Aruba Dives Sites

These are the most popular and the ones you're likely to see. Go Antilla!

Aruba Dives Sites
Aruba Most Popular Dive Sites

Scuba Diving Magazine readers once voted Aruba as the Caribbean’s No. 1 wreck diving and No. 3 advanced diving destination. Aruba has more than 20 dive sites and 8 shipwrecks, including the Antilla German freighter, one of the largest wrecks in the Caribbean.

Overall, Aruba is an excellent dive location for divers of skill levels. Marine life here is diverse with underwater critters of all shapes, sizes and colors. Schools of yellowtail snappers and grunt fish are common here as well as queen angelfish. So are parrotfish, which snorkelers at De Palm Island normally can see in abundance.

As part of the Dutch ABC islands (Aruba, Bonaire, Curacao), Aruba’s reefs are festooned with the usual massive orange barrel sponges.

Antilla Wreck (60')
Aruba’s most famous wreck and one of its best underwater photo sites is this World War II German freighter on the north west coast of Malmok beach. One of the Caribbean’s largest wrecks, this 400-foot long ship-reef is covered with giant sponges and coral formations as well as lots of small macro critters. Antilla is among Aruba’s best dive for underwater photographers.

Jane Sea Freighter Wreck (30’-90’)
The dive starts on the Barcadera reef and descends to the wreck of the Jane Sea freighter, which stands up-right and decorated with sea fans and bran coral. Inside the wreck, divers can explore the ship’s hull and cabins.

Malmok Reef & Debbie ll (70’)
About 2 miles off the North West , Malmok Reef is best known for its spread leaf and brain corals, lobsters, stingrays, and colorful giant barrel sponges. The Debbie II, a 120-footfuel barge sunk here in 1992 is an added man-made coral reef that attracts schools of fish and barracuda.

Pedernales Wreck (35')
The shallow depths make this an ideal spot for newer divers, located about a mile west of Palm Beach. The Pedernales site consists of large pieces of wreck spread between coral formations, the remains of the oil tanker torpedoed during World War II. Here it’s possible to see lobsters, groupers and good numbers of angelfish.

Renaissance Airplanes (40’-80’)
Located on Renaissance reef , this is the resting place of 2 sunken airplanes. The older, a Convair 400, is in about 80 feet of water. The newer YS-11, once part of the Air Aruba fleet, is at 40 feet. Both planes are now the homes of a variety of marine life and corals.

De Palm Slope (15-120’)
Next to popular De Palm Island, reef slopes from a shallow 15 feet and bottoms out at 120 feet. This is a drift dive accessible from De Palm Island or by boat.

Mangel Angel Halto Reef (15’-110')
The reef is called Mangel Halto due to the mangroves on the nearby beach. The dive slopes from 15 feet to 110 feet, offering a variety of corals and marine life, including deep-water gorgonians, sea anemones, both tube and vase sponges, octopus, seahorses and yellowtail snapper.

Cabez Reef (50')
At the tip of Aruba’s east coast, only advanced shore divers should attempt this site due to the usual rough seas and strong currents. But it’s worth the effort for what many consider one of Aruba’s most exciting dives. Look for big schools of barracuda, amberjacks and rainbow runners along with sting rays.

Arashi Reef (35'-40')
Just ½-mile off Arashi Beach, this is another excellent site for new divers. The reef is home to brain coral, large star corals, numerous sea fans and the scattered parts of an airplane, a sunken Lockheed Lodestar, scattered at about 35 feet.

Tugboat Wreck (40'-90')
Located about 2 miles south west of Oranjestad harbor, a gradual slope leads to an old pilot boat and its excellent stands of hard and soft coral. Usual residents are green moray eels and French angelfish. If you’re lucky, you may spot stingrays and spotted eagle rays.

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