Now that I have cruised on Carnival, Norwegian, and Princess, I can do a comparison of the three.

Before we get into it let me say I have a much deeper knowledge of Carnival having cruised on most of their ships and all of the ones built in the past 15 years.

For Princess I have only sailed on one ship (Regal) that was 10 years old. For Norwegian I have only sailed on one ship (Jewel) that was 20 years old. Also the Norwegian cruise was an Alaska cruise so I spent a lot of time ashore and many of the outdoor facilities were unusable for much of the cruise.

I do have four Norwegian cruises booked including Encore and Prima next year. I’ll be able to give a more fair assessment of Norwegian at that time. I’m hoping to be able to book Sun Princess later this year.

Booking

I have come to like Princess Plus and NCL’s Free at Sea. In the past I always came out as good or better paying for everything individually with Carnival. That changed last year when their fares skyrocketed. As a person who always gets the drink package and internet, that’s an additional $700/week on top of the cost of the cruise. I’m adding gratuities into this comparison since Princess Plus includes gratuities.

Princess Plus cost me $400/week and includes unlimited non-alcoholic drinks and alcoholic drinks up to $15. That limit didn’t stop me from getting anything I wanted. It may be an issue if you like high end liquors or wines.

Princess maintains the 15 drink/day limit that Carnival has, but not the one drink every five minutes limit. They also will deliver drinks to you anywhere on the ship (7-12 minute delivery times for me). I used that feature to stock my fridge with beer on port days when I wasn’t going to hit the limit. That stockpile allowed me to go well over the limit on sea days.

Unlimited Wifi, gratuities, two casual meals, fitness classes and specialty desserts are also included in Princess Plus. I didn’t use the classes or the desserts. My understanding on the casual dining is it’s a recent change. Places that used to be included are now $15. That included the sushi place, the wine bar, and Alfredo’s on Regal Princess. I used both of mine at Alfredo’s and I’ll say that calzone should not be free. It was excellent.

NCL with the Free at Sea includes drinks up to $12, 180 minutes of WiFi, 1 or 2 specialty dinners and $50 off of excursions. They charge you gratuities for the drinks and a higher level than Carnival does but it’s significantly cheaper than purchasing a drink package with Carnival. With Norwegian I paid about $163/week for unlimited alcoholic drinks of $12 or less.

The $50 off of excursions was huge for me in Alaska. I used it seven times, saving $350. I know what you’re thinking. They raise the price of excursions $50 and call it as sale. That’s what I thought at first. Until I found the $50 excursions/tickets you could get for free. That included the Gold Belt Tram in Juneau and the Sky Glider at Icy Strait Point. They have since raised the price of the Sky Glider. I believe it would cost you about $20 after the discount this year.

I am going back to Alaska with Norwegian again this year. I have seven excursions again and two of them are free. I booked the Gold Belt Tram again which I may or may not use. This time I added the Summit Scenic Drive in Skagway which was a $50 excursion that I get for free.

The 180 minutes of WiFi is the worst part of Free At Sea. Right away that WiFi wasn’t going to work for me. I did the upgrade for $300 which got me drinks up to $15, unlimited WiFi, non-alcoholic beverages and a bump up to three total specialty dinners. I haven’t decided if I’m going to do that upgrade again or just pay for WiFi separately. On the cruises where I have access to a solo lounge that has a fancy coffee machine in it, I’m seriously considering not doing the $300 upgrade and just buying a WiFi package. The only alcohols I used from the upgrade were Grey Goose and Bailey’s. I would be fine with Tito’s and Mahoney’s from the basic package.

That additional $300 did not include gratuities. Let’s add $140 for that and say that the Free At Sea+ is $440 and Princess Plus is $400 with gratuities where I’m paying $700 on Carnival. 

A Carnival cruise needs to have a cheaper fare to give me the same value as Norwegian and Princess. Right now it’s not happening.

With Carnival and Princess I can save 10% by using gift cards. Norwegian no longer offers them but I make up for that with my Veteran’s discount. Additionally Norwegian has Cruise Next/Cruise First certificates. At any time you can purchase a $250 certificate for $150. Then throughout they year they will offer sales where you can get $500 certificates for $250. You can only use one certificate per booking but they will randomly have sales where you can use multiple certificates. They just had one where you could use two cruise next certificates for any room category. This can be a significant additional savings I can’t get on Carnival or Princess.

Military/Veteran Discounts

Norwegian gives you 10% off of your fare. I didn’t get it on my first cruise with them because I had a horrible Personal Cruise Consultant. I learned about it after I got back. It was easy to get verified with ID.Me which I already had setup with the VA. Now I get 10% off applied to every cruise I look at with NCL. 

Princess offers $100 onboard credit for veterans. With them it was also easy to get my status verified online. My initial application for OBC was denied because I already had shareholder OBC for my cruise and they had recently stopped allowing both. A week prior to my cruise I heard they had started approving both again. I re-applied and got it. 

Depending on the price of your cruise, 10% can be a lot more than $100 and you never know when Princess could stop allowing both veteran and shareholder again so I put Norwegian ahead of Princess in this category.

I don’t think Carnival offers any Military/Veteran benefits anymore. When they did I never booked it because it didn’t seem to be any better than early saver and you had to go through the hassle of faxing in your DD-214. Carnival comes in last for me in this category.

Booking Transfers

I typically use a travel agent for my bookings. Not because I need them, but because they give me Onboard Credit. I either put a room on hold and allow them to book it or book it myself and transfer it to them. That way I don’t miss out on the room or price I wanted. 

With Carnival I would just have to call Carnival and put a PIN on my reservation. Then my Travel Agent could use the PIN to take over my booking and give me onboard credit. That’s pretty simple. I’m used to that. I like that.

With Norwegian it’s a little more difficult. You have to fill out a form that you send in to Norwegian. After I filled out the form for my Encore booking and sent it in, I was reading up on the rules. It sounded like you could transfer it up to one week after making final payment. After I sent off the form I logged in and made my final payment. That way I wouldn’t have to give the TA my credit card number. With Carnival I always pay with gift cards so I don’t have to actually give out my credit card number. NCL doesn’t have gift cards so you have to use a credit card. 

Three weeks later NCL emails me and says they can’t transfer my booking because it’s paid in full. I must have read the rules wrong. That mistake cost me $125 onboard credit.

On my next booking with NCL I made sure I only made the deposit prior to the transfer going through.

Upgrades

Carnival sends out upgrade offers. Norwegian and Princess allow you to bid. In 20+ cruises with Carnival I have only accepted an upgrade offer once. That was from an interior to a balcony on my Venezia Transatlantic last year. I feel like $30/day is what I’m willing to pay to upgrade to a balcony. Carnival usually wants $700-1000 a week from me. On the Transatlantic they only wanted $348 which was $23/day on the 15-day cruise.

On NCL and Princess I placed bids of a little bit over the minimum bid on most categories. I came up empty with Norwegian but I was upgraded to a balcony on Regal Princess for a total of $210 which was $30/day on my 7-day cruise.

Airfare

I have only booked airfare through cruise lines twice. Both were last year. I did Carnival to Barcelona and I did Norwegian to Anchorage and back from Vancouver. In both cases I saved about 50% booking through the cruise line vs. booking myself. Had I waited until closer to my Alaska cruise I could’ve booked reasonable flights on my own for $100-200 more than I paid NCL.

There are two major differences between the two cruise lines. With NCL I routinely see 2 for 1 airfare as part of their Free at Sea promotion. That means where I saved about 50% booking myself, I likely would’ve saved about 75% if I had someone with me. On the surface that makes NCL a better value than Carnival. 

The other major difference is with Carnival I was able to pick my flights. With NCL I had to blindly hand over my money and hope for the best. They do offer deviations. I paid an additional $25 for them to book me into Anchorage two days before my cruise. That ensured that I would be able to spend time in Anchorage and be able to take the embarkation day train to Seward.

There was a little bit of nervousness with Carnival because while I selected my flights six months out, they didn’t actually ticket me until two months out. But it all worked out in the end.

The cheapest flights are usually the early ones and the late ones. I guess I shouldn’t have been surprised when NCL booked me on an early flight to Anchorage and a late flight from Vancouver. I like flying out early. That flight to Anchorage was one I would’ve picked myself.

I couldn’t have gotten worse flights from Vancouver. They booked me out of Vancouver at 11:45pm on debarkation day. They had me spending all of the early morning hours flying across Canada to Toronto. They only gave me a one hour layover in Toronto. Then they had me flying down to Dallas. Since I can’t sleep on planes, that makes an extremely long day for me. 

I tried to get NCL to change my return flight. They wouldn’t. I tried to get them to at least get me a longer layover in Toronto. They told me they’re authorized to give me as little as 30 minutes between flights. An hour was twice as much. In the end it turned out I had to go through customs in Toronto. By the time I got through security and customs, the customs agent informed me he didn’t have me as a passenger on any flight. That’s because I already missed my flight.

I ended up having to spend an hour in line with customer service who told me that despite what Norwegian told me, they would never allow a 30-minute layover to be booked and would’ve recommended two hours having to clear customs.

I spent another three hours in Toronto and had to connect in Chicago before I was able to get home. I had to file a claim because I paid $45 for a seat upgrade on the flight I missed and wasn’t able to get the upgrade either of my new flights. Air Canada did issue a refund and sent me a one time 20% off discount code good for two years.

Unless you have  a lot of wiggle room on the back end and don’t mind spending a lot of time on planes and in airports, I wouldn’t recommend booking airfare with Norwegian.

I have never booked airfare with Princess. I would expect it to be similar to Carnival since they are both Carnival brands. Maybe that’s something I’ll be able to review in the future. I won’t do it if I can’t pick my flights though.

Rooms

My only experience with NCL here is the one interior room on a 20-year old ship. That said, I found it to be a very modern room. I would say it has almost as many USB outlets as the new Carnival ships. On the new Carnival ships I get four on the desk and one on each bed light. On Norwegian Jewel I had two on the table under the TV and one on each bed light.

The big surprise here is that the Regal Princess, which is only 10 years old and has a lot of technology on board, had no USB ports in the room.

Another thing that surprised me about my Norwegian Jewel room was the glass shower door. That is something I only see on the newest Carnival ships. It wasn’t on the Regal Princess either.

I like that both Norwegian and Princess have liquid hand soap in the bathroom. I have gotten into a habit of bringing my own with Carnival.

The one negative about my Norwegian room would be the toilet. I don’t know if it’s standard in all Norwegian rooms or if it’s just interior rooms or if it’s just that class of ship. The problem is it was facing the wall and if you have long legs, it’s a definite issue.

On Princess I originally had an interior which I later upgraded to a balcony. I was excited for my interior. It was a sideways room with a little hallway going to the bathroom and wide open closet and shelf space on both sides of the hallway leading to the bathroom.

I upgraded to a regular balcony which was a little different. It had a closet coming out in front of the bathroom door, separating the bathroom area from the rest of the room. There were no doors on the closet which I liked. But there was a door on the shelf space. I think the setup is good because you basically have a separate changing area outside of the bathroom that is blocked off from the rest of the room.

One annoying thing about the Princess room was the light in front of the bathroom door has a sensor. So you get up to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night and this bright light comes on in your face. I ended up putting duct tape over the sensor which caused problems when I was in the closet area during the day and did want that light to stay on. Some people cover it up at night and remove the tape during the day. I didn’t want to mess with that so I just dealt with it being off.

The big negative to most balcony people will be the fact that it did not have a couch. It was fine for just me and may have contributed to my ability to get a balcony upgrade for a reasonable price. If that’s the case, I’m all for it. Solo balconies are a great idea.

With Princess I also had an option of a robe in my room during online check-in. 

For in-room TV I would go with Princess. They had a news channel for everyone. They had a live sports channel in the room. They had a special events channel which had some football games on Saturday and Sunday. Their on-demand section is incomparable and all included. 

Carnival’s TV in the rooms is pretty bad. They have very few non-Carnival channels. No news. No sports. The older ships have a couple of channels with scheduled movies. The newer ships have a pretty good selection of both pay and free on-demand movies. NCL had a much better channel selection than Carnival. I would rank NCL second and Carnival third.

Stewards

Princess has twice a day service. Carnival and Norwegian have once a day. On Carnival I prefer evening service. Here lately I’ve been fighting their stewards because they seem to prefer to get everything done in the morning. On Norwegian we only had one true sea day being in Alaska so I didn’t fight it.

It was a nice change on Princess not having to worry about it knowing I would have morning and evening service. On Princess you don’t have to ask them for ice. The bucket is in the refrigerator and it stays full.

If you are a towel animal fan, Carnival has them every day, Princess gave me one for the cruise, Norwegian didn’t have any.

Main Dining Room

Let’s start with breakfast. I’m not a fan of the Princess dining room breakfast. It was a very small menu with two specials that swap out daily. I didn’t like their pancakes. They didn’t have waffles, French toast, or a breakfast sandwich on the menu.

I heard there was a good French toast you can order off menu but I didn’t think about it until debarkation day. It seemed like a big ask for them on debarkation day so I didn’t.

I loved the Norwegian breakfast. Their pancakes, waffles, and French toast are all better than Carnival in my opinion. Their breakfast sandwich is very close with Carnival’s. But the Norwegian one has a pretzel bun so I would go with that one over Carnival’s.

Carnival is in between for me. I like the breakfast sandwich and the french toast. I’m not a fan of their waffles and I think their pancakes are average.

For lunch I liked the Norwegian menus better than Princess. Carnival would have a shot with their Journey lunch menus. Since they don’t have lunch in the MDR on regular 3-8 day cruises, they come in last here.

Dinner I felt like it was all about the same between the three lines. I did like Princess’ dessert options better. I love the souffle on Carnival. On Princess it seemed like they had a different souffle almost every night.

For seating it was easily Norwegian Jewel’s Tsar’s Palace. At Tsar’s Palace those two person tables weren’t right on top of each other as they have been in every other cruise ship dining room I’ve been in. Princess had them close together but I felt made an effort not to seat someone right next me. Carnival I feel the opposite. They purposely try to seat people right next to each other when they could’ve left one table between them for space.

The last thing I want to address here is the number of people I have to fight through on Carnival to get to the dining room. This has been an issue since they went to requesting tables on the Hub App. I wait until my table is ready, then head to the dining room. A large number of people camp out in front of the dining room, in front of the elevators, and in the stairwell waiting for their table. I have to fight my way through those people to get seated. I did find that it was less of a problem on my recent Carnival Spirit cruise. It could be an issue that only plagues the larger ships.

I saw nothing like this on Norwegian or Princess. Princess I just walked up with no line and was seated immediately. Norwegian I almost always walked up and was seated immediately. A couple of times they had me wait for a minute or two on a couch inside the dining room. I feel like Carnival’s dining rooms are as big as Princess and larger than the Norwegian ones. I don’t know why they can’t figure it out. 

I rank the main dining rooms Norwegian, Princess, then Carnival.

Casual Dining

For Casual dining I have to give it to Carnival. Their MDR is not open for lunch but they do the best job with the number of included lunch options outside of the buffet.

On Norwegian it was really just the MDR, buffet, and the Pub. On Princess they had the MDR, buffet, pizza, burgers.

Every Carnival ship has Pizza, Deli, Guy’s Burgers, and Blue Iguana Cantina. Ships built in the last decade have Guy’s BBQ and a pasta lunch in the Italian Restaurant. Vista class adds a noodle bowl lunch in JiJi. The newest of ships add Street Eats, Big Chicken, Chibang, and a larger menu at the Italian restaurant.

I’m not a huge fan of the Carnival pizza. They have limited toppings, I don’t like the crust, and for years they have just thrown three globs of cheese on them. I have noticed recently they have been using shredded cheese and getting a better distribution of the cheese on the pizza.

I think the Norwegian Pizza was better than Carnival’s. My problem there was it was in the buffet. I think it was only open during buffet hours. And it was buffet style. I witnessed people separating the slices with their bare hands which is an example of why I’m not a fan of buffets. I will only eat their pizza if I get to see it from the oven to my plate, which wasn’t a problem the one time I ate it.

My favorite pizza is on Princess. They had two standard pizzas then one special pizza that rotated each day. My one complaint with them is they make very large pizzas and they don’t want to throw pizza away. If you wanted pizza and it wasn’t very busy you may get a slice that has been sitting there for awhile. I even witnessed a fresh pizza sitting there while an obviously old pizza was being served. But if you get there at a peak time when all of the pizza is fresh, they’re the best.  

Specialty Dining

For included specialty dining I will go with Norwegian because you do get specialty dinners with Free at Sea. For overall specialty dining options and quality I will go Carnival.

I feel like the Carnival Steakhouse is on par with the Princess Steakhouse. Carnival’s costs more. They were both a step above Norwegian. But my steakhouse meals on Norwegian were included in Free at Sea.

I think the Italian restaurant on Princess was a step above Carnival. The newer Carnival ships I have been on have more options with JiJis, Teppanyaki, Sushi, Rudy’s Seagrill, Emeril’s Bistro and Viaggio.

It is likely the newer ships on Princess and Norwegian have more options that change my rankings up in the future.

Chef’s Table

I did The Chef’s Table on both Carnival and Princess.

I thought it was more fancy on Princess. I got the impression it’s a really big deal to them. They have a special table just for this event in one of the dining rooms. It’s very fancy. They had more high level people there. The Director of Food & Beverage, Executive Chef, and Restaurant Manger were there the entire time. Everyone was asking me about it the next day (hostess, waiter, restaurant manager).

On Carnival it was more of an experience with a more thorough galley tour, a culinary demonstration, and a magician. They didn’t have the high level people involved. It was run by a sous chef. The Executive Chef came out once for a group photo.

On Princess you got individual photos with the Executive Chef and Director of Food & Beverage. I rank them Princess first and Carnival second.

Drinks/Bars

Again I have just a small sample size of one 20-year old Norwegian ship and one 10-year old Princess ship against nearly the entire Carnival fleet so I’m not sure this is totally fair. I didn’t feel like Norwegian or Princess had a bar or bartenders at the level of Carnival’s Alchemy Bar.

I feel like Princess tries with their “Good Spirits” bar and it’s special menu after 5pm, but they fell short. I didn’t feel like the Good Spirits bartenders were the best they had. My favorite bartenders and cocktails on Princess were at Crowners.

For Norwegian again I was on a very old ship that didn’t have the best bars. I didn’t feel like they had any special drink menus and their bartenders were very robotic. It was the only cruise ship I’ve been on where I didn’t feel like I made a connection with any of the bartenders.

On the upside, there is no daily limit on drinks with them, you can order more than one drink at a time, you don’t have to sign a receipt and the bartenders aren’t constantly asking you your name.

On Carnival you have to sign a receipt with each drink purchase. I have gotten used to using that as an additional tip option and not carrying cash around, but it was nice not having to sign on Norwegian and Princess.

On Princess one of the negatives about the medallion is it tells the bartenders the people in close proximity but they are constantly asking for you’re name or room number. It is much nicer just to hand the card to the bartender, get your drinks, and go on Norwegian.  On Princess you could also order more than one drink at a time but they do have the 15 drink daily limit like Carnival. Both Princess and NCL have bottled beer. Carnival does not.

Coffee

I was a big fan of the Starbucks Coffee shop on NCL Jewel. There was never a line. They always knew what I wanted. And they have 20oz cups. Since I normally drink 20-24oz of coffee a day, I have to go back for a second one on Carnival and Princess. On NCL one is enough.

My favorite cruise ship coffee is easily the butter pecan latte on Princess. It’s almost worth booking with them just for that every day. Carnival comes in third for me in the coffee department.

Entertainment

For production shows I feel like the costumes, sets, and talent on Princess are far superior to Norwegian and Carnival. Just from the little bit I saw of Norwegian, I liked their production shows better than Carnival’s Playlist Productions. I know some of the newer Norwegian ships have old Broadway shows on them so my opinion of their production shows will likely go up as I start to cruise on some of their newer ships over the next year.

For fly-in entertainment (excluding comedians) I have to go with Princess. Just on the one run-of-the-mill Western Caribbean cruise I went on with them they had a Jerry Lee Lewis impersonator, a wildly popular Elvis impersonator, a magician, and a duo of comedic jugglers.

On Carnival I would expect possibly a singer or a magician. They may have both on one of their newer ships. I haven’t seen any of the Carnival singers generate anywhere near the level of excitement the Elvis impersonator did.

I don’t think Norwegian had any fly-in entertainment. Initially I thought their acrobatic duo  was fly-in talent. When they were featured in one of the production shows that made me believe them to be Norwegian employees.

For comedians there is no competition. Carnival has four comedians on a typical 7-day cruise. They usually have 3-4 comedy shows 4-5 of those days. That includes family friendly shows and adult shows.

One of the most disappointing parts of the Norwegian ship for me was the theater. The seats were low to the ground and there wasn’t a lot of legroom. In some seats you could feel a metal bar in your backside. It was a bit shocking to me being an older ship because the most comfortable theaters I’ve been in are the old Carnival theaters. Those have long couches and tables allowing plenty of legroom to stretch out and have people walk by without having to get up. I have taken a peek at the Norwegian Breakaway class theaters and it doesn’t look like it’s going to get any better. The one Princess theater I’ve been in is on par with the newer Carnival theaters. 

I would put Princess second. They had three comedians each doing one show and repeating it later. The only downside is they are all family friendly shows. Norwegian comes in last with one comedian and three shows over the course of the week but two of them were adult shows.

For movies I would put Princess first, Carnival second, and Norwegian third. Princess had indoor and outdoor movies. They probably had six movies per day. Carnival has 1-3 movies per day on lido deck. I don’t know how the newer Norwegian ships are like but Jewel in Alaska had a couple movies a day in the atrium.

Sea Day Activities

Sea day activities is easily Princess first, Carnival second, and NCL third. I may be a little hard on NCL here because I was in Alaska and only had one sea day. I will say they had one of the more unique experiences I haven’t seen on any other ship. This is a bridge viewing area. The window is closed while docking and sailing away so you really can only take advantage of it on Sea days. That was my favorite thing on my NCL sea day.

Carnival is starting to work in more afternoon comedy which is extremely popular. By more I mean one show on some sea days. But they mostly have the bingo, trivia, ice carving, and one Q&A during the week.

Princess had the most to do. Their activities made me feel like I was on a Carnival Journey cruise. They had multiple Q&A’s, culinary demonstrations, a free galley tour, a backstage tour in the theater, lectures including one on navigation from the first officer. They had a magic show. I never ran out of things to do on Princess.

Live Sports

With all of the cruises I’ve done over the past decade, I was not familiar with the Sport24 channel until this past year when I spent two weeks on Carnival Venezia’s Transatlantic. That was the primary sports channel during the crossing. It was very frustrating because while that channel had American sports, it mostly had tennis, rugby, and cricket. I say that to say this: Sport24 is the sports channel on NCL and Princess.

Carnival typically has ESPN and SEC Network. It’s not the normal ESPN. Sometimes you’re going to get soccer when real ESPN is getting something else. But you are going to get more American sports on Carnival than you are on NCL and Princess.

I was on NCL the first week of college football and no college football was on. I heard during football season they will get a couple of college games and a couple of NFL games. They seem to be limited to what is on the Sport24 channel.

I think Princess does a little better than NCL. In addition to what was on the Sport24 channel they had a Special Events channel where they showed more football. That channel was also available in your cabin.

Carnival’s college football is limited but still better than Princess and NCL. For NFL Carnival gets all of the games. You’re only limited by what the bartender will put on the TV. Sometimes they will tell you they can’t change the channel. But overall it’s easily Carnival first, Princess second, and NCL third for live sports.

Loyalty Programs

I have been Platinum with Carnival for four years and I will be Diamond with them in a year. You have to have 75 cruise days with them to get Platinum and 200 for Diamond. I am only going to focus on the top tiers of these loyalty programs since you don’t get many benefits at the lower tiers.

The platinum benefits include a bottle of water, a complimentary beverage at brunch, a VIFP pin, a small gift, priority embarkation/debarkation/water shuttle/guest services line, $25 free play in the casino, a VIFP party that includes free drinks, and 2-5 bags of laundry depending on the length of the cruise.

The only benefits I care about are the priority embarkation/debarkation/guest services, the free play and the laundry. The water and drinks mean nothing since I buy the Cheers package with them.

The only benefits I will care about when it comes to diamond is the diamond lunch and laundry going to unlimited. The only way I can see myself really needing more laundry than what they already give me is if it’s a long cruise. Three bags a week is good for me.

I have no experience with the Princess or Norwegian loyalty programs but I’m going to go over what catches my eye when I look at their benefits.

The first thing I noticed with Princess is they are giving me double points for being a solo. You only need 50 days for platinum and 150 for elite. That means having only cruised with them once, I am just two cruises away from Platinum and ten cruises away from Elite. With Carnival I didn’t make Platinum until my 13th cruise. My Diamond cruise will be my 28th cruise with Carnival.

The main benefits for me in the Platinum level with Princess would be priority embarkation, 50% off of WiFi packages, and access to the Platinum and Elite lounge. I’m not sure if I would use the internet discount or not since you get it with Princess Plus.

As an Elite with Princess the primary additional benefits I could use include 10% off in the gift shop, 10% off of shore excursions, priority water shuttle, complimentary wine tasting event, complimentary mini bar setup, priority debarkation, and complimentary laundry services and shoe polishing.

It doesn’t mention a limit on laundry. If that means unlimited I think Princess Elite has done a good job of matching the benefits I get with Carnival and I can get there much quicker with them.

Norwegian only gives a solo one point per day so it will take just as long to move up through the ranks as it did on Carnival. They do have double or triple point specials at certain times with certain ships. I will be keeping my eye out for those. They have the most tier levels with seven. But I think most of the benefits I would care about would be gained at Platinum which is the fourth tier level. I already have 7 days under my belt so it will take me 10 more cruises with them to get to platinum.

They do have a slew of discounts that start with the first tier and expand in the second tier. But pretty much everyone gets the open bar package with Free At Sea these days so I don’t see a discount on that package being a benefit. The shop discount starts at 10% and maxes out at 15% for the 2nd-7th levels. The shore excursion discount is one that starts at the second level with 10%, increases to 15% at the 5th level, and maxes out at 20% for the seventh level. Photo and spa discounts I will never use.

There is a cocktail party that starts at the second level. Since I will always have the open bar package, I don’t think that would be much of a benefit for me.

The laundry benefit kicks in at the 3rd level which is Gold. You have to sail 45 days to get that level which is almost as many as Platinum on Princess. Double for me since Princess gives me double points. But that laundry benefit is only 50% off of 1 bag at the Gold Level. At platinum it goes up to 1 free bag. That’s the maximum even for Ambassadors who have 700 days with Norwegian. They need to do better than that.

Priority debarkation and water shuttles begin at the gold level.

Priority embarkation begins at Platinum. They also get dinner for two with a bottle of wine, Wines around the world tasting, and the Behind the Scenes Ship tour. I know Carnival charges $150 for their Behind the Fun tour so I would consider that a nice benefit. 

The only benefits I really see to being higher than Platinum with Norwegian is you get dinner with officers at Sapphire level. That’s 150 days so equivalent to Elite on Princess and 50 days short of Diamond on Carnival. Once you get to Diamond (350 days) you get an exclusive mixology experience. 

I’m going to rank these programs Princess, Norwegian, and Carnival. I say that because I can get all of the Princess benefits and most of NCL’s in 11 cruises. It took me 13 to get most of Carnival’s and 27 to get all of them. The one area that makes it tough between Norwegian and Carnival is the laundry. I can’t believe Norwegian never goes above one bag of laundry. But I feel some of the other benefits like the behind the scenes ship tour which Carnival charges $150 for outweighs a couple bags of laundry.

Shareholder Benefits

I have received a total of $1,550 in onboard credit from Carnival since I purchased my stock. I’m going to get at least another $500 in the next year with the cruises I have booked now. Since Princess is a Carnival Corp company, I also received $100 for the cruise I went on with them. The fact that you get the benefit with so many cruise lines with Carnival Corp (Carnival, Princess, Holland America, Seabourn, Cunard, Costa, Aida, P&O) makes Carnival the best cruise stock to own in my opinion. The amounts differ with the foreign cruise lines but with the American brands you get $50 on cruises of 6 days or less, $100 on cruises of 7-13 days, and $250 on cruises of 14 days or longer. 

I do not own Norwegian stock but I hope to one day when the price makes sense for me. With them you get $50 on sailings of 6 days or less, $100 for 7-14 and $250 on cruises of 15 days or more. 

The key difference here is on a 14-day cruise you only get $100 with NCL where you get $250 with Carnival brands. I think that, along with the lower stock price, and the number of cruise lines you can use it with makes Carnival the best cruise stock to own for onboard credit benefits.

Overall

I think Princess is better overall. They really need to get USB ports in their Regal Princess rooms though. That was shocking. Whether or not Princess worth the price is what you have to decide. When I went last fall Princess was cheaper than Carnival. Last summer Princess Alaska cruises were cheaper than Carnival. This summer I can’t do Alaska on Carnival for less than $2,000. I can do it for half of that on NCL and Princess. I’m regretting the August Jubilee booking I made a year ago because I’m finding Sun Princess for the same price. With Princess plus it comes out better than Jubilee with all of the add-ons. This fall I’m finding better value on Princess out of Galveston again.

When everything is equal I will pick Princess. When Norwegian is the best value I will go with them. When everything is equal between Norwegian and Carnival I will likely go Carnival. I find that to be unlikely since I need the Carnival fare to be 300-500 less than Norwegian to offset Free at Sea. The solo rooms on Norwegian are very attractive to me. The last four cruises I’ve booked  have been with them. Carnival is like an old shoe. It’s comfortable. But I’m not going to pay more for an old shoe.