Two seas, two very different days: the open crossing south-east to Phi Phi, and the sheltered karst water north-east into Phang Nga Bay. Compare Phuket boat tours on the number the listings hide — what the day costs once the national park collects its fee at the pier.
Updated August 2026
Six boat tours are compared here, four crossing to the Phi Phi Islands and two running into Phang Nga Bay. The Mu Ko Phi Phi national park charges 400 THB per adult in cash at check-in, and only some tours include it — which is why the $43 speedboat costs more for the day than the $51 one. Maya Bay itself is closed to landings from 1 August to 30 September 2026 and reopens on 1 October.
Key takeaways
We currently compare six bookable boat tours from Phuket. "From" is the lowest adult shared-group rate we read on each listing in August 2026, and the platform was showing discounts against list price on five of the six. Prices, availability and inclusions are set by the operator and confirmed at checkout; every tour below is free to cancel up to 24 hours before departure.
$51 all-in — the park fee is already inside it, so it lands below the $43 speedboat once 400 THB is paid at the pier
The only Phi Phi tour here whose price is the price. The 400 THB park fee is inside it, which makes the all-in cost lower than…
The cheapest headline on the page and the most honest listing: it states 40 to 42 guests on the boat, warns that June to October is…
Three meals, seven stops and 4,014 reviews behind it. The national park fee is the catch — 400 THB per adult is collected in cash at…
Six islands and a canoe through the Panak caves, with the Ao Phang Nga park fee inside the price and a full refund if a storm…
It starts at a lounge at Royal Phuket Marina with breakfast and a safety briefing, and it runs the circuit backwards, which puts you at the…
The only tour here that ends after dark. Lunch and dinner are both on board, kayaks go into the Hong Island caves, and the park fee…
The middle two columns are the point of this page. A tour that leaves the national park fee off its price is not cheaper — it is quieter about the total. Fees below are per adult: 400 THB in Mu Ko Phi Phi, 300 THB in Ao Phang Nga, converted at 32.85 THB to the dollar on 19 August 2026. Where each boat actually goes is on its card above.
| Tour | Listed | Park fee | You pay | Rating | Book |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Our pick Sea Angel speedboat | $51 | Included | $51 | 4.4 (2,077) | Check Availability Details |
| Phi Phi speedboat day tour | $43 | +400 THB (~$12) | About $55 | 4.3 (2,119) | Check Availability Details |
| Phi Phi day trip with lunch | $44 | +400 THB (~$12) | About $56 | 4.3 (4,014) | Check Availability Details |
| 7 Wonders Phang Nga Bay | $75 | Included | $75 | 4.8 (2,616) | Check Availability Details |
| Power catamaran day tour | $76 | Included | $76 | 4.2 (110) | Check Availability Details |
| James Bond sunset cruise | $149 | Included | $149 | 4.9 (1,867) | Check Availability Details |
Free cancellation up to 24 hours before departure on every tour listed here.
Children pay 200 THB in Mu Ko Phi Phi and 150 THB in Ao Phang Nga, and under-3s are free. A family of four on a tour that excludes the fee adds around 1,200 THB before anyone steps on a beach.
Live dates and prices for our pick, the Sea Angel speedboat, straight from the booking platform. Prices on this page were read from the listings in August 2026 and change with season and demand.
Checking one of the others? James Bond sunset cruise · Phi Phi day trip with lunch · Power catamaran day tour · Phi Phi speedboat day tour · 7 Wonders Phang Nga Bay
Two different national parks sit on the two different routes out of Phuket, and each charges foreigners at the gate rather than at checkout.
Every island on the Phi Phi circuit — Phi Phi Leh, Maya Bay, Pileh Lagoon, the Viking Cave, Monkey Beach — sits inside Hat Noppharat Thara–Mu Ko Phi Phi National Park. Foreign adults pay 400 THB, children 400 THB's half at 200, and under-3s go free. The rate structure is published by Thailand's Department of National Parks, and the park's own visitor information covers the closures that go with it.
Operators collect it in cash at check-in, before you board. On the $43 speedboat the listing spells this out — "mandatory to pay by cash at the check-in point" — and on the $44 day trip it sits in the not-included list. The Sea Angel boat and the power catamaran have already paid it for you.
Bring baht. There is no card machine at a check-in desk on a pier at seven in the morning, and one of the two tours that excludes the fee also adds about 5% for card payments on anything else you buy.
James Bond Island is really Khao Phing Kan, and the thin needle of rock offshore is Ko Tapu. Both stand inside Ao Phang Nga National Park, where foreigners pay 300 THB per adult and 150 THB per child aged 3 to 14 under the fee schedule in force since June 2022.
Here the picture is simpler: both Phang Nga tours on this page include the fee. The 7 Wonders circuit lists it, and so does the sunset cruise. Neither collects anything at the pier beyond what you choose to buy on board.
The wider point is that a park fee is not a scam or an upsell — it funds the ranger boats and the reef work that closed Maya Bay for four years. It is simply a cost that some listings show you and others do not.
Sort any booking platform by price and you get the two tours that exclude the park fee at the top. Add 400 THB per adult and the order inverts: the $43 speedboat becomes about $55 and the $44 day trip about $56, while the $51 Sea Angel boat stays at $51 with the fee already paid.
That is roughly a dollar or two per person, not a fortune. It matters because it flips the ranking, and because a fee collected in cash at a pier at 08:00 is the single most common source of "nobody told us" in Phi Phi trip reports. Two travellers on a tight budget who booked the cheapest listing end up paying more than they would have for the boat with better ratings.
One detail that goes the other way: the $43 speedboat includes the 20 THB Khai Island landing fee that the others leave you to hand over on the sand.
Four of the six tours here carry Maya Bay in the title. Two facts about it change what you should book, and neither appears on the booking page until you scroll.
Maya Bay closes to visitors every year from 1 August through 30 September so the reef and the beach can recover, and 2026 is running to that calendar. It reopens on 1 October.
The boats still sail. Every Phi Phi tour on this page runs its normal day during the closure and sightsees Maya Bay from the water instead of landing — one operator explicitly reallocates the time to Phi Phi Don, and another states that the boat may only pass by. Nothing is cancelled and nothing is refunded, because nothing was promised as a landing.
If standing on that particular beach is the reason you are booking, go after 1 October. If the day out is the reason, the closure barely dents it: Pileh Lagoon, the snorkel stop and Khai Island are the parts most reviewers actually rave about.
Since the bay reopened after its long closure, swimming inside it is not allowed. You can walk in to about knee depth, and rangers enforce that line rather than suggest it. Boats cannot approach or anchor at the beach either: they come in through Loh Samah Bay at the back of Phi Phi Leh and a short boardwalk carries you through to the sand.
The Sea Angel listing states both rules on the booking page — "Arrive at Loh Samah Bay and follow the official walking route", "Swimming at Maya Bay is not permitted" — which is a fair signal of how the rest of its small print behaves. Others leave you to discover it at the boardwalk.
The practical upshot: the swimming everyone photographs at Phi Phi happens at Pileh Lagoon, twenty minutes away, and at the snorkel stop. Judge a tour on how long it gives you there, not on how long it gives you at Maya Bay.
Nothing at all — Phang Nga Bay has no equivalent closure. James Bond Island and the six-island circuit run their full itineraries through August and September, which is one reason to look north-east rather than south-east if you are here in the monsoon months.
The other reason is the water. Phang Nga Bay is a shallow, island-shielded basin, and the crossing to it is short. The run to Phi Phi is an hour of open Andaman Sea, and in low season that hour is where the seasickness happens.
Between them the six tours call at fourteen places. Knowing which is a swim, which is a photo stop and which is fifteen minutes of engine noise is most of the work of choosing.
Stop order and inclusion change with tide, swell and park rules. Every operator on this page reserves the right to reshuffle the day, and in low season they use it.
Both leave Phuket in the morning and both come back at dinner time. Almost nothing else about them is the same.
The Phi Phi group lies about 45 kilometres south-east of Phuket, out in the Andaman Sea. Four tours here make that crossing, and all four are speedboats or a power catamaran because anything slower would eat the day. Reckon on an hour each way at speed, in open water, with the boat slamming if there is any swell at all.
What you get for it is colour and water: Pileh Lagoon between vertical cliffs, a snorkel stop chosen on the day for visibility, an hour and a half on Phi Phi Don with lunch, and a beach hour on Khai. Four tours, four slightly different orders of the same stops.
Book this if the point of the day is being in the sea. Skip it if anyone in the group is a nervous sailor between June and October.
| What changes | Phi Phi day | Phang Nga Bay day |
|---|---|---|
| Crossing | About 1 hour of open sea each way | 30 to 45 minutes in sheltered water |
| Park fee | 400 THB, included on 2 of 4 tours | 300 THB, included on both tours |
| Main activity | Swimming and snorkelling | Canoeing, caves, sightseeing |
| Monsoon behaviour | Rough; stops get dropped | Sheltered; runs in most weather |
| Landmark | Maya Bay (closed 1 Aug – 30 Sep) | James Bond Island (open year-round) |
| From | $43 to $76 | $75 to $149 |
North-east of Phuket the sea turns into a shallow basin studded with limestone towers, mangrove channels and caves you enter lying flat in a canoe. The crossing is short and the water is protected by the islands, so this is the route that keeps working when the Andaman is up.
The six-island circuit is the fullest version: Ko Yao Yai, the Panak caves, canoeing at Hong Island, lunch in the stilt village of Koh Panyee, James Bond Island and a last swim at Naka. Its 4.8 from 2,616 reviews is the strongest evidence base on this page after the sunset cruise.
The sunset cruise is the other shape entirely — a big catamaran with day beds and a DJ, kayaks at Hong Island, and dinner served as the light goes. It is by some distance the most expensive day here, and the only one that gets you back after dark.
Take Phang Nga Bay between June and October, when the Phi Phi crossing is at its worst and Maya Bay is either closed or unswimmable anyway. Take Phi Phi between November and April, when the sea flattens out and the water clarity that the snorkel stops depend on is at its best.
If you want both and have two days, do them in that order — the Phi Phi day is the more tiring of the two, and the bay makes a better recovery day than a warm-up.
One more consideration nobody mentions on the listings: the 7 Wonders tour states plainly that it is not suitable if you have a flight, a cruise or an evening appointment the same day. Hotel drop-off after the boat lands can take another hour and a half in Phuket traffic. Take that seriously on any of these tours, not just that one.
The hull decides more about your day than the itinerary does: how hard the crossing hits, how many people share the beach with you, and how many stops fit before dark.
| Boat | Typical group | Ride in swell | Stops per day | On this page |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Three-engine speedboat | 40 to 42 guests | Hard; the operator's own word is "very bumpy" | 6 to 7 | Phi Phi tours from $43 |
| Power catamaran | Shared, capacity not stated | Steadier on two hulls, still fast | 7 to 8 | Catamaran day tour, $76 |
| Large motor catamaran | Up to 95 guests | Smoothest; day beds and a bar | 4 to 5 | Sunset cruise, $149 |
| Long-tail boat | Around 6 to 10 | Coastal only, not for crossings | 1 to 2 | Sold on the day as a photo add-on |
None of the six tours compared here is a long-tail boat. Long-tails run short coastal hops and the Phi Phi photo laps sold at Pileh Lagoon for an extra fee — they do not make the crossing from Phuket, whatever the search results say.
Every tour on this page is a shared departure. The word covers everything from forty people on a speedboat bench to ninety-five on a catamaran with day beds.
Only two of the six state a capacity. The $43 speedboat says 40 to 42 guests on a three-engine boat, which is normal for the Phi Phi run and is the number to picture whenever a listing stays quiet. The sunset cruise states a maximum of 95, which sounds enormous until you see the boat — it is a wide catamaran with a top deck, a dance floor and a bar, designed for exactly that.
The other four say nothing, and a comparison site should not invent numbers for them. What we can say is that all four run the same class of shared speedboat or catamaran out of commercial piers, and none of them is sold as a small-group product.
If a small boat matters to you, this is not the page's strength: private charters out of Phuket start well above these prices and are a different market. Phuket charter operators quote roughly 16,000 to 36,000 THB for the boat for a day — about $490 to $1,100, checked August 2026 — which is worth doing arithmetic on for a group of six or more.
Across the review summaries for the Phi Phi boats, the recurring criticism is the same one: the speedboat feels cramped and reviewers would prefer fewer people per boat. It is worth knowing rather than worth avoiding — the fix is choosing your seat and your departure rather than a different tour.
Sit toward the middle-rear of a speedboat if you feel the slamming, toward the bow if you want it. One reviewer noted the guide telling them exactly that: where to sit if you dislike the bouncing, where to sit for the adrenaline. Ask on boarding.
The other fix is timing. The $43 tour sells a late 10:45 departure alongside the standard 09:30, which puts you at the busy stops behind the main wave and gets you a sunset on the way home. The catamaran runs the circuit backwards for the same reason.
Phuket faces the Andaman Sea, so the south-west monsoon lands on this coast from roughly May to October: rain, swell and a rougher crossing. Temperature barely moves all year — the sea state is what changes. Mean daily highs below are the 1981–2010 station normals for Mueang Phuket published by the Thai Meteorological Department.
September and October are the wettest months on the island, with monthly rainfall normals of 361 mm and 320 mm against 24 mm in February. Tours run in rain — what stops them is a severe weather warning, and one operator here refunds storm cancellations in full.
Six tours, five different piers, and a hotel drop-off that can add ninety minutes to a day already listed as eight hours.
The Sea Angel speedboat runs from its own pier at Koh Siray, 10 to 15 minutes from Phuket Town, past the fishing harbour after the bridge. Because the company owns the pier, the boats and the crew, it also sells a meet-at-pier fare below the hotel-pickup one — worth taking if you are staying anywhere near town.
The $43 speedboat checks in at Roong Siam Pier and drops off at five locations including Kata Beach and Chalong. The catamaran uses a lounge at Royal Phuket Marina. The 7 Wonders tour leaves from Boat Lagoon Pier with thirteen pickup zones covering most of the island. The sunset cruise boards at Ao Por Pier in the north-east and returns to Yacht Haven Marina.
That geography matters if you are staying in Patong or Kata: the northern piers mean a long van run at both ends of the day.
The 7 Wonders listing is unusually straight about this: pickup between 07:00 and 08:00, back at the pier around 17:00 to 17:30, hotel drop-off up to another hour and a half depending on traffic and where you sleep. That is a genuine eleven hours door to door against a listed eight.
The same arithmetic applies everywhere on this page. The $44 day trip shows a 105-minute van leg before the boat even starts and a one-hour transfer home afterwards. The shared van is the hidden cost of every hotel-pickup option, because it collects from several hotels in sequence.
Two practical consequences. Do not book any of these on a departure day — one operator says so outright. And if the van run bothers you more than the fare, the meet-at-pier options are the cure, not a cheaper tour.
Outlying areas cost extra and the listings do say so. The sunset cruise charges 3,300 THB per van from Khao Lak or Bang Sak and offers no transfer from Krabi at all. The $44 day trip charges 1,400 THB for a private transfer from Mai Khao, Ao Por, Yamu and Pa Klok, 2,500 THB from Khao Lak, and adds around 5% on card payments.
On the day, the usual extras are fins at 100 THB a pair, beach chairs, and the long-tail photo boat at Pileh Lagoon that several reviewers say was worth it. One review summary for the Sea Angel tour mentions upselling at the pier and asks for clearer information on those optional costs in advance — so treat the list above as your advance information.
None of that changes the ranking in the price table. It is simply the difference between a day that surprises you and one that does not.
Listing photographs are shot on flat-calm days in high season. Video is harder to flatter — the third clip below was filmed when a storm rolled through, which is the version of the day nobody advertises.
The full bay circuit from the van pickup onwards, including the canoe sections and the crowds at Khao Phing Kan.
Video: Adventures of Lauren & JasonA shared speedboat day filmed end to end. Useful for judging how close together the seats are and how the stops are paced.
Video: Home Away Travel AdventuresThe honest low-season version: the same itinerary run through rain and swell, and what the crew do about it.
Video: Shipped AwayThird-party videos, embedded from YouTube. We did not shoot them and have no relationship with the creators.
This is the shape of the Sea Angel speedboat day, our pick. Times shift with pickup order, tide and how many boats are already at each stop.
The shared van collects from several hotels in turn, which is why the window is wide. Meet-at-pier guests make their own way to Koh Siray and save the difference in fare.
Thirty minutes at the pier: voucher check, life jackets, snorkel gear sized, and the briefing about what the day will and will not include. On tours that exclude it, this is where 400 THB per adult changes hands in cash.
About an hour of open Andaman Sea. In high season it is fast and flat. Between June and October it is where the motion sickness happens — take the tablet before boarding, not when you feel it.
An hour at a site the crew choose on the day for visibility and current. This, not Maya Bay, is the underwater part of the trip.
An hour swimming in the emerald channel between vertical cliffs. The long-tail photo boat circles here for an extra fee if you want the shot everyone comes home with.
Thirty minutes at Maya Bay, entered through Loh Samah and walked in on the boardwalk — from 1 August to 30 September this is sightseeing from the water only. The Viking Cave is a twenty-minute pass, no landing.
An hour and a half: Thai buffet, a walk through Tonsai, and enough free time to swim off the beach if the buffet queue moves quickly.
Twenty minutes watching macaques from the boat, then an hour on Khai's sandbank beach for the last swim of the day. Shallow, warm, and the calmest water you will be in.
The run back, then up to an hour in the van depending on where you are staying. Plan nothing for the evening beyond dinner.
Two lists worth reading before the alarm goes off: what the boat does not supply, and what the national park will not let you do.
Cash in baht comes first, and not only for the park fee: fins are 100 THB a pair, beach chairs cost money, the long-tail photo boat costs money, and card acceptance at a pier is unreliable. A dry bag matters more than a towel — every one of these boats gets spray over the bow, and phones die that way weekly.
Sunscreen should be the reef-safe kind; one operator asks for biodegradable outright. Water shoes are worth the space on the Phi Phi tours, where you board from the water at some stops and the sand at Khai has broken shell through it. Motion-sickness tablets go in before boarding — one tour includes them, the rest expect you to have thought of it.
Leave the drone at home. Two of the six listings ban them explicitly, and national park enforcement around Phi Phi Leh is not casual.
No swimming inside Maya Bay, at any time of year. No feeding or touching the macaques at Monkey Beach — one listing bans both in writing, and the monkeys bite. No drones over the national park islands. No littering, and no smoking on several of these boats.
Some restrictions are about who can board rather than what you do: pregnant travellers are excluded on all six, and one speedboat also excludes travellers over 80, over 100 kg, or with recent surgery, along with back, heart and mobility conditions. Read that list before you book for an older parent.
The itineraries themselves are conditional. Every operator here reserves the right to change the order, drop a stop or replace one, for tide, swell, crowd control or park rules. In low season they use that clause, and a tour that skips a stop in a storm is doing its job rather than short-changing you.
Spectacular day on the water. The timing at each stop was excellent. We had enough time to participate without feeling rushed.
Great mixture of chill out, adventure and 007 film nostalgia. Great value for money for the amount of experience you get.
A fast motorboat, a bit of bouncing on the waves, but the guide told us where to sit if we didn't like it.
The pick-up at the hotel was super punctual, the boat was splendid, and the tours were very complete and diverse.
Everything was well organised. The views and organisation of all attractions were perfect.
Lunch was lovely as were the drinks and snacks provided throughout the day. Our children enjoyed the snorkelling.
Short excerpts from verified GetYourGuide reviews of the tours on this page, with their original dates. Full reviews sit on the operators' listings.
It depends on the sea more than on the boat. Between November and April, when the Andaman flattens out, the Phi Phi crossing is worth making and the Sea Angel speedboat is the one we would book: 4.4 from 2,077 reviews, its own pier and crew, and the 400 THB park fee already inside the $51 fare. Between June and October, take Phang Nga Bay instead — the 7 Wonders circuit rates 4.8 from 2,616 reviews, covers six islands and runs in sheltered water when the Phi Phi run is punishing. — the full worth-it verdict weighs the crossing against what you see.
Well above the shared tours compared here. Private speedboat charters out of Phuket are quoted for the boat rather than per person: roughly 16,000 THB for a Phang Nga Bay day and up to about 36,000 THB for Phi Phi at August 2026 rates, which is around $490 to $1,100. That maths starts to work at around six or more people; below that, a shared departure at $43 to $76 is hard to beat. We do not list private charters on this page — everything here is a shared, bookable departure with free cancellation. The private or shared comparison works the break-even maths through with real charter quotes.
Sometimes, and it changes the ranking. Of the six tours here, four include the fee and two do not: the $43 speedboat and the $44 day trip each collect 400 THB per adult in cash at check-in. That is why the $51 Sea Angel tour is the cheapest complete Phi Phi day on the page. The full breakdown is in the fees section, including the 300 THB Ao Phang Nga rate and the 20 THB Khai Island landing fee. The full cost breakdown adds the extras sold on the day too.
Not for landings. Maya Bay closes every year from 1 August to 30 September for reef recovery and reopens on 1 October 2026. Boats still run the Phi Phi day through the closure and sightsee from the water. Even when it is open, swimming inside the bay is banned year-round and boats enter through Loh Samah Bay at the back rather than anchoring at the beach — what that means in practice. Everything the rangers enforce is in the Maya Bay access guide.
Yes, and thousands of people do. The south-west monsoon runs roughly May to October, and tours operate in rain — what stops them is a severe weather warning, with one operator here refunding storm cancellations in full. What changes is comfort: the hour-long Phi Phi crossing gets rough enough that one operator calls it "very bumpy" in writing, and stops get dropped for safety. Phang Nga Bay is the sheltered alternative in those months. See the month-by-month sea guide and what happens if weather cancels your day.
Five different ones across these six tours: Koh Siray, Roong Siam, Royal Phuket Marina, Boat Lagoon and Ao Por. That matters because the van leg between your hotel and the pier can run 45 minutes to nearly two hours each way. If you are staying near Phuket Town, the meet-at-pier fare on the Sea Angel tour saves both money and the shared-van collection round. Full pier list.
A three-engine speedboat fits six or seven stops into a day and hits hard in swell; a large catamaran fits four or five stops, rides smoothly and costs more. Roughly 40 guests is normal on the speedboats here, and the sunset catamaran states a maximum of 95. If anyone in your group is prone to seasickness or has back trouble, pay the difference for the bigger hull — the comparison is here.
Less than it looks, on these routes. Both destinations are an hour or more away by boat, so a half day spends most of itself travelling — which is why every tour compared here is a full day. Half-day trips out of Phuket exist, but they run to the near islands such as Khai or Coral Island rather than to Phi Phi or Phang Nga Bay, and they are a different product from the ones on this page.
A few days is usually enough outside the December to February peak, and two of these listings were flagged as likely to sell out when we checked in August 2026. All six are free to cancel up to 24 hours before departure and most offer reserve-now-pay-later, so booking early costs nothing and holding out for a better price generally gains nothing.
Planning guides
The detail that does not belong on a comparison page: what the day really costs once the pier takes its cut, which months the sea allows, and what happens when it does not.
Phuket Boat Tours
