According to the certifications added by scuba divers on DiveBuddy.com, the following list indicates the percentage market share by each certification agency. I included all types of certifications, not just entry level certs. This data was collected from 21,273 divers.

In the following list, I counted only once per agency per diver (ie: if a diver has 3 PADI certs and 1 DAN cert, I counted 1 for PADI and 1 for DAN):

Worldwide
1. PADI: 55.6% (54.9% USA, 60.6% Outside USA)
2. SSI: 10.6% (11.4% USA, 6% Outside USA)
3. NAUI: 10.4% (11.1% USA, 6.2 Outside USA)
4. SDI: 4.5%
5. TDI: 3.0%
6. DAN: 2.4%
7. IANTD: 1.5%
8. Red Cross: 1.2%
9. CMAS/WUF: 0.9%
10. YMCA: 0.7%
11. NASE: 0.7%
12. NSS/CDS: 0.5%
13. NASDS: 0.5%
14. IDEA: 0.5%
15. Other: 6.9%

In the following list, I counted all certifications per diver (ie: using the example above, I counted 3 for PADI and 1 for DAN):

Worldwide
1. PADI: 63.0% (62.1% USA, 68.2% Outside USA)
2. SSI: 12.9% (13.7% USA, 7.6% Outside USA)
3. NAUI: 7.5% (7.9% USA, 4.9% Outside USA)
4. SDI: 3.8%
5. TDI: 2.2%
6. DAN: 1.9%
7. IANTD: 1.0%
8. Red Cross: 0.8%
9. CMAS/WUF: 0.6%
10. NASE: 0.5%
11. IDEA: 0.5%
12. YMCA: 0.4%
13. Other: 5%

Comments

carlb8 - 12/14/2014 10:15 AM Thanks for sharing! This is some of what I wondering in my own investigation. Somewhat tangential but potentially useful, I found this summary of certifications by the different agencies: scubatravel.co.uk/training/qualifications.html I cannot validate the accuracy of the C chart comparison, but perhaps others might be able to comment on that if they wish. It lists most of the organizations you have here and a few others, which are likely in your "Other" category. I liked that it was one place that had all the links to each agency as well. I do note that it doesn’t include some you identified above so it is not comprehensive but perhaps has a UK/Europe bias given the source. Not surprising considering your two methods of tallying the results, but those agencies that by design have more certification steps will be weighted or skewed higher in your second tally. Thus, PADI with several more certification steps will logically increase their percentages by your second method as compared to say, SDI, TDI, IANTD and likely most others. Not a critique, just an observation on one cause of the shift in statistics between the two lists.

Scubabunnycr - 12/14/2014 9:23 AM Thanks for that info, it’s interesting to see how the different agencies compare with market share.

jerry8389 - 12/14/2014 5:44 AM I’m a PADI instructor and according To our last years numbers PADI held 75% of all Dive training certifications. Now that is the numbers PADI supplied to us. I bet your numbers are Pretty close to correct