Is the Discover Scuba Diving Program Killing the Dive Industry?

Usually when I dive, it’s in the best places—on liveaboards and at resorts designed exclusively for divers. These spots are typically filled with highly experienced divers who, if I’m being honest, tend to be a bit older. The community of such divers is small, and we’ve discussed the decline of the dive industry in previous deep dives. But once you move away from the luxury, elite-style dive holidays, there’s a broader ecosystem—dive resorts, small boats, and training centers that for years have relied on the educational structure as their backbone. A new diver comes in, completes their Open Water training, buys a mask and snorkel, and continues the journey. Eventually, they finish their training, become fully equipped and committed divers, and graduate to the liveaboards and high-end resorts, taking two or three dive trips a year.

However, if you’ve been around the dive industry for a while—whether as an instructor, dive center owner, club member, or passionate hobbyist—you’ve probably noticed a quiet shift in how people are engaging with scuba diving. It’s not about the gear, and it’s not about the dive sites. It’s the mindset. Increasingly, people are treating scuba diving not as a journey or a skill set to develop over time, but as a one-off experience—a novelty. Just another checkbox on the holiday itinerary. In the same way people have treated skydiving in the past: a one-time experience with an instructor, never to be repeated.

At the center of this shift lies one program that’s become both hugely popular and deeply controversial: Discover Scuba Diving, or DSD for short. I first noticed this trend over a decade ago when I was working the day boats in Cairns, Australia. These boats carried more than 100 guests, and every single one was offered a free DSD in the ocean. Most of them didn’t even know what that meant—but they took it anyway.

So let’s talk about it—honestly. Is the DSD program helping the dive industry grow, or is it quietly undermining everything that makes scuba diving sustainable?

Where DSD Came From—and Why It Took Off

The Discover Scuba Diving program wasn’t born out of bad intentions. Quite the opposite—it was introduced by agencies like PADI and SSI as a way to make diving more accessible. The logic was simple: let people try scuba in a safe, supervised environment without committing to a full course, and they’ll fall in love with it. From there, they’d naturally want to get certified and become lifelong divers.

And for a while, that seemed like a solid idea. DSD became a staple offering at resort destinations around the world. Whether you were in Koh Tao, Cozumel, or Sharm el-Sheikh, you could walk into a dive shop and sign up on the spot. In those early days, DSD felt like a gateway—a taster session that sparked curiosity and led people toward full Open Water certification. Dive centers marketed it that way, too: “Try before you buy.”

But over time, something shifted. Instead of being a stepping stone into the dive world, DSD started becoming the main event. It stopped being a doorway and started functioning more like a revolving door.

In high-volume tourist destinations—think Thailand, Egypt, the Maldives, or Mexico—DSD is now the bread and butter of many dive shops. It’s easy to sell. It’s easy to run. And it’s easy to scale. One instructor, a shallow reef, some patient hand-holding, and boom—another dozen people have “been scuba diving” for the first time.

But here’s the kicker: most of them never come back.

The Drop-Off: Where Do the DSD Divers Go?

This is where we hit the snag. Industry numbers suggest that somewhere between 5% and 15% of DSD participants ever go on to complete a full certification. That’s a dismal conversion rate. In fact, in a piece I recently wrote for Inside Scuba about diver retention after Open Water, I pointed out that even certified divers drop off faster than we’d like—but the DSD crowd barely sticks around at all.

There are plenty of reasons for this. Many DSD divers are tourists on short holidays who just want a cool story or a few Instagram-worthy photos. Some are nervous and never really relax underwater. Others feel like they’ve “done scuba” and don’t realize how much more rewarding it becomes with proper training. And some are simply ticking boxes—dive with sharks, see a wreck, snap a selfie, move on.

Then there’s the experience itself. I’ve seen DSD sessions all over the world, and they’re often overcrowded, rushed, and devoid of educational value. They don’t spark the curiosity needed to continue the path. It’s a numbers game: dive resorts are pushing high volumes through at a low price and tight margin, trying to squeeze out extra revenue by selling things like a photo of you with Nemo. You go down, sit on the sand in a line, wait your turn for the photo op, then return to the boat and get charged another 40 bucks for the shot. It’s become a high-volume, Disneyland-style, tick-box exercise.

And the result is the same. They don’t get certified. They don’t join clubs. They don’t buy gear. They don’t come back.

What This Means For the Industry’s Foundation

Now, I’m not saying every DSD diver needs to become a hardcore tech diver running a twinset in 5°C (41°F) water. But the reality is that a healthy dive industry depends on more than just short-term, high-volume traffic. It needs committed divers—people who stick around, who bring their mates into it, who take Rescue, Divemaster, and maybe even go on to teach.

The problem is, the more we rely on DSD, the more we build a model that caters to transients—not just in terms of customers, but in terms of values. Dive centers start to prioritize quick turnover over meaningful instruction. Instructors spend their careers kneeling in the sand, holding onto someone’s tank while they paddle around like startled goldfish. Instructor burnout skyrockets. Teaching people who genuinely want to learn is rewarding. Shepherding tourists who just want to cross scuba off a list? Not so much.

The very dive stores that we all came through are losing their bread and butter. They miss out on repeated courses, equipment sales, and word-of-mouth referrals that bring in future divers. One of the most lucrative parts of running a dive shop is dive travel. Most successful stores have a loyal group of divers who form the backbone of those trips. But without new divers moving up through the training pyramid and coming out the top, there won’t be anyone to join those future expeditions.

Club Diving, Community, and the DSD Effect

This shift away from long-term engagement is hitting local clubs and community-based training organizations especially hard. Take BSAC (the British Sub-Aqua Club), for example. It’s built on a completely different philosophy—one rooted in mentorship, progression, and community. Training is often delivered by volunteers, with a real emphasis on skill-building and viewing diving as a lifelong passion rather than a short-term product.

But these clubs are struggling. Younger divers often don’t see the appeal of slow, structured development when they’ve already “been diving” on holiday. I’ve spoken to club instructors across the UK who say they’re seeing fewer new recruits, and many of those who do join aren’t interested in helping teach or mentoring others down the line.

When DSD becomes the norm, the idea of investing in the sport—time, money, and energy—starts to feel outdated. We end up with a growing divide: on one side, a handful of experienced divers keeping the flame alive; on the other, millions of people who did one dive on a beach somewhere and never thought about scuba again.

DSD vs. Proper Training: What’s Being Lost?

Let’s not forget that scuba diving is a technical activity. It demands respect for safety, situational awareness, environmental responsibility, and buoyancy control. These aren’t things you can fully appreciate in a 30-minute dip at 12 meters (40 feet) while clutching your instructor’s hand. And yet, more and more people think that’s all there is to it.

I’ve seen reefs trashed by careless fin kicks from DSD groups. I’ve seen instructors exhausted from trying to keep nervous tourists from bolting to the surface. And I’ve heard time and time again from dive pros who feel like they’ve stopped teaching and started babysitting.

Meanwhile, Open Water and Advanced courses—the programs that actually give divers the foundation to explore the underwater world safely and meaningfully—are being pushed to the sidelines. Fewer sign-ups. Fewer referrals. And ultimately, fewer real divers being made.

When I lived in Australia, I saw the lowest standard of instructor training and dive ability I’ve ever encountered anywhere in the world. Was it their fault? No. It was what they presumed to be the industry norm: taking 100 people a day on a try dive in the ocean. They didn’t have time to think about how participants were feeling, whether they were having a meaningful experience—they just had to get the job done. The next group was already waiting.

As instructors, they had no passion for understanding diving beyond what was right in front of them. They were supposed to be the inspiration for new divers, telling stories of great dives and sharing their love for the ocean. Instead, they were tired, worn out, and had little depth of knowledge about diving.

Where Do We Go From Here?

So what’s the fix? Do we ban DSD programs? Of course not—they serve a purpose. But we do need to rethink how we use them.

First, DSD should be clearly marketed as an introduction, not the full picture. There needs to be a meaningful educational component—marine conservation, basic diving skills, and a clear pathway to certification. Not just a splash-and-dash tour.

Second, dive centers should be incentivized to convert DSD divers into certified divers. Offer a discount on an Open Water course if they book within a certain time-frame. Give credit for skills already completed. Make it easy to keep going.

And finally, we need to shift the narrative. Diving isn’t just a tourist activity. It’s not just for warm water and palm trees. It’s a skill. A community. A lifetime of discovery. We need to start telling that story again—online, in person, and in the way we train.

A Wake-Up Call, Not a Condemnation

I know some people reading this will disagree. DSD brings money into the industry. It keeps instructors working. It gets people in the water who otherwise never would. All of that is true.

But we’ve got to stop pretending that DSD is building the future of diving. It’s not. It’s building a short-term economy based on shallow engagement and high turnover. That might be fine for now—but what happens when the tourists stop coming? When the reefs are wrecked? When the instructors burn out and the clubs fold?

This isn’t a call to scrap DSD. It’s a call to reframe it. Use it the way it was meant to be used—as a first step, not a final product.

If we care about the future of diving—not just the business side, but the culture, the community, the craft—then we need to start thinking long-term again. That means supporting certification. Supporting clubs. Supporting instructors. And, most importantly, supporting the divers who want to stay.

Because it’s not the people who do one dive that keep this industry alive.
It’s the ones who come back.