It was a sight that puzzled many visitors last summer: despite the island’s notoriously heavy tourist traffic, scores of rental sunbeds on Mallorca’s beaches remained unused. Even then, holidaymakers on the “island of high prices” were already tightening their belts.
That doesn’t seem to bother Palma’s city administration, which continues to turn the price screw. In the summer of 2026, sunbeds and umbrellas for fans of the Playa de Palma are set to become even more expensive—provided a new concessionaire believes there’s still money to be made. Ten euros will be charged per item, and a couple seeking shade will have to shell out 30 euros. That means paying 66 percent more on the Playa de Palma than in 2019.
This exasperating price policy—far beyond what most would consider reasonable—casts an unflattering light on the conservative local politicians currently running the city. Detached from reality, they seem insatiable. One might well assume that, in this case, greed has eclipsed good sense. After all, it has become common knowledge among rational observers that, particularly for German tourists, higher airfares and hotel rates have already made them far more cautious with their holiday spending than in previous years. Still, Mallorca’s local politicians appear to be playing a dangerous high-stakes game—whether it’s va banque or something closer to Russian roulette.
The fact that, next year, the price of two sunbeds and an umbrella will amount to half the cost of a double hotel room elsewhere in the Mediterranean is symptomatic of a broader trend. Sky-high rents and property prices, coupled with ever-rising living costs, are gradually turning Mallorca into a kind of Monaco or Côte d’Azur. Those with little money, some of the island’s grandees may well mutter, can simply head for the beaches of Albania.
The eagerly awaited influx of North Americans and wealthy Gulf tourists, they assume, will fill any gaps. And the local workers on their meagre salaries? They are apparently expected to muddle through somehow. Developments like the pricing policy at the Playa de Palma unfortunately reinforce the suspicion that impudence and cynicism have now taken hold at City Hall.