Info New Thailand Diving Regulations 🇹🇭

[JonnieB]

Stricter Regulations for Diving Activities Now in Effect in Thailand - TAT Newsroom

Thailand enforces strict new diving and snorkelling regulations nationwide to protect coral reefs and marine life, effective from 22 April 2025.

www.tatnews.org

 

[TostitoBandito]

No problem with any of that, except the "stay 2 meters above reef" bit. For new divers sure it makes sense, but for experienced divers with good buoyancy control who want to see macro life or take pictures, you need to get down in there and it can absolutely be done safely and responsibly. Good luck spotting <1" macro let alone taking pictures of it from 6+ feet away. Just address the idiots who repeatedly bash into the coral.

 

[Wheeler925]

Seems a bit ridiculous to try and scuba police it

 

[MB NZ]

It'll never be enforced by anyone but the dive shops and only if they are so inclined.

 

[Trilobite]

Unclear. Are they restricting cameras for snorkelers or just scuba divers? I can understand restricting them for scuba divers, but an experienced snorkeler/free diver shouldn't have to log 40 scuba dives or get AOW certified just to take photos.

 

[TostitoBandito]

It'll never be enforced by anyone but the dive shops and only if they are so inclined.

Yeah, I imagine enforcement will be completely discretionary and probably only done in egregious cases. Like, a dive op won't care about little accidental stuff, but if a diver is blatantly handling animals or knocking over coral and they think it might be on photo/video or that other guests are really vocally upset about it, they'll certainly self-report to save their own asses.

And the 40+ dive or AOW for a camera requirement doesn't mean a whole lot, especially when PADI will happily enroll you in AOW straight out of your OW class. I imagine ops will kinda sorta try to enforce that, but it won't do a lot to stop bad behavior.