In search of a subaquatic adventure? The top 19 dive sites in the world are listed below.
It should come as no surprise that there are countless areas to explore in the deeps given that oceans make up more than 70% of the Earth's surface. However, you must know where to search in order to find some of the best scuba diving in the world at accessible depths for leisurely enjoyment (you must also be certified to dive, and PADI can assist with that).
Follow our advice to experience some of the best scuba diving in the world, from colorful coral reefs filled with fish to eerie shipwrecks in the Pacific.
1. The French Polynesian archipelago of Tuamotu
In locations like Bora Bora and Moorea, honeymooners frequently stick to snorkeling in the shallows with rays and reef sharks close to their overwater bungalows. However, experienced certified divers are aware that the Tuamotu Archipelago offers French Polynesia's greatest underwater thrills. Some of the best scuba diving in the world is waiting for you in atoll passes in places like Makarova, Tangaroa, and Tikehau. What may you observe? To name a few, O2 Makarova offers walls of hundreds of grey reef sharks, Tikehau Ocean Tour offers enormous manta rays, and Tangaroa Diving Center offers wild dolphins. Dive diving here isn't even close to being epic.
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2. Palau
Palau is well-known among snorkelers for having Jellyfish Lake. But for scuba diving in a shark sanctuary, divers travel to this isolated outpost of the picture-perfect islands of Micronesia. Among the highlights are well-known diving spots like the German Channel, which attracts manta rays, and the Luong Channel, one of the world's most thrilling drift dives. You can explore less-traveled areas of the Rock Islands by kayaking in Palau. Two of the oldest diving shops in Palau, Sam's Tours and Fish 'n Fins, can take you quickly to the most famous dive location in the country, Blue Corner, where the sheer quantity of marine life—including sharks, enormous schools of fish, rays, and more—has been compared to an underwater Serengeti.
3. Indonesia's Raja Ampath Islands
Raja Ampath in West Papua is the best diving location on earth, and Indonesia is the heart of the best scuba diving in the world, from Bali and Lombok to Sulawesi and Komodo. The diving sites in this isolated area have immaculate coral gardens, an abundance of fish, and beautiful karst landscapes surrounded by clear waters. With coral reefs just outside your bungalow, Midsolo Resort is an amazing place to stay. Additionally, Meridian Adventure offers fantastic homestay and boutique hotel accommodations for divers. The best choices are Damari and Areneid, both traditional Indonesian pines boats, if you want to dive Raja Ampath's wonders on a liveaboard diving boat (where you sleep onboard, dive, eat, and repeat) to get in as much underwater time as possible. When looking for a more yacht-like vessel to dive and tour the area, Aqua Expeditions is a fantastic option.
Maldives 4.
The Maldives offers some of the best scuba diving in the world at locations near North Male Atoll, Baa Atoll, Hanif Aru Bay, Ari Atoll, and beyond, whether you prefer a luxurious stay at sea aboard the incredible liveaboard dive boat, Scuba spa, or prefer an overwater villa at a luxury resort like Hilton Maldives Amangiri Resort & Spa or Jumeirah Maldives Olhahali Island. There are reef sharks, manta rays, and whale sharks (oh my!) in this diving area.
5. Portugal's Azores
The Azores is a gorgeous volcanic archipelago that belongs to Portugal and is located 850 miles from the continent. It is largely surrounded by ocean. So it comes as no surprise that there will be some very amazing diving here. You can travel on the stunning catamaran Water & Wind with Portugal Dive on land-based trips from the islands of Terceira, Pico, and So Miguel to dive with whale sharks, rays, and other ocean marvels.
Tobago 6.
Few Caribbean islands can compare to Tobago in terms of diving excitement. This island is renowned for its drift dives and abundant marine life, which includes a variety of Caribbean and South American species. Divers who are in the know keep the tropical island in the southeast Caribbean on their radar because the dive location Coral Garden is home to one of the biggest brain corals in the world. Set out with the Tobagonian diving team from Tobago Dive Experience to explore distant spots near Saint Giles where you might see scalloped hammerheads and Japanese Gardens, which are home to enormous, robust corals and fans.
Galapagos Islands, No. 7
Even if Darwin's Arch, a famous rock arch, fell in 2021, some of the best scuba diving in the world is still waiting for you when you travel to Ecuador's magnificent Galapagos Islands. To dive with marine life that includes endemic marine iguanas, penguins, sunfish, Galapagos sharks, whale sharks, silky sharks, schooling hammerheads, manta rays, and much more, scuba divers who enjoy being in the water with large animals and don't mind chilly water temperatures that can dip into the 60s board liveaboard dive boats like the Galapagos Sky and Calypsos yacht.
8. Costa Rica's Cocos Islands
More over 340 miles off the Pacific coast of Costa Rica are the Cocos Islands, which are well worth the trip for some of the most exciting diving on the planet. It takes a liveaboard scuba diving boat, such as the Oceanus Aggressor I or Oceanus Aggressor II, 36 hours to go from the mainland city of Puntarenas to this secluded location. The possibility to witness schools hammerheads, manta rays, whale sharks, and other pelagic fish makes the exhausting voyage worthwhile once you get there.
9. Mexico's Socorro and Revillagigedo Islands
To get to these far-flung Mexican islands, a liveaboard diving yacht must make another lengthy journey. Around 240 miles off the southern coast of the Baja California Peninsula are the adjacent volcanic islands of Socorro and Revillagigedo. The area's plankton-rich waters are home to manta rays, silky sharks, humpback whales, and bottlenose dolphins. Leading liveaboard companies like Pacific Fleet and Nautilus Dive Adventures frequently travel to the area.
10. Mexico's Baja California Sur
Go to Baja California Sur for amazing on-land diving in the Sea of Cortez and the Pacific Ocean off the Baja California Peninsula. With Dive Ninja Expeditions, you can dive with sea lions and go whale watching in the waters off Cabo San Lucas. With Red Travel Mexico, you can swim with whale sharks in La Paz. And with Blue Nation, another top dive shop in the area, you might even be able to see blue whales in the waters off Loreto. There is a reason why Jacques Cousteau famously referred to the Sea of Cortez as "the world's aquarium," but you won't understand it unless you go underwater and discover it for yourself.
Eleven. The Bahamas
Gin-clearer seas are difficult to discover than those near the lovely Bahamas. There are numerous reasons why you'll find some of the best scuba diving in the world here, including the stunning reefs of the Exumas, wreck dives near New Providence Island, shark encounters at Grand Bahama's well-known Tiger Beach, and wreck dives surrounding New Providence Island. What's best? You can spend as much money on diving in the Bahamas as you want. The private charter Motor Yacht Loon offers the height of luxury with first-rate onboard diving amenities and a luxury tender to take you and your group from the mothership to the best dive locations in the Exumas and beyond. For a more affordable option, Blackbeard's Cruises is a no-frills liveaboard that guarantees loads of friendship and diving time.
12. United States, The Florida Keys
You only need to drive to the Florida Keys south of Miami to dive along North America's only coral barrier reef. To tour nine shipwrecks along the Florida Keys Wreck Trek, stop by one of the many diving shops along the Overseas Highway (don't miss the wrecks of Spiegel Grove, Eagle, and Vandenberg). There are miles and miles of magnificent coral reefs, which are home to tarpon and barracuda as well as parrot fish, nurse sharks, and sea turtles. There are numerous seasoned dive shops in this area, but Horizon Divers, Islamorada Dive Center, and Captain Hook's are among the best.
13. New Zealand's Poor Knights Islands
Perhaps when you think of New Zealand, scuba diving is not the first thing that springs to mind. But just offshore from the village of Tuukka in the Poor Knights Islands Marine Reserve, a few hours' drive north of Auckland on the North Island, is some of the best subtropical diving in the entire Southern Hemisphere. Join Dive on boat excursions during the day! Jacques Cousteau once ranked Blue Maomao Arch among the top 10 dive destinations in the world. Tuukka to places like this. The blue maomao fish, which are the dive's namesake, as well as moray eels and a plethora of other marine life, including tiny, colorful sea slugs known as nudibranchs that shimmer like sunken treasure, will be present. Migratory whales also visit these seas in January.
14. Fiji
Soft corals are abundant in Fiji, and their stunning hues span from pinks, yellows, and blues to oranges and light purples. And you have all the ingredients for some of the best scuba diving in the world when you combine stunning marine life with that picturesque setting at dive spots near Viti Lavu, Vanua Lavu, Taverna, and the Yaskawa Islands. Fiji is a fantastic destination for family travel, with outstanding resorts like Vuma Island Fiji, Jean-Michel Cousteau Resort Fiji, and Six Senses Fiji on Mabolo Island offering wonderful cuisine, spas, and on-site diving shops. Clownfish, seahorses, triggerfish, turtles, and other typical coral reef suspects can be found in Fiji. And if you want to go shark diving, you may go with Beha Lagoon Resort on one of the most well-known dives in the world. There, you might witness up to nine different types of sharks, including lemon, white, black, and bull sharks.
Australia's Heron Island is 15.
When it comes to scuba diving in Australia, the Great Barrier Reef should be your first choice. Additionally, the majority of tourists head to Cairns for day trips to dive on the world's most well-known coral reef. However, keep the coral reefs of Heron Island on your radar if you want to see something truly stunning. From the town of Gladstone, which is located north of Brisbane, you can take a boat excursion or a helicopter to get to the island because it is situated in a more isolated area of the Great Barrier Reef. Around Heron Island, there are more than 20 dive spots where you might view lemon sharks, white-spotted eagle rays, three of the Great Barrier Reef's six sea turtle species, and perhaps even migrating humpback whales from June to September.
Chuuk Lagoon in Micronesia, 16.
For wreck divers, the warm, fish-filled waters of Chuuk Lagoon in Micronesia may be the most legendary location for World War II-era wrecks. Booking a spot on the Odyssey liveaboard, which transports up to 16 visitors to Japanese wrecks like the Shin koku Maru and San Francisco Maru, is the ideal way to experience it all during a diving vacation here. You can sense the human tragedy underwater when noticing items like utensils and even clothing used by the crew because many lives were lost in these battle wrecks. However, marine life is abundant on the rusting ruins, which are covered in both hard and soft corals and teem with tropical fish.
Egypt's Red Sea, 17.
This nation provides some truly fantastic scuba diving locations, from desert outposts like Dahab and Sharm el Sheikh on the Sinai Peninsula to the waters off Hurghada on mainland Egypt. With the help of Awesome Adventures, it's simple to combine the well-known Cairo attractions (such as the pyramids and temples) with shore-based diving excursions from the mainland and liveaboard diving in the Red Sea. Dive sites in the Red Sea include iconic British freight steamships like the SS Thistlegorm, as well as a wealth of shark species and vibrant coral reefs.
Philippines' Tabatha Reef Marine Park 18.
The waters off the Philippines offer some of the best scuba diving in the world in the Coral Triangle's center. Tabatha Reef Marine Park, in the Sulu Sea near the westernmost province of the Philippines, Palawan, offers an extraordinary journey for divers who want to see more turtles, rays, and sharks than they could ever conceive all in one location on amazing reef and drift dives. Liveaboard diving trips on the All Star Infiniti leave from Puerto Princes in the Palawan Islands, which are a fairly amazing location in and of themselves.
The Cayman Islands (19.
The Cayman Islands, a favorites in the Caribbean for simple, fish-filled diving, entice divers with easily accessible wrecks that are near to shore (such the USS Kittiwake, which snorkelers may also explore), as well as vibrant coral reefs. You can base yourself on land at a diving-focused hotel like Sunset House or Cobalt Coast Resort or explore the Caymans while aboard a liveaboard like the Cayman Aggressor IV. Schools of thousands of silversides, a two-inch-long fish that assembles brilliantly throughout the summer, appear on the walls and shallow reefs of the islands, creating an amazing underwater sight.