The bay faces south towards the English Channel, its shoreline is 260 yards (240 m) in length.

[1] The bay has a rocky and exposed shoreline with areas of shingle and a storm beach formed from large pebbles.

It is backed by cliffs composed of landslide debris from the Upper Greensand and Chalk.

During the winter of 2019/2020 a large rotational landslide took place in the cliff face in the central section of the bay.

According to author Adrian Searle in his 2016 book Churchill's Last Wartime Secret: the 1943 German raid airbrushed from history Woody Bay is the purported landing site of a covert commando raid by German forces during the Second World War with the aim of retrieving equipment and prisoners from the nearby site of RAF St Lawrence.