Sipadan Island

Why go

The deep wall dives

Rising 600 metres from the Celebes Sea seabed, this oceanic island is a fully protected marine park with no accommodation of its own. The nutrient-rich currents hit the deep walls here and support resident reef sharks and green turtles on the steep drop-offs. You stay at the nearby islands and travel over by speedboat to dive among the schooling chevron barracuda.

Sipadan is the dive people fly to Borneo for. The wall drops into open ocean so mainland rain rarely spoils the visibility. The dive you do while waiting for the barracuda to form a vortex is already a very good one. The terrain suits divers who are steady in currents and comfortable with deep drop-offs. If you want to dive among thousands of schooling fish on a deep wall Sipadan is the one.

Sabah Parks permit quotas

Sabah Parks issues 254 Sipadan permits a day. These are allocated through licensed resorts and operators and a permit can be guaranteed with the right resort and dive package; the team confirms the nights that apply to your dates; which dates are available depends on the resort. You must be an Advanced Open Water diver to dive here. This rule has been in place since October 2022. Snorkellers also need a permit to enter the water. The marine park is closed every November to give the reef a rest and reopens on 1 December.

The team arranges your permit applications with your dive package. Book early to secure your dates because the allocation sells out months in advance.

Resident reef sharks and turtles

The island's geology creates upwellings that sustain a dense marine ecosystem. The green turtle and the critically endangered hawksbill turtle are resident here in extraordinary numbers. The green turtle feeds mainly on seagrasses and algae while the hawksbill uses its narrow raptor-like beak to pick sponges and tunicates from the reef. In the Celebes Sea, mixed stock genetic analysis indicates that many immature green turtles foraging here originate from rookeries across the Turtle Islands Heritage Protected Area and Sarawak. A persistent misconception attributes the overgrazing of seagrass beds at Sipadan to a highly cited 2014 study on the density paradox but that specific benchmark study was actually conducted at Derawan Island in Indonesia.

Endangered grey reef sharks are resident and demonstrate high site fidelity as they patrol the current-swept drop-offs at sites like South Point. In contrast, the vulnerable whitetip reef shark is a more benthic species. They pump water over their gills so they can rest motionless on the sandy shelves and in the caverns of Whitetip Avenue.

The chevron barracuda is resident and forms massive synchronised tornadoes at Barracuda Point to conserve energy and deter predators. By swimming in a non-directional milling vortex, individuals located in the inner and trailing positions experience significantly reduced drag. This hydrodynamic advantage results in substantial metabolic energy savings and allows the school to rest during the daylight hours according to hydrodynamic energetics studies. Simultaneously, the sheer volume and synchronised movement of the vortex present a massive intimidating visual target that confuses and deters apex predators.

Schooling bigeye trevally are resident in the sunlit shallows and vulnerable bumphead parrotfish are seen on most stays forming dawn squadrons to feed on the coral framework. As the largest herbivorous and corallivorous fish in the ecosystem, adult male bumphead parrotfish can reach 130 cm in length and weigh over 45 kilograms. Their massive nodular teeth and bony foreheads let them ram and break up live coral as they feed. This intense feeding behaviour reduces dead and living coral matrix into fine calcareous sand and fundamentally shapes the reef's topography to facilitate new coral recruitment. The bumphead parrotfish was reassessed as vulnerable by the IUCN in 2024 because their slow growth and extreme site fidelity make them highly susceptible to overexploitation elsewhere.

The dawn dive and curfews

A Sipadan permit covers 2 dives a day. The diving hours run from the 6am dawn dive to mid-afternoon. The ESSCOM security curfew is strictly enforced from 6pm to 6am so all boats must leave the site and return to the resorts by mid-afternoon. There is no night diving at Sipadan.

The parrotfish sleep in the shallow lagoon and reef flats at night. As the sun rises, they form massive dawn squadrons that can number more than 100 fish and move together along the reef edge to begin feeding. Because these encounters occur at the break of dawn, ambient light is exceedingly low.

The trevally schools are seen slightly shallower than the barracuda and they often mill between 2 and 15 metres below the surface. They are highly tolerant of divers and frequently allow respectful photographers to become completely enveloped within the eye of the school. Because they inhabit the sunlit shallows, ambient light photography is highly effective.

Camera lenses and strobe lights

Choose a wide-angle lens for the turtles because an adult green turtle's shell can be more than 1 m long. Marine turtles lack eyelids so high-intensity rapid-fire strobe flashes can temporarily blind them and cause acute distress particularly in darker environments like the overhangs of the Drop Off or during dusk dives. Ethical interaction demands that divers never approach a turtle head-on because this blocks their path to the surface for air. Divers must position themselves parallel to the turtle's trajectory. Touching, riding or holding the carapace is a severe violation of Sabah Parks regulations and international wildlife ethics and this universally results in immediate expulsion from the marine park.

To capture the magnitude of the barracuda vortex, a fisheye lens is virtually mandatory. The highly reflective silver scales of the barracuda easily blow out and overexpose under harsh artificial light. Barracuda Point is subjected to nutrient-rich oceanic currents and this means powerful strobes illuminate particulate matter and create severe backscatter. The optimal technique involves turning strobes off or positioning them extremely wide on low power and relying instead on ambient sunlight. Divers achieve the most striking results by dropping below the school and shooting upward to silhouette the synchronised vortex against the sunburst. Divers must never swim directly into the centre of the vortex. Approaching aggressively or exhaling explosively will shatter the formation and expend the animals' conserved energy.

When photographing the dawn squadrons of bumphead parrotfish, photographers must never intercept the herd's forward trajectory because blocking their path forces the squadron to scatter and instantly ruins the natural behaviour.

Sharks possess highly evolved sensory systems that are acutely attuned to electromagnetic fields and low-frequency pressure waves. Erratic finning, chasing or rapid pursuit will instantly drive them down the reef wall and out of visual range. Finding a stable vantage point on the reef while maintaining absolute neutral buoyancy allows the sharks to swim their natural patrol circuits and this frequently brings them closely past the camera.

Resorts on the nearby islands

Because you cannot stay on Sipadan, your base dictates your mornings. Mabul and Kapalai are the closest options. Mabul is the centre of Sabah's muck diving with resorts ranging from overwater bungalows to converted oil rigs. The shallow rubbly benthic environments here harbour premier macro diving and support a staggering diversity of cryptic invertebrates.

Mataking and Pom Pom sit further out on the Alice Channel. They offer premium beach comfort but the speedboat transfer to Sipadan takes around 80 minutes and can be choppy during the north-east monsoon from November to February. Pom Pom Island is home to the Tropical Research and Conservation Centre. The surrounding ecosystem suffered structural damage from decades of illegal blast fishing so researchers here employ coral micro-fragmenting to accelerate radial coral growth and deploy artificial step reefs to consolidate the mobile rubble.

If Sipadan is your priority, the team can arrange a resort package with a guaranteed permit or a day trip through a licensed Semporna operator.

The sunlit shallow reef

Snorkellers can join the boats to Sipadan provided they secure 1 of the 254 daily permits. The sheer walls mean you are snorkelling over deep blue water but the green turtles and bigeye trevally often mill in the sunlit shallows between 2 and 15 metres. You will need to be comfortable in open ocean currents and you must stay with your guide at all times.

The 1933 bird sanctuary

Sipadan was a gazetted bird sanctuary long before it became a dive destination and was established in 1933. The island's dense forest canopy provides a vital resting stop for migratory birds crossing the Celebes Sea. While the marine life draws the divers, the terrestrial protection is what kept the island's ecosystem intact before the resorts were relocated.

The north-east monsoon season

Semporna has no single dry season. It receives about 2,342 mm of rain a year and March and April are the calmest and least wet months. Sipadan's wall drops into open ocean so mainland rain rarely spoils the underwater visibility. The weather primarily decides the boat crossing. The north-east monsoon runs from November through February and brings elevated swells with a higher chance of cancelled transfers in December and January. The park is closed every November.

The road to Lahad Datu

Allow 24 hours between your last dive and any flight. If you are heading to Danum Valley or the Kinabatangan after your island stay, you will fly out of Tawau or travel overland from Semporna to Lahad Datu. Lahad Datu is the primary aviation hub for Danum Valley and is located roughly 150 kilometres north of Semporna. There are no commercial flight connections between Lahad Datu and Semporna or Tawau so you travel overland. You can make this journey by private car or minivan. The drive takes 2.5 to 3.5 hours on mostly sealed but occasionally uneven roads.

Leave your Danum Valley lodge after breakfast to reach Lahad Datu by mid-morning and continue by road to the Semporna jetty. With the transfers timed together, you can reach Semporna by 2pm for the afternoon resort speedboats to Mataking or Pom Pom and spend that night on the island. Plan a relaxing final afternoon at your resort before you travel.