Iceland Waterfall Road Trip: 14 Ring Road Falls in Driving Order

Short answer

Driving anticlockwise from Reykjavík, 14 named waterfalls sit on or just off Route 1 — the first five within 142 km of the city. Only three are visible from the road itself (Skógafoss, Foss á Síðu, Goðafoss); the rest need a signed turn-off, and the table below gives the road number for each one. Just two stops cost you real time: Svartifoss and Hengifoss, the tallest on the route at 128 m, are each about 90 minutes of walking there and back. Nothing here needs a 4x4.

Ring Road (R1) openHighlands: 1 of 7 monitored roads closed or impassableVegagerðin, updated just now

The Ring Road waterfalls in driving order — anticlockwise from Reykjavík

#	Waterfall	Region	Turn off at	Coordinates	Height	Leg
1	Urriðafoss	South Coast	Route 1, then a short signed track	63.9249, -20.6719	6 m	67 km
2	Seljalandsfoss	South Coast	Route 249 off Route 1	63.6155, -19.9882	60 m	48 km
3	Gljúfrabúi	South Coast	Route 249 — same car park	63.6208, -19.9863	40 m	1 km
4	Skógafoss	South Coast	Route 1, signed turn-off	63.5321, -19.5113	60 m	25 km
5	Kvernufoss	South Coast	Skógar folk museum, off Route 1	63.5287, -19.4805	30 m	2 km
6	Foss á Síðu	South Coast	Visible from Route 1	63.8561, -17.8694	Not recorded	87 km
7	Svartifoss	South Coast	Route 998 to Skaftafell, off Route 1	64.0277, -16.9753	20 m	48 km
8	Hengifoss	East Iceland	Route 931 off Route 1, near Egilsstaðir	65.0952, -14.8897	128 m	155 km
9	Litlanesfoss	East Iceland	Route 931 — same trail	65.0837, -14.8831	30 m	1 km
10	Dettifoss	North Iceland	Route 862 north off Route 1	65.8143, -16.3844	44 m	107 km
11	Selfoss	North Iceland	Route 862 — same car park	65.8054, -16.3880	10 m	1 km
12	Goðafoss	North Iceland	Route 1, signed pull-in	65.6828, -17.5506	12 m	55 km
13	Hraunfossar	West Iceland	Route 518 via Borgarfjörður	64.7026, -20.9806	Not recorded	194 km
14	Barnafoss	West Iceland	Route 518 — same car park	64.7018, -20.9737	10 m	0 km

The “leg” column is the straight-line distance from the previous stop, computed from the coordinates — it tells you how the stops are spaced, not how far you drive. Added up with the run home it comes to about 867 km, against a Ring Road that is roughly 1,320 km of actual tarmac. That missing 453 km or so is the fjords the road wraps around, the turn-offs to the falls, and the general refusal of Icelandic geography to lie flat. Any itinerary quoting straight-line numbers as drive distances will have you arriving somewhere in the dark.

Coordinates are decimal degrees, WGS-84. Paste a pair into a phone map or the rental sat-nav; they point at the waterfall, which at Svartifoss and Hengifoss is a long walk from where you park.

The whole loop, with every fall on it

These 14 stops on the same interactive map as every other place we hold — so you can see what else is beside each one before you commit a day to it.

Ring Road fallsOpen the waterfall map

Should you drive it clockwise or anticlockwise?

For waterfalls, anticlockwise. Heading east out of Reykjavík puts Urriðafoss, Seljalandsfoss, Gljúfrabúi, Skógafoss and Kvernufoss inside the first 142 km, so day one is the day you came for. The next real cluster is Dettifoss and Goðafoss in the north, most of a loop later.

The case for clockwise is crowds, not scenery: you hit the South Coast at the end, having spent the early days on quieter roads, and you tend to stay a step ahead of the coach traffic. Both directions visit the same falls. Read the table bottom-to-top if you go that way.

One thing that is not a matter of preference: the two Borgarfjörður falls, Hraunfossar and Barnafoss, are on Route 518 rather than Route 1. Anticlockwise they are your last stop before the city, which works nicely. Clockwise they are your first, an hour in, before you have properly started — and in that direction plenty of people skip them and regret it.

What each stop actually costs you

This is where prose itineraries mislead, because they give a day plan and not a cost per stop. Most of these falls are a car park and a short walk — you can add five of them to a driving day without noticing. Two cannot be squeezed.

Effort per stop — the part that decides your day, not the distance

Waterfall	What it takes	Why it is on the route
Urriðafoss	Car park, two minutes on foot	Iceland's highest-volume fall by flow, and almost everyone drives past it in the first hour.
Seljalandsfoss	Paved car park, paid; a few minutes on foot	The walk-behind one. Path round the back usually shut October to April.
Gljúfrabúi	Wade a shallow stream into a canyon	600 m from Seljalandsfoss and completely hidden. Waterproof boots.
Skógafoss	Car park, five minutes; stairs if you want the top	Sixty metres tall and about as wide. The one most first trips remember.
Kvernufoss	15-minute walk up a small canyon	1.5 km from Skógafoss, with a fraction of the people. Walk behind this one too.
Foss á Síðu	Lay-by. You do not get out if you do not want to	Falls off a cliff behind a turf-roofed farm. In a south-westerly the wind blows it sideways.
Svartifoss	Roughly 45 minutes uphill each way	Black basalt columns framing the drop — the ones Hallgrímskirkja borrowed.
Hengifoss	Steep 2.5 km hike each way	The tallest fall on this route at 128 m, striped with red clay bands.
Litlanesfoss	On the way up to Hengifoss	Basalt columns like organ pipes. You pass it whether you meant to or not.
Dettifoss	Car park, then 10–15 minutes over rock	The one you feel through the ground before you see it. West bank is the paved side.
Selfoss	Short walk upstream from Dettifoss	Wide and low, on the same river. Skipping it makes no sense once you have parked.
Goðafoss	Car park, two minutes	A horseshoe right beside the road, and the easiest big fall in the country to visit.
Hraunfossar	Car park and a boardwalk	Not one fall but a whole lava field seeping cold blue water into the river.
Barnafoss	A few minutes along the boardwalk	Violent where Hraunfossar is gentle. Last stop before Reykjavík.

Svartifoss (roughly 45 minutes uphill from the Skaftafell visitor centre) and Hengifoss (a steep 2.5 km each way) are the two that eat a morning. Everything else is a stop, not an excursion. If your trip is tight, those are the two to drop — and Hengifoss is the one worth keeping, because at 128 m it is the tallest fall on this route and the red clay bands in the cliff behind it are not like anything else on the loop.

Before each leg, not just at the start of the trip: today’s road conditions and can I drive there today?. Route 862 to Dettifoss and the east-fjord roads are the two places on this list where a bad forecast changes the plan rather than just the view.

Frequently
asked questions

Which waterfalls are on Iceland's Ring Road?

Going anticlockwise from Reykjavík: Urriðafoss, Seljalandsfoss, Gljúfrabúi, Skógafoss and Kvernufoss on the South Coast; Foss á Síðu and Svartifoss in the south-east; Hengifoss and Litlanesfoss in the east; Dettifoss, Selfoss and Goðafoss in the north; and Hraunfossar with Barnafoss on the run back through Borgarfjörður. Goðafoss, Skógafoss and Foss á Síðu are the ones actually visible from Route 1 — the rest need a signed turn-off, and the table on this page gives the road number for each.

How many days do you need for a waterfall road trip in Iceland?

Seven is the comfortable minimum for the full loop, which is the same answer as for the Ring Road generally — see our how-long-to-drive guide for the reasoning. Waterfalls do not change the arithmetic much, because most of these stops cost you 10 to 30 minutes. The two that do are Svartifoss and Hengifoss, each roughly 90 minutes of walking there and back. Budget those two as half a morning apiece and the rest as coffee stops.

Should you drive the Ring Road clockwise or anticlockwise for waterfalls?

Anticlockwise — east from Reykjavík along the South Coast — puts five waterfalls in your first day and Skógafoss and Seljalandsfoss in the first two hours of real driving. That is the right order if the falls are why you came. The argument for clockwise is crowds: you reach the busy South Coast at the end of the trip and stay ahead of the coach tours earlier on. Either way the list is the same, just reversed.

Do you need a 4x4 for the Ring Road waterfalls?

No. Every stop on this page is reachable on paved or well-graded roads in a 2WD in summer, including Dettifoss's west bank on Route 862. None of them needs an F-road. A 4x4 becomes the right answer if you add the Highlands falls — Háifoss and Aldeyjarfoss are both off this loop and both on gravel — or if you are driving in winter, when the argument is about grip rather than clearance.

Can you drive the Ring Road waterfall route in winter?

The loop stays open most of the winter, but individual sections close for hours or days in storms, and that changes the trip from a route into a daily decision. Two specifics for this list: the path behind Seljalandsfoss is usually roped off from October to April because of ice and falling icicles, and the Dettifoss road 862 has a winter service level that can leave it unploughed. Check the live line at the top of this page before each leg, not just at the start of the trip.

How long is the Ring Road?

About 1,320 km around, without detours. The straight-line legs in the table on this page add up to roughly 870 km — that gap of some 450 km is the fjords the road goes round, the turn-offs to the falls themselves, and the fact that no road in Iceland goes where a crow would. Treat the straight-line numbers as spacing between stops, never as driving distance.