Choosing a BCD is surprisingly simple - I know, you must think - that's easy for us to say! But there are basically four questions you have to ask yourself:

How much diving am I going to realistically be doing with it?
Cold or warm water - as this will depict how much lift you will require as cold water = thicker wetsuit = more weights = more buoyancy
What percentage split between cold and warm water?
Wing or conventional design?

These are the fundamental questions you need to answer for yourself before even starting to browse as you could get lost for years just trying to choose the correct BCD! Once you have answers to these questions then ideally you need to try a few BCDs on. Or if you can't answer those questions then please call us to talk them through.

Countless times we have seen people come in to the shop wanting an Aqua Lung Axiom BCD after spending three months researching on the web, asking around at his dive club, burning the midnight oil on dive forums and walking out with a Scubapro X-Force BCD just because it fits his body shape better! Yes sure there a few other questions like reliability, after sales service, spare parts and so on - but that is our job to make that selection already in what we stock - we won't carry anything that is likely to break after a week in the Red Sea or go obsolete within a year, we would not be in the business if that were the case!

Thinking about getting a ladies BCD but not sure what the benefits would be? Read our 'Why Choose a Women's BCD' article to find out how they differ from a standard BCD.