Every Galapagos Tour On This Site, Compared

How To Read The Tour Tables

Every table on this page sorts by review count, not by rating. A 5.0 from three reviews tells you three people were happy; a 4.4 from 47 tells you far more about what a typical day actually looks like. Sorting by depth surfaces the tours with the longest public track record.

Some rows show no rating at all. When a listing has no reviews, or publishes no review data, we print that blank rather than filling it with a placeholder. A missing rating is a fact about the listing, not a sign of a bad tour, but it does mean you are relying on the itinerary alone.

The From column shows the lowest published per-person price on the operator's own booking listing. It does not promise what you will pay: seasons, group size and options move the final figure, and park fees sit outside every price here. Tour names link to the site's own write-up, where the itinerary is covered in full.

Filter And Sort Every Galapagos Tour

The six tables below split the roster by departure point. This one keeps all of it in view: narrow it by where a tour leaves from or by what the listing actually includes, then sort on price, rating, review count or time on the water. Every figure is read from the operator listing, and a blank is left blank.

Tours Departing From Santa Cruz Island

Santa Cruz is the cheapest entry point on the site, with everything departing Puerto Ayora and prices from $39.99 to $175. The tours here split between the highlands, giant tortoises and lava tunnels, and the bay around town. None of them crosses open water, which makes this the calmest category if boats are not your thing. See the Santa Cruz tours.

Full write-ups, photos and inclusions on the Santa Cruz Island Tours hub.

Tours From San Cristobal And Kicker Rock

San Cristobal has its own airport, a short walk from town, so you can be on a tour the day you land. Kicker Rock dominates the category, the eroded volcanic cone that is the island's signature snorkelling site, and every listing departs Puerto Baquerizo Moreno. Sea lions are everywhere, including the beach in town. See the San Cristobal tours.

Full write-ups, photos and inclusions on the San Cristobal Tours hub.

Isabela Tours, Sierra Negra And The Tunnels

Isabela is the largest island and the quietest of the three main bases. The tours here run to Sierra Negra's caldera, the sharks and iguanas of Las Tintoreras, and the lava arches of Los Tuneles at Cabo Rosa. Note that if you start from Santa Cruz this involves the longest crossing of the inhabited islands, so several listings run to a full 10 hours. See the Isabela tours.

Full write-ups, photos and inclusions on the Isabela Island Tours hub.

Day Trips To The Uninhabited Islands

These are the long days: 7 to 11 hours door to door, crossing open water to islands with no permanent population, Bartolomé, North Seymour, Santa Fe, South Plaza, Floreana, Española and Pinzón. A naturalist guide authorised by the park is mandatory at protected visitor sites, and every one of these tours runs with one. See the day trips.

Full write-ups, photos and inclusions on the Galapagos Day Trips hub.

Multi-Day Island Hopping Packages

Island hopping packages arrange your bed on each island and the movement between them, usually the public inter-island ferries, while you sleep ashore every night. They run from 2 to 8 days and start at Baltra, San Cristobal airport, Puerto Ayora or Quito. They suit travellers who want the logistics handled without living on a boat. See the island hopping packages.

Full write-ups, photos and inclusions on the Galapagos Island Hopping hub.

Dive Day Trips In The Islands

Diving is the thinnest category on the site, with only a handful of listings and just 14 reviews between them. That is not because nobody dives the Galapagos: almost all of the real dive market books direct with shops on the islands, never through a listing page. Read these rows carefully and treat them as a starting point. See the diving tours.

Full write-ups, photos and inclusions on the Galapagos Diving Tours hub.

Comparing All Six Tour Categories

The 1,527 reviews across the site are not spread evenly, and the shape of that record tells you something. Day trips hold 593 of them, and the deepest pool sits with the long day runs out to the uninhabited islands: Isabela follows with 379, Santa Cruz with 271, San Cristobal with 157. Island hopping, by contrast, carries only 113 reviews, roughly the same count of listings as the day trips but barely a fraction of the public feedback, and diving is thinner still at 14. In practical terms, you can judge a Pinzón or a Kicker Rock day boat with some confidence from what past passengers wrote, while the multi-day packages and the dive listings ask you to trust the operator's own description far more than the crowd's.

The tables show published prices and ratings as recorded on each operator's own booking listing; nothing here is estimated or filled in.

Which Tour Fits Your Trip

Why Our Review Counts Are Small

The review counts on this site look small next to Rome or Bali listings, and there is a simple reason. The Galapagos received 290,404 visitors to its protected areas in a full year, a rounding error against mainstream destinations, and 79% of them stayed land-based, booking much of it in person on the islands.

Star ratings are a weak signal at this sample size. A 4.4 from 47 reviews describes a tour that has run for many people; a 5.0 from 3 describes a good morning. Itineraries tell you more: which sites, how many hours on the water, whether lunch is included. Read the itinerary first, the rating second.

A thin sample does tell you the tour exists and runs. It does not tell you how it handles bad weather, a rough crossing or a cancelled ferry. Where the review count is single figures, weigh the operator's cancellation terms and the itinerary details more heavily than the score.

How We Put This Comparison Together

Every listing on this site was opened individually on the operator's own booking page and confirmed live at the time of checking. Where an older note and a live page disagreed, the live page won. Nothing on this page is estimated, rounded into existence, or copied from another aggregator. The method and its limits are set out on the about page, and the commercial relationship behind the site on the disclosure page.

Ordering is by review count and nothing else. No tour moves up this page because an operator asked, paid, or offered a better rate. Ratings, prices, lengths and departure points are recorded exactly as published, including the rows that show no rating at all, because a blank is information too.

One cost sits outside every price on this site: the Galapagos National Park entrance fee, $200 for foreign adults and $100 for children under 12, paid on arrival, plus the $20 Transit Control Card bought before you fly. Neither is included in any tour price here. The fee is set by the park authority and published at galapagos.gob.ec.