Glyn
☀️ THE BENIDORM BULLETIN
Your weekly dose of sun, sangria, and what’s on
Issue 61 | 24–31 May 2026
From the Editor
Something unusual is happening to Benidorm’s skyline — and this week’s most interesting story isn’t about nightlife, weather, or what’s on at the Palace. It’s about a 64-storey skyscraper, a €3.4 million penthouse, and a buyer list that reads like a European rail timetable. We’ve also got a properly exciting weekend incoming: Dark City Fest rolls into Sala Penélope on Friday for two nights of gothic rock and post-punk, the Theatre Showcase is still running for anyone who fancies their evenings with a touch less karaoke, and San Juan is less than a month away. The weather is doing its job. Let’s get into it.
Lead Story
A €3.4 million penthouse in Benidorm — and it’s already sold
Europe’s tallest residential building is going up on Poniente Beach, half of its 260 apartments are already gone, and the view from the top floor will cost you the best part of three million pounds.
Benidorm has always been many things to many people — reliably sunny, cheerfully unpretentious, the sort of place where a decent paella costs less than a round of drinks in central London. What it hasn’t traditionally been associated with is the kind of residential property that makes your eyes water slightly. That, it turns out, is changing.
TM Tower — already rising on Poniente Beach — is set to become Europe’s tallest residential building when it completes in 2028. Sixty-four floors, 230 metres, 260 apartments — and half of them are already sold. The tower will overtake the current European record holder, a skyscraper in Warsaw, by a comfortable 38 metres. This is the sort of statistic that Benidorm’s council has not been shy about mentioning.
The penthouse on the 63rd floor went for €3.4 million — approximately £2.9 million — to a Spanish businessman. Four bedrooms, four bathrooms, a dressing room, and a terrace. Communal facilities include a sky bar and astronomical observatory on the same floor, a cinema, gym, heated pools and sports areas covering more than 10,000 square metres. Not a bad development for a resort more commonly associated with £4.50 breakfasts.
Perhaps the more interesting detail is who’s buying. Two-thirds of purchasers are international: Polish buyers lead at 36.5% of sales, with Ukrainians close behind at nearly 14%. The British, who this month account for half of every hotel bed booked in the resort, are for once largely watching from the sidelines. Whether that changes as the tower nears completion is an open question.
What this means for you
- TM Tower sits on Poniente Beach — visitors staying in that area will notice construction activity, though the structure is well advanced and the beach remains open.
- The communal sky bar and observatory may become one of Benidorm’s more unusual visitor attractions once the building opens in 2028 — worth watching.
- Property prices in Benidorm have been rising steadily. If you’ve ever considered buying out there, this week’s news is probably worth filing away.
As Promised Last Week
SkyFest: here’s what’s on the programme
Last week we introduced SkyFest, Benidorm’s enormous new outdoor events complex at Guillermo Amor Sports City. Several of you wrote in asking what’s actually on. Here’s what’s confirmed so far, ahead of the opening night on Saturday 28 June.
- Latin Fest — 4–5 July
- Chayanne concert — 24 July
- World Cup final screening — 19 July (no pressure, England)
- Oro Viejo by DJ Nano — 1 August
- DJ Symphonic — 21 August
- Comedy — Miguel Lago and Luis Piedrahita
- Family musicals — Tarzan and The Sound of Music
More than 24 events in total through to September. Worth factoring into your dates if you’re still choosing when to travel this summer.
What’s On This Week
The theatre crowd and the goth crowd descend on Benidorm simultaneously this week, which is exactly the kind of overlap only Benidorm could produce without anyone finding it the least bit unusual.
📅 Until Saturday 30 May
4th Theatre Showcase
Benidorm | Check Visit Benidorm for venue and full programme
Nine days of theatrical performances, and still running through this weekend. For visitors who’ve already reached their personal limit on ABBA tributes, this is a genuinely different option for an evening. The full programme is on the Visit Benidorm website — worth checking before you head out.
📅 Friday 29 – Saturday 30 May
Dark City Fest 2026
Discoteca Penélope, Avenida Comunidad Valenciana | Ticketed — book in advance
As trailed last week: the second edition of Benidorm’s dark music festival takes over Sala Penélope for two full nights. Twenty-five bands, fourteen DJs, doors from 6pm on Friday. Headliners are The 69 Eyes (Finland), She Past Away (Turkey), and Front Line Assembly (Canada) — gothic rock, post-punk, dark wave and electro-industrial across the board. It is, in the finest possible sense, a completely different evening from what’s happening in the English Zone twenty minutes away. Capacity is limited, so don’t assume the door is an option. 18+ only.
📅 Friday 19 – Wednesday 24 June | Coming Up
Fogueres de Sant Joan — San Juan Festival
Benidorm beaches and city | Free
Consider this your advance notice. Six days of bonfires, parades, fireworks and beach celebrations marking the summer solstice — with the centrepiece on the night of 23 June, when bonfires are lit on the beach at midnight in a tradition that has been going for centuries. It is spectacular, it is free, and visitors who time a late June trip around it tend not to regret the decision.
Tonight’s Entertainment
From gothic headliners to Michael Jackson Thursdays to a Valencian club music tribute next weekend, Benidorm’s evening programme remains, as ever, completely unreasonable in terms of what’s available.
🎭 Elements — Benidorm Palace
Tuesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday | Dinner from 20:30; show from 22:00 | Benidorm Palace
Still the resort’s flagship night out. If ELEMENTS hasn’t made your list yet, this week is as good a time as any — it runs all summer, and booking ahead rather than hoping for the door remains strongly advisable.
🎭 Michael Jackson Tribute — Miguel Concha
Every Thursday, now through to late August | NOVA, Benidorm | Check venue for times
A full Michael Jackson tribute performance every Thursday throughout the summer. This week’s pick is Thursday 28 May — a solid mid-week option for anyone wanting live entertainment without the full Palace commitment. Thriller sounds different in 22-degree heat. Better, if anything.
🎭 Dark City Fest
Friday 29 – Saturday 30 May | From 18:00 | Discoteca Penélope | Ticketed
Two nights, fourteen DJs, twenty-five bands — best experienced dressed entirely in black. Full details in What’s On above. Tickets in advance; limited capacity.
One for next weekend: Homenaje a la Ruta 90s & 2MIL at Auditorio Julio Iglesias, Saturday 6 June. A tribute evening to the legendary Ruta del Bakalao — the Valencian club circuit that defined Spanish electronic music in the 1990s and early 2000s. If you know what the Ruta was, you’re already sold.
☀️ Weather Watch — May 2026
Late May is doing exactly what you want it to do. Warm days, nine hours of sunshine, and evenings that cool just enough to make a terrace dinner genuinely pleasant rather than sticky. The sea is sitting at 18°C — swimmable, provided you commit on the way in rather than hovering at ankle-depth for ten minutes.
Highs: 22°C Lows: 12°C Sun: ~9 hrs/day
Rain days: ~8 this month Sea: 18°C
What to pack: Light cotton for the days, and a cardigan or thin layer for evenings — the temperature drops noticeably once the sun goes down, and the English Zone catches a breeze. High-factor sunscreen is non-negotiable; the UV index in late May is high, and British skin in Spanish sunshine has a tendency to make its feelings known at volume. Sunglasses, a hat, and swimwear. The sea is perfectly swimmable. Go in without thinking too hard about it.
❓ You Asked…
Q: Do I need to book a private transfer from Alicante, or is there a cheaper option?
You don’t need to — and for most independent travellers, the ALSA coach service from Alicante airport is the sensible choice. It runs regularly, it’s air-conditioned, and it costs a fraction of what a private transfer charges. Private transfers earn their money when you’re travelling as a family with serious amounts of luggage, arriving on a late-night flight, or simply can’t face waiting around — in those cases, the convenience is worth the difference. Otherwise, the coach is straightforward and reliable. One thing worth checking before you travel if you’re considering car hire: there has been some confusion in the forums recently around international driving permits. Worth confirming whether your licence requires one before you get to the rental desk, rather than discovering it when you’re tired, laden, and losing your patience.
Q: Which bars in Benidorm actually show British sport?
The English Zone is your answer, and it has been for approximately thirty years. The bars along that strip screen UK football, rugby, cricket and everything else throughout the season without exception — you will not struggle to find somewhere showing a Premier League match, a test, or, as several forum visitors have been asking this week, a Scottish Cup Final. The mildly entertaining aspect of all this is that a fair number of these screens are watched with perfectly good Mediterranean sunshine visible through the pub window. A fully air-conditioned British sports bar, in Spain, in May. Benidorm remains, in the finest possible sense, entirely itself.
🔥 Hot Topic
A €3.4 million penthouse in Benidorm. So — has the resort changed?
A decade ago, suggesting that Benidorm would one day host Europe’s most expensive new residential tower would have produced a particular kind of smile. And yet this week, a penthouse on the 63rd floor has sold for nearly three million pounds, the dominant buyer group is Eastern European, and the tower itself will be taller than anything currently standing in the Western European residential market.
Whether this changes Benidorm as a destination is, honestly, a different question — and the honest answer is probably: not in any way you’ll notice on your trip. The English Zone and the Old Town have coexisted cheerfully for years. The Palace and the €4.50 full English have never been in competition. A 230-metre tower rising above Poniente doesn’t alter the character of the strip any more than the In Tempo building beside it did. Benidorm has always been several very different resorts occupying the same stretch of coastline. It’s just that description is now more literally true than it used to be.
What the TM Tower story does suggest is that Benidorm’s long-term trajectory is firmly upward — in ambition, in international profile, and now, rather demonstrably, in altitude.
🍽️ Eat & Drink
This week’s tip: try the other end of the beach
The most animated discussion on the Benidorm forums this week isn’t the nightlife, the events, or the new skyscraper. It’s lunch. Specifically, the chiringuito and beachside restaurant scene along Poniente Beach and the La Cala area has been generating an unusually warm consensus: better-value fresh fish, a more relaxed atmosphere, and genuinely good sunset views at prices that compare well with the main Levante strip.
No single venue dominates the recommendations — it’s more of a general area tip from visitors who’ve been coming here long enough to know the difference. If your default for lunch is wherever’s nearest to the hotel, consider this a nudge to walk a bit further one afternoon. The fish tends to be worth it.
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That’s Issue 61 done. Europe’s tallest residential tower rising on Poniente, Dark City Fest arriving at Sala Penélope this Friday, San Juan bonfires on the beach in less than a month, and a strong case for walking a bit further to find your lunch. A thoroughly decent week to be in Benidorm.
Next week we’ll have a closer look at what’s shaping up as one of the busiest June weekends in the resort’s recent history, plus the full build-up to San Juan. If you have tips, questions, or news, send them to glyn@benidormoldtown.co.uk — we read everything, and the best questions end up in these pages.
Until next time — keep the sun on your face and the sangria cold. ☀️
— The Benidorm Bulletin Team
