Tenerife works well for families for reasons that have nothing to do with marketing. The flight is four hours from most of northern Europe. The sea is swimmable every month of the year. The two big parks are genuinely good rather than merely large. And self-catering apartments are the default here rather than the exception, which changes the economics of feeding a family for a week.
What follows assumes you are staying in the south, because most families do and because the parks and the swimmable beaches are there.
Siam Park is the one to spend money on
Siam Park sits above Costa Adeje and is routinely rated the best water park in the world, which for once is not a claim the park invented about itself.
The scale of it is the point: a wave pool that produces genuine surf, a lazy river the length of a small town, and a set of slides that get progressively less suitable for the nervous. The Tower of Power drops almost vertically through a shark tank, and the queue for it is full of people quietly deciding to go and look at something else.
Two practical things. Buy tickets ahead: the gate queue is long and the online price is lower. And go early, because the popular slides build hour-long queues by midday and half the park is empty at ten.
For a family with children old enough to swim confidently, this is the best single day on the island.
Loro Parque, and the reason it needs a decision
Loro Parque is in Puerto de la Cruz, an hour and a half away in the north, and it is a serious zoological collection: the world's largest parrot collection, a penguin house, gorillas, and an aquarium.
It also keeps orcas and dolphins and runs shows with them, which a lot of families now feel differently about than they did twenty years ago. That is a decision to make before booking rather than at the turnstile with children already excited.
If you go, the combined Loro Parque and Siam Park ticket is meaningfully cheaper than two separate gates and forces a day in the north, which is worth having anyway.
Tours and Things to Do in Tenerife
Whale watching, Teide, boat trips, walking tours and day trips across the island and out to La Gomera, via GetYourGuide.
Siam Park entry ticket
The water park above Costa Adeje, and a large part of why families pick this coast at all.
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Loro Parque entry ticket
The parrot and marine park at Puerto de la Cruz, and the main reason to give the north a whole day.
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Loro Parque and Siam Park on one ticket
Both parks on one purchase, cheaper than two gates and a reason to cross to the north.
Check availabilityWhich beaches suit small children
Not all of them, and the difference matters.
Playa de las Vistas, at Los Cristianos, is the safest choice in the south: imported pale sand, a breakwater that keeps the water flat, a gentle shelf, and lifeguards. It is the one to use with toddlers.
Playa del Duque at Costa Adeje is the smart end, calm and well served, with the sunbed and restaurant infrastructure that makes a long day with children possible.
Playa de las Teresitas, outside Santa Cruz in the north-east, is the best beach on the island and the water is protected by a reef. It is an hour and a half from the southern resorts, so it is a day trip rather than an afternoon.
Avoid the exposed northern beaches with young children. Black sand gets extremely hot underfoot by midday and the Atlantic swell on that coast is not a paddling sea.
Teide with children
The cable car works from about six upwards, and the effect of standing on a volcano above the clouds is not lost on anyone.
Manage two things. The altitude is real and small children tire fast in thin air, so keep the time at the top short. And the temperature at the base station is often fifteen degrees below the coast, so pack accordingly rather than driving up in swimming costumes.
The summit permit walk is not suitable for children and is not the part you are going for.
The rest of the week
Whale and dolphin watching works from about five upwards. Pick a catamaran rather than a speedboat, go in the morning when the sea is flat, and choose an operator that does not chase.
Jungle Park in Arona is smaller and cheaper than the two big parks, with birds of prey flying, and it fills a half day.
The Lago Martiánez pools in Puerto de la Cruz are seawater lidos designed by César Manrique, and they are a good answer to a cloudy northern day.
Pirate boat trips out of Los Cristianos are exactly what they sound like and are aimed squarely at seven-year-olds, who love them.
Where to stay with children
Self-catering is the sensible default and it is what most of the accommodation here is. An apartment with a kitchen removes the tyranny of eating out three times a day with tired children, and the saving over a week is substantial.
Costa Adeje is the calmest of the three southern resorts and has the best beaches for small children, at a price.
Los Cristianos has a real town behind the beach, a flat and walkable centre and Playa de las Vistas, which is the safest water in the south.
Playa de las Américas is the busiest and the youngest, which suits teenagers and does not suit toddlers.
Two things to check before booking anything: which floor and whether there is a lift, because pushchairs and third-floor walk-ups do not combine; and whether the pool is heated, because an unheated pool in January is a pool nobody uses.
Cloudy days and rainy days
The south rarely needs a wet-weather plan. When it does, or when everybody has had enough sun, there are real answers.
Santa Cruz has the Museo de la Naturaleza y Arqueología, which holds Guanche mummies and is more interesting than that sounds, and the Museo de la Ciencia y el Cosmos in La Laguna is built for children and is genuinely good.
The Lago Martiánez pools in Puerto de la Cruz work in cloud, being outdoors but sheltered, and are an attraction in themselves.
Icod de los Vinos has the thousand-year dragon tree and Garachico has rock pools that fill with the tide, and both are fine in overcast weather.
The one to avoid saving for a wet day is Teide. Cloud on the coast often means cloud on the mountain, and paying for a cable car into fog is a bad afternoon.
What people forget to pack
Water shoes. Several of the best beaches and every rock pool are volcanic, and the surfaces are sharp.
A high-factor sunscreen and more of it than usual. The latitude is subtropical and the burn time is much shorter than a northern European summer, particularly on and near water.
A warm layer each. Not for the coast, for Teide, where a family in shorts is a family that turns round at the base station.
Any regular medication in its original packaging. Pharmacies here are excellent and can deal with a great deal without a doctor, but not with a prescription they cannot read.
Eating out with children
Two things to know. Spanish kitchens open late, and a restaurant that starts serving dinner at eight is normal rather than awkward. And Spanish restaurants are relaxed about children in a way that surprises northern European parents: a child moving around a dining room at ten at night attracts no comment at all.
The practical answer for younger children is to eat the main meal at lunch, Spanish-style, and keep the evening light.
Roughly by age
Under four. The beach, the pool and the apartment, and not much else. Playa de las Vistas at Los Cristianos is the right beach. Skip Teide, skip the boats, and do not book a park.
Four to seven. Loro Parque, the pirate boat, the Lago Martiánez pools and the gentler half of Siam Park. Whale watching works from about five if the boat is a catamaran and the trip is short.
Eight to twelve. The best age for this island. Everything at Siam Park, the cable car up Teide, snorkelling, a short walk in Anaga, and the buggies and jet skis that need an adult alongside.
Teenagers. Surf lessons at Playa de las Américas, diving courses, paragliding from Adeje with an instructor, and the water sports at El Médano. This is the point at which the island stops being a compromise and starts being the reason they want to come back.
Practical things worth knowing
Spanish restaurants eat late. A kitchen that opens at eight is normal, and the resort strip has adjusted to visitors but the good places inland have not. Feed small children early and eat properly yourself later, or accept the local timetable.
Self-catering is the default here and it changes the budget substantially. A supermarket run on arrival and breakfast on the balcony saves more over a week than any deal on flights.
Pharmacies are excellent, open long hours and staffed by pharmacists who can advise on minor things without a doctor. The green cross sign is what to look for.
