Koh Tao With Kids: Where To Stay, Eat & Best Things To Do
Koh Tao is a small island with beautiful beaches, great snorkelling and a much more relaxed feel than Koh Samui. We spent three nights here as a family and found it easy to explore by 4WD taxi, with plenty of calm bays that are good for kids. This guide covers where we stayed, the beaches we visited, and a few practical tips to know before you go.
Looking for more family-friendly tours and activities in Koh Tao? Browse our Koh Tao activities link below & we also have more details about the activities we enjoyed further down in this post!
Key Facts
When to visit
The best weather is January to March, and crowds are thinner from May to July. Avoid October to November as it’s rainy season.
How to get there
We caught the Lomprayah ferry from Koh Samui to Koh Tao, which takes about two hours. We paid $94 AUD for our family of four, plus a little extra for air-conditioned seating. It’s cheaper if you sit outside. While we waited for the ferry in Koh Samui, we had a good lunch at a small beachside restaurant called Al e Carte.
How to get around
There are no Grab taxis on the island, so the best way for a family to get around is to hire a 4WD taxi. It’s open-air, with the back of a ute. We used Mr Bear Taxi. He was a great driver, and his cab had a roof. There are also plenty of long-tail boat water taxis if you want to bay hop around the island
Where we stayed on Koh Tao
We stayed at Koh Tao Relax Freedom Beach, which collects guests from the ferry port at Mae Haad Pier. We paid $700 AUD for three nights. We chose this hotel for its location, as Mae Haad and Sairee Beach can be quite busy and loud. There is no pool, but there are two calm, protected beaches where you can swim. The seafood coconut soup was delicious. There are two restaurants—one at the main beach and one at Freedom Beach 2—and both offer the same menu. The rooms are clean but basic. The shower pressure wasn’t strong, but the beds were comfortable and spacious, with two double beds. The paved walk between the two beaches is lovely and has great views. Freedom Beach 2 has a good snorkelling spot, and further offshore there is a reef where turtles feed on the seagrass.
Best activities we did on Koh Tao
You can easily spend a day beach hopping around the island. We hired a 4WD taxi through Mr Bear. He was a great driver, and his cab had a roof. You can also organise a long-tail water taxi, but we didn’t this time because the winds were quite strong. It is worth checking the wind, as some beaches are better than others when it is high. We use the Windy app. We paid $100 for five hours, and he waited for us at each beach. It was much cheaper than getting a water taxi.
Walking up to John-Suwan Viewpoint, which takes about 15 minutes. The climb is quite challenging, with lots of rocks and ropes to help you. The space at the top is small, so it suits older, confident kids better. It’s also only a few minute walk from Koh Tao Relax Freedom Beach Resort
The resort is also within walking distance of Shark Bay, although the walk is a little hilly. Go early in the morning for the best chance of seeing turtles. It is quite a small bay, and I imagine it gets busier as the day goes on. On the Rock Beach Bar opens at 10 am and has both covered and uncovered seating. You can hire a mask and snorkel for 100 baht each, with a 500 baht deposit. Life jackets are also available
Ao Leuk Beach is much bigger and is another great spot to visit in the morning. Entry is 5 baht, as the beach is part of a rustic-looking resort. There are a couple of restaurants, although we didn’t eat there. The sunbeds also didn’t offer much shade.
We also visited Tanote Bay, which is famous for its big jumping rock. The beach has great snorkelling, particularly at the southern end near Mountain Reef Resort. We had lunch at Lai Beach Bar, which had good, reasonably priced food and plenty of shade. Try to get there before 12 pm to secure a table, as the restaurant is small and popular. You can also hire snorkels and life jackets here. Mango Bay is another beach worth visiting, but we ran out of time..
Ao Hin Wong Beach has a 20 baht entry fee, and mask and snorkel hire costs 100 baht. Hire your gear from Freedom Beach Bar rather than at the top of the entry point, as the bar has a better range of snorkels for kids. The beach is quite small and can get busy after 1 pm. The bar is rustic and popular with a younger crowd, but it has a cool vibe. This is where we saw reef sharks near the rocks by the hill. There are also a few dogs belonging to the bar owner. They kept to themselves and slept in the shade away from the sun.
If you want to visit Koh Nang Yuan Island and the Japanese Gardens, you can arrange a long-tail boat from Mae Haad Pier or book an organised tour through Klook or GetYourGuide. It gets busy, so I recommend leaving early in the morning. There is great snorkelling, food available at the resort and a 250 baht entry fee. Plastic bottles are not allowed on the island. We found the snorkelling at Tanote Bay and Hin Wong better than at the Japanese Gardens. However, we also scuba-dived here and could see much more underwater.
Getting Our PADI Open Water Certification with Simple Life Divers
One highlight of our time on Koh Tao was completing our PADI Open Water Dive Course with Simple Life Divers. We’d talked about learning to dive as a family for years, so finally doing it together was a pretty special experience.
Kids aged 10 and up can complete the PADI Open Water course, making it a great family activity if your children are confident swimmers and keen to try something new. The course runs over three days and combines theory, pool training, and open-water dives. By the end, you’re certified to dive to 18 metres anywhere in the world. You also need to do an e-learning module as part of the course, which includes tests. We did the e-learning before we left, and we worked through each module together as a family over 5 Sunday nights (the end-of-section quizzes require an 80% pass rate).
For parents, this is the bit worth knowing:
- 10 and 11 year olds: maximum depth of 12 metres and they need to dive with a PADI Professional or certified parent/guardian.
- 12 to 14 year olds: maximum depth of 18 metres and they need to dive with a certified adult.
- 15+: they move to the standard PADI Open Water Diver certification.
Day 1: Pool Training and Learning the Basics
The first day is a BIG day.
We spent about five hours in the pool learning all the basic diving skills, plus how to set up and pack down all our dive gear.
This was probably the most important day for me because, unlike the kids, I was pretty nervous.
Our dive instructor, Dave, was brilliant. He’s been diving for over 25 years and has spent the past five years diving on Koh Tao. He was incredibly patient with the kids, and also with a slightly nervous me (Chelsea!).
You’re not just swimming around the pool with a tank on your back. There’s quite a lot to learn and remember. You practise the skills you’ll need before you’re allowed out into open water, so by the end of that first day we were all SO much more comfortable with the equipment and being underwater. You need to be able to swim. PADI requires you to float/tread water for 10 minutes and complete a 200 metre swim unaided, or you can do the 300 metre option using a mask, fins, and snorkel.
One thing I really liked about Simple Life Divers was the small-group setup. Their PADI listing says the course has a maximum of four students per instructor, and they have their own training pool.
Day 2: Our First Open Water Dives
On the second day, it was time for the real thing.
We boarded one of Simple Life Divers’ boats and headed out to Japanese Gardens, one of Koh Tao’s beginner-friendly dive sites. The water was calm and clear, making it the perfect place for first-time divers. We completed two dives and practised many of the skills we’d learnt in the pool, but this time in open water. You need to do the practice skills in the water as part of the course, and it does include taking your regulator out of your mouth underwater and practising emergency skills.
Day 3: Dives three and four
The final day is another boat trip for dives three and four.
By this point it felt completely different to day one. We knew how our gear worked, what we were doing getting into the water and, most importantly for me, I wasn’t spending the whole time thinking about breathing and equalising. The two sites they take you to, include seeing a sunken ship was really cool.
These final dives are still part of the course and certification, but you’re also starting to enjoy actually being underwater rather than concentrating on every single thing you’re supposed to be doing.
Once you’ve completed all four open-water dives and the other course requirements, you’re certified. Simple Life Divers describes its Open Water course as theory, shallow-water training and four open-water dives over three days.
How much does the PADI course cost?
The three-day PADI Open Water course with Simple Life Divers currently costs 11,000 THB per person and includes the theory, confined-water training and four open-water dives.
That’s roughly:
- 11,000 THB per person
- €293 EUR per person (approx)
- Around $520 AUD per person at recent exchange rates.
For our family of four, the course was 44,000 THB, so roughly €1,170 EUR / $2,080 AUD.
For three full days of training and diving, including all the equipment and four open-water dives, we thought it was really good value, particularly as you walk away with an actual PADI certification rather than just doing a one-off dive.
Where to stay while you’re doing the course
My tip would be to stay at Simple Life Cliff View Resort while you’re doing the course.
It’s only about 50 metres from the dive school, so you can basically walk out of your room and be there. This made life SO much easier, particularly with the early starts and three full days of diving.
There are a few different Simple Life accommodation options in this part of Sairee, and they differ quite a bit.
We stayed in the newer Simple Life Cliff View Resort section and this is the one I’d recommend for families. It has much newer accommodation, including two-bedroom suites, a large cascading swimming pool and views across Sairee Beach towards Koh Nang Yuan.
The other option is Simple Life Talay & Divers Resort, where the dive school is actually located. It’s beachfront and has everything from air-conditioned bungalows to cheaper fan rooms and shared dorms. It also has two pools that are used for dive training during the day.
This section felt more geared towards the younger diving crowd when we were there. It’s cheaper and super convenient if you’re diving, but the accommodation is more basic and, in our opinion, a bit more run-down. If you’re coming with kids, I’d spend the extra and stay at Cliff View. You still have the convenience of being right near the dive school, but you get a much nicer family room and pool to come back to after diving. And trust me, after five hours learning dive skills on that first day, being able to walk 50 metres back to the resort rather than having to organise a taxi across Koh Tao is VERY handy – you don’t realise how much diving takes it out of you!
Favourite Places to Eat in Koh Tao
- Taatoh Seaview Café and Restaurant
- Tartar
- Ananas Restaurant
- Freedom Beach 2 Restaurant
- On the Rock Beach Bar (drinks at Shark Bay)
- Lai Beach Bar (Tanote Bay)
- In Touch Restaurant
- Seaside Restaurant and Bar
- Koh Tao Food Ville
