Best Cruise Lines in the Caribbean

The Caribbean is one of the most famous places for cruising. There are more than 200 cruise ships in the Caribbean. As there are so many options for the visitors, choosing the best Caribbean cruise can be overwhelming. While choosing the perfect cruise line, it mostly depends on the visitor’s tastes and preferences. Some tourists love the big resort feel in cruise ships. Some are interested in the highest level of luxury. Others look for the best Caribbean cruise on a budget. Some cruises are suitable for families and kids, some are perfect for romantic honeymoon couples.

So, you need to choose your best Caribbean cruise according to your travel style. Here we will discuss about some of the major category types of Caribbean cruises. This article only covers the beginner guide to Caribbean cruise lines. After you select the category of cruise you wish to travel then you need to look for specific ships, itineraries, homeports, and costs. 

Best Megaresort Caribbean Cruises

If you are interested in spending your week-long vacation on a Caribbean cruise with a large resort, then you can go for MSC Cruises, Norwegian Cruise Line, Royal Caribbean. These big resorts contain every kind of amusement you can ever ask for. They are some of the biggest vessels on Caribbean cruises. Megaresorts at sea are mostly dominated by these three Caribbean cruise lines.

Royal Caribbean Oasis Class megaships are the best in the Caribbean. These series of ships are over 20% bigger compared to other cruise ships. Most of the Oasis-class Cruise lines stay a part of the year in the Caribbean. Oasis-class massive ships outer decks provide large water slides, outdoor pool zones, surfing simulators, zip lines, and rock-climbing walls. Inside of these ships offers shops restaurants, casinos, bars, lounges, spas, showrooms, and many more. 

Best Caribbean Cruises For Families

Carnival Cruise Line, Royal Caribbean, Norwegian, and Disney Cruise Lines are some of the best Caribbean cruises for a family trip. Royal Caribbean Oasis Class ships also rule in this category. Because of their large size, they can offer various amusing features for the family tourists. They also provide dedicated kid clubs which come with no extra cost. They offer various kid’s activities with expert supervision. These cruise lines have many amazing features for family amusement. Norwegian’s new cruise ship Norwegian Encore provides the longest go-kart track at sea which is one of the exclusive family-friendly attractions. If your family is a Disney fan then Disney Cruise Line of Caribbean is best for you. Sailing with Captain Mickey will cost you a bit more than other family cruises. 

Best Caribbean Cruises for Travelers On A Budget

The Caribbean cruise which is mostly famous for its affordability is called Carnival. It is famous in the Caribbean cruise market for its cheap price. In order to reduce the cost, Carnival’s Caribbean vessels revolve around different U.S. homeports instead of other cruise lines. Carnival sails their ships to the Caribbean from Florida cruise hubs, Baltimore, New York City, Charleston, South Carolina, New Orleans, and Galveston Texas. The idea is to allow U.S. people to reach the Carnival Cruise ship by car so that they could save the cost of flights. 

You will not get the massive megaresort experience in Carnival like Royal Caribbean or Norwegian vessels. But they also provide many attractive features. They provide several pool areas, a water section with waterparks, waterslides. There are also Sport Square areas including ropes courses, basketball, mini-golf, and many other outdoor entertainments. So, you can see that cheap price doesn’t necessarily mean less features or amusement in Caribbean cruise lines. 

One of the major drawbacks of Carnival ships is that due to their low fares they onboard a lot of people at a time. So, sometimes it can feel a bit jamming and overcrowded in Carnival compared to other cruise lines. The space ratio is also as low as 30. Space ratio is a measurement of space in the vessel available per passenger. Where Royal Caribbean has 40 space ratio and the Norwegian has 36 to 41. 

Best Caribbean Cruises For Solo Travelers

For solo travelers, the best cruise among the big-ship lines is Norwegian. They are Miami-based cruise operators in the Caribbean and for every ship, they deploy in the Caribbean they offer an entire zone for solo travelers. These solo travelers’ zone can be found in the Caribbean vessels such as Norwegian Encore, Norwegian Getaway, Norwegian Breakaway, and Puerto Rico-based Norwegian Epic, San Juan. 

These unique solo cruiser zones of the Caribbean offer dozens of solo traveler cabins, all of the cabin clusters around each other. There is also facility of private lounge including a bar and television. Solo traveler rooms of these cruise vessels are very small around 100 square feet, they are also known as Studio cabins. The rooms may be small but they are designed in a way to maximize storage space. 

Another renowned Caribbean cruise for solo travelers is Virgin Voyages. Their first vessel named Scarlet Lady provides 46 solo travelers cabins. Also, some worth mentioning solo cruises are Silversea Cruises and Crystal Cruises.

Best Caribbean Cruises For Luxury Lovers

As most of the world’s luxurious cruise ships are busy in Europe and Asia or travels around the world on exotic world cruises. So, it is quite difficult to find luxury lines with butler service and free-flowing caviar in the Caribbean. One of the best luxury cruises in the Caribbean is Crystal Cruises. Some other luxury lines in the Caribbean where money is not an issue are Regent Seven Seas Cruises, Seabourn Cruise Line, and Silversea Cruises. These luxury companies send at least two of their vessels in a part of the year to the Caribbean. 

You can find these luxury cruises during the winters in the Caribbean. April and October are known as dead zones for luxury cruises and it is usually advisable to avoid these parts of the year.

The most interesting luxury cruises are from Seabourn. One of their 458 passenger ship Seabourn Odyssey travels between Barbados and St. Martin during the winter. You can go for an amazing 14-day Caribbean adventure on this ship while traveling from Barbados to St. Martin you can visit St. Vincent, Martinique, Guadeloupe, St. Kitts, and Nevis and Antigua. While traveling from St. Martin to Barbados you can visit Tortola, St. Barts, St. Kitts, Guadeloupe, St. Lucia, and Grenada.