Where to See Great Barracuda: Dive Sites, Season, Tips

The great barracuda is a streamlined predator, 1.40 meters on average and up to 2 meters, that hunts by ambush. It sometimes follows divers out of curiosity. You find it in almost every tropical sea, the Red Sea included.

Where to dive to see the great barracuda?

Seen from the front, a diver with arms spread glides above a thick school of blue-striped yellow snappers covering the reef, in deep blue water.

MaldivesReef

Banana Reef

Malé atolls

JFMAMJJASOND

Can be seen all year round: hunting in the current, with giant trevallies

A gray manta ray gliding to the left over a reef of leather corals, surrounded by damselfish in the foreground, in blue-gray water.

IndonesiaPelagic

Blue Magic

Raja Ampat

JFMAMJJASOND

Peak season from October to April: a school of yellowtail and chevron barracuda at the edge of the pinnacle

A green turtle swimming to the right in open blue water, two yellowish remoras under its plastron, next to a column of divers' bubbles and small fish.

IndonesiaReef

Bunaken, Lekuan walls

Sulawesi: Bunaken and Lembeh

JFMAMJJASOND

Peak season all year round: solitary in the blue, plus schools of Heller's barracuda on Lekuan 3

A diver in a black wetsuit facing the camera, framed by red sea fans and orange soft corals where small anthias swim, against blue water.

IndonesiaReef

Cape Kri

Raja Ampat

JFMAMJJASOND

Peak season from October to April: a school of chevron barracuda in the current off the point, with loners out in the blue

A huge school of fish in silhouette, seen from below against the sunlight sparkling under the surface, in deep blue water.

IndonesiaPelagic

Castle Rock

Komodo

JFMAMJJASOND

Peak season all year round: loners in the blue, near the trevally tornadoes

Close-up of an anemone with green, purple-tipped tentacles, nestled in the orange-red folds of its column, approached from the right by a pink anemonefish with a white stripe

ThailandPelagic

Chumphon Pinnacle

Gulf of Thailand: Koh Tao

JFMAMJJASOND

Peak season from January to October: lone great barracudas around the schools of chevron barracudas

A hawksbill turtle seen from above swims just over rocks covered in algae, brain corals, gorgonians and yellow tube sponges, in green-turquoise water

FranceReef

Cousteau Reserve (Pigeon Islands)

French West Indies: Guadeloupe and Martinique

JFMAMJJASOND

Can be seen all year round: on the Coral Garden wall and at Pointe Barracuda

Aerial view of the long Le Diamant beach lined with turquoise water, Diamond Rock offshore and Morne Larcher, a green hill, on the right

FrancePelagic

Diamond Rock

French West Indies: Guadeloupe and Martinique

JFMAMJJASOND

Can be seen all year round: in the current, off the east and south faces

An oceanic whitetip shark with white-edged fins swims below the surface, surrounded by striped pilot fish

EgyptPelagic

Elphinstone Reef

Southern Red Sea, Egypt

JFMAMJJASOND

Can be seen all year round: alone at cleaning stations or schooling in the blue

A sea anemone with raised white tentacles and a pink base, with a blurred diver in yellow fins in the background, in the Njao channel

TanzaniaPass

Fundu Gap

Pemba

JFMAMJJASOND

Can be seen all year round: schooling in the current, at the mouth of the channel

A cloud of orange anthias above a hard coral reef, in clear blue water

EgyptReef

Giftun Islands

Central Red Sea, Egypt

JFMAMJJASOND

Peak season from May to October: in the blue along the Small Giftun wall, with snappers and trevallies

A Moorish idol striped black and yellow, its long white dorsal filament stretched out, in front of a wall covered in red sponges and soft corals at Hin Daeng

ThailandPelagic

Hin Daeng and Hin Muang

Andaman Sea: Similan, Surin and Lanta

JFMAMJJASOND

Peak season from November to May: schooling in the blue, along the walls

A large potato grouper, gray marbled with black, seen from above, resting on the pale sand of a gully between two coral-covered rock walls, in a cloud of small silver fish

TanzaniaPass

Kinasi Pass

Mafia Island

JFMAMJJASOND

Peak season all year round: in a tight school in the current, above the deep wall

A reef manta ray seen head-on, its white belly and gill slits visible, passes above the sand in blue-green water, with small fish on the reef at right

ThailandPelagic

Koh Tachai Pinnacle

Andaman Sea: Similan, Surin and Lanta

JFMAMJJASOND

Peak season from October to May: tight schools spinning in a vortex above the top, large loners at the edge of the boulders

A tight school of silvery barracudas, seen from the side in deep blue water, photographed in the Red Sea at Ras Mohammed

TanzaniaPelagic

Leven Bank

Zanzibar

JFMAMJJASOND

Can be seen all year round: schooling at the edge of the plateau, in the current

A large white sea fan with red veins spread wide, between a rust-colored sponge riddled with holes on the left and a yellow sea fan, with a diver in black approaching on the right in blue water.

IndonesiaPelagic

Magic Mountain (Misool)

Raja Ampat

JFMAMJJASOND

Peak season from October to April: a school of barracuda in the current, on the slope, with fusiliers and surgeonfish

Misali Island seen from a plane, a triangle of forest edged by a white beach, sitting on a turquoise reef flat in a dark blue sea, in the haze

TanzaniaReef

Misali Island

Pemba

JFMAMJJASOND

Can be seen all year round: alone or in small schools at the edge of the drop-off

The silhouette of a diver heading down head-first toward the Palancar Gardens reef, the sun backlit at the surface, sea fans on the bottom

MexicoReef

Palancar Reef

Yucatán and the Caribbean: Cozumel, cenotes, Playa del Carmen

JFMAMJJASOND

Can be seen all year round: hanging still in the blue above the pinnacles

Aerial view of Pescador Island, a rock covered in green vegetation with its white lighthouse, surrounded by about ten dive bancas on a dark blue sea

PhilippinesReef

Pescador Island

Visayas: Cebu, Bohol and Negros

JFMAMJJASOND

Can be seen all year round: schooling in the blue, especially early in the morning

A wall of pink soft corals and an orange sea fan at Richelieu Rock, in front of a cloud of glassfish and a school of yellowtail fusiliers in the blue

ThailandPelagic

Richelieu Rock

Andaman Sea: Similan, Surin and Lanta

JFMAMJJASOND

Peak season from October to May: lone great barracudas and tight schools of chevron barracudas around the top

A chevron barracuda with a silvery blue body, its flanks marked with V-shaped bands, darts diagonally to the right in the middle of its school, in blue water full of particles

ThailandPelagic

Sail Rock

Gulf of Thailand: Koh Tao

JFMAMJJASOND

Peak season from January to October: alone on the edges of the chevron barracuda schools

A reef in the Cozumel park: a purple azure vase sponge in the foreground, a barrel sponge, a sea fan and small blue fish in bright blue water

MexicoWall

Santa Rosa Wall

Yucatán and the Caribbean: Cozumel, cenotes, Playa del Carmen

JFMAMJJASOND

Can be seen all year round: in the blue, along the wall

A garden of hard corals and fire coral a few meters below the surface, a butterflyfish in the foreground

EgyptReef

Shark and Yolanda Reef, Ras Mohammed

Northern Red Sea, Egypt

JFMAMJJASOND

Peak season from May to October: in a tight school above the saddle, from May to October

Two divers swim along the deck of the Thistlegorm beside a passageway, in milky blue water

EgyptWreck

SS Thistlegorm

Northern Red Sea, Egypt

JFMAMJJASOND

Peak season from April to November: schooling above the bridge, densest from April to November

The Liberty's hull covered in pink and brown encrusting corals, a blue-ringed angelfish along the plating and yellow butterflyfish in the blue

IndonesiaShore dive

USAT Liberty wreck

Bali and Nusa Penida

JFMAMJJASOND

Can be seen all year round: loners hanging motionless above the deck

How do you identify a great barracuda?

Long body, prominent lower jaw, fang-like teeth: the great barracuda looks like nothing else. Its two dorsal fins are widely spaced, the flanks carry a few black spots and the tips of the rear fins are white. It averages 1.40 meters and can reach 2 meters and 50 kilos.

Great barracuda in pictures

A great barracuda above a sandy bottom, head to the left, mouth half open: prominent lower jaw lined with long pointed teeth, large eye, long silvery body; sponge-covered rocks on the right.

Where does the great barracuda live?

You find it in almost all tropical and subtropical seas, except the eastern Pacific, from the surface to about thirty meters, sometimes down to 100 meters. Juveniles frequent reefs and estuaries, in schools; adults live mostly alone, also in open water. Since the late 1970s, it has colonized the northern Mediterranean, from the Gulf of Genoa to the Esterel.

Is the great barracuda dangerous?

The great barracuda hunts fish and cephalopods by ambush, with a short burst of speed that reaches 60 km/h. It is curious and sometimes follows divers, and more often spearfishers, drawn by their catch. Incidents are extremely rare: its jaw is weak and its teeth fragile, although a large one can inflict a wound. Don't bother it and don't feed it.

Our tip

Is it following you? That's curiosity. Keep your distance, don't try to touch or feed it, and let it go: it isn't built to go after a diver.