Can I ride on the beach with 32c tires?

I haven’t seen the beach, or tried to cycle on one. I have at least cycled through numerous sandpits, a common obstacle in cyclocross races (and traditional CX tires are 32-34mm wide).

I would guess that you mean the sand is somewhat compacted. You could certainly try it, but I would guess that the sand may not be compacted enough, and your tires might dig in to it. This would probably make it considerably harder to cycle through the sand.

I don’t know what your area is like, but many off-road trails with hard packed crushed limestone or gravel can easily be traversed on 32mm tires. The ones without loose gravel can even be ridden on traditional road bikes.

Yes on hard sand it should be fine. The problem is what if it is not hard or there are patches of dust. At that point it will be a bit more tricky. The good part is you are on a bike and on sand. So if you fall it is not a big deal, and if you find yourself getting stuck you can walk sections.

You may consider lowering your tire pressure too as that works for cars and fat bikes on loose terrain because it increases the contact patch (i.e. lowers the pounds per inch on the tire to the sand, which makes you less likely to dig into the sand).

Note - Depending on how often you ride in wet/sandy conditions you may want to proactively upgrade your bottom bracket bearing to a sealed one. I did on my Trek road bike which has a notoriously fragile bottom bracket bearing/seal. For your Merida it may not be much of an issue as long as you keep the area between the peddles and frame relatively clean on a regular basis.

Beach races are quite standard, but there's a difference between soft and hard. There is nothing very complicated about bringing a vehicle over sand, and no strict cut-off point.

However this is a very pure beach racing bike

https://www.koga.com/en/bikes/race/collection-2018/beachracer.htm

It's a 10kg racing/CX bike with discs and Schwalbe 62mm (2.35") Big One tyres

This tyre is very specifically designed for beach racing.

https://www.bicyclerollingresistance.com/mtb-reviews/schwalbe-big-one-2016

"The Schwalbe Big One is a mountain bike tire designed for beach racing. Because of the beach racing requirements, the Big One has a huge volume, minimal profile and an extremely low weight for its size. "

It might be easier to fit wide tyres to a MTB in that they usually have that kind of clearance, but 2"+ tyres are a minimum really

https://road.cc/content/feature/105242-beach-slapped

Riders report pressures as low as 4 psi, which means tubeless is sensible, but I think the exact pressure depends on the sand but certainly won't be anywhere close to the pressure you'd run a 32c tyre at.

There are some more tips here

https://fatbikeplanet.com/5-best-fat-bike-tires-for-sand-riding-2020/

Performance of tires on sand mostly depends on tire pressure: The pressure in the tire is almost the same as the pressure that your tire applies to the sand.

32 millimeter tires are generally ridden with pressures around 5 to 6 bar, and that's likely too much for wet sand. Sand may be much stronger when its wet, but 6 kilograms per square centimeter are quite a bit. Unless the sand is of the kind that you find at beaches which are amenable to drive cars on, I wouldn't try with such a slim tire.

That said, if you want to ride your bike on sand and don't want to swap tires, you can reduce its air pressure to the rated minimum. As I said, that pressure is the pressure that you apply to the sand, so minimum air in your tire may allow you to ride on sand that you couldn't cross with high pressure.

Of course, if you want to ride on sand regularly, use the widest tires that will fit your frame. Or buy a mountain bike for this.