Is Virgin Voyages Worth the Extra Cost

If you do a cursory comparison between most other cruise lines and Virgin Voyages, you’ll see that Virgin is much more expensive than the others for basically the exact same cruise. And you may wonder what you’re missing. Here it is – Virgin is NOT much more expensive. Virgin claims there are no hidden fees and it’s true. With most other cruise lines, if you want to drink something other than water? That costs money. Want to have some slightly-better food? Money. You want your bartender to eat tonight, right? Money. You want your room steward to eat tonight, don’t you? Money. You want a drink package but your companion doesn’t drink alcohol? Too bad – they have to buy it, too! On top of that, with many other cruise lines, you have to click through a lot of screens before you get your “final cost” – and you don’t even know that it’s not the final cost until you’re at the end of your cruise.

Just to hammer in my point, I did an analysis comparing two nearly identical cruises between Virgin Voyages and Royal Caribbean for a 4-night cruise in March of 2022 leaving from Miami, stopping at Nassau, Bahamas, their private island/space, and a sea day in an Inside cabin. Both of these screen shots are from their initial search results screen. These figures were pulled in late February 2022, which means we are not taking advantage of any early bird discounts.

Disclaimer: Just to be clear, I’m not trying to hate on Royal Caribbean, claim that they are bad value for your money, or that they are a bad cruise. I just randomly used them as an example to compare the real out-of-pocket cost between a cruise line with a typical cost structure and Virgin Voyages.

“Wow Virgin is so much more expensive!” Let’s take a walk.

First of all, notice that this is the price per person. Rooms are almost always based on double-occupancy. Some cruise lines do have solo cabins, including Virgin Voyages. But most don’t, which means that even if you’re sailing alone, you still have to pay for two people.

Second, RC only shows you the price per person in the search screen. You have to select a sale date and cabin type to get the cabin price, which is a more real number. Virgin allows you to search by Cabin price, getting you that much more real number up front.

$251 X 2 = $502. RC still looks a lot cheaper, right? Well let’s start clicking through the screens until we reach the final cabin price + taxes and fees.

At this point, we get a base fare of

Virgin Voyages: $1,650
Royal Caribbean: $724.46

But all those hidden fees for four nights and 2 people…

Room Gratuity

Gratuity is the biggest required one. For this cruise, Virgin Voyages already has the gratuity included in the cost. From Royal Caribbean’s website, gratuity is an extra $14.50 per person per day.

Virgin Voyages: $0
Royal Caribbean: $116

Drink Gratuity

Again, with Virgin Voyages, drink gratuity is already included in your cruise fare. From Royal Caribbean’s website, gratuity is an extra 18% to all beverages. Let’s say you spend $200 on drinks.

Virgin Voyages: $0
Royal Caribbean: $36

“If the gratuity is already included in the drink price, doesn’t that mean I get 18% less alcohol for the same money on Virgin?” Surprisingly, no. Royal Caribbean doesn’t post their drink prices online, so I found these entries on Cruise Mummy comparing both Royal Caribbean and Virgin Voyages drinks prices. There is some variability for individual drinks, plus they cost $1 more each on RC’s newer ships, but Virgin is not consistently more expensive.

Basic Drinks Package

Most cruise lines offer a basic drinks package. This is basically “something other than water.” Cokes, non-pressed juices, teas, and drip coffee. Basically what can be put in an urn or coke machine. From Royal Caribbean’s website, the smallest drinks package you can get is for coke products only. This has a range of $13 – $15, so we’ll pick the cheapest at $13 per person per day.

Virgin Voyages: $0
Royal Caribbean: $104

Better Food

Most cruise lines have some restaurants that are included with your fare. But if you want a more premium experience, it’s going to cost you. Scarlet Lady has more than 20 restaurants on board that are included with your fare. And these aren’t all the exact same food with different dining rooms claiming to be different restaurants (yes, I’ve seen that). Some of them are typical cruise fare like pizza and hamburgers. But they also include six restaurants that are a “typically you would have to upgrade for these” such as steak & seafood and Korean BBQ. That you can eat at as much as you want (pending capacity). So let’s say that you want two upgraded dining experiences. This Royal Caribbean voyage is on Freedom of the Seas. We’ll pick the Chef’s Table, which varies between about $85 – $95 per person, and Izumi Hibachi, which is $45 per person.

Virgin Voyages: $0
Royal Caribbean: $260

Internet

Lots of people want to disconnect while at sea, but human parents and pet parents are often not comfortable being 100% disconnected from what’s going on back home. With Virgin Voyages, your basic wireless internet is free. This is extremely unusual in the cruise industry. I haven’t been able to find an official source for how fast it is, but The Points Guy did some testing and found the download speeds to usually be between 3 and 8 MBPS. Royal Caribbean has no free option and doesn’t advertise how much their paid option costs, so we had to go to Royal Caribbean Blog to find out. $15.99 per day per device for the cheapest Surf option, which is equivalent to Virgin’s. In our scenario, let’s assume that each Sailor only has one smartphone and no laptops.

Virgin Voyages: $0
Royal Caribbean: $127.92

Fitness Classes

Many cruise lines offer group fitness classes like yoga and spinning. With Virgin Voyages, all group fitness classes are included with your fare. Not so with Royal Caribbean. They don’t tell you how much their classes cost online, so I had to find Cruise Line’s article on Fitness classes. Let’s pick one yoga class and one spinning class, which are each $12 per person.

Virgin Voyages: $0
Royal Caribbean: $48

Private Island / Space

Royal Caribbean has their Coco Cay and Virgin Voyages has their Beach Club at Bimini. These are very different spaces. The Beach Club at Bimini has a large pool, beach, lockers, and all food included. It’s a very relaxing high-end type of place. Payable upgrades are things like cabanas. Coco Cay has all of those things, plus a helium balloon, a whole water park, more pools, and even nicer beaches. But here’s the thing: those nicer things Royal Caribbean advertises all over the place with their Perfect Day at Coco Cay cost extra. Included in your fare are basic beach and pool access. But if you want everything they’re advertising to you, it costs money, so I consider it a surprise cost. Whereas with Virgin Voyages, everything they advertise to you is included. How much you pay varies on what you want access to, and the cruise, which Royal Caribbean doesn’t tell you, so I’m using Cruise Maven’s Perfect Day at CocoCay estimator. Let’s take the lowest cost per person for a full day at Thrill Waterpark ($44 per person) and Coco Beach Club ($54 per person). This excludes the hot air balloon and zip line (which most cruise lines would consider a paid shore activity).

Virgin Voyages: $0
Royal Caribbean: $196

Bottom Line

All of our extras on Royal Caribbean are coming in at $887.92! This brings our final cost to

Virgin Voyages: $1,650
Royal Caribbean: $1,613.92

Well look at that! Our original difference of $925 is down to $36.08. Obviously I had to make a lot of assumptions here. The order of magnitude of the difference is going to vary depending on your cruise style. If you want a premium dining experience every night, if you want more fitness classes, if you drink more alcohol and thus higher gratuities, etc. Even if you don’t think you want those things, it’s a very frustrating feeling to be on a ship, know that you could be having a better experience, but don’t want to be nickle-and-dimed for it. Maybe you think you don’t need the fancier food. But if it’s already included, maybe you’ll discover a new kind of food you love. Or maybe it turns out you love yoga but had just never tried it before because you don’t know where to go. Having so much included with your fare lets you explore things you may not have ever even thought of exploring.

What about Alcoholic Drinks Packages?

I mentioned alcohol gratuity and basic drinks package, but didn’t even get into the alcoholic drinks package. This is a major apples – oranges comparison between these two. It heavily relies on your individual tastes so it’s really tough to come up with a generic scenario like we did above. But let’s look at some numbers.

Royal Caribbean offers a typical Deluxe Drinks Package that varies between $63 – $89 per person per day. And you have to pay another 18% gratuity. In our scenario, picking the smallest cost, that works out to about $594.72. And by the way, it’s only valid for drinks less than $13 and everyone in the cabin must buy it. Do you enjoy chocolate martinis, coincidentally priced at $15? Congrats, you’re still shelling out $2 per drink (plus another 18% gratuity). Traveling with someone that doesn’t drink alcohol? He better drink a whole lot of coffee and cokes!

Virgin Voyages has the concept of a Bar Tab. You pre-pay $300, per cabin, and get an extra $50. Any member of the cabin can use it for any kind of drink, including that $15 martini. Or that $80 fancy whiskey or the $3 macchiato. And no extra gratuity. The End, no “buts”.