Stingrays and eagle rays. That’s what can surround you at sites like Grand Cayman’s Stingray City and Little Cayman’s Eagle Ray Roundup. The Cayman Islands boasts a biodiversity that blows away most of the Caribbean and can rival known bio hot spots around the globe, nurtured by years of forward-thinking conservation practices we hope will pay of for generations to come. Marry that 
to the legendary lack of runoff — a bequest of the Cayman Islands’ fat land masses and lack of running rivers — and you’ve got a perfect wedding of exquisite visibility and a mind-boggling natural landscape in which to enjoy it.

GO NOW: /caymanislands

Stepping up to the challenge of cold-water diving is rewarded tenfold with prolific marine life in British Columbia. Plumose and other anemones carpet the walls at sites like Vancouver Island’s Nanaimo, where exuberant sea lions and kaleidoscopic nudibranchs are all in a day’s dive.

GO NOW: /canada

If you’re looking for candy-colored creatures and impossibly blue water, Palau delivers in spades. The tropical water of this Micronesian archipelago are a living rainbow of marine life, where yellowtail fusiliers fly above healthy coral reefs, and mantas dance at cleaning stations as reef sharks cruise below.

GO NOW: /palau

Featured destinations have been voted on by our readers for best marine environment — from North America to the Pacific and Indian oceans to the Caribbean and Atlantic. The photos selected highlight different destinations across the globe, but are not necessarily first-place winners in their categories. For a full list of winners, please scroll down.

BEST MARINE ENVIRONMENT IN THE CARIBBEAN AND ATLANTIC

1. Cayman Islands

2. U.S. Virgin Islands

3. Saba

4. British Virgin Islands

5. Mexico

BEST MARINE ENVIRONMENT IN NORTH AMERICA

1. British Columbia

2. California

3. Texas

4. Florida

5. North Carolina

BEST MARINE ENVIRONMENT IN THE PACIFIC AND INDIAN OCEANS

1. Indonesia

2. French Polynesia

3. Palau

4. Galapagos

5. Mexico

Thousands of subscribers and Web users rated their experiences at dive destinations in a variety of categories on a scale of one to five. Final scores are an average of the numerical scores awarded. A minumum number of responses was required for a destination to be included in these ratings.

More Top 100 Winners:

Best Wall Diving | Best Underwater Photography | Best Advanced Diving