Imagine floating on a clear sea of liquid watching fishes, crustaceans, corals - everything from dolphins to dugongs face-to-face. If this sounds like something you would love to do, then the NAUI Skin Diver or Junior Skin Diver course is for you!
Just imagine where you will go! Begin your underwater explorations by enrolling in a NAUI Scuba Diver class. This is our entry-level certification course where you will learn the fundamental knowledge and skills to safety dive in open water. * Junior Level certification is available for these course.
The Steps and what to anticipate in becoming certified as a Diver
Medical Form
Do you want to extend your bottom time, lessen your surface interval, and maximize every dive? Become a NAUI Enriched Air Nitrox diver! This course may be taught as a stand alone program or may be combined with other NAUI training programs such as NAUI Scuba Diver or NAUI Advanced Diver.
Enroll in a NAUI Advanced Diver Course to explore new dive sites and undertake exclusive activities under the supervision of a NAUI Instructor. This course allows individuals to learn about specialties and diving activities of particular interest. Your confidence and skill as a diver will increase while you experience the excitement of learning more about the underwater world.
* Junior Level certification is available for these course.
Despite all the best training and planning, sometimes the unexpected happens. Whether due to environmental conditions, medical emergencies or accident, divers and professionals may be called upon to intervene. In order to be prepared, NAUI provides training in First Aid, CPR, AED, Bloodborne Pathogens, Oxygen Administration and First Aid for Hazardous Marine Life Injuries. All training complies with the latest International Liaison Committee on Resuscitation (ILCOR) standards.
Once you are 15 years of age and a certified scuba diver, you can expand your diving knowledge with a NAUI Rescue Scuba Diver or NAUI Advanced Rescue Scuba Diver course. Learn how to manage risks and effectively handle limited in-water problems and diving emergencies, how to assist and transport divers, and how to perform surface rescues and rescues from depth involving both boat and shore based skin and scuba divers.
NAUI has partnered with Performance Freediving International (PFI) to offer the most cutting-edge and safest training standards in the sport. Freedive training teaches the techniques to allow you to comfortably enjoy the underwater world and improve your breath-holding ability.
Welcome to the wonders of the underwater world! The NAUI Snorkeler course is an entry-level program designed to educate snorkelers on the skills and knowledge to safely observe underwater attractions from or near the surface of the water. Maximum depth during training is 15 feet (5 meters). If you are looking to learn how to use basic snorkeling equipment or increase your comfort in the water while exploring, this is the course for you.
The Safe Buddy program is designed to train uncertified freedivers, and other aquatic enthusiasts, in the safety and rescue techniques necessary for breath-holding. This program increases safety awareness during recreational breath holding/freediving activities.
Explore your abilities as a Freediver to experience the underwater world like never before! The Freediver course educates divers on the skills, safety and problem management to allow you to comfortably enjoy the underwater world and improve your breath-holding techniques.
NAUI training continues far beyond the basics!
NAUI Instructors teach a wide range of specialized types of diving.
Enroll in a NAUI Underwater Environment course to learn about the physical and biological aspects of the diving environment with an emphasis on your local area. You'll study related sciences, such as oceanography, limnology, geology, biology, and ecology, and learn about various types of plant and animal life, conservation and pollution issues, the characteristics of water movement, shore, bottom and surface conditions, and how to plan dives in diverse diving locations.
With NAUI the learning never ends. Our experienced world-class instructors are the best at introducing divers to new skills and helping you reach your personal goals as a NAUI certified diver. In addition to the specific continuing education opportunities listed below, NAUI Instructors are authorized to build individual courses for certification based on their personal expertise and the needs of the learner. If you want to learn how to do it underwater, there is a NAUI Instructor ready to help .
Does the thought of deep diving fascinate you? If you are at least 18 and have a NAUI Advanced Scuba Diver certification or the equivalent, you can enroll in a Deep Diver course where you'll gain the knowledge and skills to plan and make enjoyable deep dives while minimizing risks of deep diving.
Our underwater environment presents divers with scenes of breathtaking beauty with wild and incredible creatures that amaze and fascinate. How can you possibly remember each one unless you bring them back through photography or videography? NAUI has trained some of the best underwater photographer and videographers in the world! Enroll in a NAUI Underwater Photographer or NAUI Underwater Videographer course today and begin taking home more than just sea stories to share with your friends and family.
While dry suits were once used almost exclusively for situations such as ice diving or deep wreck diving, many sport divers are now using dry suits regularly for everyday recreational dives all over the world. Perhaps you live in a cold-water climate or would just like to be warmer regardless of where you dive.
Underwater Hunter and Collector
If spearfishing or collecting underwater specimens interests you, the NAUI Underwater Hunter and Collector course may be just right for you. You'll learn about skin diving techniques, hazards and cautions, safety concerns, spearfishing and collection equipment, and specific techniques on how to hunt and collect responsibly, while minimizing the diving risks of such activities.
If you’re like most divers, you’ll love exploring at night even more than during the daylight. At night the reef comes alive as many of the daylight inhabitants retreat to the safety of dens and ledges while nocturnal creatures take over the reef during the nighttime hours. The NAUI Night Diver course focuses on the specific skills and knowledge needed to increase your enjoyment and minimize the risks of diving at night.
If you possess the desire to assist in the training of other divers, a NAUI Training Assistant specialty course might be for you. This course will qualify you in the skills and knowledge necessary to perform as a training assistant during NAUI diver training courses overseen by an active-status NAUI Instructor.
Public Safety Divers are a special breed! Many start as recreational divers, but because of their intense desire to serve their local communities many join local volunteer and paid Public Safety Diver teams to provide emergency, rescue and investigative services to the public.
At some point in your diving career, you or your buddy will either lose or find something underwater and the knowledge and skills you gain in the NAUI Search and Recovery Diver course will help you when you do. You'll learn about underwater navigation using natural and compass techniques; the problems, methods, equipment, hazards, and safety procedures regarding limited visibility diving; proper search methods and techniques; and how to handle light salvage or recovery, including rigging and knots.
If you are at least 18 years old and have a NAUI Advanced Scuba Diver certification or the equivalent thereof, you can take a Wreck Diver (External Survey) course and start exploring sunken vessels, aircraft, and other amazing wrecks in the underwater world. During your training, you will learn about safety, hazards and cautions, special risks of overhead environments, entanglement, limited visibility, deep diving, equipment, location of wrecks, sources of information, search methods
As you become more environmentally aware of your underwater surroundings, you may find yourself particularly interested in the ecology of two major oceanic environments, the kelp forests and the coral reefs. NAUI proactively promotes sound environmental diving techniques to help protect our planet's ecosystems, and teaching divers how to better interface with the delicate kelp and coral environments. Through the Underwater Ecologist courses, you will learn more about our favorite diving environment
Qualified divers are essential to collect and record archaeological data on submerged cultural resources and often perform invaluable volunteer assistance to accredited archaeologists by assisting during field work. Learn specific skills and knowledge that are helpful for wreck diving activities and provide increased enjoyment when visiting submerged cultural resources. You'll gain the basic information and skills that are used in underwater archaeological interpretation of wreck and other sites.
Recreational Hookah Diver
Learn the techniques needed use a surface supplied Recreational Hookah system underwater. Hookah dive systems eliminate the need for cylinders by pumping air from the surface to divers. Graduates of this course are not certified as Scuba Divers but are considered competent to use recreational hookah diving systems.
Minimum age is 18 years for this program. Certification as a NAUI Scuba Diver, NAUI Rescue Scuba Diver, NAUI Nitrox Diver, NAUI Master Scuba Diver, NAUI First Aid for the Diving Professional, NAUI Oxygen Provider (or equivalent) are required.
Would you like to lead dives and dive trips and take certified divers on vacations to the world's best dive sites? Many Divemasters are employed full-time or work independently supervising certified divers during club, store, resort or charter tour and travel activities. As a NAUI Divemaster you enjoy again and again adventures to which you introduce your clients. NAUI Divemaster certification is another option leading to NAUI Instructor qualification.
Want to begin working as a professional in the field, organizing your own courses, issuing certifications and conducting open water skin dives? NAUI Skin Diving Instructor training will enable you to join NAUI as a leadership member and independently conduct skin diving training. Because of the growing popularity of snorkeling and skin diving, this may gain you substantial financial rewards. You can also team-teach with a NAUI Instructor, offering the skin diving portion of the Scuba Diver Course
As an Assistant Instructor, you will be authorized to teach all aspects of skin and scuba diving under the supervision of a NAUI Instructor. This is the best possible way to develop your instructional skills. The rating can be a step toward full Instructor, or an end in itself. Match your time, talent and interests with the NAUI programs near you, and enjoy the adventure of personal and professional enhancement as a NAUI leader.
NAUI values and respects the knowledge, skills and abilities of its instructors. As such, NAUI Instructorsare authorized and can be approved to teach every level of diving in which they possess the training, knowledge and experience. NAUI also allows its instructors to develop their own "instructor specified" specialty courses. If you are someone who seeks even more adventure and specialization, NAUI provides pathways to gaining Public Safety Diver, Technical and Freediving Instructor ratings.
The NAUI Instructor Crossover Course (ICC) is designed to train and qualify applicants in good standing with non-NAUI recreational scuba training organizations as a NAUI Instructor member. During the course, candidate instructors learn effective methods to teach skin and scuba diving in compliance with NAUI Diving Course Standards.
The Instructor Trainer designation is a formal NAUI leadership designation, not a certification. The NAUI Instructor Trainer designation (IT) provides recognition to NAUI Instructors who have completed a combination of training and evaluated experience specific to the preparing, training, evaluating and counseling of NAUI Instructor candidates.
The Course Director designation is a formal NAUI leadership designation, not a certification. The NAUI Course Director designation (CD) provides recognition to NAUI Instructors who have completed a combination of training and evaluated experience specific to the preparing, training, evaluating and counseling of NAUI Instructor Trainers as well as Instructor candidates.
Technical diving is a form of scuba diving that exceeds the typical recreational limits imposed on depth and immersion time (bottom time). Tec diving involves accelerated decompression and/or the use of variable gas mixtures during a dive. Therefore, this advanced method of diving requires additional experience, training and equipment.
Introduction to Technical Diving Skills
Introduction to Technical Diving
Sidemount Diver
Overhead Environments
Cavern Diver
Cave Diver (Levels I and II)
Cave Guide
Wreck Penetration Diver
Technical Wreck Penetration Diver
Technical Ice Diver
Mine Diver (Levels I and II)
Diver Propulsion Vehicle
DPV Technical Diver
DPV Extreme Exposure Diver
Gas Blender and O2 Service Technician
Nitrox Gas Blender and O2 Tech
Mixed Gas Blender and O2 Tech
Introduction and Youth Courses
Discover Scuba® Diving (10 yrs+)
Bubblemaker (8 yrs+)
PADI Seal Team (8 yrs+)
PADI Skin Diver
PADI Certified Courses
Open Water Diver
Adventure Diver
Advance Open Water Diver
Emergency First Response
Rescue Diver
Specialty Courses
Freediver
Master Scuba Diver
PADI Pro Courses