Should you upgrade to a premium cruise line? The surprising reasons it can be worth it

Australia sees more than a million cruise passengers coming through our waters every year. What might be surprising to some is knowing that about half of all these visitors are sailing on just two cruise lines, Carnival Cruise Line and Royal Caribbean. 

While Australia sees all kinds of different cruise lines and ships on its shores, it’s these big family lines that drive the majority of cruise traffic. These family lines are known for being centred around family fun, with a special emphasis on family entertainment, high quality kids clubs, multi-generational activities and more. 

However, also very popular in Australia are premium cruise lines. These are lines which are generally a step up from the family cruise experience, such as Princess Cruises, Celebrity Cruises and Holland America Line. Princess is a hugely popular option for Aussie cruisers, and has been for a long time. 

It is celebrating its 50th year of sailing in Australia this year – making it Australia’s oldest cruise line following the closure of P&O Australia.

There are a number of reasons why these lines are popular, from value to ambience. There might be more reasons than you think to book a cruise on a premium line.

What to know about premium cruise lines in Australia 

• The price jump may not be what you think, premium might even be cheaper. The most important thing to note about Aussie cruising, is that premium lines are not always more expensive than family lines. While Carnival Cruise Line is by far the cheapest cruise line in Australia fare-wise, Royal Caribbean fares are often fairly comparable with those of Princess and Celebrity. For many itineraries, Princess and Celebrity can even be quite a bit cheaper. 
• Premium doesn’t necessarily refer to more expensive, but rather a different type of experience.Think of premium cruising as pointing more towards a cruise experience built more around sophistication, dining, adult-focused activities and so on. Royal Caribbean ships have some of the best facilities of any in Australia, but they’re not considered a premium line. You can’t guarantee that your premium line will top them in every way, but rather that it will be geared towards a different kind of cruising experience. 
• Which premium lines sail in Australia? The most popular premium lines that still sail in Australia are Princess Cruises, Celebrity Cruises and Holland America Line. 

Why try premium?

Avoid kids and crowds 

If you’ve cruised with Carnival or Royal and liked the experience at sea but did not enjoy the younger children running around, making the leap to a premium line will largely solve this problem for you. While you’ll still definitely find kids on these lines, they have significantly less of a presence and the demographic leans more towards couples, groups of friends, and multi-generational families with slightly older children.

Another bonus of this is that the ship’s entertainment and activities will generally be more geared towards adults rather than families.

You’ll still see kids around, and if you want to take them, there are still kids clubs and things to do as a family, but it’s a far cry from the amount of families you’ll see on Carnival or Royal Caribbean.

More itineraries to try out 

In Australia in particular, the family lines sail fairly standard itineraries. These do involve great sailings like those to the Great Barrier Reef or the South Pacific, but premium lines definitely have more diversity into sailings.

For example, Princess Cruises definitely offers the biggest range in itineraries for Aussie cruisers, with cruises on offer all around the country, even in Western and South Australia, and even circumnavigations of the entire country’s coast line. 

Holland America is known for its New Zealand sailings which offer more immersion than most other lines, visiting more ports and sometimes running one way, allowing the whole cruise experience to be slowed down and focused more on the destination.

Celebrity also offers a great range of itineraries, including specialised wine cruises, which focus on visiting wine regions. 

If you want the destinations to be a larger part of your holiday, upgrading to premium is a good way to go. 

A more refined and sophisticated atmosphere 

As mentioned above, this is really the key difference between a family and premium sailing. You can expect more tranquility and more sophistication, across the ship you’ll still find entertainment and things to do, but you can expect more of an upscale vibe, even down to the way people dress.  You can expect fewer flip flops in the dining and more buttoned shirts.

Think of the difference between staying in a family beach resort versus in a nice, boutique hotel.

You can still expect a lively atmosphere, live music, plenty of entertainment, venues to dance and so on, but in general, it’s all happening in a more refined and curated way, with less of the free-for-all feeling that you might find on a family line.

Dine away

While you can find good food on any cruise ship, lines like Celebrity and Princess place dining as a much higher priority than the family lines do. While you’ll still have to pay a little bit extra for specialty restaurants, you can expect the included restaurants to be a notch above what you’d expect on a family line, and the specialty restaurants to be more innovative, unique and elegant. 

Celebrity especially is a great cruise line for foodies, with an extra focus on contemporary and innovative cuisine, as well as special and unique venues, like their Magic Carpet. 

These premium lines don’t quite bring that luxury level of dining where all restaurants are included and you can expect mind-blowing meals wherever you look, but they’re generally a solid mark above family lines in terms of consistency, diversity of options and overall restaurant quality.

Package together your holiday

All three premium lines in Australia offer deals to package together drinks and wifi, if you so choose. 

Princess’s packages, Princess Plus and Princess Premier are the most well known, as they also include a range of other perks and offer the best pricing amongst major lines. However, Celebrity and Holland America also have offers to package together drinks and wifi that let you relax with a better idea of what your final cruise bill will look like.

Carnival has actually recently introduced a package that does this well, however, it’s only available during certain promotional periods, rather than being a stable option that guests can rely on. Royal Caribbean does not offer this option. 

Adding the premium experience together with a drinks and wifi package can give you something much closer to an all-inclusive feeling. Also, if you’re already someone who gets drinks and wifi packages, they’re generally cheaper on premium lines, due to the packages, and this means that if you are paying more in your fare, it will likely even out due to paying less for drinks and wifi.