Diving in Papua

Papua is one of the best dive havens of the world. Located in the Indo-Pacific Area, divers enjoy a huge diversity of dive sites including barrier reefs, coral walls (drop off), and coral gardens, patch reefs, fringing reefs, sea grass beds, coral atolls, and wreck dive sites.

You can dive in Papua all year round, with the high season generally from May to November. While the reef teems with life, they are extremely fragile.

In recognition of the importance of preserving the marine ecosystem, members of the Papua New Guinea Divers Association actively promote the use of moorings on regularly dived sites. The need to practice sensible diving and respect the underwater environment is emphasized and in doing so, the message to all divers is very clear: please look but don’t touch.

Dive Operators

Dive operators offer both Land Base and Live-Aboard Dive Tours. Land Base Tours normally consist of a day tour taking up to three dives whilst live-aboard tours can take 7-10 days, with up to five dives a day. Most land-Base Operators offer resort type dive courses and have fully equipped dive shops with diving and snorkeling equipment available for hire.

For those bringing their own equipment there are facilities available in the main cities to clean equipment. The majority operate on small to medium size property, with emphasize on personal attention in a relaxing environment. Dive sites are short distance from the resorts.

While the range in size of live-aboard dive boats is between 45′ and 120′, with differing levels of amenities, the excellent quality of diving is synonymous with each operation. Several operators now offer nitrox and re-breathers and most boats have facilities for camera equipment changing.

Irian Diving has an excellent site which includes info on eco lodges. Papua Tourism also has a detailed list of operators.