older story of the beach before tourism took over. Deckchairs and beach huts can be hired along several stretches in season. Keep going east past the Palace Pier and the front leads to Brighton Marina, a large modern harbour with restaurants and a cinema, and beyond it the Undercliff Walk runs on beneath the chalk cliffs toward Rottingdean and Saltdean, a flat, sea-level path that is one of the quieter walks out of the city.

Come back at dusk in winter

The thing most day-trippers miss is the starling murmuration. From late October through to February, at dusk, tens of thousands of starlings gather over the West Pier ruin and the Palace Pier, wheeling into a huge shifting cloud before dropping down to roost in the ironwork. It is the best free spectacle in Brighton and the single best reason to be on the seafront on a cold afternoon. Wrap up, get down to the front before the light goes, and watch the ruin do the one thing it still does perfectly.