Maafushi, Maldives

Maafushi: Submarine Cable Landing Point

Maafushi is a submarine cable landing point located in the Maldives, an island nation in the Indian Ocean. Two submarine cables land at Maafushi, connecting it to other points within the Maldivian archipelago. Both cables are domestic in nature, linking Maldivian islands to one another rather than extending to international destinations, making Maafushi a node within the country's internal submarine cable network.

The two cables serving Maafushi — the Domestic Submarine Cable of Maldives (DSCoM) and the Ithaafushi-Maafushi-Hulhumale — reflect the Maldives' ongoing investment in inter-island connectivity. Both cables were still in draft status as of their respective ready-for-service years of 2024 and 2025, indicating that Maafushi is part of a relatively recent and expanding phase of domestic submarine cable development in the country.

Cables Landing at Maafushi

The Domestic Submarine Cable of Maldives (DSCoM) is a 286-kilometre domestic submarine cable with a ready-for-service year of 2024 (draft status). All endpoints of this cable are located within the Maldives, confirming its role as an intra-national link designed to improve connectivity across the dispersed islands of the Maldivian archipelago.

The Ithaafushi-Maafushi-Hulhumale cable has a ready-for-service year of 2025 and is also in draft status. Like DSCoM, all endpoints of this cable are situated within the Maldives. The cable's name identifies specific Maldivian islands — Ithaafushi, Maafushi, and Hulhumale — as its key waypoints, establishing a direct submarine route between these locations.

Regional Context

Within the Maldives, Maafushi hosts 2 submarine cables, placing it in the upper 76 percent of the country's 17 landing points by cable count. Hulhumale leads the national network with 7 cables, followed by Eydhafushi, Hithadhoo, and Kulhudhufushi each with 3 cables. Maafushi sits alongside Dhangethi and Male, which also each host 2 cables, representing a mid-tier presence in the Maldivian domestic submarine cable landscape.

Network Role

Maafushi functions as a domestic inter-island cable hub within the Maldives, served by two cables that together form part of the country's growing intra-national submarine infrastructure. Rather than serving as a gateway to international cable systems, Maafushi's role is oriented entirely toward strengthening connectivity between Maldivian islands, with the Ithaafushi-Maafushi-Hulhumale cable in particular suggesting a focused corridor linking nearby islands in the central atolls region.

With both cables carrying recent or imminent ready-for-service dates, Maafushi represents an active addition to the Maldivian cable network during a period when the country has been expanding its domestic submarine infrastructure across multiple landing points. In the broader Maldivian submarine cable graph, Maafushi contributes to the redundancy and reach of intra-national connectivity across an archipelago that depends on submarine links to bridge its many islands.