Ranked by recorded summer water temperature: the Top End, the Kimberley, the far northern reef and the Indian Ocean territories, where 30 °C water is normal and a 3 mm suit is for sun protection.
Updated daily from the directory. 25 sites listed.
1. Cocos (Keeling) Islands · External Territory
Cabbage Patch
Summer water: 28-29 °C · A hillside of golden cabbage coral 6–20 m across, glowing in sunlight and swarming with thousands of anthias and chromis; garden eels and sleeping whitetips on the sand.
2. Cocos (Keeling) Islands · External Territory
Cannons
Summer water: 28-29 °C · Old cannons among Porites corals on sand, with garden eels and gobies – and a chance of dugong, dolphins and mantas.
3. Cocos (Keeling) Islands · External Territory
Cologne Gardens
Summer water: 28-29 °C · All-levels wall with a blooming coral reef top and big orange gorgonians deeper; snapper schools at full moon and bumphead parrotfish in summer.
4. Cocos (Keeling) Islands · External Territory
Cossies Beach
Summer water: 28-29 °C · Calm, shallow lagoon snorkelling off one of Australia's most celebrated beaches, right beside The Rip.
5. Christmas Island · External Territory
Flying Fish Cove
Summer water: 28-29 °C · Arguably Australia's best shore dive: a pristine coral slope and wall 50 m from the car park, endemic and hybrid reef fish, and whale sharks passing the drop-off in season.
6. Cocos (Keeling) Islands · External Territory
The Rip (Direction Island)
Summer water: 28-29 °C · A fast, coral-lined drift channel from the ocean into the lagoon, full of sharks, humphead parrotfish and Napoleon wrasse, with a safety rope to stop and watch.
7. Christmas Island · External Territory
The Sandpatch
Summer water: 28-29 °C · A dense garden eel colony and easy shallow reef right off the beach; the island's go-to training and night dive.
8. Christmas Island · External Territory
Admin Wall
Summer water: 28-29 °C · A sheer, effectively bottomless wall reached from the beach, with trevally, reef sharks and seasonal whale sharks.
9. Coral Sea · External Territory
Admiralty (Osprey Reef)
Summer water: 28-29 °C · A coral village of huge bommies with a centuries-old anchor in a swim-through, flashlight fish at night and a sheer wall below.
10. Coral Sea · External Territory
Amazing (Holmes Reef)
Summer water: 28-29 °C · A shallow wall riddled with soft-coral-lined archways, swim-throughs and caves where sharks rest.
11. Coral Sea · External Territory
Around the Bend (Osprey Reef)
Summer water: 28-29 °C · Osprey's most challenging drift, where current brings barracuda, hunting predators and mantas to a cleaning station.
12. Christmas Island · External Territory
Boat Cave
Summer water: 28-29 °C · A sea cave big enough to park the boat in, with a floor carpeted in plate corals and colourful whips on the walls.
13. Cocos (Keeling) Islands · External Territory
Broccoli Patch
Summer water: 28-29 °C · Easy shallow coral garden to 10 m with a sandy floor – a perfect buoyancy-practice and snorkel site, often with turtles and dolphins.
14. Cocos (Keeling) Islands · External Territory
Cable Bommie
Summer water: 28-29 °C · Two large winches and lengths of cable believed to date from the Direction Island cable station, now overgrown with coral and fish.
15. Christmas Island · External Territory
Coconut Point
Summer water: 28-29 °C · The island's classic drift: swirling currents, eel gardens, gorgonians and a chance of hammerheads, ten minutes from the jetty.
16. Coral Sea · External Territory
Crystal Plateau (Bougainville Reef)
Summer water: 28-29 °C · A clear-water hard-coral terrace on the edge of the abyss, with sharks and giant potato cod.
17. Coral Sea · External Territory
Dungeons & Dragons (Bougainville Reef)
Summer water: 28-29 °C · A maze of caves and tunnels in the reef top, opening onto a 1,000 m wall patrolled by sharks and barracuda.
18. Christmas Island · External Territory
Eidsvold Wreck
Summer water: 28-29 °C · WWII history in 5–18 m: the broken-up Norwegian freighter Eidsvold, torpedoed in Flying Fish Cove in 1942, now overgrown with hard coral.
19. Cocos (Keeling) Islands · External Territory
Enterprise
Summer water: 28-29 °C · A bommie on the drop-off where the incoming tide's upwelling brings grey reef sharks, dogtooth tuna and big groupers in close.
20. Coral Sea · External Territory
Fairy Grotto (Osprey Reef)
Summer water: 28-29 °C · A range of big coral bommies with caverns and swim-throughs beside a 1,000 m wall.
21. Coral Sea · External Territory
False Entrance (Osprey Reef)
Summer water: 28-29 °C · Spectacular bommies and blue-water swim-throughs in a blind gully, with schooling trevally and barracuda and dense grey reef shark aggregations.
22. Christmas Island · External Territory
Fuel Buoys
Summer water: 28-29 °C · Healthy coral reef beneath the Navy refuelling buoys, with a surreal straight trench carved by the giant mooring chain.
23. Coral Sea · External Territory
Half Way Wall (Osprey Reef)
Summer water: 28-29 °C · Osprey's gentler wall, with bommies on the lip of a 1,000 m drop and the chance of hammerheads.
24. Christmas Island · External Territory
Leanne's Leap
Summer water: 28-29 °C · An easy one-way drift from drop-off into a lush coral garden, often linked with Submarine Rock.
25. Cocos (Keeling) Islands · External Territory
Manta Service Station
Summer water: 28-29 °C · A shallow manta cleaning station at about 9 m where Cocos' resident reef mantas come in to be cleaned, with excellent light for photography.
Frequently asked questions
Where is the warmest diving in Australia?
Darwin Harbour and the Top End reach 29–32 °C in the wet season, with the Kimberley, Torres Strait, Christmas Island and Cocos close behind at 27–30 °C.
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