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Expand Your Horizons

Your Open Water Diver certification introduced you to a new realm of exploration and made you keenly aware that you've only just scratched the surface of the underwater world. Continue your scuba journey with The PADI Advanced Open Water Diver course.

Experience new adventures with a PADI Instructor by your side. Fine-tune your buoyancy skills, build confidence in your navigation abilities, and try new activities like wreck diving, night diving or underwater videography. An Advanced Open Water Diver certification also opens the door to dive sites deeper than 18m/60ft.

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Learn more about PADI Specialty courses

Continuing Education

Advanced Open Water Diver

This course can be taken after completing the PADI Open Water Diver certification. It's titled PADI Advanced Open Water Diver because it advances your diving knowledge & skills.

Continuing Education

Enriched Air Diver

The most popular PADI specialty course. Scuba diving with enriched air nitrox gives you more no decompression time, especially on repetitive scuba dives.

Continuing Education

Night Diver

The underwater world changes as day creatures retire & nocturnal organisms emerge. If you've wondered what happens underwater after the sun goes down, enroll in the PADI Night Diver Specialty course.

Continuing Education

Dive Against Debris Specialty

Pay the ocean forward by helping clean it up on your next dive. Learn about the problems of marine debris, conducting Dive Against Debris surveys, and how divers are a part of the solution to keeping our oceans clean.

Beginner

Emergency First Response

Discover simple to follow steps for emergency care. This course focuses on building confidence in lay rescuers and increasing their willingness to respond when faced with a medical emergency.

Continuing Education

Rescue Diver

Learn to prevent and manage problems in the water, and become more confident in your skills as a diver. It's challenging, yet very rewarding.

Continuing Education

Public Safety Diver™

Work with local authorities, be part of a rescue team and, quite possibly, assist in underwater criminal investigations.

Continuing Education

Emergency Oxygen Provider

Immediately recognize scuba diving illnesses treatable with emergency oxygen and be prepared to offer aid. There are no prerequisites or age restrictions. This course is open to everyone.

Continuing Education

Adaptive Support Diver

Increase your awareness of divers’ varying abilities, and explore adaptive techniques to apply while diving or freediving with a buddy with a disability.

Continuing Education

Delayed Surface Marker Buoy (DSMB) Diver

Many divers wouldn’t think of diving without carrying a delayed surface marker buoy (DSMB, and in some locations it’s considered required safety equipment. Knowing how to properly deploy and manage a DSMB are valuable skills learned in this course.

Continuing Education

Enriched Air Diver

The most popular PADI specialty course. Scuba diving with enriched air nitrox gives you more no decompression time, especially on repetitive scuba dives.

PADI Digital Underwater Photography course

Continuing Education

Digital Underwater Photographer

The most popular diving specialties course. It’s easy and fun to capture images of your underwater scuba adventures.

Continuing Education

Dry Suit Diver

Becoming a dry suit diver allows you to expand your boundaries and dive more places, more often. This suit seals you off from the water and keeps you comfortable, even in surprisingly cold water.

Continuing Education

Deep Diver

Explore deeper dive sites with confidence at depths down to 40 metres/130 ft. Learn to manage your gas supply, go over buddy contact procedures, and buoyancy control.

Continuing Education

Underwater Navigator

Fine-tune your underwater observation skills and learn to use your compass more accurately. This course may count towards college credit, ask your instructor.

Continuing Education

Peak Performance Buoyancy

Observe aquatic life without disturbing their surroundings. Improve the buoyancy skills you learned as a new diver and elevate them to the next level.

Continuing Education

Wreck Diver

Ships, airplanes and even cars are fascinating to explore and usually teem with aquatic life. Each wreck dive offers a chance for a new discovery.

Continuing Education

Night Diver

The underwater world changes as day creatures retire & nocturnal organisms emerge. If you've wondered what happens underwater after the sun goes down, enroll in the PADI Night Diver Specialty course.

Continuing Education

Search and Recovery Diver

Retrieve lost items that have fallen overboard or over a dock. Learn effective swimming patterns and using a lift bag for heavy objects.

Continuing Education

Equipment Specialist

Learn to manage basic scuba diving equipment repairs and adjustments. Understand routine care and maintenance procedures and how dive gear works.

Continuing Education

Diver Propulsion Vehicle

Propel your way through the water and glide over reefs, buzz around a large wreck or weave through a kelp forest. You must be at least 12 years old and a PADI (Junior) Open Water Diver or higher.

Continuing Education

Boat Diver

This course helps you expand your knowledge about boats from small inflatables to large liveaboards. You'll gain experience scuba diving by completing two dives from a boat.

Continuing Education

Peak Performance Buoyancy

Observe aquatic life without disturbing their surroundings. Improve the buoyancy skills you learned as a new diver and elevate them to the next level.

Continuing Education

Underwater Navigator

Fine-tune your underwater observation skills and learn to use your compass more accurately. This course may count towards college credit, ask your instructor.

Continuing Education

Deep Diver

Explore deeper dive sites with confidence at depths down to 40 metres/130 ft. Learn to manage your gas supply, go over buddy contact procedures, and buoyancy control.

Continuing Education

Night Diver

The underwater world changes as day creatures retire & nocturnal organisms emerge. If you've wondered what happens underwater after the sun goes down, enroll in the PADI Night Diver Specialty course.

Continuing Education

Full Face Mask Diver

Diving with a full face mask allows you to breathe from your nose and mouth, and provides added comfort in colder water. The mask can also be fitted with communication gear, which can be useful for various types of specialty diving.

Continuing Education

Self-Reliant Diver

Although diving with a buddy is the norm, there are reasons for an experienced diver to develop self-reliance and independence while diving. Learning to carry out dives without a partner can make you a stronger diver in most dive situations.

Continuing Education

Drift Diver

Drift diving can be relaxing and exhilarating. The course teaches you how to enjoy going with the flow as you scuba dive down rivers and use ocean currents to glide along.

Continuing Education

Boat Diver

This course helps you expand your knowledge about boats from small inflatables to large liveaboards. You'll gain experience scuba diving by completing two dives from a boat.

Continuing Education

Search and Recovery Diver

Retrieve lost items that have fallen overboard or over a dock. Learn effective swimming patterns and using a lift bag for heavy objects.

Continuing Education

Sidemount Diver

A sidemount configuration (scuba tanks alongside of the diver) offers more flexibility and better steamlining options. Learn about the many benefits of diving with a sidemount configuration.

Continuing Education

Dry Suit Diver

Becoming a dry suit diver allows you to expand your boundaries and dive more places, more often. This suit seals you off from the water and keeps you comfortable, even in surprisingly cold water.

Continuing Education

Ice Diver

Ice diving is one of the most adventurous scuba specialties. Learn the roles and responsibilities of support personnel, tenders and safety divers. See beauty few others ever experience.

Continuing Education

Night Diver

The underwater world changes as day creatures retire & nocturnal organisms emerge. If you've wondered what happens underwater after the sun goes down, enroll in the PADI Night Diver Specialty course.

Continuing Education

Cavern Diver

Gain the knowledge and skills to explore caverns correctly and safely. This course guides you to enter far enough for adventure, but stay within the light zone for an easy exit to open water.

Continuing Education

Underwater Naturalist

Get a better understanding about the local ecosystem and the differences between terrestrial and aquatic worlds. See new things, even in the most familiar dive sites.

Continuing Education

Fish Identification

Enjoy dives even more when you can recognize and identify fish families and their characteristics.

Continuing Education

Coral Reef Conservation

This course helps you appreciate the complexity of coral reef habitats and teaches how you can help conserve these vital systems.

Continuing Education

Dive Against Debris Specialty

Pay the ocean forward by helping clean it up on your next dive. Learn about the problems of marine debris, conducting Dive Against Debris surveys, and how divers are a part of the solution to keeping our oceans clean.

Continuing Education

Project AWARE Specialist

Uniting scuba divers and water enthusiasts to make a difference. By earning this certification, you’ll learn how you can make a difference for ocean protection every time you dive or travel.

Continuing Education

AWARE Shark Conservation

Sharks are an essential part of a healthy ocean. This course explores why they are vulnerable, the importance of a healthy shark population, managing threats and how to take action to protect them.

Continuing Education

Digital Underwater Photographer

The most popular diving specialties course. It’s easy and fun to capture images of your underwater scuba adventures.

Continuing Education

Underwater Videographer

Capture the sights, sounds, and the dynamic motion of the underwater world as a videographer. Cover the fundamentals and create interesting, entertaining video worth watching again and again.

Continuing Education

Self-Reliant Diver

Although diving with a buddy is the norm, there are reasons for an experienced diver to develop self-reliance and independence while diving. Learning to carry out dives without a partner can make you a stronger diver in most dive situations.

Continuing Education

Fish Identification

Enjoy dives even more when you can recognize and identify fish families and their characteristics.

Continuing Education

Discover Technical Diving

This short course is designed to let divers experience technical diving in confined water. Get introduced a few basic skills and procedures. Discover Tec may credit towards the Tec 40 course.

Continuing Education

Discover Local Diving

Have an experienced dive professional help you understand a local dive environment so you can better enjoy the dive adventure.

Learn more about freediving or check out the available courses.

Beginner

Basic Freediver

Learn basic freediving principles and focus on practicing breathhold techniques in a pool or confined water site.

Beginner

Freediver

Your first step toward discovering why freediving is becoming a popular way to explore beneath the waves. No previous freediving course is required.

Continuing Education

Advanced Freediver

Designed to refine and improve your freediving skills, allowing you to progress slowly while learning how your body performs during apnea (suspension of breathing).

Continuing Education

Master Freediver

For advanced freedivers who want to approach elite freediving levels. You'll learn to bring your static apnea, dynamic apnea, free immersion and constant weight skills to the next level.

Professional

Freediver Instructor

Turn your freediving passion into a profession. This instructor course is for the avid freediver who spends a lot time thinking about freediving and sharing details of their latest adventures.

Learn more about tec diving or check out the available courses.

Continuing Education

Discover Technical Diving

This short course is designed to let divers experience technical diving in confined water. Get introduced a few basic skills and procedures. Discover Tec may credit towards the Tec 40 course.

Continuing Education

Tec 40

Consists of three knowledge development sections, three practical application sessions and four training dives. Designed for the diver transitioning from recreational diving to technical diving.

Continuing Education

Tec 45

Part 2 of the PADI Tec Deep Diver program. Extend your depth limit to 45 metres/145 ft. Learn to plan & execute repetitive decompression dives using a single stage/decompression cylinder.

Continuing Education

Tec 50

Part 3 of the full PADI Tec Deep Diver program. Develop competency & have the skills to dive to a max of 50 metres/165 ft. Learn how to extend & accelerate decompression stops using up to 2 gases.

Continuing Education

Tec Trimix Diver

This course turns experienced tec divers into extreme divers. During this course, you'll make dives as deep as 90 metres/300 feet, use multigas trimix computers, & handle up to 4 stage/deco cylinders.

Continuing Education

Tec Trimix 65

Extend your depth range the right way with a blend of helium, oxygen & nitrogen (trimix). The Tec Trimix 65 course introduces you to using trimix down to a maximum depth of 65 metres/210 feet.

Continuing Education

Tec Sidemount

Wearing more than one tank has become increasingly popular for technical diving. With the Tec Sidemount Diver course you can apply what you learn to other TecRec courses.

Continuing Education

Tec Gas Blender

Being a gas blender is a key job at a busy PADI Dive Center or Resort. This course teaches you how to blend enriched air nitrox and helium-based gases using one or more blending methods.

Discover Rebreather Program

Breathe without exhaling bubbles as a rebreather diver. You’ll get longer no stop limits, learn to reuse the gas you exhale by recycling the good part and replenishing it for your next breath.

Continuing Education

Rebreather Diver

Get longer no stop limits, reduced gas consumption (reuse most of your exhaled gas), & unmatched wildlife encounters because you don't release annoying bubbles.

Continuing Education

Advanced Rebreather Diver

Dive in silence and train to dive as deep as 40 metres/130 feet. Learn about scrubbers, oxygen consumption and bailout requirements including how to configure a bailout cylinder system.

Continuing Education

Tec 40 CCR

The Tec 40 CCR course is your entry into the tec diving realm. Learn the details of proper setup, predive checks, dive planning, failure and problem management and teamwork for CCR diving.

Continuing Education

Tec 60 CCR

The next step in becoming a tec CCR diver. Learn to complete multiple decompression stops, manage life-support problems, and dive with trimix/heliox as a diluent. It's a considerable challenge.

Continuing Education

Tec 100 CCR

Significantly more challenging than the Tec 60 CCR Diver course. You'll learn to plan and make dives with hypoxic trimix/heliox using a Type T (technical) CCR to a max depth of 100 metres/330 feet.

Start Your Scuba Career

Continuing your dive education allows you to explore new places and deepen your knowledge of the ocean. Along the way, you may discover a passion for sharing your experiences and knowledge with others.

If you like helping people and want a meaningful job that supports ocean conservation, becoming a PADI Divemaster is the first step.

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PADI Master Scuba Diver™

Fewer than two percent of divers ever become Master Scuba Divers. The Master Scuba Diver rating denotes significant experience and expertise, some call it “the black belt of diving.

Learn More

Need a quick refresher?

Haven’t been diving lately and want a quick scuba refresher? PADI ReActivate is the perfect way to update your dive skills and knowledge from the PADI Open Water Diver course before jumping back into the water.

Whether you want a few reminders or need to go over the basics, ReActivate ensures you’re prepared for your next PADI course or diving holiday. Brush up on scuba fundamentals using the interactive online program, then meet up with a PADI Professional to review your in-water skills.

REFRESH MY SKILLS

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Your questions, answered

Your PADI certification does not expire. Enrolling in PADI’s scuba refresher course (ReActivate) is recommended if you haven’t been diving in awhile, but not mandatory. Dive shops appreciate seeing a recent ReActivated date on your certification card because it means you’re ready to dive in.

Advanced Open Water, Rescue Diver and more than a dozen of PADI’s most popular specialty courses are available online. You can start your training at home and finish with a dive shop near you, or on vacation. The choice is up to you.

Earning a certification while traveling is a great way to have an authentic local diving experience. Ask the local dive center or resort what their destination is known for (drift, wreck, night, etc.) and if they offer any distinctive specialties.

Or, show your support for your local diving community by earning a certification close to home. Learn about your local ecosystems by taking an Underwater Naturalist or Fish Identification course, or prepare for your next trip by taking PADI’s most popular specialty - Enriched Air Nitrox.

More than 75 percent of new divers say they want to improve their scuba skills by taking additional classes, but fewer than 40 percent ever do so. When asked why, many say, “I didn’t feel ready.”

What these divers don’t realize is, the Advanced Open Water Diver course is designed to help new divers improve their skills and build confidence. In this course, you’ll get better at the skills you learned in your Open Water Diver course as you try new diving experiences (photography, wreck diving, etc.) with a helpful instructor by your side. If the word “advanced” seems intimidating, think of it as a specialty course sampler instead.

Speaking of specialties, many new divers get a lot out of the Peak Performance Buoyancy class and the Underwater Navigator course. You could try one or both of these specialties first, and earn credit towards your Advanced Open Water certification along the way. Ask your PADI Instructor for more information.

Any certified diver who would like to refresh their scuba skills before enrolling in a class or taking a dive trip should ReActivate. The online program is completely personalized. You’ll move quickly through familiar concepts you understand well and dive deeper into things you may have forgotten.

After reviewing scuba fundamentals online, schedule an in-water session with a PADI Professional who will help you brush up your underwater skills and answer any questions you have. Divers who complete both the online knowledge review and in-water skill refresher receive a replacement certification card with a ReActivated date on it.

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