Royal Caribbean Drinks Package: Prices, the 20% and Whether It Pays

Royal Caribbean sells three drinks packages, priced per sailing rather than at one fleet-wide rate, so the figure you pay is the one attached to your own booking. The price moves with the ship, the date and how well the cruise is selling. A 20% service charge is then added at checkout.

That makes the sum worth doing properly rather than from a rule of thumb. This guide sets out what each package covers, what people actually pay, and the rules that decide it before any arithmetic does. The prices here are observed rather than published, so treat them as a guide and check your own booking.

The Three Packages

There are three, and only one involves alcohol. The names do not make that obvious, so it is worth being clear about which is which before looking at any prices.

One detail in the Deluxe package terms is worth noting. It covers any single drink priced up to US$14. Order something dearer and you pay the difference rather than the full price, which is fair enough. But it does mean the premium cocktail lists on the newer ships are not fully covered by the package that looks like it covers everything.

The two non-alcoholic packages are more straightforward and considerably cheaper, and they are underused. A great many passengers buy the Deluxe package because it is the one that gets talked about, when what they actually drink through the day is coffee, water and the occasional mocktail. If that is closer to your holiday, the Refreshment package covers it for a fraction of the price and carries none of the cabin-wide rules that make the Deluxe package awkward.

1. Deluxe Beverage Package. The alcohol one. Cocktails, spirits, liqueurs and beer, wines by the glass, fountain soft drinks, mocktails, premium coffees and teas, bottled still and sparkling water, fresh-squeezed juices, and smoothies and milkshakes where the ship has them. Drinks up to US$14 each, plus 40% off bottled wines up to US$100 and 20% off bottles above that.
2. Refreshment Package. Everything above except the alcohol. Fountain soft drinks, mocktails, Johnny Rockets milkshakes, bottled still and sparkling water, premium coffees and teas. The sensible choice for anyone who drinks a lot of coffee and not much else.
3. Classic Soft Drinks Package. Fountain soft drinks and unlimited refills, plus access to the Coca-Cola Freestyle machines and the cup that activates them. The cup matters more than it sounds, because it is the only package that still includes one.

What Is Not Included

The Deluxe package reads as though it covers everything, and for most of a normal day it does. The exceptions are worth knowing because they tend to appear at exactly the moments people assume they are covered.

Anything priced above US$14 is the main one. On the newer ships the premium cocktail lists, the rarer single malts and the better wines by the glass sit above that line, and you pay the difference. It does mean the bar bill is not always zero, and a habit of ordering from the top of the list will produce a running total worth keeping an eye on.

Bottles of wine are not included either, though they are discounted: 40% off bottles up to US$100 and 20% off anything dearer. For a couple who would rather share a bottle over dinner than drink by the glass, that discount plus no package at all is sometimes the cheaper evening.

Some venues sit outside the package altogether. The mini bar, room service charges, the ship’s private venues and some onboard events are all charged separately, as are drinks bought ashore. The rule of thumb is simple: if it is not served by a bartender in a normal bar or restaurant, check before assuming.

What It Costs

Royal Caribbean prices each package per sailing rather than setting one rate across the fleet. Each package is priced per sailing, in the Cruise Planner attached to your booking, and the number moves with the ship, the date and how well the cruise is selling. It is the single biggest difference from the lines that print a fixed price on a public page, the same for everyone.

What people pay is reasonably consistent, even though the figure is not published. The Deluxe Beverage Package is generally US$55 to US$120 per person per day. The non-alcoholic Royal Refreshment Package sits around US$35, and the Classic Soft Drinks Package nearer US$15. Older and smaller ships sit at the bottom of each range. The newest and largest sit near the top, and the same ship can move by US$20 or more between sailings, with school holidays and short breaks dearest.

It works rather like airline pricing. Royal Caribbean is filling a set number of package slots on a set sailing, and the price reflects how that is going. A cruise selling well carries a dearer package. One that is not gets discounted as the date approaches, which is why it pays to keep checking.

Two things follow from that. The first is that any figure quoted in an article, including this one, is a guide rather than your price, and the only number that counts is the one in your own Cruise Planner. The second is that the price genuinely does fall, so it is worth checking more than once. Royal Caribbean discounts packages in the run-up to sailing and around its regular sales, and a package bought early can be cancelled and rebought at the lower price.

How the Service Charge Works

Royal Caribbean sets this out in its own gratuity FAQ: a 20% gratuity is added to beverage packages whether you buy before the cruise or on board. The figure shown while you are deciding is before that charge is applied.

On a mid-range Deluxe package at US$70 a day, that is roughly US$84 per person per day once the percentage lands. Over a seven-night cruise for two it turns about US$980 into about US$1,176. Royal Caribbean’s FAQ calls this gratuity optional, so it can be adjusted at the Guest Relations desk like the daily charge. Once the package is paid for, the gratuity is covered and nothing further is added at the bar, though you can tip more if you want to.

It also matters when you compare lines, because they do not all work this way. Some add nothing at all to bar prices, so an advertised package price is the whole price. Others add a percentage on top of every drink. Always work that percentage in before comparing, or the package that looks cheapest may not be.

The Rules Worth Knowing

Royal Caribbean’s conditions decide this for more people than the arithmetic does. Three in particular are worth knowing before you start working out whether the package pays.

1. Everyone of drinking age in the cabin has to buy it. Royal Caribbean requires all guests of legal drinking age in the same stateroom to buy the Deluxe package if any of them does. A couple where one drinks and the other does not cannot buy a single package between them, and that one rule rules it out for a great many people. The non-alcoholic packages have no such requirement.
2. One drink at a time, and no sharing. The package is personal and tied to your SeaPass card, which the bar staff will ask to see. Only one drink is served per guest at a time, so you cannot collect a round, and you cannot buy a drink for someone else on your package.
3. The legal drinking age is not always the same. Royal Caribbean applies the drinking age of the waters the ship is in, which is 21 on most itineraries out of the United States and 18 on many European sailings. It decides who can buy the Deluxe package at all, and it can change during a cruise.

When It Pays

There is no single break-even figure, because the package price varies by sailing and so does what you drink. The method matters more than any number: take the price in your own Cruise Planner, add 20%, and divide by what a drink actually costs you.

On a Deluxe package at US$70 a day, or about US$84 with the service charge, and with cocktails on board at roughly US$14, break-even is around six cocktails a day. On beer at about US$9 it is nearer nine or ten. On a cheaper sailing at US$55 a day the sums are considerably kinder, and at the top of the range near US$120 the package needs a good deal more drinking to justify.

Count the things that are not alcohol, because they add up faster than people expect. Premium coffee, bottled water taken ashore, fresh juices at breakfast and mocktails by the pool all count, and two speciality coffees and a couple of bottles of water is already US$15 before anyone has had a drink. The itinerary matters too: a week of sea days on a large ship is very different from a port-intensive Mediterranean sailing where you are ashore from nine until five.

One more variable decides it for couples. Because every adult of drinking age in the cabin has to buy the Deluxe package, the real question is rarely whether it pays for you. It is whether it pays for both of you combined. Take a pair where one drinks enthusiastically and the other has a glass of wine with dinner. Together they will usually lose on the package, even though one of them is comfortably ahead. That single rule turns more people away than the price does.

Sailing Without One

Plenty of passengers do, and the ships are set up for it. Tap water, standard coffee and tea, iced tea, lemonade and juice at breakfast are included in the fare, so nobody goes thirsty without a package.

You are also allowed to bring some of your own. Royal Caribbean permits two 750ml bottles of wine or champagne per stateroom at embarkation, and up to twelve standard cans or cartons of non-alcoholic drinks per guest. Bringing your own water and soft drinks removes a surprising slice of the spend that would otherwise push you towards a package.

If you do go without, the drinks bought individually also carry the 20%, so a US$14 cocktail is closer to US$17 on the account. Your SeaPass account is visible on the app throughout, which is the honest way to keep track rather than discovering the total on the last morning.

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