Floating in the Dead Sea is one of those experiences you have to live to believe. You walk into the warm, dense water, lean back and, without doing anything, your body rises to the surface and stays there, like a cork, impossible to sink. There's so much salt (almost ten times more than in the ocean) that it holds you up effortlessly, and the classic image is the traveller floating on their back with an open newspaper in their hands. You're also at the lowest point on dry land on the entire planet: 430 metres below sea level, at the bottom of the great Jordan Valley.
The Jordanian side of the Dead Sea, in the Sweimeh area less than an hour from Amman, is the perfect place to enjoy it in comfort. Along the shore you'll find the big resorts with spas and pools, the cheaper public beaches and the pits of black mineral mud that people smear over themselves from head to toe, leave to dry in the sun and then rinse off in the salty water. Dead Sea mud and salts, extremely rich in minerals, are famous worldwide for their benefits for the skin, and a whole cosmetics industry has grown up around them.
This guide helps you plan your visit: how to get there from Amman or Madaba, the difference between paying for a day at a resort and going to a public beach, what each option costs, the essential precautions (don't put your head under, don't shave beforehand, take care with your eyes and any cuts), the best time of day to float and how to combine the Dead Sea with Wadi Mujib, Bethany or Madaba. It's a unique, therapeutic and very photogenic place, ideal for a day or two of relaxation on a Jordan itinerary.
The Dead Sea, called Al Bahr al Mayyit in Arabic, is a landlocked lake at the bottom of the Jordan Rift Valley, fed by the Jordan River and with no outlet: water only leaves through evaporation, which is why its salinity is so extreme (around 34%, almost ten times that of the ocean) that no fish can live in it. Hence the name. It's a place full of history and biblical stories: tradition places the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah on its shores, Bethany Beyond the Jordan (the site of Jesus's baptism) is very close by, and its salts and bitumen have been exploited since ancient times; the Egyptians used its asphalt for embalming, and Herod the Great had one of history's first 'spas' here. Today the Dead Sea faces a serious problem: its level drops by around a metre a year because the Jordan River and its tributaries are diverted for drinking water and irrigation, which shrinks the lake and opens sinkholes along its shores. Its geological, biblical and environmental history is told on our history page.
Read the full history ↓The great Rift depression: the lowest point on Earth at the Dead Sea, the mosaic city of Madaba, Moses' Mount Nebo and the canyons that run down to the valley.
Read the history of The Jordan Valley and the Dead Sea →They depart from Jerusalen, 34 km away. If you book from this link we earn a commission and you pay no more.
No exact prices: a scale from $ (budget) to $$$$$ (luxury), with 2-3 options per category.
Origins, formation and what the sources say.
The Dead Sea isn't a sea but a lake, and it isn't dead by chance but because of its own extreme nature. It sits at the bottom of the Great Rift Valley, a huge fracture in the Earth's crust that runs from Syria to East Africa and here forms the deepest depression on the planet. Its surface lies about 430 metres below sea level, and it drops further every year. It is, without question, the lowest point of dry land anywhere on the globe. Nobody can stand on dry ground lower than the shore of the Dead Sea.
The lake formed hundreds of thousands of years ago, when this tectonic trough filled with water. Because it is hemmed in by mountains and has no outlet to the ocean, it works like a giant evaporator. It takes in water from the Jordan River and a few springs, but the water can only leave by evaporating under the scorching sun of the depression. As the water evaporated and the salts stayed behind, century after century, the lake built up an extraordinary salinity: around 34%, almost ten times that of the ocean. That huge density is what lets swimmers float without any effort.
That same extreme salinity gives the lake its name. No fish and almost no other organisms can live in its waters, only a few adapted bacteria and microorganisms. Hence the 'Dead Sea'. The water is dense and oily to the touch, very rich in magnesium chloride, sodium, potassium, calcium and bromine, and its shores are covered in crusts and formations of crystallised salt. All around is pure desert, with the mountains of Moab on one side and those of Judea on the other. Geologically, there is nowhere else like it in the world.
Few places in the world are as full of biblical stories as the shores of the Dead Sea. Jewish and Christian tradition places the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah in this region. Genesis tells how they were destroyed by 'fire and brimstone' as punishment for the wickedness of their people. The story of Lot's wife, who turned into a pillar of salt when she looked back while fleeing the disaster, has long been linked to the salt formations at the southern end of the lake. A salt column there is still pointed out today as 'Lot's wife'.
The Dead Sea and its surroundings appear again and again in the scriptures. Close by, tradition places the cave where Lot took refuge after the destruction of Sodom. David spent part of his life in the surrounding desert while fleeing King Saul, and prophets and hermits moved through these dry lands. Later, in Roman times, the fortress of Masada was built on a rock outcrop above the western side of the lake. It was the scene of the last, tragic stand of Jewish resistance against Rome in 73-74 AD.
On the shore, by the Jordan River where it flows into the lake, lies Bethany Beyond the Jordan (Al-Maghtas). Christian tradition places the baptism of Jesus by John the Baptist here, and it is now a World Heritage Site. And in the caves along the northwestern shore, on what is today the Israeli side, the famous Dead Sea Scrolls were found in the mid-20th century. They are the oldest known biblical manuscripts. It's hard to find so much sacred history packed into so few kilometres.
Since ancient times, the Dead Sea has been a place of wealth as well as legend. Its waters and shores produced two goods that the ancient world wanted badly. The first was bitumen, or natural asphalt, which rose to the surface of the lake in large floating blocks. The peoples of the region collected it and sold it. The ancient Egyptians used it, among other things, to embalm mummies. It was so typical of the lake that the Greeks and Romans called it 'Lake Asphaltites', the lake of asphalt.
The second treasure was balsam, a fragrant medicinal resin grown in nearby oases such as Ein Gedi and Jericho, and worth its weight in gold. Ancient kings and queens fought over these plantations. Cleopatra, queen of Egypt, is said to have obtained the balsam gardens of the area from Mark Antony. The warm, dry climate, the lake's minerals and these products made the region rich and strategic.
The Dead Sea was also one of the first 'health' destinations in history. In the 1st century BC, King Herod the Great was already using its waters, its mineral muds and the nearby hot springs (such as those of Callirhoe, today Hammamat Ma'in) as a kind of spa to treat skin and body complaints. That old belief in the healing power of its minerals still drives the spas and the Dead Sea cosmetics industry today: muds, salts and creams sold all over the world.
Today the Dead Sea is going through a quiet but serious crisis: it is drying up. Over the last few decades its level has fallen faster and faster, by around a metre a year, and its surface has shrunk dramatically since the mid-20th century. The shore a swimmer walks on today is much further out than the one their grandparents knew. The main cause is human. The Jordan River, which feeds the lake, and its tributaries are diverted more and more for drinking water and irrigation in Jordan, Israel and Syria, so only a fraction of the old flow now reaches the Dead Sea. On top of that, industrial mineral extraction evaporates water from the lake in enormous pools.
The effects are visible and dangerous. As the water pulls back, the exposed ground becomes unstable. Sinkholes suddenly open along the shores, mostly on the Israeli side but on the Jordanian side too, swallowing roads, farmland and buildings. Areas that were coastline not long ago have turned into a landscape of retreat and abandonment. That's why it matters so much to float only at organised, safe beaches and not to wander along 'wild' shores.
Ambitious projects have been proposed to stop the decline, such as the so-called 'Two Seas Canal' or 'Red Sea–Dead Sea' project, which would bring water from the Red Sea to the Dead Sea. But they are expensive, complex and politically sensitive, and their future is uncertain. Meanwhile this unique place, the lowest on Earth and rich in history and minerals, keeps shrinking year after year. It is one of the clearest examples of how water use can change a landscape that has lasted for millennia.
Despite its environmental crisis, the Dead Sea is still one of the top attractions in Jordan and the whole Middle East. On the Jordanian side, the Sweimeh strip, less than an hour from Amman, has grown into a hub of luxury spa resorts, cheaper public beaches and wellness centres that make use of the lake's minerals. Every year, travellers from all over the world come for the unmistakable experience of floating in its waters, covering themselves in black mud and enjoying its sunsets.
This tourism has two drivers. One is the unique and unusual experience of floating, which you can have almost nowhere else on the planet (only in comparable hypersaline lakes, such as the Great Salt Lake or some lakes of the Altiplano). The other is the healing reputation of its minerals. The mud, the salts and the special air of the depression, which is denser, richer in oxygen and filters out ultraviolet rays, are considered good for skin conditions such as psoriasis. They support a whole cosmetics and health tourism industry.
For travellers, the Dead Sea is above all a place to relax and a change of pace on a Jordan trip: a break of spa, pool and floating between the intensity of Petra, the Wadi Rum desert and the cities. It's easy to combine with nearby sites full of history, such as the baptism site at Bethany, the mosaic city of Madaba, Mount Nebo, where Moses saw the Promised Land, or the adventure canyon of Wadi Mujib. Floating at the lowest point on Earth, with two thousand years of biblical history around you and a golden sunset over the water, is one of those experiences you never forget.
