Snorkeling Lankayan Island (Malaysia)
5 min read · Field guide
Lankayan Island is a sleeper even among sleepers: a single small island in the Sulu Sea off Sandakan, in Malaysian Borneo, ringed by a clear fringing reef and protected as part of the Sugud Islands Marine Conservation Area. Its claim to fame is turtles — green and hawksbill turtles nest on the island's beaches and are frequently seen in the water — which makes it one of the more dependable turtle encounters in Southeast Asia, and one that doesn't appear on any mainstream snorkel list. It's quiet, it's small, and it lives up to its reputation: easy clear-water reef snorkeling with a conservation story you can actually participate in.
Seasonal guidance, not a forecast — no live tide tables, weather or marine advisories here; check local conditions before you go.
Why Lankayan is a sleeper pick
Lankayan is the whole list in miniature: one island, one small resort, and a ring of fringing reef you can reach by swimming straight off the beach. Because the island sits inside the Sugud Islands Marine Conservation Area — a reserve established specifically to protect this reef system — the coral is healthy, the water stays clear, and the wildlife is unbothered. Visitor numbers are tiny compared with the big-name Indonesian and Philippine reefs, so it feels less like a tourist reef and more like a well-kept secret.
It also delivers variety in a small package: shallow coral gardens off the island's flanks, seagrass flats around the edges, and a house reef that attracts turtles, rays and the occasional small reef shark with pleasing regularity. You can snorkel the same reef for several days running and still find something new in it.
Turtles, first and foremost
Green and hawksbill turtles are the island's reason for existing. They nest on Lankayan's beaches through the nesting months, and the conservation area runs a hatchery on the island that protects the nests and releases hatchlings — guests can see hatchlings set free when the timing lines up. In the water, the same turtles graze the reef and seagrass year-round, so in-water sightings are common rather than lucky.
The honest framing matters here: you are visiting an active conservation project, not a theme park. Nesting and hatchling timing is seasonal and never guaranteed, so go for the reef and the resident turtles, and treat the hatchling releases as the bonus they are — not the thing to book the trip around.
Getting there & the practical reality
Lankayan is reached by boat from Sandakan on the Sabah coast — roughly an hour and a half to two hours across the Sulu Sea. A small resort occupies the island, so this is not a DIY beach-camp trip: you stay on the island or visit as part of its programme, and a conservation fee funds the reef and turtle management you are swimming in. The logistics are simple — fly into Sandakan, get to the jetty, done — which is half the appeal.
The water is warm year-round, roughly 28–30°C, and the reef is snorkelable any month. The rainiest, choppiest stretch tends to fall around the turn of the year, so the drier first half of the year is the most comfortable window. Bring a mask and fins that fit you, keep off the coral, and give nesting and hatchling turtles generous space — the rules here exist to keep the island exactly as it is.
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Explore the destination
Limestone karst scenery, shallow lagoons and — around Coron — some remarkably shallow shipwrecks. A photogenic, warm-water corner of the Philippines that packs a lot into short boat hops.
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