How Fin Rank works
Every dive centre on Fin has a profile strength score from 0 to 100. Fin Rank is where that score puts the centre among the others in its area. The directory sorts by it, the centre's page shows it, and nothing about it is for sale.
Three rules
Every point is one of three things: something a diver uses to choose a centre, a check that the listing is accurate, or a link to Fin from the centre's own website. Every point can be reproduced from the data on the listing. Points are earned at thresholds, not for the presence of a field, so eleven characters of description earn nothing.
The formula
The most a listing can score without the link is 60. The link is worth 40 on its own, so a centre that links to Fin from its website sits above every centre that does not, while a bare link on an otherwise empty listing still sits below a complete one.
| Group | Component | Points | Rule |
|---|---|---|---|
| Contact (15) | Website live | 5 | A website is listed and its domain resolves. |
| Phone | 2 | A phone number is listed. | |
| 2 | An email address is listed. | ||
| Address | 2 | A street address is listed. | |
| Opening hours | 4 | At least one day has hours. | |
| What they offer (15) | Services | 5 | Three or more services. One or two earns 2. |
| Certifying agencies | 3 | At least one agency. | |
| Languages | 2 | At least one language. | |
| A price | 2 | A try-dive price is listed. | |
| Description | 3 | 300 characters or more. 80 to 299 earns 1. | |
| Dive sites (12) | Dive sites they run | 12 | Six or more sites earns 12, three to five earns 9, one or two earns 5. Only sites named on the operator’s own website or confirmed by the owner count. |
| Reputation (12) | Google rating | 8 | 4.5 or above earns 8, 4.0 to 4.4 earns 6, 3.5 to 3.9 earns 3, below 3.5 earns 1. |
| Google review count | 4 | Log-scaled. 100 reviews earns the full 4. | |
| Trust (6) | Logo | 2 | A logo is on the listing. |
| Photos | 2 | Three or more photos uploaded by the owner. | |
| Claimed and verified | 2 | The owner has claimed the listing. | |
| Link to Fin (40) | Links to Fin from their own website | 40 | A live link to divewithfin.com on a page under the operator’s own website domain, verified by fetch and re-checked monthly. |
Rank
Fin Rank is the centre's position by profile strength within its area: the smallest region around it with at least five dive centres, never wider than its country. Ties break on Google review count, then name. The whole directory is recomputed nightly, and a centre's own area is recomputed the moment its owner saves a change, so the number on the page is never behind what the owner just did.
On a dive site page the order is different: centres that run that site, named on their own website or confirmed by the owner, come first, then profile strength.
Tiers
Claimed listings also show a tier. Bronze is 25 to 49, Silver is 50 to 74, Gold is 75 and above. Gold is only reachable with the link, so Gold means the centre's article is live on its own website.
Verified and Unverified
Most listings were built from public sources: the centre's website, Google Business Profile, and the dive sites that name them. Those show Unverified. When the owner claims the listing, it shows Verified, automatic updates stop, and what the owner writes is what divers see. Claiming is free: a single-use link goes to the email on file.
The link and the article
Once a claimed listing reaches 45 profile points and confirms 3dive sites, Fin writes the centre an article about the sites it runs, with the depths, seasons and marine life recorded there. The centre publishes it on its own website and links back to its page on Fin. Any link from the centre's own domain earns the points, article or not. The link is checked by fetching the page, checked again every month, and the points are removed after two consecutive failures.
Nothing is paid in either direction, the anchor text is the Fin brand, and publishing is the centre's choice.
When Fin has its own reviews
Reviews left on Fin will join the Reputation group and Google's share will shrink. Any change to the formula is recorded here with its date.
Changes
- 4 September 2026: this formula replaces the previous score, which gave full description points for eleven characters and counted a website that no longer resolved.
Run a dive centre? Find your listing and claim it from the page.