The species diversity of pontoniine shrimps (Decapoda: Palaemonidae: Pontoniinae) previously recorded in the vicinity of Lizard Island, Great Barrier Reef (GBR), Australia, were compared with new records obtained during a recent three-week expedition as part of the CReefs Project, a field project of the Census of Marine Life. Few previous investigations at this location had discovered 18 species of pontoniine shrimps distributed among 12 genera. In contrast, relatively little effort, approximately 35 hours sampling (40 dives), was required to increase this list more than twice adding 20 new species records from 15 pontoniine genera for the locality including 6 species and 1 genus reported from Australian waters for the first time and 1 genus and 4 species new to science. This large increase in species was enumerated with little additional effort and the relatively low total species diversity of these shrimps known from this location compared to species known from the southern GBR (e.g. Heron Island), where overall diversity is expected to be less, strongly indicates that the enumeration of these shrimps from the northern GBR is far from complete.