Sidemount Diving: Not Just for Cave Ninjas Anymore

Benjamin Hadfield   Apr 22, 2026

Sidemount Diving: Not Just for Cave Ninjas Anymore

By Benjamin Hadfield, Stuart Scuba - Technical Instructor Trainer

I have been diving sidemount for a lot of years now, and I am old enough to remember the days before there really was such a thing as a proper “sidemount rig.”

Back then, sidemount was a little bit diving, a little bit engineering, and a little bit garage-based bad decision making.

We were clipping tanks to our sides, modifying harnesses, experimenting with bungees, and pretending that what we had built in the parking lot was definitely the future of diving and not just a fantastic way to confuse everyone on the boat. Then came the early attempts at actual systems. The SMS 100. The Nomad. They were important steps forward, and they at least had the right idea, but the physics was not fully there yet. The concept was exciting. The execution was… spirited.

There were dark little sidemount groups where people talked about best practices like they were passing down secret family recipes. Standardization was not really a thing. Hose routing was all over the place. I have seen two long hoses, two short hoses, one hose routed to the moon and back, and several configurations that looked like someone had lost an argument with a pile of bungee cord. Eventually, though, things started to settle down. The configuration philosophy matured. The thinking became more aligned with solid twinset technical concepts. Gear manufacturers improved. Divers improved. Training improved.

Then Hollis released the SMS75, which was another step in the evolution. Better. Cleaner. Still not perfect, but closer. Fast forward through a few more generations, a lot more learning, and a lot of very wet trial and error, and now we are at a point where sidemount systems and BCs are genuinely refined, thoughtful, and incredibly capable.

And yet, even now, sidemount still suffers from one giant misconception.

A lot of divers hear “sidemount” and immediately picture deep, dark cave passages, hardcore technical divers, and people who have not seen daylight since 2014. Some of the older generation will practically choke on their coffee if you suggest doing sidemount from a boat. They look at you like you just said you plan to dive a wreck wearing roller skates.

I am here to tell you this is wrong.

Sidemount is not just for caves. It is not just for extreme penetration dives. It is not just for technical divers with seventeen backup plans and a thousand-yard stare. Sidemount is an incredibly practical, comfortable, efficient, and enjoyable way to dive recreationally as well.

So let’s put all of this out there and dispel a few myths and a fair amount of BS.

First, what is so good about sidemount?

At its simplest, sidemount means carrying your cylinders at your sides instead of on your back. That sounds like a small change until you actually dive it. Then you realize it changes everything about how the dive feels, how your body carries the load, how you move through the water, and how much access you have to your own equipment.

The biggest recreational advantage is redundancy.

When you dive sidemount, you are generally carrying two full-sized cylinders, each with its own regulator set. That means two fully independent air sources. Not one tank feeding everything. Not a single point of failure. Two separate systems. From a safety and self-reliance standpoint, that is huge. It gives you options, flexibility, and peace of mind. That alone gets a lot of divers interested.

Then there is gas management.

On a two-tank recreational day, sidemount can be extremely efficient. Instead of surfacing from dive one with a bunch of awkward leftover gas in a back-mounted cylinder and then switching tanks in the usual way, you can plan your gas across two cylinders in a way that is clean and efficient, always within your dive plan and training. Done properly, you get excellent use out of your gas supply without wasting half a tank here and a random chunk there. It is a very elegant system once you understand it.

But the thing most divers notice first is trim.

Sidemount and trim: this is where the magic happens

A good sidemount diver in the water looks like they are cheating and floating motionless on a magic carpet of awesomeness. 

Flat. Stable. Balanced. Clean. No feet bicycling. No head-up sea horse posture. No rolling side to side like a shopping cart with one bad wheel. Just smooth, controlled movement.

That is because sidemount, when set up correctly, encourages proper body position in a very natural way. The cylinders are distributed along your sides instead of stacked high on your back, so your center of gravity and buoyancy become much easier to fine-tune. You can adjust where the tanks ride. You can streamline your profile. You can build a setup that works with your body rather than against it.

For many recreational divers, trim has always been something they know they should improve, but they are never quite sure how. In sidemount, you feel the difference immediately. The system rewards good posture and body awareness. It teaches you to stay horizontal, to move deliberately, and to keep your equipment tidy. You become more efficient because you are not fighting the water. You are moving through it.

And when you are in great trim, everything gets better. Air consumption often improves. Buoyancy gets easier. Finning gets cleaner. Your awareness goes up. Your environmental impact goes down. You stop looking like you are wrestling the ocean and start looking like you belong there.

That is not just a tech diver thing. That is an every-diver benefit.

Let’s talk about backs, because gravity is undefeated

One of the most underrated benefits of sidemount is what it does for divers with back issues, shoulder issues, or just a healthy dislike of carrying heavy things like a medieval turtle.

Backmount puts all that weight squarely on your spine and shoulders. You gear up, stand there cooking in the sun, and then do the awkward boat shuffle while pretending your lower back is fine. Sidemount changes that game completely.

You can gear up in stages. You can enter the water with less on your body. You can handle cylinders one at a time. Once in the water, the weight is supported by buoyancy rather than crushing your skeleton like an unpaid intern under a filing cabinet.

For a lot of divers, especially as we get a little older and a little wiser and make weird noises when standing up, sidemount is not just more comfortable. It is the difference between continuing to dive happily and not enjoying the gearing-up process at all.

I have seen divers get in sidemount and immediately say, “Why didn’t I do this years ago?”

Usually, right after they realize they can stand upright without filing a complaint with their lumbar spine.

Can it be done from a boat?

Absolutely.

This is one of the silliest myths that still hangs around. People act like boat diving in sidemount is some kind of forbidden art. It is not. It is simply a skill set.

Like anything in diving, there are tricks and techniques. How you stage cylinders. How you gear up. How you pass tanks. How you enter. How you exit. None of it is difficult. It just needs to be taught correctly and practiced until it becomes routine.

A good instructor makes all the difference here. Boat diving in sidemount is not hard, but it is different. Once divers learn the flow, most of them realize it is actually very manageable, and in many cases, more comfortable than lugging everything fully assembled on their backs.

If you can learn to carry a cup of coffee onto a boat without wearing it, you can learn sidemount boat procedures.

Probably.

Beach diving in sidemount absolutely rocks

If there is one place where sidemount really shines, it is beach diving.

Carrying heavy cylinders over sand in backmount is a full-body negotiation with the laws of physics. Carrying them in sidemount, or better yet, staging them intelligently, can make the entire process dramatically easier. You can move tanks separately. Suit up in a more controlled way. Manage the entry without that giant back-loaded wobble that makes you feel like a refrigerator with fins.

Beach entries are often about timing, balance, and reducing awkwardness. Sidemount helps with all three. Because the weight is distributed differently and because you can manage the cylinders independently, entries and exits can be more controlled. Once in the water, you are immediately in a streamlined configuration that feels stable and balanced.

For shore divers, that is a massive advantage.

And if you have ever waddled across a beach in full backmount while small children silently judged you, you already understand the appeal.

What about wreck diving?

Wreck diving and sidemount are a fantastic combination.

Now, let me be clear: wreck diving should always be conducted within your training, experience, conditions, and plan. But from a configuration standpoint, sidemount offers some real advantages.

First, streamlining. A well-configured sidemount diver can have a very clean profile in the water. That matters around structure. Second, access. You can see your valves, hoses, clips, and cylinder positions directly. If something needs adjustment, it is right there. Third, balance and control. In wreck environments, precise buoyancy and trim matter a lot. Sidemount supports both.

And yes, for more advanced divers in overhead or more restrictive environments, sidemount can offer additional flexibility. But even on non-penetration wreck dives, the comfort, trim, and efficiency make it a joy to dive. It is not only about getting into tight spaces. It is about having a smart, clean, controlled system in the water.

Wrecks are rarely right off the beach. They often involve boat diving, current, descent lines, and task loading. A good sidemount diver can manage all of that beautifully.

Other places, sidemount makes sense

Honestly? More places than people think.

It works great for photographers who want a stable, horizontal platform and less clutter in front of them. It works well for smaller-framed divers who do not love the bulk of traditional backmount doubles. It is excellent for divers who travel and want flexible options depending on local logistics. It is useful in rivers, shore entries, altitude diving, and environments where gear handling matters just as much as the actual dive.

I have used sidemount in Hawaii from shore and boats, in high-altitude lakes, in rivers, in ice diving, and all over Florida from both boats and beaches. This is not some one-trick cave pony. It is a versatile, highly refined system when used correctly.

Technical Diving, Travel, and the Magic of Remote Places

Now let’s talk about one of my favorite parts of sidemount, especially from a technical diver’s perspective: travel and remote locations.

This is where sidemount really starts to feel like a passport to adventure.

A lot of divers picture technical diving as something that only happens in heavily supported destinations, with twin sets lined up neatly, helium on tap, oxygen fills ready to go, and a compressor room that looks like NASA built it. And yes, those places are wonderful. We all love a good fill station and a dive center that smells faintly of blending panels and ambition.

But the world is full of incredible dive destinations that do not have that kind of infrastructure.

What they do have is single tanks. Lots of them.

That little island in the middle of nowhere? Single tanks.
That rugged coastal village with incredible drop-offs and almost no technical support? Single tanks.
That remote tropical destination with amazing walls, wrecks, caves, currents, and reefs that make your eyeballs fall out? Also, single tanks.

For years, that was the limiting factor. You could go to these places and dive them recreationally, sure, but the moment you wanted to stretch into more advanced profiles, longer runtimes, more gas redundancy, or dives that pushed beyond the practical single-tank envelope, the dream started to fall apart. No twinsets. No manifolded doubles. No proper back-mounted technical setup. End of conversation.

But sidemount changes that.

Suddenly, those same remote places become possible technical destinations.

That is a huge shift.

When you can build a solid, redundant technical-style platform out of two readily available single cylinders, the whole map opens up. Places that used to be “beautiful, but limited” become places where serious divers can actually do serious diving. Not because the location changed, but because your configuration adapted to reality.

And that is one of the things I absolutely love about sidemount: it is practical in the real world.

Not in the brochure world.
Not in the fantasy dive center with unlimited resources world.
In the actual world.

The world where boats are small, compressors are basic, tanks are everywhere, and nobody has seen a twinset since 2017.

Now, let’s be realistic. If you are heading somewhere truly remote, helium and pure oxygen may still not be available. So no, sidemount is not magically turning every distant island into a full trimix expedition base with unlimited bailout and deco gas options. If the gases are not there, the gases are not there. Physics still wins. Logistics still matter. And no amount of enthusiasm will blend helium out of coconuts.

But even without full gas support, sidemount still expands what is possible in a major way.

Those longer, more demanding, more technical dives that were previously out of reach in a single-tank setup now come into range. Dives where extra gas matters. Dives where redundancy matters. Dives where a little more bottom time, a little more margin, and a little more capability can turn “we can’t do that here” into “yes, with proper planning, we can.”

That is a big deal.

It means remote wrecks that were once too ambitious for a single tank start becoming realistic objectives. It means deeper reef lines, more complex profiles, stronger current environments, and farther-reaching exploratory dives can be approached in a way that is smarter, safer, and far more comfortable. It means you are no longer limited to the lowest common denominator just because the destination is remote.

And honestly, there is something incredibly cool about that.

There is something special about standing on a dock in a faraway place, looking at a pile of plain old single cylinders, and knowing that to everyone else they are just rental tanks—but to a sidemount diver, they are opportunity.

That is the beauty of it.

Sidemount takes destinations that were once recreational-only and gives them technical potential. It turns logistical limitations into manageable challenges. It makes the world bigger for divers who are trained, thoughtful, and ready to do it right.

But here is the truth: sidemount is not something you should learn from YouTube and optimism

Could you piece together a harness, watch some videos, and go try it?

Sure.

Could you also cut your own hair with a dive knife?

Also sure.

That does not make it a good plan.

Sidemount is a skill set. It should be learned from an instructor who has spent countless hours diving it, refining it, solving problems in it, and yes, absolutely discovering all the ways not to do it as well. Good sidemount is not just clipping tanks to your sides and hoping for the best. It is body position, cylinder placement, weighting, trim, hose routing, gas management, valve drills, problem solving, and making the whole system work as one smooth package.

When taught well, sidemount feels logical, elegant, and fun. When taught badly, it feels awkward, chaotic, and like you somehow brought a garage sale underwater.

So, should you go into sidemount?

Maybe.

Not every diver needs it. Not every diver will fall in love with it. But a whole lot of divers would benefit from it more than they realize.

If you want more redundancy, better trim, more comfort, less back strain, smarter gas use, and a configuration that can grow with you from recreational diving into more advanced training, then yes, you should seriously consider it.

And if you are going to do it, do it right.

Come take sidemount with Benjamin at Stuart Scuba.

Benjamin is a Technical Sidemount Instructor Trainer with thousands of hours in position, diving sidemount in environments ranging from Hawaii shore and boat dives to high-altitude lakes, rivers, ice, and Florida boat and shore diving. That experience matters because sidemount is at its best when it is taught by someone who has lived it, refined it, laughed at it, fixed it, and turned it into a system that truly works.

Sidemount is not just for cave divers.
It is not just for tech divers.
It is not just for the weird guy on the boat with too many bolt snaps.

It is one of the most comfortable, capable, and enjoyable ways to dive.

And once you get it dialed in, you may never want to go back.