Best Komodo liveaboards in 2026, compared by price per night

A wooden hull, four nights, and one number that compares them

What the boats have in common, and the figure the booking pages bury.

The pier at Labuan Bajo fills with wooden phinisi, and for four nights one of them is yours. The park starts a few hours west: Komodo, Rinca, Padar, Gili Motong, and around 5,700 Komodo dragons spread across them and the coast of western Flores. UNESCO inscribed the park in 1991. ⁸

The park office sits in Labuan Bajo, in Kabupaten Manggarai Barat, the West Manggarai Regency of East Nusa Tenggara. That is the town every boat below leaves from and returns to. ⁹

Price per night is the only fair way to line these boats up. One sells three days and two nights. One sells five days and four nights. One mostly sells seven days and six nights. Divide by nights and three sales pages start telling the same story. ^{4, 1, 10}

Every figure here was read from the seller's own page on 26 September 2026. Rupiah converts at Bank Indonesia's JISDOR reference rate for 25 September 2026, IDR 17,917 to the dollar. Where two pages disagree about the same boat, both numbers appear. ⁶

Which Komodo liveaboard is best value in 2026?

Three named boats, side by side, at the price each one published on the research date.

On cost per dive, Situju7's October departure wins at about USD 162 a dive, all in. On cost per night, Ahsana wins at USD 112.50. Cachalo publishes no Komodo-specific rate, so it cannot be ranked on either measure. ^{1, 3, 4}

The gap between the cheapest and the dearest berth here is a factor of six. Ahsana sells a shared cabin on a three-day, two-night Komodo round trip from USD 225 per person, which is USD 112.50 a night. A December berth on Situju7 works out at USD 687.50. Four nights of Ahsana at that rate is USD 450, roughly one night on Situju7 at its cheapest dated departure. ^{4, 1}

Read the guest count beside the price. Ten people on Situju7 means five cabins and a crew who learn your name. Twenty-five on Ahsana is a different week entirely, at a quarter of the nightly rate. Cachalo puts 18 guests in nine ensuite cabins on a 51 metre hull built in 2024. ^{1, 4, 10}

What does a 5-day Komodo liveaboard really cost?

One berth, priced line by line, from the fare to the park's own daily charge.

Situju7's USD 1,809 October berth lands at USD 2,109 once the operator's own required Komodo port and park fee goes in. That is USD 300 above the headline, or about 17 percent. The fare already covers meals, airport transfers, snorkel gear, land excursions, towels, toiletries, WiFi and the diving itself, so the list of extras is short and specific. ^{1, 3}

Divide the whole commitment by the diving and the trip reads differently. Thirteen dives inside a USD 2,109 week is about USD 162 a dive, and that price carries the bed, the food and the boat moving between sites while you dry off. A day boat out of Labuan Bajo sells dives one at a time; MMT's liveaboard and shore diving comparison runs both ways side by side. ^{2, 3}

Not every boat prices diving the same way. Situju7 bundles 12 dives and a free night dive into the fare; a booking aggregator for the same boat instead lists a separate USD 495 to 535 diving package as a required extra, a conflict recorded below. Put a bundled and an itemized package on the same footing with MMT's dive package comparison method. ^{11, 3}

Why does the same berth cost USD 941 more in December?

Six dated departures on one boat, and the swing between them.

Season moves this trip more than the cabin does. The same five-day itinerary on the same boat runs USD 1,809 for a 6 October 2026 departure and USD 2,750 for 7 December 2026 and 4 January 2027. That is USD 941 per person, or USD 235.25 a night, for the same days on the same water. ¹

October is the cheap door. November costs USD 197.75 more a night than October, and December costs USD 235.25 more. Across one berth the October saving of USD 941 is more than three times the operator's USD 300 Komodo port and park fee, which is a rare case where the calendar buys more than any single line on the bill. ^{1, 3}

Is a budget Komodo liveaboard worth it?

What USD 112.50 a night buys, and the one price on the page to challenge.

Ahsana is the budget end of this comparison, and the trade is people. A 30 metre phinisi, nine cabins, room for 25 guests, sold as a shared cabin on a three-day, two-night Komodo round trip from USD 225 per person, or IDR 4,000,000. That is USD 112.50 a night and USD 75 a day, with obligatory park fees excluded. ^{4, 6}

The two prices on that page sit slightly apart. IDR 4,000,000 is USD 223.25 at Bank Indonesia's 25 September rate, against the USD 225 printed beside it. Rounding explains that gap. The other gap on the page needs a phone call. ^{4, 6}

Two nights buys two nights. Half the time inside the park, half the diving, and the park's daily charge still applies to every calendar day you are inside it. Add IDR 250,000 a day for a foreign visitor from the park's own tariff further down this page. ^{4, 5}

• Snorkelers and first-timers. Two nights inside the park at USD 112.50 a night is the cheapest published way onto a boat in this comparison. ⁴
• Groups who want the whole boat. Nine cabins and 25 berths is a party, not a couple's week. Ask for the charter figure in writing and read it against the two published ones. ^{4, 12}
• Travelers pricing Indonesia end to end. The boat is one line in a longer trip, and MMT's Indonesia travel guide sets the islands and the arrival around it.

What does a luxury phinisi buy in Komodo?

Cachalo's specification is published in full. Its Komodo price is the part to ask for.

Cachalo is the luxury end: 51 metres, built in 2024, 18 guests in nine ensuite cabins. Its Komodo route runs seven days and six nights as the typical shape, and its own route card advertises up to 18 dives as a ceiling. ¹⁰

The price is the part the page holds back. USD 900 per person is the floor across every destination Cachalo sails, Raja Ampat, the Banda Sea and Alor among them, with no Komodo figure broken out. Read it as an invitation to ask, then get the quote for your dates in writing. ¹⁰

What Cachalo does publish is its park-fee schedule, and it is the clearest of the three boats. The fee is bundled by trip length, which makes the per-night arithmetic easy and the comparison honest. ¹⁰

Set USD 40 a night beside the park's own published entrance tariff of about USD 13.95 a day and the bundle plainly covers more than one ticket. What else it covers is a question for the operator. MMT's page on marine park and conservation fees covers how these lines behave across dive destinations. ^{5, 6, 10}

What does Komodo National Park charge on top?

The communities who live in the park, the government's daily tariff, and the cap on how many people get in.

The park's own tariff is a daily charge, and it stacks on whatever the boat sells you. Foreign visitors pay IDR 250,000 per person per day, about USD 13.95, effective 30 October 2024 under Indonesia's non-tax state revenue regulation. Divers add IDR 25,000 a day. These are Indonesian government decisions, and they have moved before. ^{5, 6}

A cap of 1,000 people a day has been in force since 1 April 2026, confirmed on the record in April 2026 by the park authority's public relations coordinator. The park counted 429,509 visits in 2025, an average of about 1,177 a day, and foreign visitors averaged about 68 percent of them. The cap sits below the traffic the park already carries, so the sailing date is the scarce thing on this trip. ⁷

Park tickets run through SiOra, the park authority's own app and web platform, launched through the forestry ministry in September 2025. If your boat prepays entry for the group, ask for the receipt with your name on it. ¹³

People live inside this park. Resident communities include the Komodo, Bima and Manggarai, alongside Bajo and Bugis communities who came later. The Ata Modo, descendants of Komodo Island's original inhabitants, live in the reserve today. The park itself sits in West Manggarai Regency on Flores, Manggarai country. ^{14, 9}

No published fee or visitor rule specific to Komodo village or to the Ata Modo, separate from the park's general entrance charge, turned up in this research. Ask the guide on board what the village asks of visitors, and pay what the community asks on the day. ¹⁴

Where does a four-night Komodo route go?

The published five-day route on Situju7, day by day, and what fewer nights costs you.

Four nights buys the far side of the park. Situju7's published five-day itinerary names 19 stops, with 13 dives in the package, 12 plus a free night dive, and none on the embarkation or disembarkation day. The middle three days carry the diving. ^{2, 3}

Ask for the stop list that applies to your own dates before you plan a morning around Padar. The route above is the one published for the five-day trip on 26 September 2026. ²

How to price a Komodo boat before you book

Five questions that make any two boats comparable in a minute.

Four numbers decide this trip: nights, guests, what the fare carries, and what the park charges. Get those from the seller in writing and the marketing falls away.

1. 01

   Divide the fare by nights

   A three-day, two-night trip and a five-day, four-night trip are different products. USD 225 over two nights is USD 112.50; USD 1,809 over four nights is USD 452.25. ^{4, 1}

2. 02

   Ask for the guest count, not the cabin count

   Nine cabins means 25 guests on Ahsana's 30 metre hull and 18 guests on Cachalo's 51 metre one. The number of people in the water with you sets the week. ^{4, 10}

3. 03

   Split required extras from optional ones

   Situju7's Komodo port and park fee of USD 300 for the trip is required and prepaid; an extra dive or an additional night dive beyond the 13 included is USD 150 each, optional. Put them in different columns before you compare anything. ³

4. 04

   Add the park's own daily charge

   IDR 250,000 a day for a foreign visitor, about USD 13.95, plus IDR 25,000 a day if you dive. Five days comes to USD 69.77 before the diving surcharge, the government's own per-day tariff behind whatever a boat bundles into its fee. ^{5, 6}

5. 05

   Check the date against the cap

   The park allows 1,000 visitors a day, and 2025 ran at about 1,177 a day on average. Fix the sailing date, then buy the flights. ⁷

• You know whether park fees are bundled or paid on the day. Cachalo bundles USD 240 for seven days; Ahsana excludes them from the fare. ^{10, 4}
• You know which cabin the headline price belongs to. Situju7's dated departures list a price with the cabin category unstated. ¹
• You have a charter figure from the operator, not from an agent, when two agents sit USD 2,580 apart a night on the same boat. ^{4, 12}
• You have put this week inside the year with MMT's annual dive budget before you pay a deposit.

October is the cheapest dated door onto Situju7, and the park lets 1,000 people in a day. Both point the same way: pick the date first, and price the boat around it. ^{1, 7}