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Chalk headland in East Sussex, England

Beachy Head is a chalk headland in East Sussex, England. It is situated close to Eastbourne, immediately east of the Seven Sisters. Beachy Head is located within the administrative area of Eastbourne Borough Council which owns the land, forming part of the Eastbourne Downland Estate. The cliff is the highest chalk sea cliff in Britain, rising to above sea level. The peak allows views of the south east coast towards Dungeness in the east, and to the Isle of Wight in the west. LB&SCR H2 class 4 4 2 steam locomotive number 424 (later B424, 2424, and 32424) was named Beachy Head after this landmark.

The chalk was formed in the Late Cretaceous epoch, between 66 and 100 million years ago, when the area was under the sea. During the Cenozoic Era, the chalk was uplifted (see Cenozoic Era). When the last ice age ended, sea levels rose and the English Channel formed, cutting into the chalk to form the dramatic cliffs along the Sussex coast. Wave action contributes to the erosion of cliffs around Beachy Head, which experience frequent small rock falls. Since chalk forms in layers separated by contiguous bands of flints, the physical structure affects how the cliffs erode. Wave action undermines the lower cliffs, causing frequent slab failures – slabs from layers of chalk break off, undermining the upper parts of the cliffs, which eventually collapse. In contrast to small rock falls, mass movements are less common. A mass movement happened in 2001 when, after a winter of heavy rain, the water had begun to seep into the cracks which had frozen and caused the cracks to widen. This then made the cliff edge erode and collapse into the sea, destroying a well known chalk stack called the Devil's Chimney.

The headland has been considered a danger to shipping. In 1831, construction began on the Belle Tout Lighthouse on the next headland west from Beachy Head. Because mist and low clouds could hide the light of Belle Tout, it was decommissioned in 1902, after the Beachy Head Lighthouse had been built in the sea below Beachy Head as a replacement.

The third day of fighting in the Battle of Portland in 1653 took place off Beachy Head during the First Anglo Dutch War. The Battle of Beachy Head in 1690 was a naval engagement during the Nine Years' War. The so called Second Battle of Beachy Head took place over a week in September 1916 during the First World War. Three German U boats sank 30 merchant ships between Beachy Head and the Eddystone. This was despite a major effort involving the Royal Navy and 49 destroyers, 48 torpedo boats, seven 'Q' ships and 468 auxiliaries. During the Second World War, the Royal Air Force (RAF) established a forward relay station at Beachy Head to improve radio communications with aircraft. In 1942, signals were picked up at Beachy Head which were identified as TV transmissions from the Eiffel Tower. The Germans had reactivated the pre war TV transmitter and instituted a Franco German service for military hospitals and VIPs in the Paris region. The RAF monitored these programmes, hoping (in vain) to gather intelligence from newsreels. The area had an important wartime radar station. During the Cold War, a radar control centre was operational in an underground bunker from 1953 to 1957.

West from Belle Tout, the cliffs drop down to Birling Gap, then ascend through the Seven Sisters chalk cliffs to Haven Brow, overlooking the Cuckmere valley. The area is a popular tourist attraction. Birling Gap has a restaurant and, in the summer, multiple ice cream vans serve the area. There are many choices of walking routes.

Estimates of the number of annual deaths at Beachy Head vary from 20 a year to many more. In 2010, it was the third most common suicide spot in the world, after the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco and the Aokigahara Woods in Japan, according to The Wall Street Journal. The Beachy Head Chaplaincy Team conducts regular day and evening patrols of the area in attempts to locate and stop potential cliff jumpers. Workers at the pub and taxi drivers are also on the lookout for people contemplating suicide and there are signs with the telephone number of the Samaritans urging potential jumpers to call them. Eastbourne Borough Council drew media coverage in 2018 for its policy of removing shrines and crosses left at Beachy Head by families of suicide victims. The earliest reports of deaths by suicide at Beachy Head come from the 7th century. Between 1965 and 1979, there were 124 deaths at the location. Of these, S. J. Surtees wrote that 115 of them were "almost certainly" suicides (although a coroner's verdict of suicide was recorded in only 58 cases), and that 61 percent of the victims were from outside East Sussex. After a steady increase in deaths between 2002 and 2005, there were only seven fatalities in 2006, a marked decrease. The Maritime and Coastguard Agency, whose Coastguard Rescue Teams are responsible for the rescue of injured jumpers and the recovery of the dead, attributed the reduction to the work of the Chaplaincy Team and good coverage of services by the local media. At least 26 people died at the site in 2008.

Romantic poet Charlotte Smith's poem Beachy Head, published in 1807, uses the geography of Beachy Head to reflect on the history of England and human nature. Eastbourne born poet Andrew Franks includes a number of references to Beachy Head in his work, including Belle Tout in his collection, The Last of the Great British Traitors. In Howard Jacobson's 2010 Man Booker Prize winning novel, The Finkler Question, the bereaved widower Libor Sevcik commits suicide by jumping off the cliff at Beachy Head. In Richard Jefferies' fine essay 'The Breeze on Beachy Head', first published in the 'Standard' on 6 September 1881 and collected in 'Nature Near London' in 1883.

The cover photo of English avant garde quartet Throbbing Gristle's 1979 record 20 Jazz Funk Greats was taken at Beachy Head. There is also a track named "Beachy Head" on the album. The Cure used the location for the music video of their 1985 single "Close to Me". The location is referenced in the song "Running Wild" on the album Undertow by the British band Drenge. Progressive Celtic rock band Iona included a song titled "Beachy Head" on their 1993 album, Beyond These Shores. Beachy Head was used as a film location for the video of 'Quello Che Faro', an operatic cover of Bryan Adams' "Everything I Do, I Do It For You", recorded by classical crossover artist, Katherine Jenkins on her 2006 album, Serenade. Alternative rock band Nada Surf mentions Beachy Head in "The Fox", a song from their 2008 album Lucky. British indie pop band Veronica Falls released a song titled "Beachy Head" urging people not to commit suicide in September 2010. Canadian band Stars included a song, "Palmistry," taking place at Beachy Head, on their 2022 album "From Capelton Hill."

A photo of Beachy Head was used as a desktop wallpaper on Windows 7.