For many, the Devil's Pool is the most adrenaline-fuelled experience in the world: swimming in a natural pool right on the edge of Victoria Falls and peering over a drop of more than a hundred metres, with the waters of the Zambezi plunging past on either side and the deafening roar of the falls. A lip of rock acts as a natural barrier and holds back the current, so that — in the safe season — you can get to the very edge of the abyss in relative safety, although the sense of vertigo is total.
You reach it from Livingstone Island, the small islet in the middle of the river from where the explorer David Livingstone first gazed upon the falls in 1855. The tours are run exclusively by Green Safaris (formerly Tongabezi), which takes visitors over by boat and offers, as well as the swim in the pool, a meal on the island: a bush breakfast, afternoon tea or a gourmet lunch depending on the time slot you choose. It's one of the most exclusive and sought-after activities in the whole destination.
This guide explains how, when and with whom to do the Devil's Pool: the season when it opens, the different tour options and prices, the safety requirements and how to combine it with a visit to the falls. Because it's seasonal and places are limited, it's an experience you need to plan ahead, but those who take the plunge remember it as one of the most intense moments of their trip to Zambia.
Livingstone Island, in the middle of the Zambezi and on the edge of the falls, is the exact spot from where the Scottish explorer David Livingstone first looked out over the 'smoke that thunders' on 16 November 1855. More than a century and a half later, that same islet is the gateway to the Devil's Pool, the natural pool on the brink of the abyss that has become world-famous in the low-water season. The story of the islet, the explorer and how this experience became an icon of adventure tourism is told on our history page.
Read the full history ↓The birthplace of tourism in Zambia: by the Zambezi roars Mosi-oa-Tunya, 'the smoke that thunders', which David Livingstone renamed Victoria Falls in 1855 and which gave its name to a whole town.
Read the history of Livingstone and Victoria Falls →They depart from Livingstone, 9 km away. If you book from this link we earn a commission and you pay no more.
No exact prices: a scale from $ (budget) to $$$$$ (luxury), with 2-3 options per category.
Origins, formation and what the sources say.
Livingstone Island is a tiny islet of just a few hectares in the middle of the Zambezi River, in an extraordinary spot: right on the edge of Victoria Falls, where the river plunges more than a hundred metres into the gorge. Sitting between the calm water of the river and the void of the falls, it is one of the most remarkable places on the planet, a natural balcony overlooking 'the smoke that thunders'.
The island exists because the bed of the Zambezi, on the basalt plateau that forms the falls, is not uniform: tougher blocks of rock stick out and split the flow of water before the drop. Livingstone Island is one of these outcrops, covered in vegetation and trees. When the water is high, the force of the river almost surrounds it; when the water is low, you can walk across the rocky beds around it.
Around the island, those same rocks form natural pools right on the edge of the drop. The most famous is Devil's Pool, where a lip of rock holds back the current. For centuries these formations were simply part of the landscape known to local peoples; their transformation into a world-famous attraction, on the other hand, is very recent.
On 16 November 1855, the Scottish explorer and missionary David Livingstone travelled down the Zambezi by canoe, guided by local paddlers, and landed on this very islet to look out over the great waterfall. It was from Livingstone Island, which now bears his name, that the first European on record laid eyes on Victoria Falls, a defining moment in the history of African exploration.
Awed by what he saw, Livingstone wrote in his journal the famous line that scenes so lovely 'must have been gazed upon by angels in their flight'. He named the falls after Queen Victoria, though he also recorded their local name, Mosi-oa-Tunya. The island has been tied to that moment, and to the explorer himself, ever since.
This historical link is a big part of the experience today: people who visit Livingstone Island and peer over the edge from Devil's Pool are standing in literally the same place where Livingstone first looked at 'the smoke that thunders' more than a century and a half ago. The story of the explorer and the story of the island come together on every visit.
Knowledge of the natural pools on the edge of the falls didn't begin with tourism: the peoples of the Zambezi valley had understood the behaviour of the river and its rocks since time immemorial, although the edge of the falls was, understandably, a place of respect and danger. The idea of deliberately swimming on the brink of the abyss is a modern phenomenon, tied to the growth of adventure tourism in Livingstone.
Throughout the 20th century, the falls were mainly a spectacle to admire from the viewpoints. It was only with the rise of adrenaline tourism in Livingstone, from the late 1990s and especially from 2000 onwards, that experiences like Devil's Pool were organised and sold professionally. Exclusive access to Livingstone Island went to Tongabezi, a renowned lodge in the area, which developed the tours with specialist guides and gourmet meals on the island.
Over time, and above all thanks to the iconic photo of someone leaning over the edge of the falls spreading across the internet and social media, Devil's Pool became one of the most famous and sought-after experiences in world travel, a must on every extreme adventure list. Today Tongabezi and its operation are part of the Green Safaris group, which holds the concession for the island.
Devil's Pool is only possible thanks to a precise combination of geology and season. The submerged lip of rock that holds back the current only does its job when the Zambezi is low; at high water, the force of the river would make any attempt to get close impossible and deadly. That's why the experience is only offered during the low-water season, generally from August to December or early January, and is closed the rest of the year.
Local guides are at the heart of the activity's safety. They know every inch of the rocky bed, check the level and strength of the water every day, decide which pool to use (Devil's Pool or the neighbouring Angel's Armchair), and stay with each visitor, physically holding on to them, while they lean out over the abyss. Their accumulated experience is what turns an objectively dangerous place into a controlled adventure.
This reliance on human judgement and the level of the river makes Devil's Pool a genuinely natural experience rather than a 'theme park' attraction: every season is different, some years it opens earlier or closes later, and on some days conditions force a change of route. That very authenticity, being truly on the edge of one of the largest waterfalls in the world, is what has made it a legendary part of any trip to Zambia.
