Earthquake or Tsunami Warning in Bali: What Should You Do?

When you feel an earthquake, drop, cover your head, and hold on until the shaking stops; if you are on the beach and the shaking is strong or long, around 20 seconds or more, do not wait for a siren and move to high ground straight away. That is the core of the advice from BMKG, Indonesia's meteorology and geophysics agency, and BNPB, the national disaster agency, checked September 2026. Bali shakes often: BMKG data quoted by Bali Post counted 60 earthquakes in the Bali region in May 2026 alone, most of them small and not felt.

What should you do while the ground is shaking?

• Indoors: drop, take cover under a sturdy table, and hold on. Keep away from glass, tall cupboards, and hanging lamps. Do not run for stairs or lifts while it is still moving.
• Outdoors: move away from walls, power poles, billboards, and cliffs. On the Uluwatu cliff roads or mountain routes up to Kintamani, watch for falling rocks.
• On a scooter or in a car: pull over in the open, away from bridges and big trees.
• Once it stops: leave calmly, put shoes on because of broken glass, then check InfoBMKG.

When should you leave the beach immediately?

BNPB promotes the 20-20-20 rule: if a quake lasts about 20 seconds, a tsunami could arrive within 20 minutes, so get to somewhere roughly 20 metres high, a hill or the upper floors of a concrete building. BMKG stresses self-evacuation: strong shaking on the coast or the sea suddenly pulling back is the warning in itself, and waiting for a siren wastes precious minutes. The number 20 is a practical guide, not a precise threshold. Tsunamis come in several waves and the first is not always the biggest, so do not go back to the beach until BMKG declares the warning over.

How will you know there is an official warning?

• The InfoBMKG app (Android and iOS) and the @infoBMKG accounts. BMKG's tsunami early warning system, InaTEWS, is designed to issue warnings within 5 minutes of a quake.
• BMKG warning levels: Awas means waves forecast above 3 metres, full evacuation. Siaga means 0.5-3 metres, evacuate. Waspada means under 0.5 metres, stay away from beaches and riverbanks.
• Tsunami sirens stand at 9 points in Bali, according to BPBD Bali: Seminyak, Kuta, Kedonganan, Tanjung Benoa, ITDC Nusa Dua, Serangan, Sanur, Tanah Lot, and Seririt.
• Hotel staff and Balawista lifeguards also pass on evacuation orders. Follow their directions.

Where should you go?

Follow the tsunami evacuation route signs posted in coastal areas such as Kuta, Tanjung Benoa, and Sanur, towards assembly points on high ground or temporary evacuation sites (TES), multi-storey buildings designated for vertical evacuation, some of them hotels. Each area is different. On the Bukit peninsula (upper Jimbaran, Ungasan, Uluwatu) high ground is fairly close. In Kuta, Legian, Sanur, and Tanjung Benoa the land is flat, so climbing to the upper floors of a designated concrete building is often quicker than driving. Walk or run; cars on Kuta's narrow streets jam fast.

Is your hotel tsunami ready?

Not necessarily. As of March 2026, BPBD Bali counted only 115 of 498 star-rated hotels holding its disaster preparedness certificate, which requires 31 indicators from evacuation routes to guest-handling procedures (Bali Post, quoting BPBD Bali head I Gede Teja). Tanjung Benoa became Indonesia's first community recognised as Tsunami Ready by UNESCO-IOC on 28 May 2022. When you check in at a beachfront hotel, ask three things: is the hotel BPBD-certified, where is the assembly point or vertical evacuation floor, and how will staff alert guests in the middle of the night. Staying in a villa with no 24-hour staff? Work out your own route to the nearest high ground on day one.

Which earthquakes have been felt in Bali recently?

Before dawn on Saturday 15 August 2026, an offshore quake northeast of Mbay, Nagekeo, in East Nusa Tenggara (first reported as M7.7, then revised by BMKG to M7.0) was felt weakly in Denpasar and Badung at II-III on the MMI scale, meaning some people noticed it. BMKG's tsunami potential notice that morning covered East and West Nusa Tenggara and South Sulawesi, not Bali. Small quakes around Jembrana and the Bali Sea were also recorded through 2026. The lesson: a quake hundreds of kilometres away can still be felt, and the official status on InfoBMKG is what tells you whether to leave the coast.

Which numbers should you save?

• General emergency: 112.
• BPBD Bali Province operations centre (24 hours): +62 361 251177.
• BMKG Region III office, Denpasar: +62 361 751122.
• Your embassy or consulate emergency line and your travel insurer's 24-hour number.

If anyone is hurt after a quake, hospitals and emergency rooms are listed in our Bali emergency health guide. One habit that takes five minutes: on your first day, walk from your room to the nearest evacuation route sign, so that when the floor moves you already know which way to turn.