Mallorca
Spain
A mountain range, three hundred beaches and a capital most people fly straight past
Photo by DJ Nick Otronic on Unsplash
Photos by Austin Farrington, Wadé, Eugene Zhyvchik and Felix on Unsplash
Best time to visit all of Spain
April to June, and September to October (July and August are full)
Climate month by month
The next sixteen daysOpen-Meteo
Average high and low · °C
Rainfall · mm per month
Best months to visit This month · wettest 75mm in Oct
Where it is
39.57°N, 2.65°E Open in Google Maps
Things to do
A week easily- Drive or cycle the Sa Calobra road, thirteen kilometres of hairpins
- Take the wooden train to Sóller and the tram down to the port
- Walk part of the GR221 dry-stone route through the Tramuntana
- Find a cove on the east coast that needs a walk to reach
- Spend a day in Palma, which most visitors never do
Mallorca travel tipsthe general rules
Currency budget Spain
ExpensiveEuros, cards everywhere. The one thing to watch is the tourist tax, charged per person per night by every hotel and licensed rental and paid on departure — it is not in the booking price.
ATMs & cards
CaixaBank, BBVA and Santander machines are free with most European cards. The Euronet machines along the Playa de Palma and in Magaluf charge heavily and push conversion.
Avoid these
- Euronet along the Playa de Palma and in Magaluf
Use these instead
- CaixaBank
- BBVA
- Santander
- Banca March
Free with most European cards. Always decline the machine’s conversion offer, which costs several per cent.
Wherever you are: if the machine offers to charge you in your home currency, decline. That is dynamic currency conversion and the rate is set by the ATM's operator, not your bank.
Safety all of Spain
Very safeVery safe. Petty theft on the Playa de Palma and in Magaluf at night, and bag snatching in Palma old town, are the whole picture. The Tramuntana roads are narrow with hundreds of cyclists on them from February to April — drive as if one is around every bend, because one is.
Where to walk, and where to pay attention (9 areas)
Comfortable, including after dark
Worth more attention
- Playa de Palma — and Magaluf at night, for drunkenness and petty theft
- Palma Old Town — bag snatching in the narrow streets in high season
- The Tramuntana roads from February to April, when there are hundreds of cyclists on every bend
- Cliff jumping at the coves, which kills someone most summers
Our own assessment, not a sourced index.
Entry & visa Spain visa rules
No visa needed
Freedom of movement — no time limit, and no visa. Bring a passport or national ID card.
Other passports
No visa neededup to 90 days
90 days within any 180-day period, counted across the whole Schengen area, not per country. ETIAS, a paid online authorisation, is being introduced for these passports — check the official link for whether it applies to your travel dates.
Visa required in advance€90 (Schengen short-stay visa)
A Schengen short-stay visa is applied for before travel, at the consulate of your main destination.
How to get it: Apply at the consulate or visa centre of the country you will spend most time in, typically 15 working days ahead and no more than six months before travel.
Entry rules change often and depend on your passport, not where you live — the official page above is the authority, and the airline checks before you board.
Health & emergencies all of Spain
Excellent and cheapRequired to enter
No vaccinations are required for entry from Europe or North America.
Jabs worth having, and what happens if you need a doctor
Worth having
- Routine vaccinations up to date (MMR, tetanus, polio)
Getting treated
EU/EEA and Swiss visitors are treated on the same terms as residents with an EHIC or GHIC card; UK visitors use a GHIC. Everyone else pays, and travel insurance is worth having for the repatriation cover rather than the treatment.
Orientation, not medical advice — entry rules change and what you need depends on your own history. Check with a travel clinic four to six weeks before you go.
Food tip
Very goodPa amb oli — bread rubbed with tomato and oil — with cured ham is the everyday plate. Sobrassada is the island's paprika sausage and is spread rather than sliced. And ensaïmada, the coiled pastry, is what everybody carries home in a hexagonal box.
Nightlife
Three separate islands after dark: Palma’s good bars, the package strips at Magaluf and Arenal, and a Tramuntana where nothing happens at all.
- Santa Catalina, Palma — the best bars and restaurants on the island
- La Lonja — the old-town night
- Magaluf — the package strip, and it is exactly that
- Port de Sóller — a quiet drink with the mountains behind
Closing: Palma 03:00, Magaluf 05:00, the villages by midnight.
A beer in a bar: €3–6
Getting around
Workable- UberWorks here
- BoltWorks here
- CabifyWorks here
- FREE NOWWorks here
- Against a taxi
- About level with a metered taxi, and where a city sets a flat airport fare the taxi usually wins.
The island caps private-hire licences tightly and the supply is seasonal, so at peak the app may have nothing to send. The taxi ranks and the hotel telephone are what most people fall back on, and the airport taxi to Palma is around €25.
Time zone and your working day
Europe/Madrid — 6 hours ahead of you
2 hours of overlap with a 09:00–17:00 day where you are — 09:00–11:00 your time, 15:00–17:00 theirs.
No overlap with a 09:00–17:00 day where you are. Working from here means one of you keeps odd hours — their day starts at 03:00 on your clock.
office hours both at once night
Their 09:00–17:00 is 03:00–11:00 on yours.
The difference from the UK, Europe, the US and ten more
Worked out against America/New York, which is where this request looks like it came from.
Internet speedall of Spain
Why these are Spain's numbers and not Mallorca's
Home broadband — Fast. Several people on calls at once, large uploads, 4K. Broadband here runs at 2× the global median of 130 Mbps.
Mobile data — Fair. Maps, calls and streaming; tethering a laptop works for an hour, not a day. Mobile runs at 77% of the global median of 109 Mbps.
Ookla publishes no separate figure for Mallorca, so these are medians for all of Spain. Cities usually beat the national number and remote islands and national parks fall well below it — treat this as the country's shape, not as a measurement of the street you will be staying on.
A median is the middle of every connection tested there, old copper and new fibre together — so in a country part-way through laying fibre it sits well below what a fibre line actually delivers, and a rental on one can run several times this number. Half of the connections are slower; a fibre flat is rarely one of them. It says what a place can do, not what your rental does, so every listing on Holistay carries its own measured speed and the date it was tested.
Getting online: Airalo or Holafly — a data eSIM for Spain, installed before you fly and working the moment you land.
Source: Ookla Speedtest Global Index · measured June 2026
Must-see
Nearby day trips
Say a few words
Spanish
- HelloHolaOH-la
- PleasePor favorpor fa-VOR
- Thank youGraciasGRA-thyas
- Yes / NoSí / Nosee / no
4 more phrases
- Excuse mePerdónper-DON
- How much is it?¿Cuánto cuesta?KWAN-to KWES-ta
- The bill, pleaseLa cuenta, por favorla KWEN-ta
- Cheers!¡Salud!sa-LOOD
Religion
Catholic
Nominally Catholic and deeply secular in practice. Churches are working buildings as well as sights, and Semana Santa is taken seriously even by people who never attend Mass.
Do's and don'ts
Do
- Eat late — lunch from 14:00, dinner rarely before 21:00
- Greet with two cheek kisses, right cheek first, between women or a man and a woman
- Stand at the bar to drink; it is cheaper than sitting and more sociable
- Say buenos días on entering a small shop, and adiós on leaving
Don't
- Do not expect anything to be open between 14:00 and 17:00 outside the big cities
- Do not order sangria in a serious restaurant — it is a tourist drink; ask for tinto de verano
- Do not tip heavily; rounding up or a euro or two is normal
- In Barcelona, do not assume Catalan and Spanish are interchangeable — the distinction matters to people
Where to stay in Mallorca
No Holistay rentals in Mallorca yet — the platform is just opening up. Every listing here will have a video tour and the option to negotiate the nightly price directly with the host.
In the meantime, here is Mallorca on the sites that do have the inventory — each search is already filled in:
- Booking.com hotels, guesthouses and apartments — the widest coverage almost everywhere
- Airbnb whole homes and apartments, and the better option for a week or more
How to get there
Fly into Palma de Mallorca PMI
15 minfrom the airport· 8 km as the crow flies
15 min to Palma, 40 to the north coast.
Google Flights · Rome2Rio for the trains, buses and ferries as well as the flights
