Dive visibility in Cape Town
Cape Peninsula · False Bay · Overberg
What the underwater visibility is forecast to do across Cape Town's dive sites today, tomorrow and the day after, modelled from swell and wind history.
Dive visibility in Cape Town, tomorrow (Friday 6 November 2026): the clearest water is forecast at Buffels Bay with a median of 10.0 m and conditions rated diveable. Across all 26 covered sites the median forecast is 6.3 m, and 14 sites are rated diveable during daylight hours. Figures are modelled estimates over daylight hours, not measurements.
Every Cape Town dive site, ranked by tomorrow's visibility
| Site | Region | Tomorrow 6 Nov | Saturday 7 Nov | Sunday 8 Nov | Monday 9 Nov | Tuesday 10 Nov | Wednesday 11 Nov | Conditions |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Buffels Bay | False Bay, inside Cape Point | 10.0 m | 9.4 m | 8.2 m | 8.4 m | 9.3 m | 9.8 m | Diveable |
| Partridge Point | False Bay, western shore, north of Smitswinkel Bay | 9.3 m | 7.8 m | 6.1 m | 6.6 m | 7.9 m | 9.3 m | Diveable |
| Roman Rock | False Bay, offshore reef near Simon's Town | 8.0 m | 6.5 m | 4.6 m | 5.3 m | 6.7 m | 8.2 m | Diveable |
| Glencairn | False Bay, western shore, near Seaforth/Simon's Town | 7.9 m | 7.1 m | 5.9 m | 6.1 m | 6.9 m | 7.6 m | Diveable |
| Water's Edge | False Bay, western shore (Seaforth, Simon's Town) | 7.8 m | 7.0 m | 5.7 m | 5.8 m | 6.9 m | 7.7 m | Diveable |
| Smitswinkelbaai | False Bay, western shore, south of Partridge Point | 7.7 m | 6.6 m | 5.0 m | 5.3 m | 6.5 m | 7.6 m | Diveable |
| Boulders Beach | False Bay, western shore (Simon's Town) | 7.7 m | 6.7 m | 5.3 m | 5.5 m | 6.6 m | 7.6 m | Diveable |
| Castle Rock | False Bay, western shore, near Seaforth/Simon's Town | 7.6 m | 6.5 m | 4.9 m | 5.0 m | 6.1 m | 7.3 m | Diveable |
| Windmill Beach | False Bay, western shore (Simon's Town) | 7.2 m | 5.9 m | 4.2 m | 4.5 m | 6.0 m | 7.3 m | Diveable |
| Millers Point | False Bay, western shore | 7.1 m | 6.1 m | 4.7 m | 4.9 m | 5.9 m | 7.0 m | Diveable |
| Oudekraal | Atlantic seaboard, between Bakoven and Llandudno | 6.9 m | 5.7 m | 5.3 m | 8.0 m | 10.0 m | 10.1 m | Touch and go |
| Blouklip | False Bay, eastern shore (Clarence Drive, north of Rooi Els) | 6.5 m | 6.5 m | 6.9 m | 8.3 m | 9.0 m | 8.6 m | Not diveable |
| Pyramid Rock | False Bay, western shore, near Miller's Point | 6.4 m | 4.8 m | 3.7 m | 5.0 m | 6.6 m | 7.4 m | Not diveable |
| A-Frame | False Bay, western shore (Simon's Town, Oatlands Point) | 6.4 m | 5.8 m | 4.8 m | 4.9 m | 5.6 m | 6.3 m | Diveable |
| Cape Hangklip | Overberg coast, headland east of Pringle Bay | 6.2 m | 4.6 m | 3.4 m | 4.3 m | 5.6 m | 6.6 m | Not diveable |
| Moonlight Beach | Overberg coast, Grootbaai, east of Hangklip lighthouse | 6.1 m | 4.5 m | 3.2 m | 3.8 m | 5.0 m | 6.1 m | Touch and go |
| Romelia | Atlantic seaboard, Sunset Rocks, Llandudno | 5.9 m | 5.8 m | 6.4 m | 8.6 m | 9.9 m | 9.3 m | Not diveable |
| Long Beach | False Bay, Simon's Town | 5.7 m | 5.5 m | 4.9 m | 5.0 m | 5.5 m | 5.6 m | Diveable |
| Rooi Els | Overberg coast, east side of False Bay, near Gordon’s Bay | 5.2 m | 4.2 m | 3.8 m | 5.1 m | 6.3 m | 6.6 m | Not diveable |
| Antipolis | Atlantic seaboard, Oudekraal, wreck below the Twelve Apostles | 5.1 m | 5.3 m | 6.1 m | 7.8 m | 8.8 m | 8.0 m | Touch and go |
| Bakoven | Atlantic seaboard | 4.8 m | 4.0 m | 3.9 m | 6.1 m | 8.0 m | 8.0 m | Not diveable |
| Dalebrook | False Bay, western shore (Kalk Bay, St James) | 4.6 m | 3.1 m | 1.7 m | 2.2 m | 3.5 m | 4.9 m | Diveable |
| Bantry Bay | Atlantic seaboard, Sea Point | 4.1 m | 4.1 m | 5.2 m | 8.3 m | 9.9 m | 8.3 m | Not diveable |
| Clifton | Atlantic seaboard | 3.9 m | 3.3 m | 3.9 m | 7.0 m | 8.8 m | 7.6 m | Not diveable |
| Cosy Bay | Atlantic seaboard, Oudekraal, between Bakoven and Llandudno | 3.8 m | 4.0 m | 4.6 m | 5.8 m | 6.2 m | 5.7 m | Diveable |
| Cow and Calf | False Bay, eastern shore (Gordon's Bay) | 3.0 m | 2.8 m | 3.2 m | 4.8 m | 5.9 m | 5.2 m | Not diveable |
Median modelled visibility in metres, averaged over daylight hours. "Conditions" is the best daylight hour tomorrow, called on the weakest safety gate: entry and exit, bottom surge, current, wind or surface chop.
Forecast generated Thursday 5 November 2026 at 16:10 SAST. Updated every three hours.
Why Cape Town visibility is so hard to guess
Visibility here lags the weather. It is set by how hard the bottom has been stirred over the preceding days and how long the silt has had to drop out again, which is why an instantaneous swell forecast tells you almost nothing about what you will actually see. Instead, theviz reads six days of swell and wind history at each site, runs it through bottom-stirring physics, and lets it settle a week forward.
Cape Town also has two separate oceans. The Atlantic seaboard sites (Clifton, Bakoven, Oudekraal) clean up on a southeaster that wrecks False Bay, while Simon's Town and the False Bay western shore come good on a northwester. That is why the table above regularly has excellent and unworkable sites on the same day, and why a single "Cape Town visibility" number would be meaningless.
What the numbers mean
Every figure is a median drawn from an ensemble: four wave models crossed with three weather models, carried through separately rather than averaged first. The per-site pages give the 10th–90th percentile band and the probability of diveable conditions alongside the median. A wide band means the models disagree. It is the difference between "probably 8 m" and "anywhere from 3 to 14 m".
Full method, inputs and known limitations: methodology. Hourly detail and the fan chart: live forecast.
Water clarity on theviz is forecast from swell and wind history. It does not measure it, and it is not navigation or dive-safety advice. Conditions change fast; check locally, dive within your training, and verify marine protected-area boundaries before spearfishing.