How important is it to stick with your original agency for ADV OW?

[rhwestfall]

what is the easiest and most expedition path to Advanced OW these days

I reject the search for "easiest." Earn it!

 

[Blackcrusader]

thanks! The other thing that I noticed.... well, I could be wrong but my takeaway was that the Advanced OW cert alone, doesn't certify to max training depth limits (132ft)

ALSO, I found it interesting that some train to a standard limit of 100ft, others to 130ft, etc... why not just universally to the recreational limit of 132ft???

Padi OW is certified to the recreational depth limit of 40m. I am not talking about the limited training depth on a course with an instructor. Other agencies teach to the same ISO standard.

https://scubaboard.com/community/th...o-advanced-diving.650458/page-4#post-10364068

Thread 'Dive Accident Insurance Limitations'

Mar 1, 2025

In a recent thread, a poster related a story about having to correct someone's misinformation about dive accident insurance. That misinformation has been repeated often in ScubaBoard threads. The correction is well buried in a long thread, so I thought I would create a dedicated thread that makes it clear and which can easily be linked in future threads. This one specifically refers to DAN accident insurance, but I think it would be good if other companies had their policies clarified here as well.

The misinformed person had stated that dive accident insurance only covers you if you are...

• boulderjohn
• Replies: 80
• Forum: Basic Scuba

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[bradlw]

I reject the search for "easiest." Earn it!

i didn't mean that in terms of not earning it.
...although I never found any of my SCUBA training to be overly hard to earn....well the recreational stuff anyway....
what I meant was easy in terms of less drama, less expense, less time wasted, etc.

 

[DrakeTheDiver]

i didn't mean that in terms of not earning it.
...although I never found any of my SCUBA training to be overly hard to earn....well the recreational stuff anyway....
what I meant was easy in terms of less drama, less expense, less time wasted, etc.

I would say go with whatever course will allow you to fit into your schedule. I was working through the same dilema with most of the shops around here being SSI or SDI. I found that these courses would require you to do specialty certs prior to taking the actual course, or at least that is how the shop presented it, then they presented 4 specialties totaling over $1,000 before I would even be allowed to pay an additional $450 for the Advanced course that they considered equivalent to PADI AOW. I ended up going to Padi and am happy getting a class with them for a grand total of $400. I think the specialty courses are fun and maybe beneficial depending on experience and location, however for me, the goal is simply to get checked off because some charters around here require that AOW card to dive deeper sites. I have quite a few dives and am comfortable in my skills and working underwater, having been paid to do so for the last 4 years. So for me it was really just trying to not blow my whole scuba budget on classes, much prefer to do real dives over training dives. But if it is about sampling all the different flavors of diving, I suppose it’s whatever you want, PADI seems to offer a pretty good list to cover most of the important stuff and let you get your feet wet in those specialties.

 

[broncobowsher]

It only matters if...
You are chasing an instructor status or something along those lines with that exact agency.

I enjoy diving. Don't want to kill that enjoyment by trying to make a job out of it. My card collection is from multiple agencies. Last one I got I cared more about the insturctor. In the end, he asked which agency would I like the card issued from. I passed the class, he had multiple agencies, open choice. Same results no matter which way I went.