Editorial Standards

These are the rules we work to. They exist so a reader can judge how much weight to give any single page here, and so we can be held to something specific when we get it wrong.

1. What we cover

The Maldives: atolls, international and domestic air links, sea and seaplane transfers, dive and surf sites, seasonality and marine wildlife, local islands and guesthouse travel, and the logistics of moving between all of it.

We do not publish resort rankings ordered by commercial arrangement, coverage bought by a property or agency, guest posts or content about the Maldives that could equally have been written about anywhere else.

2. Where our information comes from

Our research is built on open, official and operator-published sources. In order of precedence:

Tier 1 — Government and regulatory bodies

Source	What we use it for
Ministry of Tourism and Environment	Tourism regulation, registered establishments, arrival statistics
Maldives Civil Aviation Authority	Aerodrome status and classification, operator certification
Ministry of Transport and Civil Aviation	Transport policy, ferry network development
Maldives Bureau of Statistics	Population, island and tourism data
Maldives Immigration / IMUGA	Entry requirements, visa rules, traveller declaration
Maldives Meteorological Service	Monsoon patterns, rainfall, wind
Maldives Marine Research Institute	Reef condition, marine species research
Environmental Protection Agency	Protected areas, marine protected area status
Visit Maldives (MMPRC)	Official destination information and event calendars

Tier 2 — Airport and transport operators

Source	What we use it for
Maldives Airports Company Limited (MACL)	Velana International Airport, Noovilu Seaplane Terminal, state-owned airports
Regional Airports Company Limited	Domestic and regional aerodrome operations
Maldivian (Island Aviation)	Domestic schedules, routes, fares, baggage rules
Manta Air	Domestic schedules and seaplane transfers
Villa Air / Flyme	Domestic schedules and fares
Trans Maldivian Airways	Seaplane transfer routes and operating windows
MTCC and Raajje Transport Link (RTL)	Public ferry routes, schedules and fares

Tier 3 — Direct enquiry. Resort, guesthouse, dive centre and surf camp reservations teams, for transfer arrangements, durations and pricing. Always quoted with the date we asked.

Tier 4 — Named expert contributors. First-hand observation from people working in the Maldives, attributed to them by name (see section 7).

Tier 4a — Our own field observation. Photographs, timings and conditions recorded by us on site, published with the island and the date. Treated as first-hand evidence for what a place looks like, never as a substitute for an operator source on prices or schedules.

Tier 5 — Traveller accounts. Recent, specific reports from divers, surfers, and guests. Used for texture and for spotting problems worth investigating. Never the sole basis for a factual claim.

We do not cite a fact to another travel website that does not itself cite anything.

3. Pricing, schedules and transfer information

Everything in this category comes from Tier 2 or Tier 3 — the airport operator, the airline, the ferry operator, or the property itself. Never from an aggregator, and never from another guide.

Each such figure is published with:

the currency and what the price includes,
the operator it came from,
and the date we verified it.

Domestic aviation and transfer pricing in the Maldives changes without notice and often varies by season, by booking channel, and by whether the transfer is arranged through the resort or directly. Where that variation exists, we state the range and the conditions rather than a single number.

4. When sources disagree

This is common enough in Maldives travel information that it deserves its own rule.

Where two credible sources give different answers and there is no single authoritative version, we publish all of them. We state what each source says, who published it, when, and what accounts for the difference — a different counting method, a different date, a definition that changed.

We do not silently pick the most convenient figure. We do not average conflicting numbers into a single invented one. If the honest answer is that the number is contested, that is the answer we publish.

Where one source is clearly authoritative — a regulator on a regulatory question, an airline on its own schedule — we follow it and say so.

5. Verification before publication

Nothing publishes until:

every price, schedule, distance and duration has been checked against a Tier 1–3 source within the last [[90]] days;
every proper noun — atoll, island, airport, IATA code, resort, dive site — has been checked for current spelling and name, since Maldivian place names have multiple romanisations and properties rebrand frequently;
every external claim has a recorded source in our internal notes, whether or not it is linked publicly;
a second person has read the page.

6. Review cycle

Content type	Re-verified
Prices, transfer costs, flight and ferry schedules	Every 3 months
Airport, route and entry-requirement information	Every 6 months
Seasonal, surf and wildlife guides	Annually, before the relevant season
Atoll overviews and background	Every 12 months

Each page shows the date it was last verified. If a page passes its review date unchecked, it carries a visible notice saying so. We would rather show a reader that our information is ageing than let them assume it isn’t.

7. Named contributors

The editorial team writes the site. Part of what makes it useful is first-hand input from people who are actually in the water and on the islands: dive instructors, surf guides, boat crew, marine researchers, guesthouse and resort staff, and travellers with recent, specific experience.

When someone contributes, we:

name them, state their role and organisation, and link to their site or profile;
keep their contribution within their actual area of expertise;
present it as an attributed expert comment, clearly distinct from editorial text;
send them the section containing their words before publication, and correct or remove it if we have distorted their meaning;
do not give their employer approval rights over the surrounding article.

What contributing does not do. It does not buy coverage, placement, a ranking, or a favourable verdict, and it does not affect how we assess that business elsewhere on the site. We tell every contributor this before they start, so that nobody contributes under a misunderstanding.

To contribute: expert@maldivestravel.fyi

8. Expert reviewers

For some subject areas we work with named expert reviewers — people with recognised professional standing in diving, surfing, marine science or Maldives hospitality — who review our coverage in their field before it publishes.

A reviewed page carries a visible credit: the reviewer’s name, qualification and organisation, and the date of review. The reviewer checks factual accuracy and practical judgement within their specialism. They are not responsible for the rest of the site, and their review is not an endorsement of it.

Reviewers are selected on demonstrable professional standing, are never drawn from a business the page assesses, and cannot review coverage of their own employer.

If you would like to become an expert reviewer: expert@maldivestravel.fyi

9. Corrections from readers and businesses

If you have spotted an inaccuracy, send us the corrected information with a way to verify it, to expert@maldivestravel.fyi. Where a correction comes from someone with relevant expertise, we publish it as a credited expert comment and link to you.

We will correct factual errors about any business promptly and without charge, and add context that can be substantiated. We will not remove accurate criticism, and we will not amend a page as a condition of a commercial relationship.

Full process, timeframes and how corrections are displayed: Corrections Policy.

10. Experience claims

We distinguish three things and never blur them:

What we have seen ourselves — written as such, with a date.
What we were told by someone who was there — attributed to them by name.
What we compiled from official sources — attributed to the source.
What we photographed ourselves — captioned as our own, with the island and the year.

We do not write in the first person about places we have not been, and we do not use language implying first-hand experience where there was none.

The same rule governs images. Photographs taken by us are captioned as ours and dated. Licensed stock and supplied press images are used for illustration only, are never captioned in a way that implies we were present, and are never used as support for a factual claim about a place. Diagrams, maps and charts drawn by us from published data carry the source and the date in the image or its caption.