Boat tours in Iceland

The Old Harbour, on Ægisgarður pier, about five minutes' walk from most downtown hotels and ten from Hallgrímskirkja. Elding and Reykjavik Sailors both have ticket offices there. Whale, puffin, sea-angling and northern-lights boats all use the same area. Arrive thirty minutes before departure to check in. The Viðey ferry (/experience/1539/) leaves from the same harbour in summer and from Skarfabakki the rest of the year.

Yes, if you are already at the lagoon. A Zodiac gets you among the icebergs and close to the glacier edge in a way the shore cannot, and the combined glacier hike and Zodiac day (/experience/716547/) is the best full day in the southeast. Boats run in the warmer months only; check the tour page for dates. It is not worth a fourteen-hour day trip from Reykjavík just for the boat.

A Zodiac is a fast rigid inflatable seating around ten, with a guide who can nose it near the glacier face and into iceberg fields; you wear a flotation suit and get a bit wet. The amphibian is a slow duck boat carrying larger groups on a fixed loop. The Zodiac is the better trip and the one we list. It has a minimum age and is bumpier; the tour page has details.

Quite possibly. Operators cancel whale, puffin and lagoon boats when the wind or swell makes them unsafe or pointless, and Iceland is windy. The decision usually comes the evening before or early on the day, by email or text. You get a full refund or a new date. Book boat trips early in your stay rather than on your last day so a cancellation can be rebooked.

Faster and closer, not better for everyone. The RIB (/experience/155331/) covers more sea in two hours than a large boat does in three and gets lower to the water, so encounters feel closer. You sit astride a saddle seat in a flotation suit and take spray head-on. It is cold, bumpy and not for young children, pregnant travellers or bad backs. For photos and comfort, choose the bigger boat.

From €55 to €286 a person, with a typical price of €150. That is the median of 77 per-person day-tour fares we currently sell. Multi-day packages and private charters are priced differently and sit outside those figures.

Puffin Watching Yacht Cruise from Downtown Reykjavík – Small Group Experience with Sea Trips Reykjavík, at €55 a person. Read what it actually is before booking on price alone — the cheapest line is sometimes an admission ticket rather than a guided trip, and a large coach costs less per seat than a small-group minibus because it gives you less time at each stop.

2 of the 119 are priced on request rather than published, which almost always means a private charter where the cost depends on group size and pickup point. Ask us and we will get a quote from the operator.

119 of them, from 39 operators: Sea Trips Reykjavík, Iceland Discover, EastWest, Your Friend in Reykjavik, Borea Adventures, Húsavík Adventures and 33 more. Every one is a company we hold a contract with — we do not list everything in Iceland, on purpose.

Day tours run from 1 hour to 14 hours, most commonly about 2.5 hours. Pickup and drop-off are usually inside that figure, so a three-hour tour from Reykjavík can mean closer to four door to door.

16 of these are admissions or tickets rather than guided tours — Reykjavik Hotels to or from Reykjavik Cruise Port: Private Transfer by Sedan or Van from €84, for instance. Worth knowing if you are driving yourself and only need entry.

Yes — 2 of the 119 run over two days or more. Those include accommodation and usually breakfast; check the individual itinerary.

65 of 119 (55%) offer pickup. The rest ask you to meet on location. Pickup is the single most common cause of a missed tour in Iceland: it runs to a window rather than a time, and the bus will not wait long.

29 of the 119 are private, the other 90 are shared departures. Private costs more in total but is priced per vehicle, so for four or more people it often works out close per head — and you set the pace.

Across the next 360 days of live availability we hold departures in October, November, December, January, February, March, April, May, June, July, August, September. That is a rolling window rather than the whole year, so a month missing from that list is not necessarily a month with nothing running.

32 of 119 run only part of the year; the other 87 run all year round. In Iceland that is usually about daylight or ice rather than demand.

Cutoffs run from 1 to 23 hours before departure, and 53 of them accept bookings inside 24 hours — so booking the night before is often possible. Popular winter tours sell out days ahead regardless of the cutoff.

99 of 119 (83%) allow free cancellation at least 24 hours before departure. The exact window is on each tour page and comes from the operator's own policy, not ours. If the operator cancels for weather you are refunded in full.

Operators rate them: 97 easy, 11 very easy, 8 moderate, 3 challenging. Iceland's ratings assume weather — an easy walk in still air is a different proposition in 15 m/s of wind.

44 of the 119 set one, ranging from 1 to 18 years. The rest have no stated minimum, which usually means infants are allowed but not that the tour suits them.

67 of 119 are marked family-friendly by the operator. That is their judgement rather than ours, and it usually means the walking is short and the vehicle has a toilet.

Operators have flagged accessibility on some: 20 for prams and strollers, 6 for wheelchair users, 2 for limited mobility. Ring us before booking rather than relying on the flag alone — Icelandic sites vary enormously and a flag does not describe the terrain at the stop.

Varies by operator. Across these: wi-fi on board on 22, parking fees on 13, food and drink on 9, admission fees on 8, fuel surcharge on 5. Anything not listed as included is not included — Icelandic operators are literal about this.

92 of 119 are guided in person, with guiding offered in Arabic, Czech, Dutch, English, Filipino, French and 5 more. English is standard on every shared departure in Iceland; other languages usually mean a private guide.

They start from Capital Region (Reykjavík), Westfjords (Ísafjörður, Hólmavík), Húsavík, Vatnajökull (Skaftafell, Höfn), Akureyri & the North, Snæfellsnes and 4 more. Where a tour starts matters more in Iceland than how long it lasts: the same tour from Reykjavík and from Vík are different days entirely.

The operator cancels and refunds you in full — Icelandic operators cancel readily, and that is a good sign rather than a bad one. What they will not do is refund you for a tour that ran and simply had poor visibility. Wind cancels more tours here than rain or cold.