celebrity cruises size of ships

Celebrity Cruises ships ranked by size from biggest to smallest — the complete list

Are you looking for the most venue-packed Celebrity Cruises ships at sea? If so, you'll want to get on one of the biggest Celebrity Cruises ships.

The biggest Celebrity cruise ships are, as you might expect, the Celebrity ships with the most onboard restaurants, bars, showrooms and decktop pool zones. They also have the biggest casinos and spas among ships in the Celebrity cruise fleet and the most cabins and suites — as well as the most variation in cabin and suite types.

With room for 3,000 passengers or more, the biggest Celebrity ships are like floating versions of the big resorts you find on land in places like Orlando or Las Vegas, although they're not quite as large as the very biggest resorts on land or sea (for the latter, you'd probably want to try a Royal Caribbean or MSC Cruises vessel). If you're in the "bigger is better" camp when it comes to a resort experience, the biggest Celebrity Cruises ships are the Celebrity ships for you.

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Still, Celebrity doesn't just operate large vessels. The Miami-based cruise brand also markets several relatively small cruise ships that carry just 2,000 or so people and have a much more intimate feel. In some cases, these vessels are 35% smaller than the biggest Celebrity cruise ships. They are ships that, notably, have fewer decktop activities and interior venues than the biggest Celebrity cruise ships.

These smaller Celebrity cruise ships are best for vacationers who like a more intimate, less crowded resort experience.

Related: The 4 types of Celebrity Cruises ships, explained

Celebrity also operates three even smaller vessels — much smaller; they carry just 16 to 100 people — in the Galapagos year-round. These three vessels make up what is essentially an entirely different business for Celebrity than the mainstream, big-ship cruising that is at the core of the company.

Celebrity is essentially two cruise lines in one: a big-ship brand with 12 vessels that carry 2,000 to 3,000 passengers and sail around the world, and a Galapagos cruisetour operator with three very tiny vessels. We include all of the vessels in this guide.

To make sure you end up on the right Celebrity ship for you, it pays to study which Celebrity cruise ships are the biggest and which are the smallest before booking.

Here, every Celebrity ship currently in operation is ranked from biggest to smallest.

1. Celebrity Beyond

Maiden voyage: 2022 Size: 141,420 tons Passenger capacity: 3,260

2 (tied). Celebrity Apex

Maiden voyage: 2020 Size: 130,818 tons Passenger capacity: 2,910

2 (tied). Celebrity Edge

Maiden voyage: 2018 Size: 130,818 tons Passenger capacity: 2,908

4. Celebrity Reflection

Maiden voyage: 2012 Size: 125,366 tons Passenger capacity: 3,046

5. Celebrity Silhouette

Maiden voyage: 2011 Size: 122,210 tons Passenger capacity: 2,886

6 (tied). Celebrity Eclipse

Maiden voyage: 2010 Size: 121,878 tons Passenger capacity: 2,850

6 (tied). Celebrity Equinox

Maiden voyage: 2009 Size: 121,878 tons Passenger capacity: 2,850

6 (tied). Celebrity Solstice

Maiden voyage: 2008 Size: 121,878 tons Passenger capacity: 2,850

9 (tied). Celebrity Constellation

Maiden voyage: 2002 Size: 91,000 tons Passenger capacity: 2,170

9 (tied). Celebrity Summit

Maiden voyage: 2001 Size: 91,000 tons Passenger capacity: 2,158

9 (tied). Celebrity Infinity

Maiden voyage: 2001 Size: 91,000 tons Passenger capacity: 2,170

9 (tied). Celebrity Millennium

Maiden voyage: 2000 Size: 91,000 tons Passenger capacity: 2,137

13. Celebrity Flora

Maiden voyage: 2019 Size: 5,739 tons Passenger capacity: 100

14. Celebrity Xpedition

Maiden voyage: 2001 Size: 2,842 tons Passenger capacity: 48

15. Celebrity Xploration

Maiden voyage: 2007 Size: 320 tons Passenger capacity: 16

What is the biggest Celebrity Cruises ship?

The biggest Celebrity cruise ship is Celebrity Beyond, which measures 141,420 gross tons. It's also the newest Celebrity cruise ship. It debuted less than two years ago, in April 2022.

What is the smallest Celebrity Cruises ship?

The smallest Celebrity cruise ship is the super-tiny Celebrity Xploration. Based in the Galapagos, it measures 320 tons, just a tiny fraction of the size of Celebrity Beyond, and it holds just 16 passengers.

Or, to put it another way, Celebrity Xploration holds fewer passengers than a lifeboat on Celebrity Beyond.

Are bigger Celebrity Cruises ships coming?

Not right now. Celebrity Cruises currently has two new cruise ships on order. However, each of the vessels is projected to be roughly the same size as the recently unveiled Celebrity Beyond — about 141,000 tons.

That size estimate can change, of course, as construction on the ships draws closer to completion. Celebrity might add elements to the ships that increase their size.

The first of the two ships on order, Celebrity Ascent, is due to start sailing in December 2023. It will be followed by an as-yet-unnamed vessel in 2025.

The two Celebrity Cruises ships on order will be the fourth and fifth ships in Celebrity's Edge-class series of vessels that began debuting in 2018. The first three ships in the series are Celebrity Edge, Celebrity Apex and Celebrity Beyond.

The Edge-class vessels are being built at the giant Chantiers de l'Atlantique shipyard in St. Nazaire, France.

Related: 5 things to love about Celebrity Beyond

What's the difference between bigger and smaller Celebrity Cruises ships?

The biggest Celebrity cruise ships have room for more onboard venues and attractions than smaller Celebrity ships. That makes them more alluring for vacationers who prefer a big resort experience with lots of options as compared to a stay at a smaller resort.

On Celebrity's biggest vessel, Celebrity Beyond, for instance, you'll find an expanded "resort-within-a-resort" area for suite passengers called The Retreat that isn't on the smaller vessels in the same Edge-class series or on other smaller ships in the Celebrity fleet. It offers a new two-story sun deck with hot tubs, lounge chairs and private cabanas that are open exclusively to passengers staying in suites.

Celebrity Beyond also has 179 more cabins than its smaller sister vessels, Celebrity Apex and Celebrity Edge, which each have 1,467 cabins. As a result, it holds 3,260 passengers at double occupancy. That's up from a 2,910-passenger capacity at double occupancy for Celebrity Apex and a 2,908-passenger capacity at double occupancy for Celebrity Edge.

Related: The 5 best destinations you can visit on a Celebrity ship

Celebrity's smaller Millennium-class ships, by contrast, only carry about 2,100 passengers at double occupancy. As a result, they have a more intimate feel, at least in the pantheon of relatively big, mass-market ships.

That makes the latter vessels a good choice for someone who wants to try Celebrity but isn't eager to travel with big crowds. The smaller ships in the Celebrity fleet thus appeal to a subset of Celebrity fans who prefer more intimacy in a cruise vessel and don't mind giving up some onboard amenities to get it. They are also often less expensive to sail on, on a per-day basis.

Related: Don't miss out on these Celebrity loyalty perks

Celebrity's three very small Galapagos-based vessels have the most intimate feel of all. They are like tiny little boutique hotels that float.

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Celebrity Cruises Ships by Size, Age and Class (2022)

Celebrity Cruises has an active fleet of fifteen ships currently with two further ships on order ( Celebrity Ascent and another Edge-class ship, currently unnamed).

In this guide, we will cover all the different ships in the Celebrity Cruises fleet and how they compare to each other.

Introduction to Celebrity Cruises

Celebrity Cruises was actually founded in 1988 in Greece, by the shipping company Chandris Group. Originally they were conducting upmarket cruises to Bermuda.

In 1997, Royal Caribbean International acquired Celebrity Cruises and during the same year, the five ships became six with the addition of Celebrity Mercury .

By 2000, the start of the brand new fleet was beginning to arrive – this was the Millennium Class ships, which began with Celebrity Millennium in 2000 and was followed by three additional ships ( Celebrity Infinity , Celebrity Summit and Celebrity Constellation ).

After that, Celebrity created the Solstice-class, which consisted of five ships. These proved extremely popular and Celebrity actually went back and ‘Solsticized’ the rest of their fleet to bring the other ships up to the same passenger experience.

In 2018, Celebrity Edge debuted with a non-traditional cruise ship bow (a Parabolic Ultra-Bow, if you may!) and The Magic Carpet (an open-air dining experience attached to the side of the ship that can move from the bottom to the top of the ship if needed and act as a platform during tender operations)

Celebrity Cruises’ Ships Frequently Asked Questions

Which is the newest celebrity ship.

Celebrity Beyond is the newest Celebrity Cruises’ ship – she joined the fleet in April 2022.

What Celebrity ship is Captain Kate on?

Captain Kate McCue is currently on Celebrity Beyond as Master of the ship.

What Celebrity ship goes to Alaska?

Celebrity Eclipse , Celebrity Solstice and Celebrity Millennium all sail in the Alaska region.

What is the biggest Celebrity ship?

Celebrity Beyond became the biggest ship of the Celebrity Cruises fleet in April 2022

What is the smallest Celebrity ship?

Celebrity Xploration is the smallest ship of the fleet at 319 GRT and carrying just 16 passengers. This ship is part of their Xpedition-class ships.

What is the oldest Celebrity ship?

Celebrity Millennium is the oldest ship in the Celebrity Cruises fleet. She joined the fleet in 2000.

Who owns Celebrity Cruises?

Celebrity Cruises is a Royal Caribbean brand, having been acquired by them in 1997 from the Greek-owned Chandris Group.

What type of bow does Celebrity Edge have?

Celebrity Edge has a Parabolic ultra bow. A curved rather than pointed bow that actually encapsulates the traditional bulbous bow as seen on ships usually. It offers a 20% greater energy efficiency.

Celebrity Cruises Ships by Size (from largest to smallest)

What does ‘tonnage (grt)’ mean.

GRT (Gross Registered Tonnage) is a term used to calculate the volume inside a ship. It is a measure of cubic capacity and is calculated by the total volume from inside the hull and decks of the ship. 1 GRT = 100 cubic feet of space. In essence, the bigger the GRT – the more ‘space’ the ship has for passengers, cargo, etc.

How are ‘Passengers (Max)’ calculated?

You’ll see multiple numbers for passengers on ships – this is because many ships include extra beds in cabins (such as the sofa/couch can convert to a pull-out bed) – but the majority of cabins usually have 2 people in them. the ‘Max’ number is if every cabin used their additional pull-out bed, etc. This number is unlikely to be reached very frequently.

Celebrity Cruises Ships by Age (from newest to oldest)

Are all celebrity cruises’ ships new builds.

Just two of the Celebrity’s ships were built and owned by other cruise lines before being acquired by Celebrity Cruises.

The two ships are Celebrity Xpedition (previously Sun Bay for Sun Bay Cruises) and Celebrity Xploration (previously Athala II for Ocean Adventures)

Both of these are quite different ships from your usual cruise ships, they are expedition ships. This means they are much smaller and have very different passenger and operational needs because they operate in much shallower, confined waters and must adhere to even stricter environmental laws in these regions.

Celebrity Cruises Ships by Class (from newest to oldest)

What is the difference between the edge-class ships.

Celebrity Edge and Celebrity Apex are both identical ships. However, Celebrity Beyond is an extra 20 meters longer and has one additional deck. This brings 179 more suites and staterooms to the ship, a bigger (40%) sundeck at The Retreat and the Sunset Bar is 180% larger.

Celebrity Ascent is due to match Celebrity Beyond in terms of size and capacity.

What is the difference between the Xpedition-class ships?

The three Xpedition-class ships that Celebrity Cruises own are all custom-built ships, with Celebrity Xploration previously operating as Athala II for Ocean Adventures.

• Celebrity Xpedition is 90m long and carries 48 passengers
• Celebrity Xploration is 30m long and carries 16 passengers
• Celebrity Flora is 102m long and carries 100 passengers

Celebrity Xpedition had its capacity reduced from 100 passengers to just 48 passengers when Celebrity Flora launched. This is to meet the Ecuador permit requirements for cruising in the Galapagos region as Celebrity Cruises only has a permit to carry 164 passengers at any one time in the Galapagos region.

Celebrity Flora is the newest of the Xpedition-class and offers just forty suites – all of which have a private balcony. The ship has six decks and has a max cruising speed of just 12 knots.

Final Thoughts

Celebrity Cruises are known for its stylish cruise ships and fantastic service. A more premium version of parent company Royal Caribbean’s offerings some would say, Celebrity aim to make cruising trendy for those who would never consider cruising.

Their Edge-class ships, with famous designers and celebrity tie-ins, aim to break to entice those that enjoy luxury hotels and travel but are yet to experience a cruise and those that like both!

If you enjoyed this article you may like our other articles that compare MSC Cruises , Royal Caribbean , Holland America Line and Cunard Line ships .

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Celebrity Cruises Ships by Size, Age, and Class

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Celebrity Cruises has a fleet of 16 cruise ships that offer passengers large-vessel luxury vacations.

Celebrity’s fleet has one of the biggest ranges in ship sizes. Their largest ships have accommodations for over 3,000 passengers, while their smallest has a guest capacity of only 16.

In this article, we’ll compare Celebrity Cruises ships by size, age, and class to help you decide which one is right for your next cruise vacation.

Table of Contents

Celebrity Cruises Ships by Size: Biggest to Smallest

When comparing cruise ships, size is the most popular choice. Cruise ships are typically measured using gross tonnage(GT), a measure of a vessel’s internal volume.

Although size isn’t everything, it is a quick way to assess the number of facilities, restaurants, activities, and entertainment options available on a ship.

Below is a comparison of Celebrity Cruises’ ships by size, arranged from largest to smallest:

Celebrity Cruises Ships by Age: Newest to Oldest

If you want to experience the latest and greatest cruise ships, you might want to sail on a newer vessel.

Newer cruise ships often have better amenities, updated decor, and more activities.

Below is a comparison of Celebrity Cruises’ ships by age, from newest to oldest:

Celebrity Cruises Ships by Class

Celebrity Cruises currently offers four classes of cruise ships.

Each class features similar designs, features, and amenities, with slight differences between sister ships.

The largest is Celebrity’s Edge-class ships. Edge-class vessels feature a unique style with their Parabolic Ultra-Bow, which offers up to 20% greater energy efficiency.

Here are Celebrity Cruises ships by class:

Celebrity Cruises Ships on Order

Celebrity Cruises currently has two Edge-class ships on order ( Celebrity Ascent and another unnamed vessel).

Celebrity Ascent is the fourth Edge-class vessel set to debut on December 3, 2023. The new cruise ship will make round-trip sailings from Port Everglades, Florida, and feature the Edge-class’ signature Parabolic Ultra-Bow.

“We’re so excited to debut the spectacular  Celebrity Ascent  in the serene setting of the Caribbean where she and all of her guests will have their moment in the sun,” said Lisa Lutoff-Perlo, CEO and President of Celebrity Cruises.

A fifth unnamed Edge-class ship is scheduled to debut in 2025.

What is the Biggest Celebrity Ship?

Celebrity Cruises’ largest ship is Celebrity Beyond . The 140,600 GT vessel has a length of 1,004 ft, with accommodations for 3,260 guests.

What is the Smallest Celebrity Ship?

Celebrity Xploration is the smallest cruise ship in the Celebrity Cruises fleet at 320 GT and has a passenger capacity of 16. The vessel is part of Celebrity’s Xpedition class which offers yacht-style sailings to the Galapagos.

What is the Newest Celebrity Cruise Ship

Celebrity Beyond is the newest Celebrity cruise ship. The Edge-class vessel joined the fleet in April 2022.

What is the Oldest Celebrity Cruise Ship?

Celebrity Millenium is the oldest cruise ship in Celebrity’s fleet. The cruise ship was built in 2000.

What Was the First Celebrity Cruise Ship?

Celebrity’s first cruise ship was the S.S. Meridian , which launched in 1990.

How Many Cruise Ships Does Celebrity Cruises Have?

Celebrity Cruises currently has 16 cruise ships in operation. Their fleet includes 13 large-sized cruise ships and three smaller yacht-sized vessels.

Why are Celebrity Xpedition Class Ships so Small?

Celebrity’s Xpedition ships ( Celebrity Xploration , Celebrity Xpedition, and Celebrity Flora ) accommodate 16, 48, and 100 guests, respectively. The Xpedition-class ships offer luxury yacht-style voyages to the Galapagos, off the coast of Ecuador. These ships are tiny because the ports they visit can only accommodate small ships.

Who Owns Celebrity Cruises?

Royal Caribbean Group owns Celebrity Cruises. The parent company also operates sister cruise lines Royal Caribbean International and Silversea Cruises.

Marcello De Lio

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What to Know About All 16 Ships in the Celebrity Cruises Fleet

Here’s what you need to know about every Celebrity Cruises ship.

Courtesy of Celebrity Cruises

Celebrity Cruises is among our readers' favorite mega-ship ocean lines — coming in at No. 1 in 2022 and No. 2 in 2023 as part of our World's Best Awards (WBA) — and it's easy to see why. This WBA Hall of Fame honoree truly shines with its sophisticated, tasteful decor and sleek onboard spaces, including swanky lounges, dazzling bars, gourmet specialty restaurants, and contemporary suites. Almost all Celebrity ships, except the three Xpedition-class vessels, offer standard amenities like casinos, retail shops, spas, and Broadway-level shows and entertainment. There's also the adults-only Solarium and The Retreat, the latter of which is reserved exclusively for suite guests. Paul Brady , Travel + Leisure ’s news director and cruise expert, told us, “Because its ships offer so much to do, Celebrity is a fantastic choice for families, who can choose from a huge array of well-designed staterooms and suites. Groups of friends, too, will find much to like, thanks to the brand's fantastic dining (and drinking) options.”

Meet the Expert

Paul Brady is the news director at Travel + Leisure and the brand's expert on all things cruise.

Kari Becker is a travel advisor at Marvelous Mouse Travels.

With a fleet of 16 ships, it can be tricky to determine which Celebrity ship is best suited for your specific needs.Travel advisor Kari Becker of Marvelous Mouse Travels explains, "Whatever your taste, there is a perfect Celebrity cruise to meet your needs." She continues, telling T+L, "There are three main classes: the Edge, Solstice, and Millennium classes, all with unique features, benefits, and advantages." The Millennium-class ships are smaller which, per Becker, may "offer a more personalized experience." Solstice is the largest class of Celebrity's fleet, says Becker. "When designed, these ships focused on innovation, with unique spaces including a real grass lawn, and unique onboard experiences, such as glass-making classes." Last but not least is Celebrity's Edge class. Per the pro, the ships in the line's newest class are "the largest of the fleet, offering more space for additional experiences and restaurants, including a massive pool deck, floating platform at sea (aptly called the Magic Carpet), and Rooftop Garden." All in all, she says, "The Edge series is for guests looking for transformative cruising and splendor with countless gourmet restaurants and immersive entertainment." 

Ahead, we’ve listed every Celebrity ship currently in service — complete with their notable amenities, launch year, guest capacity, and other need-to-know insights — to help you determine which vessel is best for your next voyage.

Celebrity Ascent

Inaugural Year: 2023

Ship Class: Edge 

Ship Capacity: 3,260 passengers

Celebrity’s newest ship is also its flashiest — in the best way possible. The Celebrity Ascent offers an expanded Retreat area (exclusive to suite guests), complete with a 40-percent-larger two-story sundeck, and the swanky Sunset Bar, which is 180 percent larger. Beyond The Retreat, there are 32 bars, restaurants, and lounges, a lush Rooftop Garden, an adults-only Solarium, the three-level Eden restaurant and entertainment venue, and the Magic Carpet, a floating platform that reaches 13 stories above sea level. Finally, stay in one of the Iconic Suites, the largest in the Celebrity fleet, for the ultimate splurge. 

Celebrity Beyond

Inaugural Year: 2022

Celebrity Beyond is nearly identical to Celebrity Ascent . Both Edge-class sister ships have the same spectacular amenities and features, including a state-of-the-art spa and fitness center that’s sure to impress wellness-seekers, who will also be happy in one of the AquaClass Sky Suites, which offer in-room yoga mats and fitness equipment. It’s also worth noting that these suite guests also enjoy access to the SEA Thermal Suite and a dedicated spa concierge. Don’t miss the adults-only Solarium, the Rooftop Garden, the aforementioned Eden, or the Magic Carpet, which offers the best views at sea.

Paul Brady was onboard the Beyond in October 2022. “My stateroom, 9164, was a Sky Suite, with a king bed facing a private terrace and a clever roll-open mirror that let natural light into the spacious bathroom. Dining at the Daniel Boulud restaurant Le Voyage was one highlight — with seven courses — but so too were casual cocktails at Sunset Bar, with its touch of Moroccan design influence courtesy of Nate Berkus, who dreamed up the multi-level lounge,” said Brady of his experience.  

Celebrity Apex

Inaugural Year: 2020

Ship Capacity: 2,910 passengers

The second Edge-class ship, Celebrity Apex , made its grand debut in 2020. It boasts an abundance of stylish onboard spaces, including the Rooftop Garden and the adults-only Solarium. Access to the exclusive Retreat area is reason alone to book one of the contemporary suites. Other highlights include the dazzling three-story Grand Plaza, where you’ll find the aptly named Martini Bar, one of 29 bars, lounges, and restaurants aboard Apex , along with the orange-hued Magic Carpet, which offers live music and a full bar 13 feet above sea level.  

“I was fortunate to snag one of just a handful of Royal Suites on the ship, 12105, which had the look of a chic coastal Florida cottage, elevated with pops of bright green, geometric tiling, and contemporary art on the walls. The bathroom, with a deep soaking tub and spacious shower, rivaled any I’ve seen at land-based resorts,” said Brady of his November 2021 sailing. “Same with the Grand Plaza at the heart of the ship, a gathering place with a hotel lobby vibe in the best possible sense — and a glitzy Martini Bar.”

Read More : 9 Best Cruises for Couples

Celebrity Flora

Inaugural Year: 2019

Ship Class: Xpedition 

Ship Capacity: 100 passengers

Cruise the Galapagos in style aboard Celebrity Flora , which made its maiden voyage in 2019. The vessel was designed with sustainability in mind: It's built with natural materials and features anchorless technology to protect the seabed. Certified naturalists from Galapagos National Park are on board to help guests gain a better understanding of the region for an educational trip. The ship also offers a once-in-a-lifetime glamping experience, which includes dinner and drinks, a naturalist-guided stargazing session, accommodations in a cabana-turned-double bed, and a private breakfast. Plus, with its all-suite accommodations, the small ship has a mega-yacht feel.

Celebrity Edge

Inaugural Year: 2018

Ship Capacity: 2,918 passengers

This sophisticated ship — the first in Celebrity’s Edge class — changed the game following its 2018 debut. What’s more, Edge was the very first Celebrity ship to feature the Magic Carpet, the multifunctional Eden, and the Infinite Veranda Staterooms, which, with the touch of a button, transform your living space into your very own private balcony.

Related: 10 Best Alaska Cruises to Take This Summer, According to Experts

Celebrity Reflection

Inaugural Year: 2012

Ship Class: Solstice 

Ship Capacity: 3,046 passengers

The fifth, final, and largest Solstice-class cruise ship, Celebrity Reflection , will impress even the pickiest of travelers with its onboard activities, amenities, and spaces, including a total of 22 bars, restaurants, and lounges. In addition to The Retreat (reserved exclusively for suite guests) and The Solarium (adults-only), Reflection — along with all Solstice-class ships — boasts the Lawn Club. Located on the top deck of the ship, this chic outdoor space (which is outfitted with real grass, no less), is perfect for sipping cocktails, enjoying a leisurely lunch, listening to live music, lounging in a cabana, or playing a game of bocce or croquet. The adults-only Persian Garden area at the spa is a favorite amongst wellness enthusiasts.

Celebrity Silhouette

Inaugural Year: 2011

Ship Capacity: 2,902 passengers

Celebrity Silhouette is elegant in every sense, from the aptly named Grand Foyer — with its marvelous marble floors, extravagant staircase (which is prime for photo opportunities), and the first panoramic oceanview glass elevators at sea — to stylish lounges like The Hideaway or the natural light-filled Sky Lounge. While suite guests gain exclusive access to The Retreat, anyone can relax in one of the swanky pool areas or the laid-back Lawn Club. Then, when hunger — or thirst — calls, passengers can take their pick of over 20 food and drink options.

Celebrity Eclipse

Inaugural Year: 2010

Ship Capacity: 2,852 passengers

An impressive modern art collection, an expansive spa, a half-acre lawn, and top-notch dining: Find all this and more aboard Celebrity Eclipse , which debuted in 2010. This Solstice-class vessel also boasts an onboard nightclub, popular among party-centric travelers, a striking Grand Foyer, and, last but not least, the Solstice Club. Located at the highest point of the ship, the Solstice Club is a haven for R&R with its canopy lounge beds — and it’s also a popular spot for morning yoga or evening stargazing sessions.

Related: 21 Cruise Tips That Will Help Make Your Trip Even Better, According to Experts

Celebrity Equinox

Inaugural Year: 2009

Refurbished in 2019, Celebrity Equinox exudes cool. On board this stylish ship, guests can sip cocktails in style at one of several hip bars, including the Martini Bar and Slush, enjoy a picnic lunch or practice their golf swing at the half-acre Lawn Club, or soak up the sun at the adults-only Solarium or the plush lounge-lined pool area. Finally, guests should consider booking a suite to access Luminae, a swanky restaurant that serves decadent dishes designed by acclaimed chef Daniel Boulud.

Celebrity Solstice

Inaugural Year: 2008

Ship Capacity:  2,852 passengers

The first ship in Celebrity’s Solstice class currently cruises Alaska and the Pacific Coast in style. Here, you’ll find the lush Lawn Club, the adults-only Persian Garden thermal suite, and the glam Grand Foyer. Additional highlights include the Solstice Deck, an onboard nightclub, and a slew of bars and lounges, including the wine-centric Cellar Masters, where oenophiles can learn about – and taste — a wide variety of vinos from across the globe. Art lovers shouldn’t miss the Hot Glass Class, featuring professional-led glass-blowing demos.

Read More : 10 of the Best Mediterranean Cruises for Every Type of Traveler

Celebrity Xploration

Inaugural Year: 2007

Ship Class: Xpedition

Ship Capacity: 16 passengers

With a passenger capacity of just 16, the Xploration is Celebrity’s smallest ship. As such, cruisers can expect an intimate onboard ambiance. When not out and about exploring the Galapagos, guests can hang in the lounge, relax in their suite (some with private balconies), and soak up some rays — or stargaze — on the hot tub-equipped sundeck.

Celebrity Constellation

Inaugural Year: 2002

Ship Class: Millennium 

Ship Capacity: 2,184 passengers

This 22-year-old Celebrity ship offers a more refined, subdued atmosphere compared to the line’s newer ships, which boast flashier features like the Magic Carpet. The Rooftop Terrace area serves as a restaurant, bar, and outdoor movie theater, complete with cozy furnishings coupled with mouthwatering bites and sips. Meanwhile, the adults-only Persian Garden area in the spa is ideal for wellness-seeking cruisers.

Celebrity Summit

Inaugural Year: 2001

Ship Capacity: 2,218 passengers

Celebrity Summit, which cruises Alaska and the Caribbean, technically dates back to 2001; however, in 2019, it received a $75-million refurbishment to bring it a little more in line with Celebrity’s newest ships, including 2018’s Celebrity Edge . Expect stylish spaces galore, including the Sunset and Martini bars, plus a sleek Rooftop Terrace where cruisers can catch outdoor flicks while basking in the ocean views.

Read More : 25 Caribbean Cruises for Your Next Tropical Vacation

Celebrity Xpedition

Ship Class: Xpedition  

Ship Capacity: 48 passengers

Last refurbished in 2018, Celebrity Xpedition was purposely built to cruise the Galapagos. The immersive onboard experience includes nightly lectures by certified naturalists from Galapagos National Park, who will be on board the entire sailing. Enjoy postcard-worthy views from the Panorama Deck, or take a dip in the hot tub on the Sunrise Deck. Passengers can choose from a handful of elegant rooms and suites; however, those who want their own balcony will need to spring on the latter.

Celebrity Infinity

Inaugural Year: 2000

Ship Capacity: 2,170 passengers

Celebrity Infinity is a favorite among laid-back cruisers — primarily couples and adult friend groups. Popular onboard hangout spots include the adults-only Solarium, the buzzy Rooftop Terrace, and, for suite guests, The Retreat. The ship also has a handful of specialty dining restaurants (in addition to complimentary ones, of course). Le Petit Chef is well worth the added fee thanks to a combination of gourmet eats and exhilarating entertainment complete with tabletop animations.

Read More : 10 Best Greece Cruises, According to Travel Experts

Celebrity Millennium

Inaugural Year: 1999

Ship Class: Millennium  

Don’t sleep on Celebrity’s oldest ship, which includes a handful of fan-favorite amenities and spaces such as The Retreat, the Solarium, the Rooftop Terrace, and the Grand Foyer. Last refurbished in 2019, Millennium now features a more contemporary design aesthetic, similar to what you’d find on the newer ships. There are also more than 15 bars and restaurants on board.

Celebrity Cruise Ships by Age, Size and Class

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Celebrity Cruises has 16 cruise ships. These range from large cruise ships that can accommodate over 3,000 guests, to small expedition yachts with a guest capacity of just 16.

In this article, we’ll explore the different Celebrity Cruises ships, to help you narrow down your options for your next cruise. You’ll find lists of the Celebrity ships by age and size, as well as explanations of the different classes of vessels in the fleet.

Whether you’re a regular cruiser or are considering your first cruise with Celebrity, I hope that you find this guide to Celebrity Cruises ships ranked by age and size to be useful!

Celebrity Cruises Ships By Age: Newest to Oldest

The following table shows all of Celebrity Cruises ships ordered by year of launch, including which is the newest Celebrity ship…

What Are the Newest Celebrity Cruise Ships?

The newest Celebrity Cruises ship is Celebrity Ascent. This ship made her maiden voyage in December 2023 in the Eastern Caribbean.

Before Celebrity Ascent, Celebrity Beyond (2022), Celebrity Apex (2021) and Celebrity Edge (2018) were the newest mainstream cruise ships in the Celebrity Cruises fleet. Two small Galapagos expedition ships, Celebrity Flora (2019) and Celebrity Xploration (2017) are also relatively new.

There’s then a five-year gap in the construction of new ships, with Celebrity Reflection being built in 2012.

Read more: The Newest Celebrity Cruise Ships (In Order)

Celebrity Cruises Ships by Size: Biggest to Smallest

When it comes to comparing the size of cruise ships, the best way is to consider the Gross Tonnage. This is a measurement of the internal volume of a ship. Length, guest capacity and the number of decks that are accessible to passengers may also be considered.

The following table shows the Celebrity Cruises ships list ordered from largest to smallest…

The most common way to compare the size of cruise ships is by tonnage. This is a measurement of the overall internal volume of a ship.

The occupancy refers to how many passengers each ship can accommodate based on having two guests in each room. As some staterooms have extra beds for third and fourth passengers, the maximum occupancy will be higher.

Which Is the Biggest Celebrity Cruise Ship?

The largest Celebrity Cruises ship is Celebrity Ascent, along with her twin sister Celebry Beyond. These cruise ships have a volume of 140,600 GT and a length of 327 m, making the ships 12% larger than the next biggest ships in the Celebrity Cruises fleet.

The biggest Celebrity Cruises ships at sea previously were sister ships Celebrity Edge and Celebrity Apex which have a volume of 129,500 GT and 16 passenger decks. However, Celebrity Reflection is 13 meters longer at 319m in length and can accommodate around 100 more guests despite having three fewer decks.

Why Are Some Celebrity Cruises Ships So Small?

Celebrity Xploration, Celebrity Xpedition and Celebrity Flora are small ships, accommodating 16, 48 and 100 guests, respectively. In fact, Celebrity Xploration is the smallest cruise ship in the world !

These ships cruise to the remote Galapagos Islands off the coast of Ecuador and so they need to be small to access the ports, sometimes via Zodiac boat.

Celebrity Cruises Ships By Class

Celebrity Cruises has four classes of ships, which are referred to as ‘series’. Each class of ships has something different to offer, whilst the ships within each class will be relatively similar.

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What Are the Different Ship Classes on Celebrity Cruises?

Celebrity edge class ships.

Celebrity Edge class ships are the newest in the Celebrity Cruises fleet. Designed to bring you closer to the ocean, they feature the Magic Carpet, an outdoor levitating bar, and Eden, a beautiful indoor area with 7,000 square feet of windows.

The ships in Celebrity Edge Class are:

• Celebrity Ascent
• Celebrity Beyond
• Celebrity Edge
• Celebrity Apex

Celebrity Solstice Class Ships

Celebrity Solstice-class ships are large cruise ships that were built between 2008 and 2012. They each feature a half-acre real grass lawn and ice-topped Martini bars.

The ships in Celebrity Solstice Class are:

• Celebrity Solstice
• Celebrity Equinox
• Celebrity Eclipse
• Celebrity Silhouette
• Celebrity Reflection

Celebrity Millennium Class Ships

Celebrity Millennium-class ships were built between 2000 and 2002 and accommodate around 2,000 passengers. Ideal for destination-focussed cruise itineraries, they’re able to access the smaller ports that larger cruise ships can’t reach.

The ships in Celebrity Millennium Class are:

• Celebrity Millennium
• Celebrity Infinity
• Celebrity Summit
• Celebrity Constellation

Celebrity Galapagos Class Ships

Celebrity Cruises Galapagos ships are designed specifically for cruises around the Galapagos Islands. They feature groundbreaking technology and offer a yacht-like experience for 16 to 100 guests.

The Celebrity Galapagos ships are:

• Celebrity Xpedition
• Celebrity Xploration
• Celebrity Flora

Read more: Celebrity Cruise Ships By Class

What Are the Different Stateroom Classes on Celebrity Cruises?

It’s important not to confuse ship classes with accommodation classes…

Celebrity Cruises also has two classes of accommodation that offer special services and amenities: the Aqua Class and the Concierge Class.

Aqua Class staterooms – In premium locations close to the spa, these come with unlimited access to spa areas and a range of perks, including welcome drinks, daily canapes, a pillow menu, bathrobes, yoga mats and priority check-in.

Concierge Class staterooms – Located on upper decks in midship locations, these come with perks such as an exclusive lunch on embarkation day, daily canapes, a pillow menu, priority check-in and access to a personalised concierge service.

Which Celebrity Cruises Ships Are Best for Families With Children?

All of the Celebrity Cruises ships are good for kids, so it wouldn’t be possible to say that one particular ship is the best. While you won’t find waterslides and ziplines, Celebrity Cruises kids’ clubs are great, with soft play and lots of organised activities.

They also have special resources available to help autistic guests, including children. Families can get priority boarding, and there are sensory toys to hire. Some film screenings are also low-volume and low-lighting, and autistic children can attend a kids club outside of their age range if it means they are more comfortable with a sibling.

When choosing a Celebrity cruise with children, the itinerary is probably more important than the ship. Older kids will love the Galapagos expeditions, warm weather cruises are loved by all, while parents with pre-school kids may like to look out for no-fly cruises from their nearest port.

Suggested read: The Best Cruise Ships for Kids

To Conclude

There’s a Celebrity Cruises ship for everyone. The newest ships , especially Celebrity Beyond, are modern and luxurious with stunning new design concepts and the latest technology.

The older ships have all been modernised as part of a $500-million makeover. So it’s fair to say that there are no bad ships when it comes to Celebrity Cruises.

But if you’d like to see which ships cruisers rate the highest, then check out this list of the best and worst Celebrity ships according to reviews for more info.

Related Posts:

• What Does The X Mean In Celebrity Cruises?
• Celebrity Cruises Drinks Package Guide
• Celebrity Cruises Vs Carnival: Which is Better?

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Jenni Fielding is the founder of Cruise Mummy. She has worked in the cruise industry since 2015 and has taken over 30 cruises. Now, she helps over 1 million people per month to plan their perfect cruise holidays.

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Compare Celebrity Ships Side by Side

Celebrity Cruises

Celebrity eclipse, passengers : .css-1xu3tth{color:black;} 2850, crew : 1250, launched : 2010, ratio : 2.28:1, size : large, departs from : fort lauderdale, port everglades, buenos aires, bayonne, cape liberty, bayonne, boston, amsterdam, piraeus, piraeus, laviron, barcelona, copacabana beach, rio de janeiro, reykjavik.

Celebrity Summit

Passengers : 2218, launched : 2001, ratio : 2.37:1, departs from : miami, vancouver, seward, los angeles, fort lauderdale, port everglades, san juan.

Celebrity Constellation

Passengers : 2170, launched : 2002, ratio : 2.17:1, departs from : tampa, rome, civitavecchia, barcelona.

Celebrity Edge

Passengers : 2918, crew : 1320, launched : 2018, ratio : 2.21:1, departs from : sydney, vancouver, seattle, honolulu, auckland, celebrity equinox, passengers : 2850, launched : 2009, departs from : buenos aires, fort lauderdale, port everglades, lisbon, rome, civitavecchia, barcelona, port canaveral, celebrity solstice, launched : 2008, departs from : honolulu, sydney, singapore, hong kong, vancouver, celebrity silhouette, passengers : 2995, crew : 1500, launched : 2011, ratio : 2.00:1, departs from : fort lauderdale, port everglades, amsterdam, rotterdam, piraeus, piraeus, laviron, barcelona, bayonne, cape liberty, bayonne, boston, reykjavik, celebrity reflection, passengers : 3046, crew : 1255, launched : 2012, ratio : 2.43:1, departs from : fort lauderdale, port everglades, celebrity apex, passengers : 2910, crew : 1536, launched : 2020, ratio : 1.89:1, departs from : fort lauderdale, port everglades, southampton, southampton, barcelona, port canaveral, celebrity millennium, passengers : 2593, crew : 1024, launched : 2000, ratio : 2.53:1, departs from : singapore, yokohama, bali, tanah ampo, mumbai, seoul (incheon), celebrity ascent, passengers : 3,260, launched : 2023, departs from : fort lauderdale, port everglades, barcelona, piraeus, piraeus, laviron, rome, civitavecchia, celebrity infinity, ratio : 2.58:1, departs from : piraeus, piraeus, laviron, barcelona, celebrity beyond, passengers : 3260, crew : 1400, launched : 2022, ratio : 2.33:1, departs from : fort lauderdale, port everglades, rome, civitavecchia, miami, celebrity xcel, launched : 2025, celebrity xpedition, passengers : 48, ratio : 0.75:1, size : small.

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Celebrity Cruise Line Fleet

Celebrity cruise line ship fleet information. Cruisedeckplans.com shows the different classes of ships in the Celebrity fleet. On this page you can also compare features and dining options for each Celebrity ship. You will find daily service charge information, size in tons and number of cabins for each ship. You can CLICK ON any ship to go to the ship page for that ship. Check out our unique stateroom capacity trend chart showing the changes in the size of the Celebrity cruise line ship fleet over the past few years. Check out our Master Ship List . You can filter and sort by cruise line or ship.

CLICK on a ship below to go to the ship decks and cabins page. Celebrity Cruise Line has 18 ships in the fleet. You can filter the Celebrity fleet by ship class using the box below. Typically Celebrity Cruise Line will build or buy several ships sharing similar features. They define the different types of ships as classes. Ships of the same class may be almost identical to each other.

Celebrity Apex

CLASS: Edge Tons 130k Built 2020 Cabins 1467

Celebrity Ascent

CLASS: Edge Tons 141k Built 2023 Cabins 1646

Celebrity Beyond

CLASS: Edge Tons 141k Built 2022 Cabins 1646

Celebrity Constellation

CLASS: Millennium Tons 90k Built 2002 Cabins 1065

Celebrity Eclipse

CLASS: Solstice Tons 122k Built 2010 Cabins 1425

Celebrity Edge

CLASS: Edge Tons 130k Built 2018 Cabins 1467

Celebrity Equinox

CLASS: Solstice Tons 122k Built 2009 Cabins 1431

Celebrity Flora

CLASS: Flora Tons 6k Built 2019 Cabins 50

Celebrity Infinity

CLASS: Millennium Tons 90k Built 2001 Cabins 1085

Celebrity Millennium

CLASS: Millennium Tons 91k Built 2000 Cabins 1109

Celebrity Reflection

CLASS: Solstice Tons 125k Built 2012 Cabins 1523

Celebrity Silhouette

CLASS: Solstice Tons 122k Built 2011 Cabins 1451

Celebrity Solstice

CLASS: Solstice Tons 122k Built 2008 Cabins 1425

Celebrity Summit

CLASS: Millennium Tons 90k Built 2001 Cabins 1103

Celebrity Xcel

CLASS: Edge Tons 141k Built 2025 Cabins 1646

Celebrity Xpedition

CLASS: Xpedition Tons 3k Built 2001 Cabins 49

Celebrity Xperience

CLASS: Xpedition Tons 2k Built 1982 Cabins 24

Celebrity Xploration

CLASS: Xpedition Tons 0k Built 2007 Cabins 8

About Celebrity Cruise Line

What sets Celebrity apart from other vacation choices today is the cruise line's passionate dedication to providing guests with a cruise experience that exceeds expectations. This has become the definition of Celebrity Cruises, and has set the worldwide standard for today's expression of what first made cruising famous -- high quality, superior design, spacious accommodations, grand style, attentive service and exceptional cuisine. Celebrity Cruises' iconic "X" is the mark of modern luxury, with its cool, contemporary design and warm spaces; dining experiences where the design of the venues is as important as the cuisine; and the amazing service that only Celebrity can provide, all created to provide an unmatchable experience for vacationers' precious time. Celebrity operates under the umbrella of Royal Caribbean.

SELLING POINTS: Celebrity Cruise Line adds a touch of class to the cruising experience. You will find fine dining and wine, art collections, and quality entertainment on board the ships. Look for the added perks that come with Concierge and AquaClass staterooms. You are more likely to find music you can dance to on a Celebrity ship. Extensive library, quiet sitting areas, adult pool and spa features all add to the total experience.

Stateroom Capacity Trend Chart

Watch growth and decline rates. Rapid growth may lead to quality and service issues.

The following is a listing of some of the features that Celebrity Cruise Line offers.

CRUISEDECKPLANS.COM Use the input buttons above to go to the main page for a Cruise Ship or Cruise Line.

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Celebrity Cruise Ship By Age And Class: A Guide to Choosing Your Ideal Ship

Are you dreaming of a luxurious escape on the high seas, but feeling overwhelmed by the choices?

Imagine a cruise where every detail is tailored to your preferences, from the age and size of the ship to the unique experiences each class offers. With Celebrity Cruises, this isn’t just a dream—it’s a reality.

Picture yourself aboard one of the stunning Celebrity cruise ships, where the age of the vessel adds to its charm and character. Whether you’re drawn to the innovative features of the newest ships or the classic elegance of the older ones, there’s a perfect match for every taste.

Dive into our comprehensive guide on ‘Celebrity Cruise Ships by Age, Size, and Class’ and discover the ideal ship for your next vacation. From the grandeur of the latest vessels to the timeless allure of the seasoned ones, let’s embark on a journey to find your perfect cruising experience.

Table of Contents

Celebrity Cruise Ships by Age, Size, and Class

If you’re considering a well-deserved getaway on the high seas, choosing the right cruise ship can be as exciting as the journey itself. Celebrity Cruises, known for their luxurious and stylish voyages, offers a fleet that’s as diverse as the destinations they explore. Whether you’re a seasoned cruiser or planning your first adventure at sea, understanding the differences in age, size, and class of Celebrity Cruise ships can greatly enhance your vacation experience.

In this guide, we’ll navigate through the Celebrity Cruises fleet, from the newest gems to the time-honored vessels, the grandest in size to the more intimate ones, and the distinct classes that make each ship unique.

• Celebrity Cruises Ships By Age: Newest to Oldest : Here, we’ll explore the fleet in chronological order, starting with the latest innovations and moving towards the ships that have gracefully sailed for years. Remember, age isn’t just a number; it often reflects the evolution of comfort and technology.
• Celebrity Cruises Ships by Size: Biggest to Smallest : Size can shape your cruise experience. We’ll look at the grandeur and amenities of the largest ships and the cozy, personalized feel of the smaller ones.
• Celebrity Cruises Ships By Class : Each class has its own personality. From the cutting-edge design of the Edge Class to the classic elegance of the Millennium Class, we’ll delve into what makes each class stand out.

Celebrity Cruises Ships By Age: Newest to Oldest

In the ever-evolving world of cruise vacations, the age of a ship can offer insights into its character and the experiences it offers. Celebrity Cruises, renowned for its modern luxury, continuously updates its fleet with new and innovative ships.

Let’s embark on a chronological journey through the Celebrity fleet, from the newest additions to the timeless classics, each offering its own unique blend of style, comfort, and adventure.

• Celebrity Ascent – Due Late 2023: Poised to be the newest star in the Celebrity fleet, the Celebrity Ascent is eagerly anticipated. While details are still unfolding, it’s set to redefine luxury cruising with the latest advancements and amenities.
• Celebrity Beyond – April 2022: The newest ship currently sailing, Celebrity Beyond exemplifies modern luxury cruising with its cutting-edge design and elevated experiences.
• Celebrity Apex – June 2021: As a relatively new addition, Celebrity Apex boasts contemporary features and innovative technology, offering a fresh and upscale cruising experience.
• Celebrity Flora – June 2019: Specifically designed for the unique environment of the Galapagos Islands, Celebrity Flora merges modern luxury with ecological consideration.
• Celebrity Edge – November 2018: Marking a turning point in ship design, Celebrity Edge features groundbreaking architecture and luxurious accommodations.
• Celebrity Xploration – March 2017: A smaller, intimate vessel designed for adventure cruises, particularly in the Galapagos Islands.
• Celebrity Reflection – October 2012: Known for its refined elegance and modern amenities, Celebrity Reflection offers a sophisticated cruising experience.
• Celebrity Silhouette – July 2011: Blending modern luxury with an array of dining and entertainment options, Celebrity Silhouette caters to those seeking a vibrant onboard atmosphere.
• Celebrity Eclipse – April 2010: This ship combines modern luxury with a range of activities and dining experiences, ensuring a memorable journey.
• Celebrity Equinox – August 2009: With a focus on fine dining and wellness, Celebrity Equinox offers a balanced and luxurious cruise experience.
• Celebrity Solstice – November 2008: As the first of its class, Celebrity Solstice set a new standard in modern luxury cruising with innovative features.
• Celebrity Xpedition – June 2004: Tailored for adventure seekers, this ship offers an intimate and immersive experience in destinations like the Galapagos.
• Celebrity Constellation – May 2002: Merging classic elegance with modern amenities, Celebrity Constellation offers a timeless cruise experience.
• Celebrity Summit – October 2001: Known for its refined atmosphere and classic style, Celebrity Summit provides a blend of traditional and contemporary cruising.
• Celebrity Infinity – March 2001: Combining classic elegance with modern features, Celebrity Infinity offers a comfortable and stylish journey.
• Celebrity Millennium – July 2000: As the namesake of its class, Celebrity Millennium combines timeless elegance with modern amenities, offering a cruise experience that has stood the test of time.

Celebrity Cruises Ships by Size: Biggest to Smallest

When it comes to choosing a cruise, the size of the ship can significantly influence your experience. Celebrity Cruises offers a diverse range of ships, from grand, floating cities to intimate, boutique vessels. Each ship’s size is not just about its physical dimensions but also about the amenities, atmosphere, and experiences it can provide. Let’s explore the Celebrity Cruises fleet from the largest to the smallest, showcasing the variety and scale of options available to you.

• Celebrity Beyond – Tonnage: 146,600; Length: 327m; Guest Decks: 16; Guests: 3,937; Crew: 1,416. The largest in the fleet, Celebrity Beyond is a marvel of modern luxury, offering spaciousness and a plethora of activities and amenities.
• Celebrity Edge – Tonnage: 129,500; Length: 306m; Guest Decks: 16; Guests: 2,918; Crew: 1,320. As a forerunner in innovative design, Celebrity Edge provides an upscale and contemporary cruising experience.
• Celebrity Apex – Tonnage: 129,500; Length: 306m; Guest Decks: 16; Guests: 2,910; Crew: 1,319. Sister ship to the Celebrity Edge, the Apex mirrors its sophistication and modern luxury.
• Celebrity Reflection – Tonnage: 126,000; Length: 319m; Guest Decks: 13; Guests: 3,030; Crew: 1,293. Known for its refined elegance, Celebrity Reflection offers a balance of size and luxury.
• Celebrity Silhouette – Tonnage: 122,000; Length: 319m; Guest Decks: 13; Guests: 2,902; Crew: 1,285. Combining modern amenities with a vibrant atmosphere, Celebrity Silhouette caters to those seeking a lively onboard experience.
• Celebrity Equinox – Tonnage: 122,000; Length: 317m; Guest Decks: 13; Guests: 2,852; Crew: 1,290. Focused on fine dining and wellness, Celebrity Equinox offers a luxurious and balanced cruise experience.
• Celebrity Eclipse – Tonnage: 122,000; Length: 317m; Guest Decks: 13; Guests: 2,850; Crew: 1,286. This ship combines luxury with a range of activities and dining experiences, ensuring a memorable journey.
• Celebrity Solstice – Tonnage: 122,000; Length: 315m; Guest Decks: 13; Guests: 2,850; Crew: 1,284. As the first of its class, Celebrity Solstice set a new standard in modern luxury cruising.
• Celebrity Constellation – Tonnage: 91,000; Length: 294m; Guest Decks: 11; Guests: 2,184; Crew: 1,022. Merging classic elegance with modern amenities, Celebrity Constellation offers a timeless cruise experience.
• Celebrity Millennium – Tonnage: 90,940; Length: 294m; Guest Decks: 11; Guests: 2,218; Crew: 1,024. Combining timeless elegance with modern features, Celebrity Millennium offers a comfortable and stylish journey.
• Celebrity Infinity – Tonnage: 90,940; Length: 294m; Guest Decks: 11; Guests: 2,170; Crew: 1,024. Known for its refined atmosphere and classic style, Celebrity Infinity provides a blend of traditional and contemporary cruising.
• Celebrity Summit – Tonnage: 90,940; Length: 294m; Guest Decks: 11; Guests: 2,158; Crew: 1,027. Celebrity Summit is celebrated for its sophisticated ambiance and classic luxury.
• Celebrity Flora – Tonnage: 5,739; Length: 102m; Guest Decks: 6; Guests: 100; Crew: 80. Specifically designed for the Galapagos Islands, Celebrity Flora offers an intimate and immersive experience.
• Celebrity Xpedition – Tonnage: 2,842; Length: 90m; Guest Decks: 4; Guests: 48; Crew: 58. Tailored for adventure seekers, this ship provides an intimate and immersive experience in destinations like the Galapagos.
• Celebrity Xploration – Tonnage: 316; Length: 30m; Guest Decks: 3; Guests: 16; Crew: 12. A small, intimate vessel designed for adventure cruises, particularly in the Galapagos Islands.

Final Thoughts

As we draw our exploration of Celebrity Cruises to a close, it’s clear that this esteemed cruise line offers a remarkable array of choices to suit every taste and preference. Whether you’re drawn to the grandeur of their largest ships or the intimate charm of their smaller vessels, each ship in the Celebrity fleet promises a unique and unforgettable journey.

Celebrity’s Newest Innovations : With the upcoming launch of the Celebrity Ascent and the recent debut of Celebrity Beyond and Celebrity Apex, the line continues to push the boundaries of luxury cruising. These ships are not just means of travel but destinations in themselves, offering state-of-the-art amenities, luxurious accommodations, and innovative experiences.

A Size for Every Style : From the majestic Celebrity Beyond, a floating city of dreams, to the cozy and exclusive Celebrity Xploration, the size of the ship can define your cruising experience. Larger ships provide an abundance of choices in dining, entertainment, and activities, perfect for those who seek variety and vibrancy. On the other hand, smaller ships like Celebrity Flora and Celebrity Xpedition offer a more intimate setting, ideal for those looking for a personal touch and closer connection with their destinations, especially in unique locales like the Galapagos Islands.

Diversity in Class and Character : Each class of ship in the Celebrity fleet has its own personality and style. Whether it’s the modern luxury of the Edge Class, the sophisticated elegance of the Solstice Class, or the classic charm of the Millennium Class, there’s a ship that resonates with every cruiser’s dream.

Your Perfect Cruise Awaits : Whether you’re a first-time cruiser or a seasoned voyager, Celebrity Cruises offers a world of choices. Consider what matters most to you – the latest in luxury and technology, the size and scale of the ship, or the unique character of each class. Your perfect cruise is waiting for you, ready to turn your dream vacation into a reality.

As you plan your next cruise, remember that the journey is as important as the destination. With Celebrity Cruises, you’re not just booking a trip; you’re crafting an experience that will create memories to last a lifetime. So, set your sights on the horizon, choose the ship that speaks to your heart, and embark on an adventure that will redefine the way you see the world.

Annie Nelson

Most recently, she sailed with Virgin Voyages , bringing her own splash of fun and creativity to the crew.

When she's not on the deck enjoying the ocean breeze, Annie loves sharing her tales and experiences on her blog. Dive into her stories, and you'll feel like you're right there with her, cruising the high seas with a cocktail in hand.

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Celebrity Cruises owns and operates sixteen cruise ships; they are listed here.  From the newest ship in the fleet to the oldest, we have listed and detailed every ship along with information about each vessel.

Celebrity cruise ships can be categorized into three classes: Millennium class, Solstice class, and Edge class.  The oldest ship in the fleet was built in 2000, with the latest vessel completed in 2023 .

List of Celebrity Ships By Age

A wholly owned subsidiary of Royal Caribbean Group, Celebrity Cruises has been around since 1988 and merged with Royal Caribbean in 1997.

Here is a list of every Celebrity Cruises ship currently operating in the fleet:

Celebrity Ascent (2023)

Celebrity Ascent is Celebrity Cruise Line’s newest ship in the fleet, the fourth ship in the popular  Edge Class , and sister to  Celebrity Edge , Celebrity Beyond , and Celebrity Apex . She is 140,600 GRTs and carries 3,836 passengers (based on two per cabin ).

Celebrity Beyond (2022)

Celebrity Beyond is the third ship in  Edge Class and sister to  Celebrity Ascent , Celebrity Edge , and Celebrity Apex . She is slightly larger at 140,600 GRTs than previous ships in this class and has a larger capacity of 3,836 passengers (based on two per cabin).

Celebrity Apex (2020)

Celebrity Apex is the second ship in  Edge Class and sister to  Celebrity Ascent , Celebrity Edge , and Celebrity Beyond . She is 129,500 GRTs and has a capacity of 3,836 passengers (based on two per cabin).

Celebrity Edge (2018)

Celebrity Edge is the first ship in the very popular  Edge Class and sister to the  Celebrity Ascent , Celebrity Apex , and Celebrity Beyond . She is 129,500 GRTs and has a capacity of 3,836 passengers (based on two per cabin).

Celebrity Reflection (2012)

Celebrity Reflection is the final ship in  Solstice Class and sister to the  Celebrity Silhouette , Celebrity Eclipse , Celebrity Equinox, and Celebrity Solstice . She is 129,500 GRTs and has a capacity of 3,836 passengers (based on two per cabin).

Celebrity Silhouette (2011)

Celebrity Silhouette is the fourth ship in  Solstice Class and sister to the  Celebrity Reflection , Celebrity Eclipse , Celebrity Equinox, and Celebrity Solstice . She is 129,500 GRTs and has a capacity of 3,836 passengers (based on two per cabin).

Celebrity Eclipse (2010)

Celebrity Eclipse is the third ship in  Solstice Class and sister to the  Celebrity Reflection , Celebrity Silhouette , Celebrity Equinox, and Celebrity Solstice . She is 129,500 GRTs and has a capacity of 3,836 passengers (based on two per cabin).

Celebrity Equinox (2009)

Celebrity Equinox is the second ship in the Solstice Class and sister to the  Celebrity Reflection , Celebrity Silhouette , Celebrity Eclipse , and Celebrity Solstice . She is 129,500 GRTs and has a capacity of 3,836 passengers (based on two per cabin).

Celebrity Solstice (2008)

Celebrity Solstice is the first ship in the Solstice Class and sister to the  Celebrity Reflection , Celebrity Silhouette , Celebrity Eclipse , and Celebrity Equinox . She is 129,500 GRTs and has a capacity of 3,836 passengers (based on two per cabin).

Celebrity Constellation (2002)

Celebrity Constellation is the final ship in the Millennium Class and sister to the  Celebrity Summit , Celebrity Infinity , and Celebrity Millennium . She is 91,000 GRTs and has a capacity of 2,559 passengers (based on two per cabin).

Celebrity Summit (2001)

Celebrity Summit is the second ship in the Millennium Class and sister to the  Celebrity Infinity , Celebrity Millennium , and Celebrity Constellation . She is 91,000 GRTs and has a capacity of 2,599 passengers (based on two per cabin).

Celebrity Infinity (2001)

Celebrity Infinity is the second ship in the Millennium Class and sister to the  Celebrity Summit , Celebrity Millennium , and Celebrity Constellation . She is 91,000 GRTs and has a capacity of 2,593 passengers (based on two per cabin).

Celebrity Millennium (2000)

Celebrity Millennium is the first ship in the Millennium Class and sister to the  Celebrity Summit , Celebrity Infinity , and Celebrity Constellation . She is 91,000 GRTs and has a capacity of 2,593 passengers (based on two per cabin). She is the first newly built vessel for Celebrity following the merger between it and Royal Caribbean .

List of Celebrity Cruise Ships Newest to Oldest

What are the different ship classes on celebrity cruises.

Celebrity Cruises has several different classes of ships. Here is a list:

Celebrity Edge Class Ships are:

• Celebrity Ascent
• Celebrity Beyond
• Celebrity Apex
• Celebrity Edge

Celebrity Solstice Class ships are:

• Celebrity Reflection
• Celebrity Silhouette
• Celebrity Eclipse
• Celebrity Equinox
• Celebrity Solstice

Celebrity Millennium Class ships are:

• Celebrity Constellation
• Celebrity Summit
• Celebrity Infinity
• Celebrity Millennium

Celebrity Galapagos ships are:

• Celebrity Flora
• Celebrity Xploration
• Celebrity Xpedition

List of Celebrity Galapagos Ships By Age

Here is a list of every Celebrity Galapagos ship currently operating in the fleet:

Celebrity Flora (2019)

Celebrity Flora was launched in 2019 and is the jewel of the Galapagos Class . She is 5,739 GRTs and has a capacity of 100 passengers. Celebrity has stated that the design and accommodations of Celebrity Flora are heavily inspired by the design of Celebrity Edge overall while also having a significant emphasis on outdoor space. Per Galápagos’ regulations, the ship is flagged in  Ecuador  and staffed by  Ecuadorian  crew members.

Celebrity Xploration (2017)

Celebrity Xploration was launched in 2017 and is in the Galapagos Class . She is only 320 GRTs and has a capacity of 16 passengers. You can book this whole ship for an intimate journey perfect for family get-togethers, getaways with friends, or small groups who want to embark on an adventure together.

Celebrity Xpedition (2004)

Celebrity Xpedition is the oldest ship in the Galapagos Class . She is 2,842 GRTs and has a capacity of 48 passengers. The ship is an alternative to Celebrity Cruises ‘ larger ships, offering more personal attention afforded by its smaller size. The ship sails to the Galápagos Islands .

List of Celebrity Galapagos Ships By Size

What are the newest celebrity cruise ships.

The newest ship in the Celebrity Cruises fleet is the Celebrity Ascent , which was launched in November 2023. She is the fourth ship in the popular Edge Class .

Which is the biggest Celebrity cruise ship?

The biggest Celebrity Cruise ship is the Celebrity Ascent . She is currently the newest ship in the Celebrity Cruises fleet at 140,600 Gross Registered Tons, has a passenger capacity of 3,836, and has a crew of 1,416. She had her inaugural sailing in November 2023.

Celebrity Cruises Ships By Size: Biggest to Smallest

Celebrity ships faq.

What is the class of older Celebrity cruise ships?

The older Celebrity cruise ships belong to the Millennium class and are known for their classic and elegant design.

What are some features of the newer Celebrity cruise ships?

The newer Celebrity cruise ships feature innovative amenities such as the “Magic Carpet” and offer a traditional cruise experience with modern touches.

How many ships are there in the Celebrity Cruises’ fleet?

Celebrity Cruises has 15 ships in its fleet, including newer and older vessels.

What is the oldest class of ships in Celebrity Cruises’ fleet?

The oldest class of ships in Celebrity Cruises’ fleet belongs to the Millennium class, with ships like Celebrity Millennium being the first in this class.

Can I book a cruise with Celebrity on their newer ships?

You can book a cruise with Celebrity on their newer ships, which offer a modern and luxurious cruise experience.

What can I expect from the expedition ships in Celebrity Cruises’ fleet?

The expedition ships in Celebrity Cruises’ fleet offer a unique cruise vacation focused on exploration and adventure, providing a different experience than traditional cruises.

What are some highlights of the Celebrity Revolution on their newer ships?

The Celebrity Revolution on their newer ships includes transforming older ships to match their newer fleet’s modern amenities and design elements, offering an enhanced cruise experience.

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Celebrity Cruises Ships by Age: Newest to Oldest

Celebrity Cruises has been setting sail to some of the world’s most incredible destinations since 1988. Think of it as that friend who knows all the chic spots in town and ensures you experience them in style. From the azure waters of the Caribbean to the scenic beauty of Alaska, Celebrity Cruises has been offering its passengers a blend of elegance and laid-back sophistication.

But here’s a little secret: not all ships are created equal. Just like how you’d pick a vintage wine based on its year, the age of a cruise ship can influence your onboard experience. Older ships carry tales of countless voyages, while the newer ones are often decked out with the latest amenities. So, if you’re wondering which Celebrity ship to hop onto next, knowing their age might just be the key. Ahead, we rank Celebrity Cruises ships based on their age, helping you understand what each ship has to offer.

Table of Contents

Celebrity Cruises Ships Ranked by Age

On average, Celebrity Cruises introduces a new ship every two years, ensuring that their fleet remains fresh and up-to-date. These ships typically serve for around 20 to 30 years before they bid adieu.

Celebrity Cruises Ships by Age:

Note: The passenger capacity listed in the table is based on double occupancy. This means that the number reflects the number of guests that can be accommodated in cabins with two people. However, many cabins can host more than two guests, thanks to pull-out sofas or pull-down bunk beds.

Related: Best Celebrity Cruises Ships By Age

Newest Celebrity Cruises Ship

Set to launch in December 2023, Celebrity Ascent is the upcoming gem in Celebrity’s Edge class. With a capacity for 3,260 passengers, it strikes a balance between size and intimacy. Dining on the Ascent offers a range of options, from the plant-based delights at Eden restaurant to gourmet dishes at Le Voyage by renowned New York chef Daniel Boulud. If you’re an art lover, you can appreciate the ship’s 4,500-piece art collection.

One of its unique features is the Magic Carpet, a movable deck that offers varying perspectives of the sea. Once it sets sail, the Ascent will cruise from Fort Lauderdale, covering the Caribbean before venturing to the Mediterranean.

Newest Celebrity Cruises Ship Currently Sailing

Since its launch in April 2022, Celebrity Beyond has been the latest active member of the Edge Series. It can accommodate 3,260 passengers and boasts 32 dining venues, ranging from Greek specialties to Italian favorites. The Rooftop Garden is perfect if you want to unwind with some live music in a tranquil setting. And if you’re looking for a dash of luxury, The Retreat boasts upscale suites with perks like private lounges and dedicated butlers. Currently, Beyond is offering unforgettable experiences in the Mediterranean and the Caribbean.

Oldest Celebrity Cruises Ship

The oldest ship in the Celebrity Cruises fleet is the Celebrity Millennium . Launched in 2000, this ship has been a long-time favorite for many. While it may not have the flashy amenities of the newer ships, the Celebrity Millennium carries a charm that’s hard to replicate. Its design is a blend of classic elegance and modern comfort, ensuring passengers have a memorable experience. Over the years, the ship has undergone refurbishments to keep up with the times.

It underwent a full refurbishment in February 2019, giving it a fresh look and feel. This renovation not only updated the ship’s design and technology but also introduced brand-new staterooms and a new lounge area.

When it comes to dining, the Celebrity Millennium doesn’t disappoint. With nine restaurants on board, passengers have a plethora of choices. From the Tuscan Grille steakhouse to Sushi on Five, there’s something for every palate (though some restaurants require an additional fee). Standard dining options include Blu and the Main Restaurant. And if you’re in the mood for some entertainment, the ship boasts a rooftop terrace with an outdoor movie screen. The Celebrity Millennium sails to various destinations, including Alaska, Asia, and Canada, offering its passengers a blend of adventure and luxury.

What’s the Biggest Celebrity Cruises Ship?

The biggest ship in the Celebrity Cruises fleet is the Celebrity Beyond. Launched in 2022, this ship stands out not just because of its size but also due to its state-of-the-art amenities and features. Designed to accommodate a large number of passengers, the Celebrity Beyond offers a spacious and luxurious cruising experience. Whether it’s the dining options, entertainment venues, or relaxation areas, everything on this ship is designed to provide guests with a grand experience. If size and scale matter to you when choosing a cruise, the Celebrity Beyond is hard to beat in the Celebrity Cruises lineup.

What’s the Smallest Celebrity Cruises Ship?

The smallest Celebrity Cruises ship is the Celebrity Xploration . Here are some key details about the ship:

• Launch Date: March 2017
• Occupancy: 16 passengers
• Tonnage: 320
• Length: 98.3 ft
• Cruising Speed: 10 knots

The Celebrity Xploration is designed for intimate journeys, making it ideal for family get-togethers, getaways with friends, or small groups who wish to explore together. This ship offers a unique experience, allowing passengers to visit the same islands Charles Darwin did on their very own private catamaran. It’s tailored for off-the-beaten-path discovery, with opportunities to explore hidden gems like Los Lobos (named for sea lions) and Kicker Rock, which is iconic in the Galápagos.

The ship ensures a luxurious experience with cozy staterooms that either have a window or veranda, providing a personal view of the stunning archipelago. Additionally, rooms come with a personal refrigerator stocked with beverages of choice, room service, complimentary snorkeling equipment, and wet suits.

Difference Between Old and New Celebrity Cruises Ships

When it comes to Celebrity Cruises, both the old and new ships have their own charm and offerings. But there are some distinct differences that set them apart:

1. Size & Capacity

Older ships in the Celebrity fleet, like the Celebrity Millennium, are generally smaller in size. This means they have a more intimate feel, accommodating fewer passengers. On the other hand, newer ships, such as the Celebrity Beyond, are larger and can host a greater number of guests. This increase in size also means more deck space, larger staterooms, and expanded public areas.

2. Amenities & Entertainment

Newer ships tend to be decked out with the latest amenities. Think state-of-the-art fitness centers, expansive spas, and innovative entertainment options. The Celebrity Beyond, for instance, features the Magic Carpet, a movable deck that offers a range of experiences. Older ships might not have these flashy features, but they offer classic entertainment and amenities that have been loved by passengers for years.

The decor on older ships leans towards a more traditional and classic style, with rich woods and warm tones. Newer ships embrace a more modern aesthetic, with neutral palettes, contemporary art pieces, and sleek designs. The Celebrity Edge class, which includes the Beyond, showcases this modern design with transformative spaces and avant-garde concepts.

4. Dining Options

While all Celebrity ships offer a range of dining options, newer ships often have a wider variety of restaurants, cafes, and bars. They might feature specialty dining venues or collaborations with world-renowned chefs. Older ships, while having fewer dining venues, often focus on timeless and classic dishes that have been perfected over the years.

5. Environmental Considerations

Newer ships in the Celebrity fleet are often designed with sustainability in mind. They might utilize advanced propulsion systems, efficient hull designs, and waste reduction technologies. While older ships might not have been built with these features, many have been retrofitted over the years to improve their environmental footprint.

In conclusion, whether you’re drawn to the charm and coziness of the older ships or the modern luxuries of the newer vessels, Celebrity Cruises offers a range of experiences to suit every traveler’s preference.

Choosing a Celebrity Cruises ship can often come down to its age. While older ships like the Millennium have their own charm and history, newer vessels like the Beyond come equipped with the latest amenities and innovations. The age of a ship can influence onboard experiences, from dining options to entertainment. So, whether you’re a fan of classic cruising or eager to experience the newest features, understanding the age of the ships can help you make an informed decision for your next voyage.

Sheryll holds an MA in Journalism and English from NYU. With over 7 years of experience in the cruise industry, she brings a blend of insightful reporting and firsthand cruising knowledge.

Princess Cruises Ships by Age: Newest to Oldest

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Ranking Celebrity Cruise Ships: From Best To Worst

I recently went on a Celebrity cruise for the first time, and I was blown away by the experience. The impeccable service, luxurious amenities, and stunning destinations left me wanting more. However, with so many Celebrity cruise ships to choose from, it can be overwhelming to decide which one is right for you.

That’s why I’ve put together a comprehensive ranking of all Celebrity cruise ships, from the best to the worst, based on thousands of reviews from past guests. Whether you’re looking for a premium experience, an expedition ship, or a relaxing atmosphere, I’ve got you covered.

From the family-friendly Celebrity Equinox to the innovative Celebrity Beyond, I’ll give you all the information you need to make an informed decision for your next Celebrity cruise. So, let’s dive in and discover the best and worst Celebrity cruise ships for your next adventure on the high seas. Get ready to set sail and experience the freedom of the open ocean.

• The ranking of all Celebrity cruise ships is based on thousands of reviews from past guests and the average scores of those reviews from Cruise Critic, Cruiseline.com, and TripAdvisor, not the author’s opinion.
• The best Celebrity Cruises ship according to past guest reviews is Celebrity Xploration, one of the Celebrity Expedition ships, with an average review score of 4.93 out of 5.
• The worst ships in the fleet have an average review score of 3.87 out of 5.
• Celebrity Cruises offers a variety of ships to suit different preferences and needs, from luxurious and stylish ships to those designed for exploring less accessible regions of the world.

Premium Experience

I love that Celebrity Cruises offers a premium experience, complete with stylish and luxurious ships, top-notch dining venues, and entertainment that sets them apart from other cruise lines.

What makes Celebrity stand out are their unique amenities, such as the Magic Carpet on Celebrity Apex, a platform that moves up and down the side of the ship, serving as a ramp to shore, a bar, and a restaurant.

Another standout feature is the glamping pods on Celebrity Flora, where guests can sleep under the stars in the Galapagos Islands.

But what really sets Celebrity apart is their standout dining options. With menus curated by Michelin-starred chefs, guests can expect exquisite culinary experiences on board.

From the Tuscan Grille on Celebrity Equinox to the Lawn Club Grill on Celebrity Reflection, there is something for every taste and preference.

And if you’re looking for a more intimate dining experience, the Chef’s Table on various ships offers a multi-course meal paired with hand-selected wines, all while being personally attended to by the executive chef.

Celebrity Cruises truly offers a premium experience for those who want to indulge in the finer things in life.

Expedition Ships

The Expedition ships from Celebrity Cruises are designed to explore remote regions of the world and are highly recommended by past guests. These ships offer a unique and immersive Galapagos exploration experience, with itineraries that showcase the natural beauty of the islands and their diverse wildlife.

If you’re looking for an unforgettable adventure, the Expedition ships are a great choice. The following table provides a comparison of the three ships in this series: Celebrity Xploration, Celebrity Flora, and Celebrity Xpedition.

These ships offer a range of amenities and features to enhance your Galapagos exploration experience. From the intimate setting of Celebrity Xploration to the luxurious accommodations of Celebrity Flora, there is something for every type of traveler. So, if you’re ready to embark on a once-in-a-lifetime adventure, consider booking a trip on one of Celebrity Cruises’ Expedition ships.

Ranking Methodology

Based on thousands of reviews from past guests and average scores from Cruise Critic, Cruiseline.com, and TripAdvisor, it was determined how the ships in the Celebrity Cruises fleet are ranked.

This methodology ensures that the rankings are based on the experiences of actual guests, rather than the subjective opinions of the author. By incorporating multiple sources and averaging the scores, the rankings are also more accurate and representative of the overall guest experience.

While the rankings are based on past guest experiences, it’s important to note that everyone’s preferences and expectations are different. Some guests may value luxury amenities and top-notch dining, while others may prioritize exploring alternative destinations and unique excursions.

By exploring alternatives and considering individual priorities, guests can find the ship that best fits their needs and preferences.

Best Ship: Celebrity Xploration

Funny enough, the highest-rated ship in the Celebrity Cruises fleet isn’t one of their luxurious, non-expedition ships. Instead, it’s the Celebrity Xploration, designed for exploring the rugged terrain of the Galapagos Islands.

This ship offers an exclusive and personalized Galapagos experience, with a maximum capacity of just 16 guests. The ship boasts a buffet and dining room, a comfortable lounge, and a spacious sun deck with a large Jacuzzi. This allows guests to soak in the breathtaking views of the surrounding landscape.

Despite its small size, the Celebrity Xploration provides a luxurious cruise experience with its elegant and comfortable accommodations. Each suite is decorated in a contemporary style and equipped with modern amenities, including a private bathroom, air conditioning, and a flat-screen TV.

With its unmatched service, attention to detail, and breathtaking views of the Galapagos Islands, the Celebrity Xploration is undoubtedly the best ship in the Celebrity Cruises fleet for those seeking a luxury cruise experience.

Best Non-Expedition Ship: Celebrity Equinox

I personally believe that the Celebrity Equinox is the top choice for a luxurious and relaxing non-expedition cruise with its family-friendly amenities and attention to updating the ship. Renowned features of the Equinox include the Lawn Club, a half-acre of real grass on deck 15 where guests can enjoy picnics and lawn games, and the Silhouette Dining Room, which offers an elegant atmosphere and delicious cuisine. Additionally, the ship has a variety of dining options, including the Tuscan Grille, Qsine, and Blu, which offers healthy and delicious options for guests.

In terms of entertainment, the Equinox has something for everyone, with live music, comedy, and theater performances. Families with children will appreciate the kids’ clubs tucked away on Deck 15, including the X-Club for teenagers and Fun Factory for younger children. The ship also offers a range of activities, such as art classes and dance lessons, as well as more relaxing options like the Canyon Ranch Spa and Solarium. Overall, the Celebrity Equinox offers a comfortable and enjoyable cruise experience with plenty of dining and entertainment options to suit all tastes.

Newest and Largest: Celebrity Flora

Surprisingly, the newest and largest ship in the Celebrity fleet, Celebrity Flora, only has a maximum capacity of 100 guests, providing a more intimate and exclusive experience. This Expedition-class ship was specifically designed for Galapagos itineraries and offers an eco-friendly design, with a focus on sustainability.

Here are some features of Celebrity Flora that make it one of the best ships in the fleet:

The ship has six different types of suite, all with private balconies and ocean views, offering a comfortable and luxurious experience for guests.

The Discovery Lounge is a beautiful space with floor-to-ceiling windows, perfect for taking in the stunning views of the Galapagos Islands. It also has state-of-the-art technology for interactive presentations and educational talks.

The Observatory is another unique feature of Celebrity Flora, providing guests with 360-degree views of the surrounding environment, including the stars at night.

The ship has two restaurants, the Seaside Restaurant and the Ocean Grill, both offering delicious cuisine made with locally sourced ingredients.

Overall, Celebrity Flora is a top choice for those who want to explore the Galapagos Islands in style and comfort, while also being environmentally conscious. Its intimate size and exclusive features make it a unique and memorable experience for all guests.

Original Expedition Ship: Celebrity Xpedition

Exploring the less accessible regions of the world, Celebrity Xpedition is the original Expedition ship of the fleet. It offers a classic yet contemporary design for an unforgettable adventure. With a capacity of 48 guests, this small ship experience allows for a more intimate exploration of the Galapagos Islands.

The ship features a comfortable lounge, a buffet and dining room, and a spacious sun deck with a large Jacuzzi. It’s perfect for relaxing after a day of exploring. The ship balances classic wood panelling and patterned carpets with more contemporary touches, providing a comfortable and stylish atmosphere for guests.

The focus of the Celebrity Xpedition is on the destination. Expert naturalists are on board to guide guests through the unique wildlife and stunning landscapes of the Galapagos Islands. For those seeking an adventure unlike any other, the Celebrity Xpedition is the perfect choice.

Relaxing Atmosphere: Celebrity Equinox

With its serene ambiance and attention to updating the ship, the Celebrity Equinox is a tranquil haven for travelers seeking a respite from the hustle and bustle of everyday life. The ship’s modern decor and spacious public areas provide guests with a comfortable and relaxing environment. The attentive crew ensures that guests have everything they need, from poolside drinks to gourmet meals at the ship’s specialty restaurants. Overall, the Celebrity Equinox’s atmosphere is perfect for those who want to unwind and enjoy a stress-free vacation.

One of the reasons why the Celebrity Equinox is so popular is because of its family-friendly amenities. Kids’ clubs are tucked away on Deck 15, and the ship offers a wide range of activities for children of all ages. Parents can relax by the pool or enjoy a spa treatment while their children are entertained with games, movies, and crafts.

The ship also has a variety of dining options, including a family-style Italian restaurant and a casual buffet. With so many amenities for families, it’s no wonder why the Celebrity Equinox is one of the best ships for those traveling with children.

Largest Ship: Celebrity Reflection

I personally found the Celebrity Reflection to be an impressive ship due to its massive size and abundance of amenities. The ship offers spacious areas for guests to unwind and soak in the atmosphere, with a passenger capacity exceeding 3,000.

The ship’s design is modern and sleek, with elegant décor and plenty of natural light flooding in through the expansive windows. One of the standout features of the Celebrity Reflection is its range of dining options, from the main restaurant to specialty venues like the Tuscan Grille and Qsine.

The ship also boasts a variety of entertainment options, including live music performances and Broadway-style shows. All in all, I believe that the Celebrity Reflection is definitely worth the hype and is an excellent choice for those looking for a luxurious cruise experience with plenty of amenities to enjoy.

Innovative Features: Celebrity Beyond

After researching and comparing various Celebrity Cruise ships, it’s clear that Celebrity Beyond stands out with its innovative features and experiences. As the newest addition to the fleet, Celebrity Beyond has been designed with a focus on luxury and sophistication.

One of the top features to check out is the Magic Carpet, a cantilevered platform that moves up and down the side of the ship, serving as a ramp to shore, a bar, and a restaurant. This unique feature allows guests to experience the ocean in a completely new way.

Another feature that makes Celebrity Beyond stand out is the Eden, a three-story space that blurs the line between indoor and outdoor, with live plants and natural elements creating a garden-like atmosphere. This innovative space offers guests a variety of experiences, from relaxation during the day to immersive shows and performances at night.

Celebrity Beyond also boasts a variety of dining options, including a rooftop garden grill, a French restaurant with a wine tower, and a specialty restaurant focused on raw food. Overall, Celebrity Beyond offers a truly unique and luxurious experience for those looking to indulge in the best of what Celebrity Cruises has to offer.

Mixed Reviews: Celebrity Edge

Exploring the reviews of Celebrity Edge feels like embarking on a rollercoaster ride, with some guests praising its stunning design and others criticizing its lack of entertainment options and small rooms.

While some guests found the ship’s Magic Carpet, a platform that moves up and down the side of the ship, as a unique and fun feature, others found it to be a waste of space and not worth the hype. Similarly, while some guests enjoyed the ship’s modern and luxurious decor, others found it to be too avant-garde and not to their liking.

In terms of entertainment options, some guests found Celebrity Edge to be lacking in daytime activities and evening shows, while others found the ship’s performances and events to be repetitive and unimpressive.

Furthermore, some guests felt that the rooms on Celebrity Edge were smaller than expected, especially in comparison to other ships in the fleet. However, others found the rooms to be adequately sized and comfortable.

Overall, while Celebrity Edge has received mixed reviews, it remains a popular choice for those seeking a unique and stylish cruising experience.

What are some of the unique features of the Celebrity Xploration that make it the best ship according to past guest reviews?

As a past guest, I can attest to Celebrity Xploration’s unique features that make it the best ship in the fleet. The buffet and dining room, comfortable lounge, and spacious sun deck with a large Jacuzzi set it apart. Pricing may be higher, but it’s worth it.

How does the Celebrity Equinox cater to families compared to other ships in the fleet?

The Celebrity Equinox is perfect for families with its kids’ clubs on Deck 15 and a variety of entertainment options. It’s known for its relaxing atmosphere and careful attention to updating the ship.

What is the Magic Carpet feature on the Celebrity Apex and how does it enhance the cruise experience?

Have you experienced the Magic Carpet on Celebrity Apex? This innovative feature moves up and down the ship’s side, serving as a ramp to shore, a bar, and a restaurant. It’s one of the many design innovations on par with Celebrity Edge.

What are some of the negative feedback and criticisms that the Celebrity Edge has received despite its stunning design?

I’ve read that despite its stunning design, the Celebrity Edge has received negative feedback and design criticisms. Some guests have complained about the small room size and repetitive entertainment options.

Is there any information on the pricing or affordability of the Celebrity Cruises fleet?

As I researched pricing comparison for Celebrity Cruises, I found that they offer discounts and promotions for their fleet. However, pricing varies based on ship, itinerary, and season. It’s best to consult with a travel agent for accurate pricing.

• Cruise Knowledge

Celebrity Cruise Ships by Age — Newest to Oldest

Doug Parker

• December 19, 2023

Celebrity Cruises, a premium cruise line known for its modern luxury ships, has a fleet that has a wide range of vessels varying in age.

The fleet is constantly evolving and being revitalized. Its ships featuring the latest in comfort, technology, and design innovations. But not to be left out are the older ships that are equally as comfortable without the newest and latest hardware.

At the forefront is  Celebrity Ascent , launched in November 2023, followed closely by her sister ship,  Celebrity Beyond , which took her inaugural voyage in early 2022. They represent modern cruising, with their bold, outward-facing design that breaks from traditional ship architecture.

On the other side of the spectrum sits the  oldest Celebrity cruise ship , the venerable  Celebrity Millennium , which made her debut in 2000. Despite her age, Millennium has undergone significant refurbishments to align with the comforts and amenities found on newer vessels.

Age Distribution of Celebrity Fleet:

• Newest Ships  (2023): Celebrity Ascent
• Oldest Ship  (2000): Celebrity Millennium

Celebrity Cruise Ships Listed from Newest to Oldest

The table below shows the ship’s name, class, the age of the vessel , gross registered tonnage, and how many guests it carries at double occupancy.

Celebrity Ascent

The  Celebrity Ascent  represents the latest and largest in the Edge Series, with a gross tonnage of 140,600. It boasts an innovative design with features such as the  Magic Carpet , a multi-purpose, cantilevered platform that scales the ship’s exterior, offering guests unobstructed views. The ship’s culinary experience is enhanced by Michelin-starred chef  Daniel Boulud  as the culinary ambassador.

Key Features: The Theatre, the Rooftop Garden, the Spa, the sprawling Resort Deck, the Sunset Bar designed by Nate Berkus, The Magic Carpet, Inventive culinary experiences, the Grand Plaza and Martini Bar, and Modernized accommodation options.

Celebrity Beyond

Key Features: Rooftop Garden with Rooftop Garden Grill, two-story Sunset Bar, Eden with Eden Restaurant and Eden Bar, Raw on 5, Le Voyage specialty restaurant, The Spa with SEA Thermal Suite, The Spa Café & Juice Bar, Camp at Sea kids’ club, Solarium with a pool and two hot tubs, Craft Social Bar, and The Retreat premium ship-within-a-ship complex

Celebrity Apex

Key Features: Rooftop Garden and Rooftop Garden Grill, The Spa with SEA Thermal Suite, Raw on 5, the Magic Carpet moving platform, Eden with Eden Restaurant and Eden Bar, Solarium with a pool and two hot tubs, Camp at Sea kids’ clubs, Sunset Bar, The Retreat premium ship-within-a-ship complex

Celebrity Flora

The  Celebrity Flora  is a marvel of modern expedition design, specifically built for navigating the waters of the Galapagos. Housing a guest capacity similar to the Xpedition, this ship places a strong emphasis on ecological sustainability and comfort. The Flora’s cutting-edge technology and design minimize environmental impact, offering a responsible way to explore the islands.

Key Features: Staterooms (with a traditional or infinite veranda). Other highlights include the Discovery Lounge, where naturalists give lectures; the Observatory library with floor-to-ceiling windows; findings from onboard oceanographic equipment that guests can view; Ocean Grill & Bar; a main dining room; and sundecks with a plunge pool and hot tub.

Celebrity Edge

Celebrity Edge is the first ship in the Edge Series, standing out with a gross tonnage of 129,500. It features the unique  Magic Carpet , and the impressive  Eden , a multi-level, glass-enclosed venue offering a blend of performance art, dining, and breathtaking vistas.

The  Infinite Veranda  staterooms blur the boundary between inside and outside, inviting the sea in.

Key Features: Rooftop Garden and Rooftop Garden Grill, The Spa with SEA Thermal Suite, Raw on 5, the Magic Carpet moving platform, Eden with Eden Restaurant and Eden Bar, Fine Cut Steakhouse, Camp at Sea kids’ clubs, Sunset Bar, The Retreat premium ship-within-a-ship complex.

Celebrity Xploration

The  Celebrity Xploration  caters to those seeking a more private and personalized experience. This intimate catamaran is perfect for small group charters, offering eight luxurious cabins. Guests aboard the Xploration receive tailored service and enjoy detailed itineraries highlighting the best of the Galapagos.

Key Features: Oceanview and balcony staterooms, lounges, a sundeck with hot tubs, use of snorkeling equipment and wetsuits, a dining room and buffet, and guidance from a naturalist along the journey

Celebrity Reflection

Key Features: Sunset Bar, Murano French Restaurant, kids’ clubs, Solarium with pool and two hot tubs, Persian Garden Spa with thermal suite, Tuscan Grille Italian Restaurant, Sushi on Five, Café al Bacio & Gelateria, Cellar Masters Wine Bar, and The Retreat premium ship-within-a-ship complex

Celebrity Silhouette

Key Features: Craft Social Gastropub, The Porch Seafood Restaurant and Raw Bar, The Lawn Club Grill, kids’ clubs, Tuscan Grille Italian Restaurant, Sunset Bar, Solarium with pool and two hot tubs, Café al Bacio & Gelateria, Persian Garden Spa, Murano French Restaurant, and The Retreat premium ship-within-a-ship complex

Celebrity Eclipse

Key Features: The Lawn Club with hot glass class, kids’ clubs, Sushi on Five, Sunset Bar, Solarium with a pool and two hot tubs, Murano French Restaurant, Persian Garden Spa with thermal suite, Quasar Nightclub, Passport Bar, Le Petit Chef projection mapping dining experience, and The Retreat premium ship-within-a-ship complex

Celebrity Equinox

Key Features: Craft Social Gastropub, The Lawn Club with hot glass studio, kids’ clubs, Sunset Bar, Sky Observation Lounge, Spa Café, the Solarium with pool and two hot tubs, Murano French Restaurant, Tuscan Grille, and The Retreat premium ship-within-a-ship complex

Celebrity Solstice

Key Features: Le Petit Chef projection mapping dining experience, Murano French Restaurant, the Spa Café, Sushi on Five, Café al Bacio & Gelateria, Tuscan Grille, the Solarium with a pool and two hot tubs, Quasar nightclub, Sunset Bar, The Lawn Club with hot glass class, and The Retreat premium ship-within-a-ship complex

Celebrity Xpedition

The  Celebrity Xpedition  is a specialty cruise ship capable of accommodating up to  100 guests , offering a sense of exclusivity and camaraderie among passengers. Its smaller size allows for access to various ports throughout the Galapagos. Onboard, travelers find comfortable staterooms and meticulous service, creating a base for daily excursions led by knowledgeable naturalists.

Key Features: Oceanview and balcony staterooms and suites, multiple sundecks including one with a hot tub, a lounge with bar and live music, a dining room and grill, a fitness room, and nightly lectures from certified naturalists

Celebrity Constellation

Here starts the Millennium Class of Celebrity Cruise Ships. These vessels represent an era of luxury cruising with an emphasis on refined amenities and signature experiences.

These vessels have undergone extensive renovations to enhance guest comfort and elevate the onboard experience, integrating features like “The Retreat,” an exclusive area for suite guests.

Key Features: Le Petit Chef projection mapping dining experience, Martini Bar & Crush, Sushi on Five, Tuscan Grille Italian Restaurant, Sunset Bar, Rooftop Terrace, The Persian Garden spa with thermal suite, and kids’ clubs

Celebrity Infinity

Key Features: The Spa Café, Le Petit Chef projection mapping dining experience, Sushi on Five, Tuscan Grille Italian Restaurant, Fortunes Casino, Café al Bacio & Gelateria, Sunset Bar, Persian Garden Spa, a basketball court, and The Retreat premium ship-within-a-ship complex

Celebrity Summit

Key Features: Le Petit Chef projection mapping dining experience, the Spa Café, Cellar Masters Wine Bar, Café al Bacio & Gelateria, Sunset Bar, Blu restaurant for AquaClass guests, Sushi on Five, Sky Lounge with floor-to-ceiling windows, The Persian Spa with thermal suite, the Solarium, kids’ clubs, and The Retreat premium ship-within-a-ship complex

RELATED: Celebrity Summit Review After Refurbishment

Celebrity Millennium

As a sister ship to Celebrity Millennium, the Celebrity Summit boasts similar levels of sophistication and class. Post-renovation, the Summit’s guests enjoy updated suites, reimagined restaurants, and enhanced lounges, alongside personalized service.

PHOTO TOUR: Celebrity Millennium in Pictures

Key Features: Le Petit Chef projection mapping dining experience, Sushi on Five, The Persian Garden spa with thermal suite, Café al Bacio & Gelateria, Tuscan Grille Italian restaurant, Sunset Bar, the Spa Café, a Solarium, kids’ clubs, and The Retreat premium ship-within-a-ship complex

RELATED: Celebrity Ships by Size

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Celebrity Millennium® is making even more waves in the cruise world with its breathtaking upgrades, and now as one of the first cruise ships in the world to receive a Four-Star Rating by Forbes Travel Guide. From adding brand new staterooms and elevating design concepts and technology across the ship to adding The Retreat®, an exclusive experience including The Retreat Sundeck and The Retreat Lounge, the change is phenomenal. These new venues combined with our award-winning Luminae are sure to please. Slip into new eXhale® bedding featuring Cashmere™ Mattresses that will surround you in luxury—literally. Marvel at completely new bathroom modernizations. Wine and dine in reimagined restaurants and lounges, including the main dining room, Oceanview Café, Sunset Bar, and Rendezvous Lounge. Surrender your senses in the newly redesigned spa. Shop in new retail boutiques. Change the way you experience the world aboard Celebrity Millennium.

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We’ve Found the World’s Most Beautiful Cruise Ships

Posted: January 6, 2024 | Last updated: January 6, 2024

When it comes to cruising, it really is more about the journey than the destination – and today's cruise ships focus more and more on passenger experience. Designs and aesthetics are constantly improving and being elevated with spaces curated by top interior designers, high-end suites that rival those in 5-star hotels and even extensive art collections on board. We take a look at the world's most beautiful cruise ships that bring a little extra sparkle, inside and out.

MS Rotterdam, Holland America Line

The 2,668-guest MS Rotterdam is the third in the Pinnacle Class series for Holland America Line. At 984 feet (300m) in length, the craftmanship used to create the classic nautical lines of the ship’s exterior reflects almost 150 years of expertise within the company. Her interiors dazzle too, with fluid lines, vibrant colors and airy, light-filled spaces from the shared areas to the staterooms and suites.

Music is the ship's main inspiration, on show everywhere from the atrium’s dramatic harp-like sculpture to the impressive World Stage, where musicians play against a wraparound LED screen. Thoughtfully curated art is displayed throughout the decks and staterooms too, from museum-quality antiques and works by the masters to avant-garde sculptures and thought-provoking photography by emerging artists. Together, they make up a floating gallery of 2,645 pieces of work ranging in value from around $500-$620,000.

Silver Moon, Silversea

Silversea's  Silver Moon maintains the small-ship intimacy and spacious all-suite accommodation that the cruise line has become known for – yet takes it to a whole new level. The ship's high-end suites have been enriched with elegant decor, premium amenities and luxurious details such as handcrafted beds by Savoir. Bespoke crystal panels by luxury French brand Lalique have been incorporated into the brand's signature restaurant, La Dame.

The innovative new culinary enrichment programme Sea and Land Taste (SALT) is designed to immerse guests in culinary experiences, from classes and market trips to extra-special meals. Dining spaces are filled with unique objects and arts and crafts pieces that draw on influences from all over the world, while color palettes throughout are used to enhance the dining experience. Lighter tones brighten the demo area, the main restaurant has rich details and accents, while the bar has a darker, more mysterious feel.

Scenic Eclipse, Scenic Cruises

Scenic Eclipse  promises to deliver an ultra-luxury cruise experience for up to 228 guests. Her indulgent suites are flooded with natural light thanks to the floor-to-ceiling sliding doors, which open onto a private veranda or terrace. All 114 suites are furnished with king-size beds, ambient lighting and lounge areas. The Owner’s Penthouse Suites are even more incredible, each with its own spacious curved terrace, private spa pool and sun loungers, plus a private lounge and dining area.

The shared spaces are pretty decadent too. There's the 550-square-foot (51sqm) Senses Spa, emblazoned with gold leaf, and multiple pool areas. The stylish Whisky Bar has a floor-to-ceiling translucent quartz display case with 110 varieties of the spirit, while a sculpture of a gown – consisting of 5,400 spoons – marks the entrance to French Champagne bar Lumière.

Disney Wish, Disney Cruise Line

Disney Cruise Line’s imagineers have once again created a world of enchantment, this time aboard the Disney Wish . The ship welcomed her first guests in summer 2022 and has a distinctly Disney design concept inspired by timeless tales. The motif of 'enchantment' manifests throughout the ship, from the magical forest setting of the Walt Disney Theatre and storybook-inspired staterooms to the fairy-tale-castle Grand Hall, where a dazzling wishing star descends from the shimmering chandelier above.

The Wish Tower Suite, set high in the forward funnel of the ship (which displays the cruise line’s Micky Mouse logo), is a 1,966-square-foot (183sqm) penthouse in the sky and the most unique Disney Cruise Line accommodation yet. Another of the ship's magical features is Disney’s first Frozen -themed theatrical dining experience, which brings the world of Arendelle to life through immersive live entertainment and world-class cuisine infused with Nordic influences.

Regatta, Oceania Cruises

Regatta is the flagship vessel of Oceania Cruises' fleet and a shining example of the OceaniaNEXT rebuild of the brand’s four 684-guest Regatta Class ships. Her 342 lavish suites and staterooms showcase designer furnishings, while the reimagined public spaces feature Tuscan marble, a revamped color palette of soft sea and sky tones, works of art and a tasteful renewal of fabrics, furnishings and light fixtures.

Regatta has four restaurants including the iconic Grand Dining Room, which has been decked out with new bejeweled chandeliers. Other beautifully refreshed spaces include Aquamar Spa + Vitality Center, eight lounges and bars and a casino. Her decks are made from the finest teak, custom stone and tile work, and her lounges, suites and staterooms have luxurious Neoclassical furnishings.

Royal Clipper, Star Clippers

Royal Clipper is one of Star Clippers’ three tall ships and officially the largest square rigger in service. The elegant vessel cuts through the water gracefully, just like the legendary clippers from a bygone era. The five-masted, fully rigged tall ship, which has 42 sails, is beautiful to look at. Her Clipper heritage is reflected in polished brass and gleaming brightwork, expansive teak decks, swimming pools, informal dining, a convivial tropical bar and a comfortable piano bar.

The balance of maritime nostalgia and modern cruising is spot-on. Passengers can recline in the bowsprit net suspended above the sea or climb the mast to the Crow's Nest for stunning panoramic views as they sail. The 18,944 square feet (1,760sqm) of open deck and three swimming pools create an expansive outdoor environment. Another notable feature is the Captain Nemo Lounge, the ship's spa and health club, with underwater glass portholes.

Seabourn Encore, Seabourn

Seabourn Encore is the newest striking ship in the cruise line's ultra-luxury fleet. Modeled on the trio of ships introduced with Seabourn Odyssey, Seabourn Encore represents another stage in the evolution of small ship cruising. There are 300 suites in total, including 16 penthouse suites and five penthouse spa suites, all with verandas facing the ocean.

Seabourn Square, designed to be an innovative concierge lounge, invites guests to access every shipboard service in a relaxed, living-room atmosphere. The Square's thoughtful layout includes a library, upscale shops, an outdoor terrace and a coffee bar, all arranged across a light-filled space with dark-wood accents, a subtle color palette and striking blue velvet armchairs.

Le Ponant, Ponant

Le Ponant  is the flagship vessel of French cruise company Ponant. The three-mast cruise yacht, which relaunched in summer 2022, has undergone a complete refit and refurbishment. Designed by French studio Jean-Philippe Nuel, her common areas have refined, clean lines with an elegant finish. The color palette – consisting of off-white, taupe and caviar gray – reflect the classic, sophisticated style, with no need for embellishments or bling.

The accommodation is equally streamlined and elevated, with the number of staterooms and suites halved to just 16, housing a maximum of 32 guests. These are spread over three decks, each benefiting from large windows, and include a particularly lovely and spacious Owner Suite. The company has chosen to place the emphasis on space and freedom aboard Le Ponant, giving guests the sense of being on their own private yacht.

MSC Virtuosa, MSC Cruises

MSC Virtuosa was named in homage to the skill and expertise of the architects and shipyard partners who designed and built it. The ship carries all the signature features of an MSC Cruises’ ship. At its heart are glamorous, gleaming mirrored surfaces in the atrium, centered around a sparkly Swarovski-studded staircase linking all three decks of the ship.

The beautifully designed indoor promenade has the longest LED dome at sea and images on the high ceiling can change from an underwater adventure to a space exploration scene. The ship has 21 bars and lounges all with their own style and unique decor, from the futuristic white and blue of the Starship club featuring Rob, the first humanoid robotic bartender at sea, to the earthy colors of traditional pub Masters of the Sea.

Celebrity Apex, Celebrity Cruises

Celebrity Apex is part of Celebrity Cruises’ Edge Series. The ship showcases the talents of British designer Kelly Hoppen CBE, American designer Nate Berkus, Paris-based design firm Jouin Manku and British architect Tom Wright. Hoppen’s inspiration for the accommodation was to create an outward-facing design emphasizing the outdoor scenery. Each of the ship's two Iconic Suites, positioned high above the bridge, have more than 2,500 square feet (232sqm) of opulent indoor and outdoor space, complete with private terrace and hot tub.

The Grand Plaza is one of the ship's most interesting spaces, inspired by the piazzas of Italy. Its chandelier transforms the atmosphere from day to night, with the lighting changing from warm and inviting to bright and dramatic. Other beautifully imagined areas are the Rooftop Garden and the Magic Carpet, a cantilevered, floating platform set 13 floors above sea level.

Queen Mary 2, Cunard

Cunard’s flagship  Queen Mary 2 exudes classic style and elegance. Designed by a team of British naval architects, the traditional ocean liner has a long, sleek bow that makes her ideal for transatlantic crossings. Its black hull, red stripe, distinctive red-and-black funnel crown and bright white decks evoke the appearance of ocean liners of a bygone era.

The lavish accommodation includes beautiful duplex suites, each with a spiral staircase, walk-in closet, marble bath and private balcony. A daily afternoon tea is served by white-gloved waiters in the Queens Room restaurant, while Godiva at Sir Samuel’s has a decadent display of pralines and truffles. Elsewhere, the planetarium 3D cinema sends guests on an epic voyage across the solar system.

Seven Seas Splendor, Regent Seven Seas

An art collection worth around $5 million is displayed throughout the  Seven Seas Splendor . The impressive floating gallery includes more than 500 crystal chandeliers and more than an acre of Italian marble which fits in well with the ship's sophisticated style. Other standout aspects are the mythical dragon that greets diners at Pacific Rim restaurant and the alcoves that jut over the ocean at Sette Mari at La Veranda.

Each of the beautifully appointed suites has a private balcony, while the palatial Regent Suite – perched on the 14th deck – has a wraparound veranda over the ship’s bow. Its custom-made Treesse mini-pool spa is situated on the front balcony, while the king-sized Vividus bed was handcrafted by upscale Swedish brand, Hästens.

Viking Octantis, Viking Cruises

The new Polar Class  Viking Octantis  is imagined by the same interior designers, nautical architects and engineers who designed the cruise line’s longships and ocean ships. An integrated bow creates a longer waterline for the ship, featuring the company’s signature Scandinavian influence. Each stateroom has a Nordic-style balcony and a sunroom, while floor-to-ceiling, distortion-free glass allows guests to take in the views and keep the elements out. The top of the panoramic glass lowers to transform the stateroom into a sheltered lookout.

The stunning Explorers’ Lounge, pictured, has two decks at the bow of the ship with double-height windows to take in the scenery. Other cleverly laid-out areas include the Finse Terrace, an outdoor lounge area just above sea level with has recessed couches and lava rock fire pits, and the Aquavit Terrace and pools, set under a retractable glass dome. The design of the spa and fitness center is in keeping with Viking’s Nordic heritage, featuring a thermal suite with traditional Norwegian badestamp (wood-sided hot tub).

Emerald Azzurra, Emerald Cruises

Emerald Cruises’ first-ever luxury superyacht, Emerald Azzurra , launched in March 2022. She stretches to 361 feet (110m) in length and carries just 100 guests across 50 deluxe suites and staterooms. The yacht's sleek design enables her to venture to ports and harbors many other, bigger cruise ships are unable to access. Onboard, the infinity-edge pool offers incredible views of passing scenery.

There are six suite and stateroom categories on the Emerald Azzurra, each wonderfully luxurious (though some a little more so). The oversized Owner’s Suites are the most opulent, with separate bedroom and lounge areas. Best of all, guests can soak up the sun from the large private curved terrace with uninterrupted views. Designer wing chairs and footstools are a fixture in the Observation Lounge, and can be taken outside on clear days and for cinema evenings.

Now take a look at more exciting new cruise ships coming soon

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Seven agonizing nights aboard the Icon of the Seas

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Updated at 2:44 p.m. ET on April 6, 2024.

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MY FIRST GLIMPSE of Royal Caribbean’s Icon of the Seas, from the window of an approaching Miami cab, brings on a feeling of vertigo, nausea, amazement, and distress. I shut my eyes in defense, as my brain tells my optic nerve to try again.

The ship makes no sense, vertically or horizontally. It makes no sense on sea, or on land, or in outer space. It looks like a hodgepodge of domes and minarets, tubes and canopies, like Istanbul had it been designed by idiots. Vibrant, oversignifying colors are stacked upon other such colors, decks perched over still more decks; the only comfort is a row of lifeboats ringing its perimeter. There is no imposed order, no cogent thought, and, for those who do not harbor a totalitarian sense of gigantomania, no visual mercy. This is the biggest cruise ship ever built, and I have been tasked with witnessing its inaugural voyage.

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“Author embarks on their first cruise-ship voyage” has been a staple of American essay writing for almost three decades, beginning with David Foster Wallace’s “A Supposedly Fun Thing I’ll Never Do Again,” which was first published in 1996 under the title “Shipping Out.” Since then, many admirable writers have widened and diversified the genre. Usually the essayist commissioned to take to the sea is in their first or second flush of youth and is ready to sharpen their wit against the hull of the offending vessel. I am 51, old and tired, having seen much of the world as a former travel journalist, and mostly what I do in both life and prose is shrug while muttering to my imaginary dachshund, “This too shall pass.” But the Icon of the Seas will not countenance a shrug. The Icon of the Seas is the Linda Loman of cruise ships, exclaiming that attention must be paid. And here I am in late January with my one piece of luggage and useless gray winter jacket and passport, zipping through the Port of Miami en route to the gangway that will separate me from the bulk of North America for more than seven days, ready to pay it in full.

The aforementioned gangway opens up directly onto a thriving mall (I will soon learn it is imperiously called the “Royal Promenade”), presently filled with yapping passengers beneath a ceiling studded with balloons ready to drop. Crew members from every part of the global South, as well as a few Balkans, are shepherding us along while pressing flutes of champagne into our hands. By a humming Starbucks, I drink as many of these as I can and prepare to find my cabin. I show my blue Suite Sky SeaPass Card (more on this later, much more) to a smiling woman from the Philippines, and she tells me to go “aft.” Which is where, now? As someone who has rarely sailed on a vessel grander than the Staten Island Ferry, I am confused. It turns out that the aft is the stern of the ship, or, for those of us who don’t know what a stern or an aft are, its ass. The nose of the ship, responsible for separating the waves before it, is also called a bow, and is marked for passengers as the FWD , or forward. The part of the contemporary sailing vessel where the malls are clustered is called the midship. I trust that you have enjoyed this nautical lesson.

I ascend via elevator to my suite on Deck 11. This is where I encounter my first terrible surprise. My suite windows and balcony do not face the ocean. Instead, they look out onto another shopping mall. This mall is the one that’s called Central Park, perhaps in homage to the Olmsted-designed bit of greenery in the middle of my hometown. Although on land I would be delighted to own a suite with Central Park views, here I am deeply depressed. To sail on a ship and not wake up to a vast blue carpet of ocean? Unthinkable.

Allow me a brief preamble here. The story you are reading was commissioned at a moment when most staterooms on the Icon were sold out. In fact, so enthralled by the prospect of this voyage were hard-core mariners that the ship’s entire inventory of guest rooms (the Icon can accommodate up to 7,600 passengers, but its inaugural journey was reduced to 5,000 or so for a less crowded experience) was almost immediately sold out. Hence, this publication was faced with the shocking prospect of paying nearly $19,000 to procure for this solitary passenger an entire suite—not including drinking expenses—all for the privilege of bringing you this article. But the suite in question doesn’t even have a view of the ocean! I sit down hard on my soft bed. Nineteen thousand dollars for this .

The viewless suite does have its pluses. In addition to all the Malin+Goetz products in my dual bathrooms, I am granted use of a dedicated Suite Deck lounge; access to Coastal Kitchen, a superior restaurant for Suites passengers; complimentary VOOM SM Surf & Stream (“the fastest Internet at Sea”) “for one device per person for the whole cruise duration”; a pair of bathrobes (one of which comes prestained with what looks like a large expectoration by the greenest lizard on Earth); and use of the Grove Suite Sun, an area on Decks 18 and 19 with food and deck chairs reserved exclusively for Suite passengers. I also get reserved seating for a performance of The Wizard of Oz , an ice-skating tribute to the periodic table, and similar provocations. The very color of my Suite Sky SeaPass Card, an oceanic blue as opposed to the cloying royal purple of the standard non-Suite passenger, will soon provoke envy and admiration. But as high as my status may be, there are those on board who have much higher status still, and I will soon learn to bow before them.

In preparation for sailing, I have “priced in,” as they say on Wall Street, the possibility that I may come from a somewhat different monde than many of the other cruisers. Without falling into stereotypes or preconceptions, I prepare myself for a friendly outspokenness on the part of my fellow seafarers that may not comply with modern DEI standards. I believe in meeting people halfway, and so the day before flying down to Miami, I visited what remains of Little Italy to purchase a popular T-shirt that reads DADDY’S LITTLE MEATBALL across the breast in the colors of the Italian flag. My wife recommended that I bring one of my many T-shirts featuring Snoopy and the Peanuts gang, as all Americans love the beagle and his friends. But I naively thought that my meatball T-shirt would be more suitable for conversation-starting. “Oh, and who is your ‘daddy’?” some might ask upon seeing it. “And how long have you been his ‘little meatball’?” And so on.

I put on my meatball T-shirt and head for one of the dining rooms to get a late lunch. In the elevator, I stick out my chest for all to read the funny legend upon it, but soon I realize that despite its burnished tricolor letters, no one takes note. More to the point, no one takes note of me. Despite my attempts at bridge building, the very sight of me (small, ethnic, without a cap bearing the name of a football team) elicits no reaction from other passengers. Most often, they will small-talk over me as if I don’t exist. This brings to mind the travails of David Foster Wallace , who felt so ostracized by his fellow passengers that he retreated to his cabin for much of his voyage. And Wallace was raised primarily in the Midwest and was a much larger, more American-looking meatball than I am. If he couldn’t talk to these people, how will I? What if I leave this ship without making any friends at all, despite my T-shirt? I am a social creature, and the prospect of seven days alone and apart is saddening. Wallace’s stateroom, at least, had a view of the ocean, a kind of cheap eternity.

Worse awaits me in the dining room. This is a large, multichandeliered room where I attended my safety training (I was shown how to put on a flotation vest; it is a very simple procedure). But the maître d’ politely refuses me entry in an English that seems to verge on another language. “I’m sorry, this is only for pendejos ,” he seems to be saying. I push back politely and he repeats himself. Pendejos ? Piranhas? There’s some kind of P-word to which I am not attuned. Meanwhile elderly passengers stream right past, powered by their limbs, walkers, and electric wheelchairs. “It is only pendejo dining today, sir.” “But I have a suite!” I say, already starting to catch on to the ship’s class system. He examines my card again. “But you are not a pendejo ,” he confirms. I am wearing a DADDY’S LITTLE MEATBALL T-shirt, I want to say to him. I am the essence of pendejo .

Eventually, I give up and head to the plebeian buffet on Deck 15, which has an aquatic-styled name I have now forgotten. Before gaining entry to this endless cornucopia of reheated food, one passes a washing station of many sinks and soap dispensers, and perhaps the most intriguing character on the entire ship. He is Mr. Washy Washy—or, according to his name tag, Nielbert of the Philippines—and he is dressed as a taco (on other occasions, I’ll see him dressed as a burger). Mr. Washy Washy performs an eponymous song in spirited, indeed flamboyant English: “Washy, washy, wash your hands, WASHY WASHY!” The dangers of norovirus and COVID on a cruise ship this size (a giant fellow ship was stricken with the former right after my voyage) makes Mr. Washy Washy an essential member of the crew. The problem lies with the food at the end of Washy’s rainbow. The buffet is groaning with what sounds like sophisticated dishes—marinated octopus, boiled egg with anchovy, chorizo, lobster claws—but every animal tastes tragically the same, as if there was only one creature available at the market, a “cruisipus” bred specifically for Royal Caribbean dining. The “vegetables” are no better. I pick up a tomato slice and look right through it. It tastes like cellophane. I sit alone, apart from the couples and parents with gaggles of children, as “We Are Family” echoes across the buffet space.

I may have failed to mention that all this time, the Icon of the Seas has not left port. As the fiery mango of the subtropical setting sun makes Miami’s condo skyline even more apocalyptic, the ship shoves off beneath a perfunctory display of fireworks. After the sun sets, in the far, dark distance, another circus-lit cruise ship ruptures the waves before us. We glance at it with pity, because it is by definition a smaller ship than our own. I am on Deck 15, outside the buffet and overlooking a bunch of pools (the Icon has seven of them), drinking a frilly drink that I got from one of the bars (the Icon has 15 of them), still too shy to speak to anyone, despite Sister Sledge’s assertion that all on the ship are somehow related.

Kim Brooks: On failing the family vacation

The ship’s passage away from Ron DeSantis’s Florida provides no frisson, no sense of developing “sea legs,” as the ship is too large to register the presence of waves unless a mighty wind adds significant chop. It is time for me to register the presence of the 5,000 passengers around me, even if they refuse to register mine. My fellow travelers have prepared for this trip with personally decorated T-shirts celebrating the importance of this voyage. The simplest ones say ICON INAUGURAL ’24 on the back and the family name on the front. Others attest to an over-the-top love of cruise ships: WARNING! MAY START TALKING ABOUT CRUISING . Still others are artisanally designed and celebrate lifetimes spent married while cruising (on ships, of course). A couple possibly in their 90s are wearing shirts whose backs feature a drawing of a cruise liner, two flamingos with ostensibly male and female characteristics, and the legend “ HUSBAND AND WIFE Cruising Partners FOR LIFE WE MAY NOT HAVE IT All Together BUT TOGETHER WE HAVE IT ALL .” (The words not in all caps have been written in cursive.) A real journalist or a more intrepid conversationalist would have gone up to the couple and asked them to explain the longevity of their marriage vis-à-vis their love of cruising. But instead I head to my mall suite, take off my meatball T-shirt, and allow the first tears of the cruise to roll down my cheeks slowly enough that I briefly fall asleep amid the moisture and salt.

I WAKE UP with a hangover. Oh God. Right. I cannot believe all of that happened last night. A name floats into my cobwebbed, nauseated brain: “Ayn Rand.” Jesus Christ.

I breakfast alone at the Coastal Kitchen. The coffee tastes fine and the eggs came out of a bird. The ship rolls slightly this morning; I can feel it in my thighs and my schlong, the parts of me that are most receptive to danger.

I had a dangerous conversation last night. After the sun set and we were at least 50 miles from shore (most modern cruise ships sail at about 23 miles an hour), I lay in bed softly hiccupping, my arms stretched out exactly like Jesus on the cross, the sound of the distant waves missing from my mall-facing suite, replaced by the hum of air-conditioning and children shouting in Spanish through the vents of my two bathrooms. I decided this passivity was unacceptable. As an immigrant, I feel duty-bound to complete the tasks I am paid for, which means reaching out and trying to understand my fellow cruisers. So I put on a normal James Perse T-shirt and headed for one of the bars on the Royal Promenade—the Schooner Bar, it was called, if memory serves correctly.

I sat at the bar for a martini and two Negronis. An old man with thick, hairy forearms drank next to me, very silent and Hemingwaylike, while a dreadlocked piano player tinkled out a series of excellent Elton John covers. To my right, a young white couple—he in floral shorts, she in a light, summery miniskirt with a fearsome diamond ring, neither of them in football regalia—chatted with an elderly couple. Do it , I commanded myself. Open your mouth. Speak! Speak without being spoken to. Initiate. A sentence fragment caught my ear from the young woman, “Cherry Hill.” This is a suburb of Philadelphia in New Jersey, and I had once been there for a reading at a synagogue. “Excuse me,” I said gently to her. “Did you just mention Cherry Hill? It’s a lovely place.”

As it turned out, the couple now lived in Fort Lauderdale (the number of Floridians on the cruise surprised me, given that Southern Florida is itself a kind of cruise ship, albeit one slowly sinking), but soon they were talking with me exclusively—the man potbellied, with a chin like a hard-boiled egg; the woman as svelte as if she were one of the many Ukrainian members of the crew—the elderly couple next to them forgotten. This felt as groundbreaking as the first time I dared to address an American in his native tongue, as a child on a bus in Queens (“On my foot you are standing, Mister”).

“I don’t want to talk politics,” the man said. “But they’re going to eighty-six Biden and put Michelle in.”

I considered the contradictions of his opening conversational gambit, but decided to play along. “People like Michelle,” I said, testing the waters. The husband sneered, but the wife charitably put forward that the former first lady was “more personable” than Joe Biden. “They’re gonna eighty-six Biden,” the husband repeated. “He can’t put a sentence together.”

After I mentioned that I was a writer—though I presented myself as a writer of teleplays instead of novels and articles such as this one—the husband told me his favorite writer was Ayn Rand. “Ayn Rand, she came here with nothing,” the husband said. “I work with a lot of Cubans, so …” I wondered if I should mention what I usually do to ingratiate myself with Republicans or libertarians: the fact that my finances improved after pass-through corporations were taxed differently under Donald Trump. Instead, I ordered another drink and the couple did the same, and I told him that Rand and I were born in the same city, St. Petersburg/Leningrad, and that my family also came here with nothing. Now the bonding and drinking began in earnest, and several more rounds appeared. Until it all fell apart.

Read: Gary Shteyngart on watching Russian television for five days straight

My new friend, whom I will refer to as Ayn, called out to a buddy of his across the bar, and suddenly a young couple, both covered in tattoos, appeared next to us. “He fucking punked me,” Ayn’s frat-boy-like friend called out as he put his arm around Ayn, while his sizable partner sizzled up to Mrs. Rand. Both of them had a look I have never seen on land—their eyes projecting absence and enmity in equal measure. In the ’90s, I drank with Russian soldiers fresh from Chechnya and wandered the streets of wartime Zagreb, but I have never seen such undisguised hostility toward both me and perhaps the universe at large. I was briefly introduced to this psychopathic pair, but neither of them wanted to have anything to do with me, and the tattooed woman would not even reveal her Christian name to me (she pretended to have the same first name as Mrs. Rand). To impress his tattooed friends, Ayn made fun of the fact that as a television writer, I’d worked on the series Succession (which, it would turn out, practically nobody on the ship had watched), instead of the far more palatable, in his eyes, zombie drama of last year. And then my new friends drifted away from me into an angry private conversation—“He punked me!”—as I ordered another drink for myself, scared of the dead-eyed arrivals whose gaze never registered in the dim wattage of the Schooner Bar, whose terrifying voices and hollow laughs grated like unoiled gears against the crooning of “Goodbye Yellow Brick Road.”

But today is a new day for me and my hangover. After breakfast, I explore the ship’s so-called neighborhoods . There’s the AquaDome, where one can find a food hall and an acrobatic sound-and-light aquatic show. Central Park has a premium steak house, a sushi joint, and a used Rolex that can be bought for $8,000 on land here proudly offered at $17,000. There’s the aforementioned Royal Promenade, where I had drunk with the Rands, and where a pair of dueling pianos duel well into the night. There’s Surfside, a kids’ neighborhood full of sugary garbage, which looks out onto the frothy trail that the behemoth leaves behind itself. Thrill Island refers to the collection of tubes that clutter the ass of the ship and offer passengers six waterslides and a surfing simulation. There’s the Hideaway, an adult zone that plays music from a vomit-slathered, Brit-filled Alicante nightclub circa 1996 and proves a big favorite with groups of young Latin American customers. And, most hurtfully, there’s the Suite Neighborhood.

I say hurtfully because as a Suite passenger I should be here, though my particular suite is far from the others. Whereas I am stuck amid the riffraff of Deck 11, this section is on the highborn Decks 16 and 17, and in passing, I peek into the spacious, tall-ceilinged staterooms from the hallway, dazzled by the glint of the waves and sun. For $75,000, one multifloor suite even comes with its own slide between floors, so that a family may enjoy this particular terror in private. There is a quiet splendor to the Suite Neighborhood. I see fewer stickers and signs and drawings than in my own neighborhood—for example, MIKE AND DIANA PROUDLY SERVED U.S. MARINE CORPS RETIRED . No one here needs to announce their branch of service or rank; they are simply Suites, and this is where they belong. Once again, despite my hard work and perseverance, I have been disallowed from the true American elite. Once again, I am “Not our class, dear.” I am reminded of watching The Love Boat on my grandmother’s Zenith, which either was given to her or we found in the trash (I get our many malfunctioning Zeniths confused) and whose tube got so hot, I would put little chunks of government cheese on a thin tissue atop it to give our welfare treat a pleasant, Reagan-era gooeyness. I could not understand English well enough then to catch the nuances of that seafaring program, but I knew that there were differences in the status of the passengers, and that sometimes those differences made them sad. Still, this ship, this plenty—every few steps, there are complimentary nachos or milkshakes or gyros on offer—was the fatty fuel of my childhood dreams. If only I had remained a child.

I walk around the outdoor decks looking for company. There is a middle-aged African American couple who always seem to be asleep in each other’s arms, probably exhausted from the late capitalism they regularly encounter on land. There is far more diversity on this ship than I expected. Many couples are a testament to Loving v. Virginia , and there is a large group of folks whose T-shirts read MELANIN AT SEA / IT’S THE MELANIN FOR ME . I smile when I see them, but then some young kids from the group makes Mr. Washy Washy do a cruel, caricatured “Burger Dance” (today he is in his burger getup), and I think, Well, so much for intersectionality .

At the infinity pool on Deck 17, I spot some elderly women who could be ethnic and from my part of the world, and so I jump in. I am proved correct! Many of them seem to be originally from Queens (“Corona was still great when it was all Italian”), though they are now spread across the tristate area. We bond over the way “Ron-kon-koma” sounds when announced in Penn Station.

“Everyone is here for a different reason,” one of them tells me. She and her ex-husband last sailed together four years ago to prove to themselves that their marriage was truly over. Her 15-year-old son lost his virginity to “an Irish young lady” while their ship was moored in Ravenna, Italy. The gaggle of old-timers competes to tell me their favorite cruising stories and tips. “A guy proposed in Central Park a couple of years ago”—many Royal Caribbean ships apparently have this ridiculous communal area—“and she ran away screaming!” “If you’re diamond-class, you get four drinks for free.” “A different kind of passenger sails out of Bayonne.” (This, perhaps, is racially coded.) “Sometimes, if you tip the bartender $5, your next drink will be free.”

“Everyone’s here for a different reason,” the woman whose marriage ended on a cruise tells me again. “Some people are here for bad reasons—the drinkers and the gamblers. Some people are here for medical reasons.” I have seen more than a few oxygen tanks and at least one woman clearly undergoing very serious chemo. Some T-shirts celebrate good news about a cancer diagnosis. This might be someone’s last cruise or week on Earth. For these women, who have spent months, if not years, at sea, cruising is a ritual as well as a life cycle: first love, last love, marriage, divorce, death.

Read: The last place on Earth any tourist should go

I have talked with these women for so long, tonight I promise myself that after a sad solitary dinner I will not try to seek out company at the bars in the mall or the adult-themed Hideaway. I have enough material to fulfill my duties to this publication. As I approach my orphaned suite, I run into the aggro young people who stole Mr. and Mrs. Rand away from me the night before. The tattooed apparitions pass me without a glance. She is singing something violent about “Stuttering Stanley” (a character in a popular horror movie, as I discover with my complimentary VOOM SM Surf & Stream Internet at Sea) and he’s loudly shouting about “all the money I’ve lost,” presumably at the casino in the bowels of the ship.

So these bent psychos out of a Cormac McCarthy novel are angrily inhabiting my deck. As I mewl myself to sleep, I envision a limited series for HBO or some other streamer, a kind of low-rent White Lotus , where several aggressive couples conspire to throw a shy intellectual interloper overboard. I type the scenario into my phone. As I fall asleep, I think of what the woman who recently divorced her husband and whose son became a man through the good offices of the Irish Republic told me while I was hoisting myself out of the infinity pool. “I’m here because I’m an explorer. I’m here because I’m trying something new.” What if I allowed myself to believe in her fantasy?

“YOU REALLY STARTED AT THE TOP,” they tell me. I’m at the Coastal Kitchen for my eggs and corned-beef hash, and the maître d’ has slotted me in between two couples. Fueled by coffee or perhaps intrigued by my relative youth, they strike up a conversation with me. As always, people are shocked that this is my first cruise. They contrast the Icon favorably with all the preceding liners in the Royal Caribbean fleet, usually commenting on the efficiency of the elevators that hurl us from deck to deck (as in many large corporate buildings, the elevators ask you to choose a floor and then direct you to one of many lifts). The couple to my right, from Palo Alto—he refers to his “porn mustache” and calls his wife “my cougar” because she is two years older—tell me they are “Pandemic Pinnacles.”

This is the day that my eyes will be opened. Pinnacles , it is explained to me over translucent cantaloupe, have sailed with Royal Caribbean for 700 ungodly nights. Pandemic Pinnacles took advantage of the two-for-one accrual rate of Pinnacle points during the pandemic, when sailing on a cruise ship was even more ill-advised, to catapult themselves into Pinnacle status.

Because of the importance of the inaugural voyage of the world’s largest cruise liner, more than 200 Pinnacles are on this ship, a startling number, it seems. Mrs. Palo Alto takes out a golden badge that I have seen affixed over many a breast, which reads CROWN AND ANCHOR SOCIETY along with her name. This is the coveted badge of the Pinnacle. “You should hear all the whining in Guest Services,” her husband tells me. Apparently, the Pinnacles who are not also Suites like us are all trying to use their status to get into Coastal Kitchen, our elite restaurant. Even a Pinnacle needs to be a Suite to access this level of corned-beef hash.

“We’re just baby Pinnacles,” Mrs. Palo Alto tells me, describing a kind of internal class struggle among the Pinnacle elite for ever higher status.

And now I understand what the maître d’ was saying to me on the first day of my cruise. He wasn’t saying “ pendejo .” He was saying “Pinnacle.” The dining room was for Pinnacles only, all those older people rolling in like the tide on their motorized scooters.

And now I understand something else: This whole thing is a cult. And like most cults, it can’t help but mirror the endless American fight for status. Like Keith Raniere’s NXIVM, where different-colored sashes were given out to connote rank among Raniere’s branded acolytes, this is an endless competition among Pinnacles, Suites, Diamond-Plusers, and facing-the-mall, no-balcony purple SeaPass Card peasants, not to mention the many distinctions within each category. The more you cruise, the higher your status. No wonder a section of the Royal Promenade is devoted to getting passengers to book their next cruise during the one they should be enjoying now. No wonder desperate Royal Caribbean offers (“FINAL HOURS”) crowded my email account weeks before I set sail. No wonder the ship’s jewelry store, the Royal Bling, is selling a $100,000 golden chalice that will entitle its owner to drink free on Royal Caribbean cruises for life. (One passenger was already gaming out whether her 28-year-old son was young enough to “just about earn out” on the chalice or if that ship had sailed.) No wonder this ship was sold out months before departure , and we had to pay $19,000 for a horrid suite away from the Suite Neighborhood. No wonder the most mythical hero of Royal Caribbean lore is someone named Super Mario, who has cruised so often, he now has his own working desk on many ships. This whole experience is part cult, part nautical pyramid scheme.

From the June 2014 issue: Ship of wonks

“The toilets are amazing,” the Palo Altos are telling me. “One flush and you’re done.” “They don’t understand how energy-efficient these ships are,” the husband of the other couple is telling me. “They got the LNG”—liquefied natural gas, which is supposed to make the Icon a boon to the environment (a concept widely disputed and sometimes ridiculed by environmentalists).

But I’m thinking along a different line of attack as I spear my last pallid slice of melon. For my streaming limited series, a Pinnacle would have to get killed by either an outright peasant or a Suite without an ocean view. I tell my breakfast companions my idea.

“Oh, for sure a Pinnacle would have to be killed,” Mr. Palo Alto, the Pandemic Pinnacle, says, touching his porn mustache thoughtfully as his wife nods.

“THAT’S RIGHT, IT’S your time, buddy!” Hubert, my fun-loving Panamanian cabin attendant, shouts as I step out of my suite in a robe. “Take it easy, buddy!”

I have come up with a new dressing strategy. Instead of trying to impress with my choice of T-shirts, I have decided to start wearing a robe, as one does at a resort property on land, with a proper spa and hammam. The response among my fellow cruisers has been ecstatic. “Look at you in the robe!” Mr. Rand cries out as we pass each other by the Thrill Island aqua park. “You’re living the cruise life! You know, you really drank me under the table that night.” I laugh as we part ways, but my soul cries out, Please spend more time with me, Mr. and Mrs. Rand; I so need the company .

In my white robe, I am a stately presence, a refugee from a better limited series, a one-man crossover episode. (Only Suites are granted these robes to begin with.) Today, I will try many of the activities these ships have on offer to provide their clientele with a sense of never-ceasing motion. Because I am already at Thrill Island, I decide to climb the staircase to what looks like a mast on an old-fashioned ship (terrified, because I am afraid of heights) to try a ride called “Storm Chasers,” which is part of the “Category 6” water park, named in honor of one of the storms that may someday do away with the Port of Miami entirely. Storm Chasers consists of falling from the “mast” down a long, twisting neon tube filled with water, like being the camera inside your own colonoscopy, as you hold on to the handles of a mat, hoping not to die. The tube then flops you down headfirst into a trough of water, a Royal Caribbean baptism. It both knocks my breath out and makes me sad.

In keeping with the aquatic theme, I attend a show at the AquaDome. To the sound of “Live and Let Die,” a man in a harness gyrates to and fro in the sultry air. I saw something very similar in the back rooms of the famed Berghain club in early-aughts Berlin. Soon another harnessed man is gyrating next to the first. Ja , I think to myself, I know how this ends. Now will come the fisting , natürlich . But the show soon devolves into the usual Marvel-film-grade nonsense, with too much light and sound signifying nichts . If any fisting is happening, it is probably in the Suite Neighborhood, inside a cabin marked with an upside-down pineapple, which I understand means a couple are ready to swing, and I will see none of it.

I go to the ice show, which is a kind of homage—if that’s possible—to the periodic table, done with the style and pomp and masterful precision that would please the likes of Kim Jong Un, if only he could afford Royal Caribbean talent. At one point, the dancers skate to the theme song of Succession . “See that!” I want to say to my fellow Suites—at “cultural” events, we have a special section reserved for us away from the commoners—“ Succession ! It’s even better than the zombie show! Open your minds!”

Finally, I visit a comedy revue in an enormous and too brightly lit version of an “intimate,” per Royal Caribbean literature, “Manhattan comedy club.” Many of the jokes are about the cruising life. “I’ve lived on ships for 20 years,” one of the middle-aged comedians says. “I can only see so many Filipino homosexuals dressed as a taco.” He pauses while the audience laughs. “I am so fired tonight,” he says. He segues into a Trump impression and then Biden falling asleep at the microphone, which gets the most laughs. “Anyone here from Fort Leonard Wood?” another comedian asks. Half the crowd seems to cheer. As I fall asleep that night, I realize another connection I have failed to make, and one that may explain some of the diversity on this vessel—many of its passengers have served in the military.

As a coddled passenger with a suite, I feel like I am starting to understand what it means to have a rank and be constantly reminded of it. There are many espresso makers , I think as I look across the expanse of my officer-grade quarters before closing my eyes, but this one is mine .

A shocking sight greets me beyond the pools of Deck 17 as I saunter over to the Coastal Kitchen for my morning intake of slightly sour Americanos. A tiny city beneath a series of perfectly pressed green mountains. Land! We have docked for a brief respite in Basseterre, the capital of St. Kitts and Nevis. I wolf down my egg scramble to be one of the first passengers off the ship. Once past the gangway, I barely refrain from kissing the ground. I rush into the sights and sounds of this scruffy island city, sampling incredible conch curry and buckets of non-Starbucks coffee. How wonderful it is to be where God intended humans to be: on land. After all, I am neither a fish nor a mall rat. This is my natural environment. Basseterre may not be Havana, but there are signs of human ingenuity and desire everywhere you look. The Black Table Grill Has been Relocated to Soho Village, Market Street, Directly Behind of, Gary’s Fruits and Flower Shop. Signed. THE PORK MAN reads a sign stuck to a wall. Now, that is how you write a sign. A real sign, not the come-ons for overpriced Rolexes that blink across the screens of the Royal Promenade.

“Hey, tie your shoestring!” a pair of laughing ladies shout to me across the street.

“Thank you!” I shout back. Shoestring! “Thank you very much.”

A man in Independence Square Park comes by and asks if I want to play with his monkey. I haven’t heard that pickup line since the Penn Station of the 1980s. But then he pulls a real monkey out of a bag. The monkey is wearing a diaper and looks insane. Wonderful , I think, just wonderful! There is so much life here. I email my editor asking if I can remain on St. Kitts and allow the Icon to sail off into the horizon without me. I have even priced a flight home at less than $300, and I have enough material from the first four days on the cruise to write the entire story. “It would be funny …” my editor replies. “Now get on the boat.”

As I slink back to the ship after my brief jailbreak, the locals stand under umbrellas to gaze at and photograph the boat that towers over their small capital city. The limousines of the prime minister and his lackeys are parked beside the gangway. St. Kitts, I’ve been told, is one of the few islands that would allow a ship of this size to dock.

“We hear about all the waterslides,” a sweet young server in one of the cafés told me. “We wish we could go on the ship, but we have to work.”

“I want to stay on your island,” I replied. “I love it here.”

But she didn’t understand how I could possibly mean that.

“WASHY, WASHY, so you don’t get stinky, stinky!” kids are singing outside the AquaDome, while their adult minders look on in disapproval, perhaps worried that Mr. Washy Washy is grooming them into a life of gayness. I heard a southern couple skip the buffet entirely out of fear of Mr. Washy Washy.

Meanwhile, I have found a new watering hole for myself, the Swim & Tonic, the biggest swim-up bar on any cruise ship in the world. Drinking next to full-size, nearly naked Americans takes away one’s own self-consciousness. The men have curvaceous mom bodies. The women are equally un-shy about their sprawling physiques.

Today I’ve befriended a bald man with many children who tells me that all of the little trinkets that Royal Caribbean has left us in our staterooms and suites are worth a fortune on eBay. “Eighty dollars for the water bottle, 60 for the lanyard,” the man says. “This is a cult.”

“Tell me about it,” I say. There is, however, a clientele for whom this cruise makes perfect sense. For a large middle-class family (he works in “supply chains”), seven days in a lower-tier cabin—which starts at $1,800 a person—allow the parents to drop off their children in Surfside, where I imagine many young Filipina crew members will take care of them, while the parents are free to get drunk at a swim-up bar and maybe even get intimate in their cabin. Cruise ships have become, for a certain kind of hardworking family, a form of subsidized child care.

There is another man I would like to befriend at the Swim & Tonic, a tall, bald fellow who is perpetually inebriated and who wears a necklace studded with little rubber duckies in sunglasses, which, I am told, is a sort of secret handshake for cruise aficionados. Tomorrow, I will spend more time with him, but first the ship docks at St. Thomas, in the U.S. Virgin Islands. Charlotte Amalie, the capital, is more charming in name than in presence, but I still all but jump off the ship to score a juicy oxtail and plantains at the well-known Petite Pump Room, overlooking the harbor. From one of the highest points in the small city, the Icon of the Seas appears bigger than the surrounding hills.

I usually tan very evenly, but something about the discombobulation of life at sea makes me forget the regular application of sunscreen. As I walk down the streets of Charlotte Amalie in my fluorescent Icon of the Seas cap, an old Rastafarian stares me down. “Redneck,” he hisses.

“No,” I want to tell him, as I bring a hand up to my red neck, “that’s not who I am at all. On my island, Mannahatta, as Whitman would have it, I am an interesting person living within an engaging artistic milieu. I do not wish to use the Caribbean as a dumping ground for the cruise-ship industry. I love the work of Derek Walcott. You don’t understand. I am not a redneck. And if I am, they did this to me.” They meaning Royal Caribbean? Its passengers? The Rands?

“They did this to me!”

Back on the Icon, some older matrons are muttering about a run-in with passengers from the Celebrity cruise ship docked next to us, the Celebrity Apex. Although Celebrity Cruises is also owned by Royal Caribbean, I am made to understand that there is a deep fratricidal beef between passengers of the two lines. “We met a woman from the Apex,” one matron says, “and she says it was a small ship and there was nothing to do. Her face was as tight as a 19-year-old’s, she had so much surgery.” With those words, and beneath a cloudy sky, humidity shrouding our weathered faces and red necks, we set sail once again, hopefully in the direction of home.

THERE ARE BARELY 48 HOURS LEFT to the cruise, and the Icon of the Seas’ passengers are salty. They know how to work the elevators. They know the Washy Washy song by heart. They understand that the chicken gyro at “Feta Mediterranean,” in the AquaDome Market, is the least problematic form of chicken on the ship.

The passengers have shed their INAUGURAL CRUISE T-shirts and are now starting to evince political opinions. There are caps pledging to make America great again and T-shirts that celebrate words sometimes attributed to Patrick Henry: “The Constitution is not an instrument for the government to restrain the people; it is an instrument for the people to restrain the government.” With their preponderance of FAMILY FLAG FAITH FRIENDS FIREARMS T-shirts, the tables by the crepe station sometimes resemble the Capitol Rotunda on January 6. The Real Anthony Fauci , by Robert F. Kennedy Jr., appears to be a popular form of literature, especially among young men with very complicated versions of the American flag on their T-shirts. Other opinions blend the personal and the political. “Someone needs to kill Washy guy, right?” a well-dressed man in the elevator tells me, his gray eyes radiating nothing. “Just beat him to death. Am I right?” I overhear the male member of a young couple whisper, “There goes that freak” as I saunter by in my white spa robe, and I decide to retire it for the rest of the cruise.

I visit the Royal Bling to see up close the $100,000 golden chalice that entitles you to free drinks on Royal Caribbean forever. The pleasant Serbian saleslady explains that the chalice is actually gold-plated and covered in white zirconia instead of diamonds, as it would otherwise cost $1 million. “If you already have everything,” she explains, “this is one more thing you can get.”

I believe that anyone who works for Royal Caribbean should be entitled to immediate American citizenship. They already speak English better than most of the passengers and, per the Serbian lady’s sales pitch above, better understand what America is as well. Crew members like my Panamanian cabin attendant seem to work 24 hours a day. A waiter from New Delhi tells me that his contract is six months and three weeks long. After a cruise ends, he says, “in a few hours, we start again for the next cruise.” At the end of the half a year at sea, he is allowed a two-to-three-month stay at home with his family. As of 2019, the median income for crew members was somewhere in the vicinity of $20,000, according to a major business publication. Royal Caribbean would not share the current median salary for its crew members, but I am certain that it amounts to a fraction of the cost of a Royal Bling gold-plated, zirconia-studded chalice.

And because most of the Icon’s hyper-sanitized spaces are just a frittata away from being a Delta lounge, one forgets that there are actual sailors on this ship, charged with the herculean task of docking it in port. “Having driven 100,000-ton aircraft carriers throughout my career,” retired Admiral James G. Stavridis, the former NATO Supreme Allied Commander Europe, writes to me, “I’m not sure I would even know where to begin with trying to control a sea monster like this one nearly three times the size.” (I first met Stavridis while touring Army bases in Germany more than a decade ago.)

Today, I decide to head to the hot tub near Swim & Tonic, where some of the ship’s drunkest reprobates seem to gather (the other tubs are filled with families and couples). The talk here, like everywhere else on the ship, concerns football, a sport about which I know nothing. It is apparent that four teams have recently competed in some kind of finals for the year, and that two of them will now face off in the championship. Often when people on the Icon speak, I will try to repeat the last thing they said with a laugh or a nod of disbelief. “Yes, 20-yard line! Ha!” “Oh my God, of course, scrimmage.”

Soon we are joined in the hot tub by the late-middle-age drunk guy with the duck necklace. He is wearing a bucket hat with the legend HAWKEYES , which, I soon gather, is yet another football team. “All right, who turned me in?” Duck Necklace says as he plops into the tub beside us. “I get a call in the morning,” he says. “It’s security. Can you come down to the dining room by 10 a.m.? You need to stay away from the members of this religious family.” Apparently, the gregarious Duck Necklace had photobombed the wrong people. There are several families who present as evangelical Christians or practicing Muslims on the ship. One man, evidently, was not happy that Duck Necklace had made contact with his relatives. “It’s because of religious stuff; he was offended. I put my arm around 20 people a day.”

Everyone laughs. “They asked me three times if I needed medication,” he says of the security people who apparently interrogated him in full view of others having breakfast.

Another hot-tub denizen suggests that he should have asked for fentanyl. After a few more drinks, Duck Necklace begins to muse about what it would be like to fall off the ship. “I’m 62 and I’m ready to go,” he says. “I just don’t want a shark to eat me. I’m a huge God guy. I’m a Bible guy. There’s some Mayan theory squaring science stuff with religion. There is so much more to life on Earth.” We all nod into our Red Stripes.

“I never get off the ship when we dock,” he says. He tells us he lost $6,000 in the casino the other day. Later, I look him up, and it appears that on land, he’s a financial adviser in a crisp gray suit, probably a pillar of his North Chicago community.

THE OCEAN IS TEEMING with fascinating life, but on the surface it has little to teach us. The waves come and go. The horizon remains ever far away.

I am constantly told by my fellow passengers that “everybody here has a story.” Yes, I want to reply, but everybody everywhere has a story. You, the reader of this essay, have a story, and yet you’re not inclined to jump on a cruise ship and, like Duck Necklace, tell your story to others at great pitch and volume. Maybe what they’re saying is that everybody on this ship wants to have a bigger, more coherent, more interesting story than the one they’ve been given. Maybe that’s why there’s so much signage on the doors around me attesting to marriages spent on the sea. Maybe that’s why the Royal Caribbean newsletter slipped under my door tells me that “this isn’t a vacation day spent—it’s bragging rights earned.” Maybe that’s why I’m so lonely.

Today is a big day for Icon passengers. Today the ship docks at Royal Caribbean’s own Bahamian island, the Perfect Day at CocoCay. (This appears to be the actual name of the island.) A comedian at the nightclub opined on what his perfect day at CocoCay would look like—receiving oral sex while learning that his ex-wife had been killed in a car crash (big laughter). But the reality of the island is far less humorous than that.

One of the ethnic tristate ladies in the infinity pool told me that she loved CocoCay because it had exactly the same things that could be found on the ship itself. This proves to be correct. It is like the Icon, but with sand. The same tired burgers, the same colorful tubes conveying children and water from Point A to B. The same swim-up bar at its Hideaway ($140 for admittance, no children allowed; Royal Caribbean must be printing money off its clientele). “There was almost a fight at The Wizard of Oz ,” I overhear an elderly woman tell her companion on a chaise lounge. Apparently one of the passengers began recording Royal Caribbean’s intellectual property and “three guys came after him.”

I walk down a pathway to the center of the island, where a sign reads DO NOT ENTER: YOU HAVE REACHED THE BOUNDARY OF ADVENTURE . I hear an animal scampering in the bushes. A Royal Caribbean worker in an enormous golf cart soon chases me down and takes me back to the Hideaway, where I run into Mrs. Rand in a bikini. She becomes livid telling me about an altercation she had the other day with a woman over a towel and a deck chair. We Suites have special towel privileges; we do not have to hand over our SeaPass Card to score a towel. But the Rands are not Suites. “People are so entitled here,” Mrs. Rand says. “It’s like the airport with all its classes.” “You see,” I want to say, “this is where your husband’s love of Ayn Rand runs into the cruelties and arbitrary indignities of unbridled capitalism.” Instead we make plans to meet for a final drink in the Schooner Bar tonight (the Rands will stand me up).

Back on the ship, I try to do laps, but the pool (the largest on any cruise ship, naturally) is fully trashed with the detritus of American life: candy wrappers, a slowly dissolving tortilla chip, napkins. I take an extra-long shower in my suite, then walk around the perimeter of the ship on a kind of exercise track, past all the alluring lifeboats in their yellow-and-white livery. Maybe there is a dystopian angle to the HBO series that I will surely end up pitching, one with shades of WALL-E or Snowpiercer . In a collapsed world, a Royal Caribbean–like cruise liner sails from port to port, collecting new shipmates and supplies in exchange for the precious energy it has on board. (The actual Icon features a new technology that converts passengers’ poop into enough energy to power the waterslides . In the series, this shitty technology would be greatly expanded.) A very young woman (18? 19?), smart and lonely, who has only known life on the ship, walks along the same track as I do now, contemplating jumping off into the surf left by its wake. I picture reusing Duck Necklace’s words in the opening shot of the pilot. The girl is walking around the track, her eyes on the horizon; maybe she’s highborn—a Suite—and we hear the voice-over: “I’m 19 and I’m ready to go. I just don’t want a shark to eat me.”

Before the cruise is finished, I talk to Mr. Washy Washy, or Nielbert of the Philippines. He is a sweet, gentle man, and I thank him for the earworm of a song he has given me and for keeping us safe from the dreaded norovirus. “This is very important to me, getting people to wash their hands,” he tells me in his burger getup. He has dreams, as an artist and a performer, but they are limited in scope. One day he wants to dress up as a piece of bacon for the morning shift.

THE MAIDEN VOYAGE OF THE TITANIC (the Icon of the Seas is five times as large as that doomed vessel) at least offered its passengers an exciting ending to their cruise, but when I wake up on the eighth day, all I see are the gray ghosts that populate Miami’s condo skyline. Throughout my voyage, my writer friends wrote in to commiserate with me. Sloane Crosley, who once covered a three-day spa mini-cruise for Vogue , tells me she felt “so very alone … I found it very untethering.” Gideon Lewis-Kraus writes in an Instagram comment: “When Gary is done I think it’s time this genre was taken out back and shot.” And he is right. To badly paraphrase Adorno: After this, no more cruise stories. It is unfair to put a thinking person on a cruise ship. Writers typically have difficult childhoods, and it is cruel to remind them of the inherent loneliness that drove them to writing in the first place. It is also unseemly to write about the kind of people who go on cruises. Our country does not provide the education and upbringing that allow its citizens an interior life. For the creative class to point fingers at the large, breasty gentlemen adrift in tortilla-chip-laden pools of water is to gather a sour harvest of low-hanging fruit.

A day or two before I got off the ship, I decided to make use of my balcony, which I had avoided because I thought the view would only depress me further. What I found shocked me. My suite did not look out on Central Park after all. This entire time, I had been living in the ship’s Disneyland, Surfside, the neighborhood full of screaming toddlers consuming milkshakes and candy. And as I leaned out over my balcony, I beheld a slight vista of the sea and surf that I thought I had been missing. It had been there all along. The sea was frothy and infinite and blue-green beneath the span of a seagull’s wing. And though it had been trod hard by the world’s largest cruise ship, it remained.

This article appears in the May 2024 print edition with the headline “A Meatball at Sea.” When you buy a book using a link on this page, we receive a commission. Thank you for supporting The Atlantic.