Barracuda Point — Sipadan

Planning a trip?

Hotels, dive operators, gear, and how to get here are on the Sipadan location page.

Overview

Drift along the wall and a tornado of chevron barracuda forms overhead. Add turtles, schooling jacks, and the occasional whitetip shark. Often run as a single drift dive — current dictates direction.

Briefing note

Permit-controlled — 176 daily permits for the entire island. Book the permit months ahead.

What you'll see

5 species curated

Chevron barracuda
year-round
Green sea turtle
year-round
Hawksbill turtle
year-round
Schooling bigeye trevally
year-round
White-tip reef shark
year-round

Sightings evidence

1 record on file

Chevron barracuda
high confidence
Last confirmed
May 2026
Recent records
65 within 50 km

Sources & methodology

How we summarise this

We aggregate confirmed occurrence records from GBIF and OBIS within a fixed radius of each dive site. Occurrence records confirm presence and reveal seasonality clustering, but they DO NOT measure per-dive probability — there is no eligible-effort denominator. We deliberately do not publish a numeric '% chance of sighting' from this data.

Sources

Global Biodiversity Information Facility — GBIF Secretariat
Ocean Biodiversity Information System — IOC-UNESCO
OBIS-SEAMAP — Duke University Marine Geospatial Ecology Lab / OBIS
iNaturalist — California Academy of Sciences & National Geographic Society
IUCN Red List of Threatened Species — International Union for Conservation of Nature
WoRMS — World Register of Marine Species — Flanders Marine Institute (VLIZ)
FishBase — FishBase Consortium
Atlas of Living Australia — CSIRO / GBIF Australia
REEF Volunteer Fish Survey — Reef Environmental Education Foundation

Conditions

Month	Water	Visibility	Current
Jan	27–29 °C	15–25 m	moderate
Feb	27–29 °C	15–25 m	moderate
Mar	28–30 °C	20–30 m	moderate
Apr	28–30 °C	25–35 m	moderate
May	28–30 °C	25–35 m	moderate
Jun	28–30 °C	25–35 m	moderate
Jul	28–30 °C	25–35 m	moderate
Aug	28–30 °C	25–35 m	moderate
Sep	28–30 °C	20–30 m	moderate
Oct	28–30 °C	20–30 m	moderate
Nov	28–30 °C	15–25 m	moderate
Dec	27–29 °C	15–25 m	moderate

Season calendar

Jan

Feb

Mar

Apr

May

Jun

Jul

Aug

Sep

Oct

Nov

Dec

Peak season highlighted · current month outlined

Gear for this site

Beyond the basic kit

SMB + reel — Drift exits over deep water are standard here.

Next step

Book your trip to Sipadan

Hotels, liveaboards, dive operators, gear recommendations, and travel logistics for the whole region.

Plan your trip →

Some links earn us a commission. Learn more