I have done more than a hundred dives in Singapore between 2018 and 2022, and I keep promoting it to other divers. The standard reaction is ‘I didn’t know that you can dive in Singapore!’. I’m not promoting it because it is so amazing, but because it is different, and thus unforgettable.
Let me tell you how it is. Expect a 20 to 30min boat ride from one of the marinas in the south. There are not many choices of dive sites, so on a busy day you might see two or three other boats. The water is year round warm, 27 to 30 degrees Celsius.
Dives are either in the morning, or in the afternoon, but anyways it will be a night dive. That’s not a typo, that’s because of the very poor visibility. It can vary from 2 to maybe 7m. You’ll get used to it, you’ll have a torch, and you’ll have the benefits of a night dive during the day. The floor is sometimes crawling with macro critters like skeleton shrimps, mud crabs, nudibranches, cuttlefish, octopus, even sea horses and bamboo sharks used to be around. There are ascidients, sea cucumbers, sea stars, and plenty of hydroids.
iNaturalist lists 163 species of nudibranches, 407 species of crustaceans, 18 species of sharks and rays, and 17 species of octopus, squids and cuttlefish. Now let me lower your expectations, you’ll probably see just a few of them, if any, and very likely no sharks, rays, or turtles. But the same can happen in the Maldives, or any other region.
There aren’t many corals, but the reef is covered in silk you better don’t stir up with your fins, and the hydroids have a painful sting, so a very good buoyancy is needed for diving in Singapore. And when you’re able to stop, hover, and staying close to your group, you can enjoy the macro life in Singapore’s reefs.
If not for pure joy, the conditions can be valued for its good training conditions for buoyancy, macro photography, navigation and lost-diver procedures.
Recently a bowmouth guitarfish (Rhina anclylostomus) has been seen in Singapore, a new species of venomous box jellyfish (Chironex blakangmati) has been described, and even a (dead) dugong has been reported. So there’s a lot of potential for excitement in Singapore’s water!