COMPUTER DIVER COURSE

Dive smarter. Dive safer. Dive with confidence.

Imagine descending with complete awareness of your depth, time, ascent rate, and no-decompression limits…
Knowing exactly what your dive computer is telling you…
Feeling calm, prepared, and fully in control of every dive profile.

The Computer Diver Course is designed to help you go beyond the basic functions of your personal dive computer and truly understand how to use it as a powerful tool for safer, longer, and more efficient dives.

Many divers wear a dive computer…
Few know how to use its full potential.

This course helps you change that.

WHY TAKE THIS COURSE?

Your dive computer is one of the most important pieces of equipment you use underwater.

When you understand how it works, you can:

• Make better dive decisions
• Improve your awareness underwater
• Plan dives more efficiently
• Increase safety and confidence
• Get more value from the equipment you already own

Instead of simply looking at numbers on a screen, you’ll learn how to interpret the information and use it to dive smarter.

WHAT YOU WILL LEARN

This course bridges the gap between traditional dive planning and modern digital technology.

Dive Planning & Monitoring

Learn how to use your computer to plan and monitor single dives, multilevel dives, and repetitive dives with greater accuracy.

Data Interpretation

Understand the meaning behind critical information such as:

• No-Decompression Limits (NDL)
• Nitrogen loading
• Depth and bottom time
• Ascent rate alerts

Advanced Features

Discover how to unlock more of your computer’s capabilities, including:

• Alarm settings
• Personalized safety options
• Gas integration for compatible models
• Connecting to smartphones or computers for digital log analysis

Safety & Emergency Awareness

Build confidence in handling situations such as:

• Recognizing signs of decompression sickness (DCS)
• Responding to computer failure
• Managing omitted decompression scenarios
• Making safer decisions under pressure

COURSE DETAILS

Prerequisites

Students typically need:

• Open Water Diver certification or equivalent
• Minimum age of 10–12 years old depending on agency standards

Duration

The course is typically completed in 1 day and often includes 2 open water training dives.

WHO IS THIS COURSE FOR?

This course is ideal for divers who want to:

• Understand their personal dive computer better
• Improve safety and confidence underwater
• Move beyond basic computer functions
• Learn how to plan dives more effectively
• Get the most out of modern dive technology

Whether you’re a newer diver or someone who has been diving with a computer for years, this course can make every dive more informed and more efficient.

WHAT YOU’LL GAIN

By the end of the course, you’ll feel:

• More confident using your dive computer
• More aware of what is happening during your dive
• Better prepared to plan, monitor, and adjust dives safely
• More comfortable relying on your equipment with understanding—not guesswork

Better knowledge. Better decisions. Better diving.

READY TO DIVE SMARTER?

Take the mystery out of your dive computer and learn how to use it with clarity and confidence.

The Computer Diver Course helps you turn information into action—and technology into a real advantage underwater.

Learn it. Understand it. Use it with confidence

Who this course is for:

• The certified diver looking for more information to maximize their use of a computer for scuba diving

Course prerequisites:

• SDI Open Water Scuba Diver, SDI Junior Open Water Diver, or equivalent
• Minimum age 18, 10 with parental consent

What you can expect to learn:

The SDI Computer Diver course takes an in-depth look at all of the following and more:

• Computers vs. tables
  • History of tables
  • Computers advantages
  • Different decompression models
• Decompression sickness
  • Cause
  • Signs and symptoms
  • Treatment
  • First aid
  • Prevention
• Types of diving computers
  • Air integrated
  • Non-air integrated
  • Features
• How dive computers work
  • Decompression information in permanent memory
  • Pressure transducer reads ambient pressure
  • Internal clock records lapsed dive or surface time, updates frequently, usually every 3 seconds
  • Information is calculated in the computer microprocessor during each update
  • Information is displayed on screen
  • User is responsible for interpreting information
• Use of dive computers
  • Always read manual first
  • Start-up procedures
  • Operating instructions
  • Ascent rates
  • Other information
• Definitions
  • Dive time:
    Elapsed time from beginning of descent until final surfacing at end of dive
  • Time remaining:
    Available time, according to computer program, that diver may remain at current depth without incurring mandatory decompression; increases as depth decreases
• Planning Multi-Level Repetitive Dives
  • Dive planning mode
  • First dive or repetitive dive
• Only One Diver per Computer
  • Very unsafe practice for two divers to attempt to monitor dive profiles with one computer
• Emergency Procedures
  • Decompression
  • Omitted decompression
  • Ascent rates
  • Computers varying ascent rates determined by the manufacture
  • Computer failure

Some of the required skills you will have to demonstrate include:

• Diver must prepare a suitable multi-level profile for training dives
• The diver is to monitor depth, buoyancy control, and air supply during the dives. For example, if the dive is projected for 21 metres/70 feet maximum depth; the diver must then monitor his depth and not exceed the planned maximum depth
• Execute a safety stop must be included at the end of each dive
• After completing the 2 dives the divers must download their computers if they have the capability
• Instructors must review this information with the students

What’s in it for you?

Upon successful completion of this course, graduates may engage in diving activities without direct supervision of the SDI Instructor* so long as the following limits are adhered to:

• The diving activities approximate those of training
• The areas of activities approximate those of training
• Environmental conditions approximate those of training

*Note: Junior divers (ages 10-14) must participate in diving activities with a parent, guardian, or dive professional.

Also, the SDI Computer Diver certification counts towards a single specialty rating to achieve the SDI Advanced Diver Development Program.

SDI Computer Diver minimum requirements:

• Satisfactorily complete the SDI Deep and Dive Computer Knowledge Quests with a passing score of 80%, followed by 100% remediation by the Instructor
• Complete all open water requirements efficiently
• Demonstrate mature and sound judgment concerning dive planning and execution