The PADI Open Water Diver course is incredibly flexible and performance based, which means that your PADI Dive Center or Resort can offer the program on a wide variety of schedules, and paced according to how fast you progress. It’s possible to complete your confined and open water dives in as few as three or four days (provided you take care of reading the manual and watching the video ahead of time).

1. Knowledge Development – This develops your familiarity with basic principles and procedures. You learn things like how pressure affects your body, how to choose the best gear and what to consider when planning dives.

You complete Knowledge Development on your own, reading each of five sections of the PADI Open Water Diver Manual and watching the corresponding section of the PADI Open Water Diver Video (which also previews skills you’ll learn). If you like learning with a personal computer, you can also get the Open Water Diver Manual and Video together as a CD-ROM. You briefly review what you studied in each section with your instructor and take a short quiz to be sure you’re getting it. At the end of the course, you take an exam that makes sure you’ve got all the key concepts and ideas down.

2. Confined Water Dives – This is what it’s all about – diving. You develop basic scuba skills in a pool or in a body of water with pool-like conditions. Here you’ll learn everything from setting up your gear to how to easily get water out of your mask without surfacing. You’ll also practice some emergency skills, like sharing air – just in case. Plus, you may play some games, make new friends and have a great time.

There are five confined water dives, with each building upon the previous. Over the course of these five dives, you attain the skills you need to dive in open water.

3. Open Water Dives – After your confined water dives, you and the new friends you’ve made continue learning during four open water dives with your PADI Instructor at a dive site. This is where you have fun putting it all together and fully experience the underwater adventure – at the beginner level, of course. You may make these dives near where you live or at a more exotic destination on holiday.