Four dive centres are compared here, and choosing between them is not a choice about price. The difference is how far you travel before the first dive and what is waiting at the end of that ride: a coral site twelve minutes out, a reef half an hour away, or a marine park an hour down the coast. Below: who is who and who suits whom.
- Four centres in one table
- No certificate: three try dives and what they cost
- With Open Water: the two near options
- With Advanced: five wrecks
- What is charged on top of the day rate
Four centres and four different days
| Centre | From where and when | Day rate | Suits |
|---|---|---|---|
| Mermaids Dive Center | The dive centre in Pattaya, 08:00 | ฿3,800 per person | Beginners and certified divers on one boat |
| Real Divers | Jomtien beach, 09:15 | ฿2,700 with your own gear | Anyone who wants a short ride and a small group |
| Pattaya Dive Centre | Beach Road, 08:15, then Samae San | ฿2,900 with your own gear | Anyone who has already seen the Pattaya islands |
| Thai Ocean Academy | Bali Hai pier, 08:00 | ฿2,700 for two fun dives | Mixed groups with non-divers along |
After that, the journey decides. Real Divers run their own 12-metre twin-engine speedboat: twelve minutes to the near islands and twenty-five to the far ones. Pattaya Dive Centre take an hour along the coast to Samae San and another thirty minutes by boat from the harbour. Less travel means more time underwater; more travel means quieter sites.
Never dived before — where do you start?
Mermaids Dive Center sells the try dive as a whole day: ฿3,800 (≈ $105) per person, meeting at 08:00 for the briefing and gear fitting, the first dive around 10:00, lunch on board through the surface interval, the second around 13:00 and back at the pier at 15:00. Groups run to eight, full equipment is in the price, and no certificate is needed.
The other two options are cheaper in different ways. At Thai Ocean Academy a try dive in the sea with two dives is ฿4,000 (≈ $111), and a four-hour pool version is ฿3,000 (≈ $83). At Pattaya Dive Centre a Discover Scuba outing with two dives is ฿4,500 (≈ $125).
Tip
if somebody in the party does not dive, you need not split up. On the same Thai Ocean Academy boat a snorkeller's place is ฿1,200 (≈ $33) — a full day from 08:00 to roughly 16:00, two sites, a hot lunch and snorkel guides in the water beside the group.
You have Open Water — where to go?
The near option is Real Divers: meeting at the centre on Soi Welcome at 08:45, the speedboat leaving Jomtien beach at 09:15, back around 14:00. Two dives with your own gear are ฿2,700 (≈ $75), with rental ฿3,000 (≈ $83), three are ฿3,200 (≈ $89) and ฿3,500 (≈ $97). No more than ten divers are on board and no more than four to a dive leader.
The coral sites lie off Koh Larn, Koh Sak and Koh Krok: angelfish, butterflyfish, pufferfish, rays and large hawksbill turtles. The same water is covered by Pattaya Dive Centre's own Pattaya-islands trip at ฿2,700 (≈ $75) with your own gear and ฿3,000 (≈ $83) with rental — so on price the two near days match exactly.
The far option is the Samae San marine park with the same Pattaya Dive Centre: ฿2,900 (≈ $80) with your own gear and ฿3,200 (≈ $89) with rental, meeting at 08:15 at Tipp Plaza on Beach Road, transfer to the harbour included. The sites are Koh Chuang, Koh Chan, Koh Ron Kon, Japanese Gardens and Hin Chalarm; the captain picks one in the morning by conditions.
You have Advanced — five wrecks
Every sunken ship in the region lies deeper than eighteen metres, so Open Water does not open them. With Real Divers those are HTMS Kood, HTMS Mataphon and HTMS Khram — three former US Navy ships at 22 to 30 metres, with schools of barracuda, batfish, sweetlips and small bamboo sharks.
Samae San has two kinds of wreck. The Hardeep is the Second World War cargo ship S.S. Suddhadip, sunk by a bomb in 1945 about three hundred metres from Koh Chuang — the very beach the survivors swam to. The T-Wrecks are T.94 and T.95, scuttled in September 2023 in the channel between Koh Chuang and Koh Chan.
Beside them is Shark Fin Rock: a sixteen-metre vertical wall and a sand bank at twenty-five metres where large blackspotted rays rest. The Advanced course with Real Divers takes two days and includes the wreck dives itself — so if you do not have the card yet, that is a way to get both at once.
What is down there, and when should you come?
Important
Thai Ocean Academy states the conditions outright — Pattaya is known for low visibility, currents and swell. The operator's answer is practical rather than promotional: the crew know which sites work on which day, and take the boat away from the main tourist spots.
There is no season as such. Pattaya Dive Centre states that diving off the Pattaya islands and at Samae San runs all year, including the monsoon months when other Thai dive regions close. Thai Ocean Academy also runs year-round and answers the windier months with the size and comfort of its boats rather than a closed season.
On the coral you regularly meet turtles, blue-spotted stingrays, moray eels, fusiliers, angelfish and butterflyfish; on the walls, lionfish. Whale sharks are seen off Koh Ron a few times a year — which is to say, not something to plan a trip around.
What is charged on top of the day rate?
- Gear rental — a ฿300 (≈ $8) difference at Real Divers and Pattaya Dive Centre, ฿600 (≈ $17) a day at Thai Ocean Academy. At Mermaids the full set is already in the price.
- Dive computer — ฿500 (≈ $14) a day at Real Divers; torches and computers at Samae San are also paid separately.
- Transfer — ฿600 (≈ $17) at Real Divers within Pattaya and Jomtien. At Pattaya Dive Centre the ride to Samae San is already included.
- Dive insurance — Pattaya Dive Centre recommends it, but it is not in the price.
- Courses — a three-day Open Water is ฿14,990 (≈ $415) on a single booking or from ฿13,000 (≈ $360) per person for two or more.
