What works at each age, the beach-entry question that decides which hotel you book, why the heat matters more than the food, and which excursions to skip entirely.
Start with the part nobody warns you about
Egyptians like children in a way that surprises most northern European parents. Your child will be talked to, fussed over, picked up by a waiter, walked behind the buffet counter to see the kitchen and handed things all day. Nobody minds a toddler making noise in a restaurant, and a crying baby draws help rather than glares. This is the biggest single difference from a Mediterranean family holiday, it is why so many families come back, and it is worth arriving expecting it — because the parents who find it difficult are almost always the ones nobody warned.
What works: Easier than most people expect. The flight is short from most of Europe, the time difference is an hour or two, hotels are used to it, and staff will take a baby off you for ten minutes without being asked. Nappies, wipes and standard formula are sold in any supermarket and pharmacy.
What catches people out: Heat and shade, not germs. A baby dehydrates on a timescale of hours in this climate, and hotel shade runs out by ten in the morning. Choose a room with a shaded terrace over a room with a view, take a fan and a proper UV-blocking pushchair cover, and treat the middle of the day as indoor time rather than trying to make it work.
What works: The single best thing here for this age is a genuinely shallow, warm, waveless sea — the Red Sea has almost no tide and no surf, and a sandy-entry bay is a paddling pool that goes on forever. Hotel kids’ clubs generally start at four, and hotel staff are extraordinarily patient with this age.
What catches people out: The entry. A large fraction of hotel beaches on this coast have coral or a jetty rather than sand, which is fine for adults and a genuine problem for a two-year-old. This is the one thing to establish before booking, and hotel photography is designed not to answer it.
What works: The best age to bring a child to the Red Sea. They can snorkel — properly, with a mask that fits and a float — and this is a place where a first mask-down moment is a fish-filled reef rather than a murky green nothing. Kids’ clubs are running, boat days are manageable, and a pool-based dive taster becomes available at eight.
What catches people out: Sunburn on the back and the backs of the legs, acquired while face-down in the water and not noticed until the evening. A long-sleeved UV top is the fix and it is the single most useful thing in the bag. Reef shoes for anywhere that is not clean sand.
What works: The age the coast opens up. A junior diving certification is available from ten, with depth limits until fifteen; the desert trips accept this age with an adult; and a full boat day stops being an endurance test. Snorkelling becomes something they do rather than something you supervise.
What catches people out: Boredom in the evening, which is the real risk at this age in an all-inclusive resort. Towns with something outside the gate — El Gouna, Hurghada — earn their premium here in a way they do not for younger children.
What works: Kitesurfing and diving are both genuinely world-class here and both are things a teenager can get properly into in ten days rather than dabble in. Learning to dive at fifteen and a half or older gives a full adult certification. The wind towns and the dive towns are not the same towns, which for once makes the choice easy.
What catches people out: That an all-inclusive resort with nothing walkable outside it is a long fortnight at sixteen. And that a diving course booked for the last three days collides with the flight — nobody can fly for at least eighteen hours after a dive, and a weather day is enough to break it.
Not the general questions — those are on the where-to-stay page. These are the family-specific ones, and every one of them has ruined somebody’s fortnight.
The most consequential question on this list and the hardest to answer from photographs. Many good hotels on this coast have a reef starting at the waterline and a jetty out over it — excellent snorkelling, and unusable for a small child who wants to paddle. Ask directly, and ask whether there is a separate sandy swimming area.
From roughly November to March an unheated pool is too cold for a small child even when the air is warm, and the hotel will describe it as a heated pool if any pool on site is heated. Shade matters more than heat between May and September.
These are large resorts. A ten-minute walk in the sun each way, four times a day, with a pushchair, is a different holiday from a two-minute one — and it is the single most common complaint from families who otherwise loved the hotel.
Ask for the hours, the minimum age, whether it runs every day, and whether it is staffed by people who speak a language your child does. "Kids’ club" covers everything from a proper programme to a room with a television in it.
All three usually exist, and all three are frequently limited in number. A fridge matters more than it sounds when you are storing milk in this climate.
Most large resorts have a doctor, usually chargeable and usually reasonable. Knowing the answer before you need it at two in the morning is the entire point of asking.
All-inclusive is defined per hotel. Whether it covers the children’s buffet at times your children will actually eat, snacks between meals, and ice cream is worth having in writing — see the what-is-included page for how to ask so you get a straight answer.
Usually the honest answer is no. Ask anyway, because the ones that say yes are worth choosing.
Almost no tide, effectively no surf inside the reef, water at bath temperature for half the year and visibility that makes a mask worth wearing on day one. A child who has only met the North Sea or the Atlantic will not recognise this as the same activity. The reef is also the thing to be careful of, and both facts come from the same feature.
Coral cuts are the most common injury on this coast and children get them because they walk where adults swim. Dead coral rubble is sharp, fire coral stings on contact, and a stonefish sitting on the bottom looks exactly like the bottom. Reef shoes solve almost all of it. Standing on the reef is also how the reef gets destroyed, which is the other reason.
Five or six is realistic for a child who is comfortable in water, and the make-or-break variable is the mask rather than the child. A leaking adult mask on a small face is why children decide they hate snorkelling. Buy a properly sized junior mask at home, test it in the bath, and use a buoyancy vest or a pool noodle so they can float and look without treading water.
A full boat day is eight hours with a crossing at each end, and for under-fives that is usually a bad trade. The alternatives are good: a house reef, a short half-day boat, or a glass-bottom or semi-submarine trip which shows the reef without anyone getting wet. On any boat, a life jacket that fits a child is something to confirm rather than assume, and the deck rail is not designed for their height.
The prevailing wind here blows off the land and out to sea. An inflatable ring with a child in it moves offshore faster than an adult can swim, in water that looks calm from the beach. This is the single most dangerous ordinary thing on this coast and it is why hotels ban inflatables on windy days. Take the ban seriously — the safety section has the detail.
A pool-based bubble session is generally available from eight, and a junior certification from ten, with a depth limit that lifts in stages until fifteen. Agencies differ slightly and all of them are internationally recognised, so pick the centre rather than the logo — the diving section explains what to look for. A child who is not enthusiastic should snorkel instead; nobody has ever been talked into enjoying a regulator.
Parents arrive worried about stomach bugs and under-prepared for the sun, and the ratio should be the other way around. A child dehydrates faster than an adult, in a dry breeze that hides the sweating, on a beach with no natural shade. Sunburn, heat exhaustion and dehydration are what actually send families to a clinic here.
Between May and September, the sun between eleven and three is not a thing to manage — it is a thing to be indoors for. Egyptian families run on this rhythm already: out early, inside in the middle, out again from four. Fighting it produces two miserable children and a burnt parent, and adopting it makes the same holiday feel twice as long.
December to February is beautiful for adults — mid-twenties, empty, and the reason many families choose it. But the sea drops to the low twenties and evenings get genuinely cool, which small children feel far more than adults do. A heated pool and a fleece for the evening turn it from a compromise into the best family season on this coast.
The advice is the same as for adults and it lives on the stomach-upsets page — rehydration first, oral rehydration salts from any pharmacy, and no folk remedies. What is different for a child is only the margin: they dehydrate faster and the threshold for seeing a doctor is lower. Not keeping fluids down, no wet nappy for hours, unusual drowsiness — that is a doctor now rather than in the morning, and the coast has good clinics.
Free, five minutes from a towel, repeatable every day, and abortable the second somebody has had enough — which with children is the feature that matters most. For a first Red Sea holiday with kids this is the main event, not the fallback.
Underrated, and the right answer for under-fives, non-swimmers and anyone who does not want their face in the water. Short, cheap by local standards, and the reef is genuinely visible rather than a gimmick.
The beach-club end of the island trip: white sand, shallow turquoise water, facilities and food, and much less time in the water than a snorkelling trip. It does exactly what families picture. Book a lounger with shade, because there is almost none.
Excellent from about seven or eight and a long day before that. Eight hours door to door with an hour’s crossing each way, and the swimming is from a boat in open water rather than from a beach. Ask about the number of stops and how long each one is.
A good easy snorkel with an uncertain chance of dolphins — and children hear "swim with dolphins", which no operator can promise. Book it as a reef day and treat the pod as a bonus, or expect an eight-hour boat ride home with a disappointed child.
Late afternoon rather than a whole day, which suits families. But the defining feature is dust, quads generally have a minimum age with adults driving younger children as passengers, and it is genuinely unsuitable for a child with asthma. Group size decides whether it is fun or a dust queue.
Not with young children. It is a four-hour drive each way with a pre-dawn start, six hours of unshaded stone in the middle, and it is a magnificent day for an interested twelve-year-old and a punishment for a six-year-old. Fly it, do it as an overnight, or leave it for another trip.
The same objection, more so. A day trip to Cairo from this coast means a flight or a very long drive, a compressed march through two enormous sites, and a return after dark. Worth doing properly on a separate trip; not worth doing to a tired child.
All widely available in supermarkets and pharmacies, including international brands. Bring enough for the first two days and buy the rest. The exceptions worth packing in full: a specific hypoallergenic or prescription formula, and any brand your child will refuse to switch from mid-holiday.
Egyptian pharmacies are excellent, everywhere and open late, and oral rehydration salts are on every shelf. What is worth bringing is a children’s paracetamol or ibuprofen in the dose and flavour your child accepts, and any prescription medication in its original packaging with the prescription.
Sold here but expensively and not always in the right size. This is the most useful item in the bag: it removes the back-and-shoulders sunburn that face-down snorkelling reliably produces, and it removes the daily argument about sun cream.
Rental masks are sized for adults, and a leaking mask is the single reason children give up on snorkelling. Buy one at home, check the seal on a dry face by inhaling through the nose, and bring it. Reef shoes likewise, in the right size.
Bring a light folding one for the airport and the resort. Do not plan on using it around town: pavements outside the resort areas are broken, high-kerbed and frequently absent, and a sling or a carrier is the realistic option in Dahar or a market.
The honest answer, which no operator will volunteer: taxis and most transfers here do not have them, and few vehicles have working rear seatbelts to fit one to. Some hotels and some pre-booked private transfers can supply one if asked in advance and confirmed in writing. Ask, choose the transfer that says yes, and know the position before you land rather than at the airport door.
Last reviewed 26 July 2026. Something out of date? Tell us