Panama City Beach Scuba Diving Information
 Panama City Beach’s Scuba Diving hot spots include over 50 wrecks, surprising amounts of amazing reefs, and hundreds of man made artificial reefs. To scuba dive in Panama City and more particularly to scuba dive the waters off Panama City Beach you need to be certified as an open water diver. If you are not certified we offer both private certification and a discover scuba diving course. Please see our Dive Charter Information page for pricing and schedules of diving experiences you can have while vacationing here in Panama City Beach.
If you are staying in Destin, Ft. Walton Beach, or the Beaches of South Walton area and are considering your scuba diving options, please consider the short 40 minute trip over to Panama City Beach for your scuba diving adventures. If you are limited in your possible down time here on the Gulf Coast, be sure to scuba dive Panama City Beach. It is the premier diving location on the panhandle. Panama City Beach has more dive options than any other location in northwest Florida.
Scuba Diving in Panama City and Panama City Beach can be divided into three diving categories. These are:
- In Shore Panama City Beach Dives
- Off Shore Panama City Beach Dives
- Spearfishing Panama City Beach
In shore Panama City Beach dives generally consist of 15 minute boat rides each way and dives in the 70 ft range. Typically the scuba dives are about 5 to 7 miles off of Panama City Beach. Superstructure of these “in shore” sites rise 30 to 40 feet above the bottom depth of 70 ft. So there is plenty of great diving in only about 40 feet of water. Families or groups with multiple divers with different levels all enjoy these dives. Visibility of these sites typically range in the 40- 50 ft range and hold lots of fish. Famous Panama City Beach in shore diving sites include several Hathaway Bridge Spans, the quintessential PCB dive spot Black Bart, a massive Navy Hovercraft, the elegant wreck of the USS Strength, and too many giant barge wrecks to list. These dive trips are typically 2 tank dives which last about 3 hours.
Off shore Panama City Beach dives generally consist of 25 minute boat rides and dives in the 100 ft range. These scuba dives are typically about 11 to 13 miles off of Panama City Beach proper. The are many dives to choose from including the Tarpon, a double wreck of 2 tug boats aptly named the “Twin Tugs”, acre site of an old navy platform named “stage 2”, countless reefs, more barge wrecks, and deep Hathaway Bridge Spans. Diving these Panama City Beach off shore sites are recommended for intermediate to advanced divers. These Panama City Beach dive trips are 2 or 3 tank dives which last about 4 hours.
Spear fishing in the Panama City Beach area is allowed on both regular in shore and off shore trips. These regularly visited sites are pretty well picked over by fisherman but they do offer excellent practice of beginners. For more advanced spear fishing in the Panama City Beach area we provide specialized bounce diving trips to land those big ones. These spear fishing trips off Panama City Beach typically involve trips up to 50 miles round trip. Dive computers are required and divers may dive multiple times, many diver wills make 5 or more dives. While scuba diving to the west of Panama City Beach (20 miles from the pass) divers are dropped on a wide array of reefs and excellent spear grounds in the 70 to 80 foot range.
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