A day boat reaches one island. A speedboat reaches six.
Which Phi Phi run gets into Maya Bay before the fleet. What a five-island blue-cave loop out of Split costs. Whether the Benagil arch is worth a 7am start, and where to sit when the chop comes up. Reviews of every speedboat, RIB and jet-boat trip you can book.
★★★★★★★★★★ 4.9 · Original Island-Hopping Speedboat Tour
Four speedboat days that decide the rest of the trip.
From an arch in the Algarve cliffs to a canyon run in Otago. What each one costs, and how much of it you spend actually moving.
01The cave everybody wantsPortimão: Benagil Caves Speed Boat Tour with Sunset OptionInto the Benagil arch and back along the Algarve cliffs. A small hull gets inside; the big catamarans stop at the mouth and photograph it.
02The long Adriatic dayBlue cave, Mamma Mia and Hvar, 5 islands speedboat tourFive stops out of Split, starting at the Bisevo blue cave while the light is still coming through the water. Ten hours, most of them under way.
03The Andaman classicHong Islands Day Trip by Speedboat with LunchHong lagoon, a viewpoint climb and lunch on the sand. November to April; the southwest monsoon closes the beach landings.
04Twenty-five loud minutesShotover River Extreme Jet Boat Ride in QueenstownA jet boat through the Shotover canyon with rock a metre off the hull, and one spin nobody is ready for.
The Andaman, the Adriatic, the Algarve: six coasts built for a small fast boat.
Limestone stacks an hour apart, a sea cave that only opens in flat water, a reef inside a marine park, a harbour you can cross at forty knots. Six places, and the trip worth booking first in each.
Phi Phi, the Hongs or James Bond Island: three Andaman days, one fast hull.
Every big day out of Phuket and Krabi is a speedboat day. What separates them is how far the crossing is, how early the pier wants you, and how many other hulls are already in the bay when you get there.
The speedboat trips more travellers take than any others.
Every speedboat trip we have reviewed →What earns each of these its place, with the price and the hours on the water.
1
Portimão: Benagil Caves Speed Boat Tour with Sunset Option
Set out from Portimão with a skipper and guide for a 90-minute RIB-boat ride past Ferragudo, Carvoeiro, Algar Seco, and Benagil Cave. You can book a shared or private trip, and the sunset departure adds warm evening light on the return. Guides such as Sergio and Carlos are known for humor and clear commentary.
From · $20
Read our review →
2
Marina, Atlantis, Palm & Burj Al Arab Speedboat Tour
from $25
3
Blue cave, Mamma Mia and Hvar, 5 islands speedboat tour
from $111
4
Portimão: Benagil Sea Caves Speedboat Adventure Tour
from $20
5
Benagil Caves & Dolphin Watching Speed Boat Tour
from $40
6
Captain Bob Speed Boat, Snorkeling, Beach Tour & Lunch St Maarten
from $139
7
Speedboat Trip to Symi with Free Time to Explore
from $35
8
Circle Line “The Beast” Midtown/Downtown Speedboat Ride
from $34
The reefs a speedboat reaches before the day boats do.
A fast hull buys the first mooring of the morning: Coral Island before the ferries, a Hurghada house reef while the water is still glass, a Zadar islet with nobody standing on it.
Sea caves only open to a hull small enough to fit through the arch.
Bisevo goes electric for about two hours either side of noon. Benagil takes a boat under three metres wide and nothing else. The Kotor grotto needs flat water. Cave runs are the first trip a swell cancels, and the one worth rebooking for.
What a speedboat seat actually costs, low to high.
Every trip on the site, grouped by what a seat costs. A harbour blast costs less than lunch. A hull to yourself for the day costs more than the flight that got you there.
Harbour blasts, hour-long sightseeing runs and the short hop out to one island and back.
The full days: four-island Andaman runs, five-stop Adriatic loops, whale zodiacs with the survival suit thrown in.
Private charters, marine-park days with the park fees inside, and the boat you get to point wherever you like.
A speedboat trip is the first thing a swell takes off the board.
A metre of chop turns an hour on a hard hull into a spine test, so the operator pulls the trip rather than run it. Andaman beach landings shut from May to October. The Dalmatian cave boats sit out a bura. Norway keeps going because everyone is in a survival suit. Book the cave and the reef early in the week, so there is a second morning to fall back on.
Four things about a speedboat day nobody mentions until you are on the pontoon.
A speedboat listing tells you the stops and the price. It rarely tells you which seat hurts, what the swell can take away, or who the operator will turn back at the gangway.
- 01Phi Phi Islands Speedboat Day TourThe crossing is open water. Bow seats take the slam; ask for the back row if your spine or your stomach has an opinion.
- 02Portimão: Benagil Caves Speed Boat Tour with Sunset OptionWhether you get inside the arch is decided by the swell that morning, not by the booking. Boats that stop at the mouth charge the same.
- 03Shotover River Extreme Jet Boat Ride in QueenstownThe spins soak everyone. Phones go in the dry bag the crew hands out, sunglasses come off, and hats stay in the bag.
- 04Tadoussac/Charlevoix: Whale Watching Zodiac TourMost inflatable operators refuse pregnant passengers and anyone with a back or neck injury. On a RIB that is a hard rule, not a formality.
Three things that need a small hull and an engine.
Big boats cannot get into the cave, cannot spin in the shallows and cannot cover a fjord and be back for lunch. These three are the whole argument for booking the fast one.
The Bisevo Blue Cave
The cave on Bisevo has no skylight. Light comes up through an underwater opening on the seaward side and fills the chamber from below, so the water reads silver-blue and everything above it turns dark. It works for roughly two hours around midday and only when the swell lets the little boats through the low entrance. Numbers are capped, tickets are timed, and the tour that gets you there for the good window costs more than the one that does not.
- 1Portimão: Benagil Caves Speed Boat Tour with Sunset Option★★★★★★★★★★ 4.8 · 11,663 reviews
- 2Blue cave, Mamma Mia and Hvar, 5 islands speedboat tour★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 7,150 reviews
- 3Portimão: Benagil Sea Caves Speedboat Adventure Tour★★★★★★★★★★ 4.8 · 6,546 reviews
The Shotover Jet
Jet boats have no propeller. They pull water in underneath and fire it out of a nozzle, which is why they run in half a metre of river and can spin on the spot. In the Shotover canyon the driver uses that to come within a metre of the rock at speed, then throws a full-power turn that soaks everyone facing outwards. Twenty-five minutes, most of it at a pace where you stop taking photographs.
- 1Shotover River Extreme Jet Boat Ride in Queenstown★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 2,540 reviews
- 2Shotover River and Kawarau River Jet Boat Ride★★★★★★★★★★ 4.7 · 1,682 reviews
- 3Surfers Paradise, Gold Coast Jet Boat Ride: 55 Minutes★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 1,499 reviews
A RIB up a Norwegian fjord
Norway runs its fast boats all year because everyone is zipped into a flotation suit before they board. A rigid inflatable covers the 42 kilometres to Pulpit Rock and back inside three hours, close enough to the wall to take spray off the waterfalls, which no scheduled ferry will do. Cold, loud, and the only way to see the whole fjord in a morning.
- 1Eidfjord: 1-Hour Fjord RIB Tour★★★★★★★★★★ 4.9 · 215 reviews
- 2Sarandë Sea Safari: Speedboat to Hidden Coves & Wild Beaches★★★★★★★★★★ 4.8 · 105 reviews
- 3Dingle: Sea Safari by RIB Boat★★★★★★★★★★ 4.8 · 94 reviews
Off Split a speedboat does five islands in the time a ferry does one.
Dalmatia is why the speedboat took the coast off the ferries. Bisevo first for the cave light, Stiniva for the cove, a long lunch on Hvar, then the Pakleni channel with the throttle open on the way back.
Every Croatian speedboat day →
By coast — where the fast boats run
By kind of trip — cave, reef, lagoon or canyon
The newest speedboat and RIB reviews.
More just-added speedboat reviews →
Private 7m 250hp speed boat tour Shipwreck Blue caves up to 8pax
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Private Luxury 6.5m 140hp Speedboat cruise Shipwreck & Blue Caves
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Mesmerizing Ile aux Cerf: Speed Boat, GRSE, Lunch & Undersea walk (Full Day)
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Full Day Ile aux Cerfs Speedboat Trip With Hotel Transfers (Private or Shared)
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Krabi 7 Islands Snorkeling and Sunset Tour by Speedboat
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Boat Tour to Caprera and La Maddalena Archipelago
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Gulf of Orosei Speedboat Trip with Aperitif from Cala Gonone
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Speed Boat Ride and Snorkel Experience in Punta Cana
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Speedboat Tour Swimming Snorkeling in Pigeon Cave Mirror Beach
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Clare: Sazan Island & Karaburun Speedboat Trip & Snorkeling
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La Preneuse: Dolphin Watching and Snorkeling Speedboat Tour
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