Royal Caribbean Cruises Reviews 

⭐ Absolutely the WORST experience with Royal Caribbean — I’m shocked this is even possible.

I booked my cruise on October 16 for a family vacation scheduled Nov 30–Dec 7. I paid $2,287 in full, the payment went through with no issues, and after about 15 days I even received my boarding ticket booklet. Everything looked perfectly smooth — we had been planning this trip for three months.

Then out of nowhere, when I logged in just to check arrival times, I see my entire reservation canceled. No call. No email. No notification at all. Just gone.

So I called Royal Caribbean and the explanation they gave me was honestly unbelievable:

“Your bank requested a cancellation and refund.”

Really? After 17 days? For a trip fully paid and confirmed?
I contacted my bank immediately — and guess what?
They never requested ANY cancellation or refund.

And this is where the situation turned from frustrating to outrageous.

I called Royal Caribbean 3–4 times, and every single time they pushed the responsibility onto my bank. At first they said refunds “take 14 days.” Well, it’s been over 30 days, and now their answer is still:

“Contact your financial institution.”

Even the supervisor couldn’t help — just repeated the same script.

And here’s the part that truly shows how little they care:
When I asked to simply rebook the same cruise, the same dates, the same ocean-view room that they canceled, they refused to honor the original price. Instead, they wanted $700 MORE for the exact same room.
So not only did they cancel my fully paid reservation without telling me, they tried to charge me extra to get it back.

This is honestly terrifying.
What if I had shown up at the port with my family — including my 2-year-old child — ready to board, only to be told my reservation was canceled behind my back? Can you imagine being stranded there, bags in hand, because of their mistake?

Royal Caribbean completely ruined what should have been a beautiful family trip — and they’re still refusing to own up to their error.

If this is how they treat fully paid, confirmed reservations… I will NEVER trust Royal Caribbean again.

I am writing this to share a difficult realization following the cancellation of my March 16, 2026, Celebrity Millennium sailing. After 15 years of loyalty to the Royal Caribbean Group, the handling of this situation has fundamentally changed how I view your brands.
My frustration is centered on a total lack of transparency and a series of broken promises. Being told my reservation was canceled for "inventory issues" is a vague explanation that provides no real understanding of why my booking was selected for removal. This lack of honesty makes it impossible to feel confident that if I book with you again, the same thing won't happen.
Furthermore, I feel a deep sense of betrayal regarding the travel reimbursement. During my initial calls, I was told repeatedly that any non-refundable travel expenses would be reimbursed as part of the compensation package. It was only after I spent weeks chasing management and submitting documentation that the goalposts were moved. To be told that Celebrity only covers "cancellation fees" and not the actual out-of-pocket cost of the flights feels like a deliberate reneging on a promise. If this had been communicated clearly from the start, it would have been one thing, but to label it a "miscommunication" after the fact is unacceptable.
For over a decade, I have been a vocal advocate for your cruise lines. However, after being treated as a transaction and subjected to inconsistent management, that trust has been eroded. While I am not ending my relationship with Royal Caribbean Group entirely, you are no longer my exclusive choice for vacations.
This experience has prompted me to actively explore other cruise lines for our future travel. I no longer feel the same confidence in recommending your brands to friends and family, as I can no longer guarantee they will be told the truth or that the company will stand by its word.

Company's website is very poorly designed. Needs updating, more options to choose from and easier navigation for online users.

They had HORRIBLE customer service! We had to be on the ship the WHOLE time due to their changing the place we wanted to go and making us go to NASSAU. It was the WORST cruise EVER! They got my account mixed up and it took 4 MONTHS for them to help fix it. I will NEVER cruise them again!!!

Nickle and dime you to death, horrible wait times for a drink at casino, excursion cancelation policy is trash, just stay away from this cruise line had way better experience on carnival and carnival being way more affordable, usually more you pay better experience and amenities you get while amenities you get are more due to their larger ships everything else goes down the tube they had only one complimentary restaurant open 24/7 which i find disgusting for the price you pay.

DO NOT BOOK WITH THEM. Significantly changed our itinerary months before departure, refusing to give a refund or correspond over email.

Please beware of the RC discounts...they are not as they appear....They advertise but discreetly the price mounts up...Several discounts I complained about...to which RC will always have an explanation to justify why it doesnt apply🙄!!...So then why advertise...Just be honest about the Price at the offset!!...
Our onboard credit was also reduced...God knows...something to do with changing rooms!!...
We also lost a destination, no reduction, and still charged the same price?? We sailed over New year and they knew from August, Haiti was not an option, but did not replace with an alternative port.
Cruises are far too full, at no time could you find sun beds anywhere on deck, or in the solarium.
Staff are lovely...but we had a member of staff in the main dining room tell us staff do not get sick leave or sick pay...and from the overall impression the staff are not overly appreciated in their roles...
tbh best part is balcony room and views of sea at night... not sure about the raving reviews you read 🤷...
Shows are fantastic...highly professional...great to watch!!...People around the world so friendly 😊!!...
Was it worth best part of £6-7k just for RC...certainly not for 7 days...maybe a 2 week cruise!!...
RC is raking it in...
But we did have a Good time, and memories.. Maybe because we spent time several days in orlando 1st, then used Brightline train to miami.
Getting to miami cruise port is a nightmare in traffic, allow at least 1hr 30 mins!!.....
I understand any other port in usa is better fld & orlando..
We also saw a women walking bare foot outside the Brightline train station, which I believe the area is extremely deprived...ironic these megacruise ship dock in such a deprived area.
There are no cash machines to use when you get the RC port..so bring dollars to tip porters, as we didnt have any!!
Issue with RC is they do not hold themselves accountable when they mess up..and refuse to acknowledge customer dissatisfaction because they are making money big bucks from loyal and wealthy customers!!

Royal Caribbean issued me a credit for a cruise I had to cancel. I was told originally that they would refund the money I had paid toward the cruise but that was a lie. Weeks went by and no refund. Finally about 4 weeks later I was issued a refund without my $500 deposit that Royal Caribbean was keeping. I argued until finally they issued a credit. A credit that I have not been able to apply on any cruise. Now its a year later and they will not extend the expiration date that I will lose my deposit. They have given me the run around for almost a year and just want to keep my $500 deposit. Shame on you! I will never travel on Royal Caribbean. Beware! Liars and thieves! I have been on the phone with them for hours and hours. Such a waste of time!

I honestly want to give less than a star. Because I'm highly dissatisfied. This is my first time ever cruising with Royal. I was really excited to book this cruise, having heard that it is one of the better cruise lines. However, upon booking my cruise and making my payments, they changed the entire itinerary of the trip, removing two islands, I specifically wanted to go to without compensation. To change or cancel the cruise, I would have to pay an additional amount. I was told that they have the right to change the itinerary at any point in time. I am highly dissatisfied, I will never cruise with Royal again. I was going to spend a thousand dollars on excursions with them, which I won't be doing.

DO NOT RECOMMEND ROYAL CARIBBEAN

Let me be clear before the defenders pile on. I understand medical emergencies happen and the guest’s health should always come first. That is not the issue.

The issue is Royal Caribbean’s complete lack of contingency planning and accountability.

Because of a medical emergency, our ship turned around, returned to Miami, and sat docked for roughly 8 hours, impacting more than 4,000 passengers. After that, Royal Caribbean downgraded our itinerary by canceling Grand Cayman, the primary reason majority of us booked this cruise, and replaced it with Freeport, Bahamas, after we had already been to Nassau earlier in the trip.

If the situation allowed for an 8 hour return to Miami, it is fair to ask why no alternative medical evacuation options were pursued earlier, or why the entire ship had to absorb the consequences of poor decision-making. Helicopters, intercept vessels, coordination with authorities, something. Royal Caribbean is a multibillion dollar company, not a mom and pop cruise line.

What really sealed this as unacceptable was the response afterward. No ownership. No meaningful compensation. Just a canned “sorry, this is out of our control.” That excuse doesn’t fly when customers paid for a specific itinerary and that itinerary was materially changed.

Emergencies are unpredictable. Planning for them is literally Royal Caribbean’s job.

This was my first and last Royal Caribbean cruise.

If Grand Cayman matters to you, or if you expect transparency and accountability when things go wrong, think twice before booking with Royal Caribbean.

I've been on more than 20 cruises in my life. I'd say about 3/4 of them were with Carnival. Carnival is usually a little cheaper, but Royal Caribbean has some incredible giant ships that are different than Carnival. I can tell you one thing about Royal Caribbean, if you get sick on their cruise and it's due to their food, they'll give you one free trip to the clinic with some medication. If you need any more medical assistance after that during your cruise, they will charge you a fortune. They did that to my girlfriend who got food poisoning from a sunny side egg in the morning. Of course they didn't want to admit that it was from their food, but it happened about three hours after she ate and she did not eat anything anywhere else when the symptoms started. She had to get intravenous antibiotics every six hours for three days. They wound up charging my account over $2200 for this service. The doctor in the clinic said my girlfriend would've died if they didn't give her this intravenous antibiotic. One of the nurses felt bad and she went against the regulations and removed about $1000 in charges, but left a balance of about 1200.
My girlfriend's Humana insurance would not pay the claim because they claimed it was not a hospital emergency room. When you are in the middle of the ocean, that is an emergency room by all means.
My girlfriend had to sue her Humana and they wound up paying the claim to settle it. But I thought Royal Caribbean was really bad not paying that medical service considering the doctor knew it was their food that did it.

I was in this Mariner of Sea by Caribbean for 4 days and that was my first cruise, the first night in my room I couldn't sleep because it was something biting my body in the bed, my skin start etching and become all red, I had to call in the middle of the night and ask to check the bed from Bed Bugs, they had to replace everything in the bed and I was sitting and shaking from cold for 2 hours when they are doing their process to look for the bed bugs and changing the sheets, when I did asked to be compensated for having a nightmare on my vacation, supervisor on charge told me that they don't compensate people, Note: I also saw one roach caroling by the wood cabinet, I believe I didn't pay all that money to have that bad experience and I do deserve to be compensated. My 2 stars are for the staff because they were very nice and helpful.

Hidden fees, we were charged 20% not optional after we had a massage. We were told on boarding there is no expected gratuity on an Australia cruise.
I didn't mind paying tips when they are deserved but to be told it's not negotiate and wasn't on the promotional material.

I have to tell you that I was very embarrassed.My last three night cruise.I am a diamond club member.And I told my girlfriend how we will get chocolate covered fruit chocolate covered strawberries.And we never did.Can you please tell me why we never did?And I was embarrassed

This was the first time I have been on Royal Caribbean cruise, I was on the odyssey of the seas. The ship and staff were great. My issue is with the food options, first the high cost of the fare there needs to be more or better food options. This line seems to provide multiple stations for dessert, vegetarian, deli ,while the food choices are limited and seems recycled. A pasta section, hamburger and hot dog station really. The food stations are strategic to appear like there are more options but not the case. The breakfast and lunch are similar with the breads, desserts with rhe exception of swapping out breakfast for some lunch items. I was really disappointed. There are more food options choices at the speciality restaurants you have to pay extra for.

So I absolutely love royal caribbean and there ships .however I will advise never to book a group. Keep your reservation individually unless its for a large company but if your a family or have even 12 rooms or less keep it as individual. Ok why am I saying this so I had booked 10 rooms for my family cruise . I was able to make 2 different log in for royal on there app and I was able to link them so at first I was able to link all of them on one but something happened after one of my family members wanted to move there room so after that I was not able to link it but I just used another email and linked the 3 rooms that it effected and was able to still do what I needed. So before you make your individual rooms into a group your able to see the ballance of each room if u need to switch people from room to room you can as long as the primary guest remains the same . Your able to have much more freedom without putting your reservation into a group. I found the group to be more problematic as even the breakdown on the invoice they send you much more confusing and if you dont pay attention you will pay more or something is not correct. I have to call everytime I need to do anything and sometimes the wait is crazy and it takes about 30 to an hour each request u might have. Another issue I had was after my group was created and again I regret it. Is that I called to give the crown and anchor number to certain members in my group and somehow the rates of the room ended up going up . I was told that this was fixed but as I noticed the following day 2 of the rooms lost the deposit that was in the rooms and back to like not having a deposit so it was the full price again. And once again having to call for them to fix there mistake of not finishing the problem in the first place was another hour on the phone waiting for someone to again fix the issue . So this is the biggest problem and I would never say its worth the agervation even if u got the tour conductor credit. If time is money you will find it not worth the added stress and additional forced communication

Allure January 3 3026
Warning: if you carry and depend on injectable medication that requires refrigeration beware.
The staff provided me with a portable refrigerator because the one in the room isn’t cool enough. While I was out of the room, they took my insulin out of the room cooler and put it into the one they brought in. Problem was, they did not turn the switch on the unit from hot to cold. They essentially fried my insulin. It took 3 days to recover my medication at the islands. They also tried to charge me for a trip hospital visit unsuccessfully. Could have ended up badly so be careful. They shouldn’t have touched my medicine without my knowledge.
Update:they denied the incident happened until I provided them with documentation. All reports were in their system.

We booked a Royal Caribbean family cruise for March 2026 well in advance. Despite this, our cruise was later cancelled because Royal Caribbean provided incorrect information about infant age requirements.

What followed was very poor customer service. Communication was slow, call backs didn’t happen, and our clear request to move to an alternative sailing was dismissed unless we paid significantly more, even though the problem was caused by Royal Caribbean’s own error.

The booking was ultimately cancelled and refunded without our notification, leaving us without a holiday and no realistic alternatives at short notice.

Booking early offered no protection. Based on our experience, this is not a company you can trust!

Lovely cruise around the Greek islands. The boat was lots of fun and very well presented.

Boarding was easy and quick. The staff couldn't do enough for us. The guys in the schooner bar were particularly awesome.

Down side the formal night was a bit of a miss. You could be in a nice suit in the main dining room sat next to a guy in shorts and flip flops. That kinda ruins the experience a little.

Apart from that we were very happy.

Horrible and scary experience with this cruise!!
We took a cruise Symphony of the Seas for new years, 2025. Our toddler became sick in the middle of the cruise and so we went for medical help to the 'clinic' within the cruise. The doctor there could not have been more incompetent - he wanted to inject our son with various things including steroids which our son DID NOT need (we were speaking with our own pediatrician back in the USA while at the clinic and he urged us not to give him steroids and other medication that the cruise doctor recommended (very condescendingly by the way)). We ended up leaving the cruise the next day to get help in Jamaica and that turned out to be a nightmare as well but our son finally did get what he needed to get better so the decision to leave the boat was a good one.

Parents of kids out there, know that cruises are NOT safe for children, particularly small ones, and in this case this particular cruise was not equipped to handle urgent medical situations as proved by the doctor. It was coincidence that we had a stop in Jamaica that day. Imagine being stranded at sea in that situation?

There is a reason the employees of the cruise have to sing songs in every buffet so that you will stop to wash your hands before going in. This is because no matter what they do to make people be clean, cramming 6,000 people in a boat and expecting viruses, bacteria, and all sorts of things not to spread is ridiculous.

Think twice about going into a cruise as it was one of the scariest experience for us. Safe to say I will not take a cruise ever again.

Hope this review will help you make a wise decision.