The 14 Most Stunning Deserts in The World

A vast valley of red sand and towering sandstone mountains so otherworldly it has stood in for Mars in multiple films, including The Martian and The Rise of Skywalker.

Bedouin-guided 4x4 tours and camel treks weave between weathered rock arches, ancient petroglyphs, and canyons, ending most days at a Bedouin camp under some of the darkest skies in the Middle East.

The scale and silence of the place are as striking as its colour.

Sossusvlei is a salt and clay pan in the Namib-Naukluft National Park in Namibia, surrounded by massive red sand dunes — among the tallest in the world at over 300 metres.

The dead white camelthorn trees in the Deadvlei pan, set against deep orange sand and cobalt sky, have become one of Africa's most iconic landscapes.

A sea of orange dunes rising up to 150 metres at the edge of the Sahara, the most accessible major dune field in Morocco and the base for camel treks and overnight desert camps.

The dunes shift constantly with the wind, and sunrise and sunset turn the sand from deep gold to burnt red.

Nights in a Berber camp under an unpolluted sky are as much the draw as the dunes themselves.

A surreal expanse of chalk-white rock formations near Farafra Oasis, carved by millennia of sand-wind erosion into shapes resembling mushrooms, camels, and icebergs scattered across pale desert sand.

Camping overnight among the formations, with no artificial light for miles, is the main way to see it - the white rock glows almost blue under a full moon.

It remains one of the least-visited major landscapes in Egypt outside the Nile corridor.

One of the hottest, lowest, and strangest inhabited places on Earth, a volcanic depression over 100 metres below sea level where sulphur springs bubble in acid-yellow and electric-green pools beside the active Erta Ale lava lake.

Camel caravans still cross the adjoining Danakil salt flats to mine slabs of salt by hand, much as they have for centuries.

The colours and scale look almost entirely artificial, which is exactly why people make the brutal trip.

Death Valley National Park in California and Nevada is the lowest, driest, and hottest place in North America, where summer temperatures regularly exceed 50 degrees Celsius.

Yet within its 13,600 square kilometres lies extraordinary scenery — from the salt flats of Badwater Basin to the colourful Artist's Palette hills and the vast sand dunes of Mesquite Flat.

The largest continuous sand desert on Earth, an ocean of dunes covering an area bigger than France across the southern Arabian Peninsula.

Some dunes rise over 250 metres, their ridgelines shifting constantly and revealing fossilised lakebeds and ancient artefacts as the sand moves.

Overnight desert camps run by Bedouin-guided outfitters, mostly out of Saudi Arabia's Empty Quarter fringes, are the realistic way to experience its scale without a full expedition crossing.

A vast, sparsely populated expanse of rock desert and singing sand dunes stretching across southern Mongolia, home to the towering Khongoryn Els dunes, dinosaur fossil beds at the Flaming Cliffs, and nomadic families still living in traditional gers.

The scale is almost incomprehensible - days of driving between landmarks across open steppe with barely another vehicle in sight.

It rewards travellers looking for genuine remoteness over polished infrastructure.

Golden dunes rolling out from Jaisalmer, the "Golden City," whose sandstone fort and havelis seem to rise directly from the sand itself.

Camel safaris into the Sam and Khuri dunes, overnight desert camps, and folk music around the campfire are the standard way to experience it, with the dunes turning deep gold at sunset.

It's India's most accessible desert experience, easily combined with Jaisalmer's fort and old city.

A vast field of parallel red sand dunes stretching across central Australia's outback, crossed by one of the country's classic 4x4 adventure routes via the notoriously steep Big Red dune outside Birdsville.

The dunes run in improbably straight lines for hundreds of kilometres, turning deep crimson at sunset against a sky with almost zero light pollution.

Crossing it is a genuine expedition, not a casual day out - self-sufficiency and proper 4x4 preparation are essential.

A semi-arid expanse of red sand and scrubby grassland covering much of Botswana, home to the Central Kalahari Game Reserve's black-maned lions, meerkats, and San Bushmen communities with millennia-old tracking traditions.

It lacks the dune drama of the Sahara or Namib, but its vast, flat horizons and dark, unpolluted skies make for some of the best stargazing safaris in Africa.

Wildlife encounters here feel genuinely remote rather than staged.

A dry tropical forest turned badlands, its grey and red-clay canyons carved into labyrinths of eroded pinnacles that look more like Utah than South America.

Split into a red zone (Cuzco) and a grey zone (Los Hoyos), it's one of the best stargazing spots in Colombia thanks to an astronomical observatory built specifically to take advantage of its clear, unpolluted skies.

Walking trails wind between the formations without requiring any technical hiking experience.

Isolated deep in Egypt's Western Desert near the Libyan border, Siwa is a genuine oasis town of mudbrick ruins, freshwater springs and palm groves surrounded by dunes, significant enough that Alexander the Great made the arduous journey to consult its oracle temple.

The ruined hilltop fortress of Shali, built entirely from local salt-clay, dominates the town, while nearby salt lakes and hot and cold springs offer a stark contrast.

Huacachina is a small palm-ringed lagoon swallowed by towering sand dunes on the edge of the Peruvian desert, a short detour off the Pan-American Highway.

The village is just a few streets and a handful of hostels around the lagoon; dune buggies and sandboarding on the surrounding dunes are the real draw.

It's a loud, high-energy stop rather than a place with much depth.