Should You Buy the Drink or Dining Package Before Your Cruise?
If you have read our guide to what is actually included in a cruise fare, you already know that the headline price of a cruise and what you will actually spend are often two very different numbers. Packages are where that gap gets decided. Buy the right ones before you sail and you can lock in a predictable vacation cost, often at a lower rate than you would pay onboard. Ignore them and you might find yourself with a final bill at the end of the cruise that is considerably higher than it needed to be.
The core principle is straightforward. Cruise lines offer beverage packages, specialty dining packages, Wi-Fi packages, and various combinations of all three at a pre-purchased rate that is almost always lower than what the same items cost individually onboard. The catch is that you are committing to a daily spend before you know exactly how you will feel once you are on the ship. That uncertainty is what makes people hesitate. It should not, because the math nearly always favors buying in advance if you have a reasonable sense of how you holiday.
On Carnival, venues like Blue Iguana and Guy’s Burger Joint are always complimentary
Drinks and Cocktails
The drink package is where most people get stuck. The question is not whether you drink, it is whether you drink enough over the course of a day to make the daily package rate work in your favor. A typical mainstream cruise line beverage package runs somewhere between $80 and $110 per person per day depending on the line and when you buy. If you have three or four cocktails, a couple of coffees, and a bottle of water on a sea day, you are likely ahead. If you have one drink at dinner and nothing else, you are not. The honest answer is that most people who think they drink moderately on a cruise drink more than they expect, because the environment encourages it and because there is no visible transaction at the point of purchase once the package is active.
Our friends at CruiseHabit have put together a drink package calculator that takes the guesswork out of this entirely. You answer a few questions about your cruise length, how many sea days you have, and what you typically consume, and it does the math for you and tells you whether the package makes financial sense. It is the most practical tool available for making this decision and we would strongly recommend running your numbers through it before booking: https://www.cruisehabit.com/cruise-drink-package-calculator
Dining
Specialty dining packages follow similar logic. If you are sailing on a line where specialty restaurants are a significant part of the onboard experience, and you know you want to eat at two or three of them during a seven-night sailing, a dining package will almost always cost less than booking those restaurants individually. The value erodes if you end up defaulting to the main dining room or frequent the lido buffet/marketplace more than you planned, which does happen. The safeguard is to book the specialty restaurants as soon as you board, treat them as fixed evening plans rather than optional extras, and make the package work for you rather than leaving it as an unused benefit. Reservations at some of the high demand onboard speciality restaurants often fill up fast and walk-ins may not always be accepted.
Internet
Wi-Fi packages are perhaps the easiest call of all. If you need to stay connected for work or simply want to be able to use your phone normally while at sea, buy the package before you sail. Onboard Wi-Fi prices have come down significantly with the widespread adoption of Starlink across the major fleets, but they are still higher purchased individually than as part of a pre-cruise bundle, and the pre-cruise rate is typically lower than what you will find in the cruise line’s app once you are onboard.
The timing of when you buy matters too. Most cruise lines offer their best package pricing during promotional periods in the months before sailing, and many allow you to reprice a package you have already purchased if a better deal comes along before your departure date. It is worth checking back periodically after you book. Carnival, Royal Caribbean, and Norwegian in particular run regular promotions where package pricing drops materially, sometimes by 20 to 30 per cent off the standard pre-cruise rate.
In Summary
The simplest way to think about all of this is to flip the question around. Instead of asking whether the package is worth it, ask yourself how you would feel arriving home to a larger bill than necessary because you paid a la carte for things you knew you were going to use anyway. If you drink, buy the beverage package. If you plan to eat at specialty restaurants, buy the dining package. If you need internet, buy the Wi-Fi. Do it before you sail, do it when pricing is at its lowest, and enjoy the cruise without a running tally in the back of your mind every time you order a round.
