Watch an ordinary recreational dive and you'll often see two people enter the water together, exchange an OK, and begin swimming along the reef. One stops to examine something while the other continues ahead. A few minutes later, they're twenty or thirty feet apart, occasionally looking around to confirm the other person hasn't disappeared. Neither is particularly concerned because, as far as they're concerned, they're still diving together.
The arrangement works perfectly well until somebody needs help. Suddenly, the distance between two divers becomes much more important than it seemed a moment earlier.
How Close Is Close Enough?
I've seen recommendations that buddies should stay within three to six feet of each other. That's reasonable in some circumstances, but it misses the point of buddy positioning.
Consider two divers swimming along a reef in clear tropical water. They can maintain visual contact from a considerable distance, but being able to see your buddy doesn't necessarily mean you can reach them quickly. In poor visibility or current, even a few feet of separation can become a problem.
I think the more useful question is whether you can recognize that your buddy needs assistance and reach them promptly. If they suddenly run out of gas, can they get to you without an underwater sprint? If they stop because something is wrong with their equipment, will you notice before swimming out of sight?
There's also such a thing as being too close. Nobody enjoys being repeatedly kicked in the mask or having another diver bump into their equipment. Good positioning leaves enough room to swim comfortably while keeping both divers close enough to help one another.
Positioning Without the Formations
For most recreational diving, I prefer swimming alongside my buddy, perhaps slightly offset to avoid overlapping fins. It's comfortable, allows easy communication, and lets both divers see what's happening without constantly turning around.
Sometimes that arrangement doesn't make sense. You might be following a narrow reef, swimming along a wall, or allowing one diver to lead because they're familiar with the site. There's nothing wrong with swimming single file, provided the leader remembers there's another person behind them and the follower maintains a useful distance.
Vertical separation matters as well. If your buddy is fifteen feet above you, they're not particularly close, even if they're directly overhead. Staying at roughly the same depth makes communication easier and avoids unnecessary depth changes when one diver needs assistance.
Most separation problems, however, have little to do with formations. They happen because two people become interested in different things.
Underwater photography is a perfect example. One diver stops to photograph a tiny shrimp while the other, having no particular interest in watching someone photograph a shrimp, wanders off to explore. Neither person is deliberately abandoning their buddy, but they've effectively stopped diving together.
The solution isn't a stricter formation. It's agreeing beforehand that the photographer will make frequent stops and figuring out how both divers can enjoy themselves without becoming separated. The same consideration applies when one diver swims faster, is less experienced, or simply prefers a different pace.
What About Three or Four Divers?
Things become slightly more complicated when there are three divers. A triangle formation might look organized, but it doesn't tell you much about how the group will respond when someone needs help. What matters is that everyone understands who is responsible for maintaining contact and what the third diver should do if the other two become occupied with a problem.
With four divers, I generally prefer two recognizable buddy pairs. Each diver has someone they're primarily responsible for, while the pairs remain close enough to operate as a group. There's little reason to impose an elaborate diamond formation on an ordinary recreational dive unless the conditions or objectives genuinely require one.
The larger the group, the easier it becomes for someone to assume another diver is paying attention. Clear expectations are more useful than an impressive-looking arrangement that nobody maintains once something interesting appears.
The Buddy You Just Met
On recreational dive boats, I'm frequently paired with someone I've never met. We may have similar certifications and experience, but that doesn't mean we approach buddy diving the same way. One of us might prefer staying close, while the other is accustomed to following a guide and occasionally checking whether their buddy is still nearby.
This is where a short conversation before the dive becomes valuable. Who's navigating? Are we planning to stop frequently? How close do we expect to stay, and what happens if we lose contact? These are the sorts of questions I discuss in Insta-Buddy Checks.
I also want to know where my buddy's alternate regulator is and how they intend to donate it. As we discussed in Sharing Gas, having a perfectly good regulator available doesn't accomplish much if the person who needs it cannot reach you.
Learning to Dive Together
Good buddy positioning becomes surprisingly natural once both divers begin paying attention to it. You notice when your buddy slows down, adjust your speed when they stop, and develop an awareness of where they are without constantly searching for them.
This becomes especially valuable during team ascents and safety stops, when buoyancy changes and both divers have additional things to manage. If you've spent the entire dive operating independently, suddenly becoming a coordinated team during the ascent can be awkward.
The best buddy pairs I've observed don't appear to be making much effort to stay together. They adjust to one another as the dive develops, leaving both people free to enjoy themselves without losing that connection. That's ultimately what we're trying to accomplish: two divers who are genuinely diving together rather than simply occupying the same stretch of water.