Celebrity Apex Cruise Reviews - Reviews

Expensive for the whole experience but enjoyed it. Thought I would do a compare review against the other cruises we had done. Others were Royal Caribbean Indy of the seas 3 nights, Sky Princess 7 nights, MSC Virtuosa 2 nights. Royal Caribbean still tops it for us but each of the 4 cruises had great things and not so great things. Room and embarkation/disembarkation was best on Celebrity, Food 3rd best but a very good 3rd best, Drink the worst, Service joint 2nd best and a very very good 2nd best. Entertainment/Activities worst. Ship layout worst on Celebrity. Whilst my review may sound critical and sound like it’s not great because it’s last in some areas it’s still a great ship and we had a great time, the 4 cruises we have done have been of a great standard and we have enjoyed all 4 and will continue cruising. I think we may have expected more of celebrity because of the price and probably wouldn’t chose celebrity again but only cause Royal Caribbean spoilt us and we found the service and app service on princess incredible.

Great sailing and enjoyed the trip! Definetly recommend

When we entered the ship to our surprise there were not staff there to greet us, that might sound odd, but we are used to having staff standing in the lobby as you enter to welcome you onboard, this immediately set the tone for the entire cruise: service isn’t valued here. We entered our cabin on our first day on board and opened the wardrobe to find a pair of dirty socks inside. Now I know things can be missed but this just assured us that the cabin hadn’t quite been cleaned properly, which on a cruise ship is a top priority post-COVID. The bedsheets were damp on touch, and this was repeated throughout our stay, every time we had our sheets changed, they were damp, which was uncomfortable and unsanitary. The dining experience on Apex, or perhaps Celebrity as a whole is not something we were used to, having different restaurants that are bookable. We have no issue with this concept, but our issue was we didn’t understand it at first and nobody explained it to us. We went to the restaurants on day 1 to ask about how it worked, we were greeted by staff that at best didn’t understand themselves how it worked and at worst couldn’t be bothered to help at all. They were confused themselves if you had to book a table or didn’t. We decided to come back later because we couldn’t get a straight answer from them. We did so an hour later, and entered the restaurant and asked a waiter if he could help us with booking a table for dinner, his response was “call 7000”, no hello, no other words uttered just looked up at us and said “call 7000”, he didn’t even wait for our response before walking off. We then tried to book dinner in the app and discovered every main dining restaurant, on every day of our cruise was fully booked. As I said before, we have no issue with a new alternative dining concept on cruises, but you can’t do that and not explain to guests how it works. It was only on day 2 when we bumped into other cruisers that they explained how it operates. So multiple staff, including Guest Services couldn’t be bothered to explain it, but our fellow guest had to. The bars onboard – Declan and like to drink when on holiday and we pay for the Premium drinks package for this purpose. It is important to us as it leads to a relaxing experience however, I think this is where your service fell down the most. The bars onboard, particularly by the pool were regularly three deep with guests, on Day 2 I waited 45 minutes for a drink at the Rooftop bar, this was 45 mins STANDING at a bar in the sun whilst the bar staff were clearly run off their feet and unable to keep up with the demand. It was regular that we waited 20 mins + at a bar for a drink crushed in with other guests – that is not a “premium” experience. We also found table or pool side service to be entirely absent. We would wait at other bars and at the main café for at least 20 mins before a member of staff even acknowledged us, let alone could provide a drink. There was one or two roaming servers’ poolside but they were woefully understaffed and unable to cope with the number of guests you had onboard. In the nightclub, as a server brought Declan a drink, I asked if I could have another drink, to which the server pointed at the bar and said “yeah the bars over there mate”. I have never experienced such an unwillingness to help or reluctance to provide any sort of service to guests. This massively impacted our overall experience, we were unable to enjoy or relax poolside because we had to regularly get up to go to the bar and were gone for 30 mins because there were not enough staff. Late one evening I couldn’t sleep as I was quite hungry, so I wondered up to the buffet and went to the pizza section where a cook was cooking pizza, I asked if I could have one to which he responded “closed”, again no acknowledgment of the guest or offer an alternative just “closed”. Lack of shoreside staff – when we got off at the ports on this cruise there were no shoreside side from Celebrity to explain anything, this was particularly frustrating at Porto, where there were two different buses, one was paid and one was free. We had to speak to other guests to work out which was which as there were no staff to explain anything. Cleanliness of ship – there was a general uncleanliness to the ship, most of the outdoor tables had black marks all other them, the cups the drinks were served in which were originally clear had turned white and were cracking through overuse, the sunbeds were filthy, surfaces across the ship were sticky in what reminded me of a bad nightclub more than a luxury ship. Future Cruise experience – I have just come off an MSC cruise where I used the future cruise desk to book a further two cruises. Now I compare that to your Future Cruise desk where we visited twice. Both times we sat down next to one of your agents and said we were interested in looking at another cruise, both times the staff just pointed towards a rack of brochures, they seemed more interested in gossiping with each other than helping us spend our money. We wanted to talk to a human and get their advice so we walked away thinking we would come back later and hopefully someone will be more helpful but no, we returned the next day to see 4 free agents sitting at desks gossiping with each other, we walked up to one of them and asked if we could talk about booking another cruise, only to be yet again directed towards a wall of brochures with no offer to help or talk to us about what we wanted and what Celebrity might be able to offer. A general lack of service and experience – throughout our cruise there just appeared to a complete lack of service, we felt more like a burden than a guest where merely asking for a bottle of water seemed too much and we were subject to tuts, eye rolls and just a complete lack of any communication, no hello, no how may I help you. Staff would just walk past you with their eyes down in the hope of avoiding any contact. We spent a lot of money onboard, Declan brought a £3,500k ring, I brought a £1,800k bag and spent several hundred dollars in the casino but everything seemed like hard work to the staff. We spoke to several crew whilst there and expressed our dissatisfaction, including with Guest Services, to which the standard response seemed to be “the ship is very full” or “this is most amount of people we’ve had onboard”, “we have never had this many children onboard” as one senior officers commented. My question to you is this: at what cost? It is all well and good packing the ships full to make more money, but someone has to ask at Head Office, what is the wider cost of this? If the ship is too full to provide a good service to its customers than surely it is over capacity. You should not have that many guests onboard if you can’t keep up the experience. On every single sea day, Declan and I were unable to find a SINGLE sunbed free, bar staff were overrun, on Day 3 the ship had run out entirely of a popular rose Whispering Angel, which is Declan’s favourite, we were unable to find a single table at lunch in the buffet to the point we had to eat outside.

Go with Celebrity excursions. These may be more expensive but the ports are very small towns with not many transportation options. Also, if delayed during the excursion, the ship WILL wait for you for their excursions. Happened once during this sailing. In the middle of nowhere locations you don’t want to be lost

Itinerary was major selling point of this cruise and it didn’t disappoint.

Great cruise to some very different ports. Make sure you prepare for the weather, it's often cold and rainy in the summer (even more than I had expected), but that didn't prevent it from being a great trip.

All in all a really nice cruise with some brilliant stops. Would do again and recommend

Wonderful cruise. Excellent staff that goes above and beyond to make sure each guest enjoys the cruise. Great food. Very clean and well kept ship. Lots of top notch entertainment.

This was our 2nd Celebrity cruise and we thought it an opportunity to try Edge class. We really enjoyed the ship and the experience.

This was our first celebrity cruise having always been with Royal so it was interesting to compare the two. Thoroughly enjoyed our cruise, made all the better as we had some great weather

Great ship, excellent cruise of the fjords and fantastic service. What’s not to like ?

We loved the transatlantic cruise. We were worried about possible rough weather but the Captain planned ahead and kept us out of harms way. There were so many fun activities to do while sailing for 7 nights in the sea. The time went by quickly and we did not experience any seasickness at all. We loved our ports. Only thing we really didn’t like was all the time zone changes. It is easier to do on the ship rather than flying. By the last full day, I had an occasional cough. And more folks here and there did. No Covid. It came with a fever by the time I got home. All in all it really was the best 13 night cruise we have been on. Definitely recommend the suite experience!

This was an amazing cruise, we love Celebrity! The crew is always excellent and the food is awesome. Only regret was not going for a longer cruise!!

This being our first cruise was a very good experience. I think we were fortunate to pick the right ship and the right itinerary for first-time cruisers. This gave us an idea on whether we would enjoy going on a cruise as well as being able to experience the great amenities of the ship not only in the retreat area but also the rest of the area of the ship. We were fortunate enough to meet the captain and his crew. We were also fortunate enough to have a conversation with a number of the crew. Many of them have been there for years with celebrity and they seem very happy and excited to have us on the ship. The crew and that ship are exceptional and we're excited to go back on it in the future.

SIMPLY AWESOME can't wait to book another and try new destinations

The ship was awesome! A wide variety of demographic groups on ship. Saw a few unattended children but overall relaxing and enjoyable. Great entertainment and food options! The staff made the cruise! Couldn’t thank them enough!

I never got off at ports. Spent time every day in thermal spa and spa treatments.

Would do this cruise again but on the Solstice class ship

This was a family cruise with our grown children & spouses (9 altogether) great experience for each of us.

Would I do it again, I don’t know. Maybe bigger is not better. This was a floating art gallery, I didn’t spend this kind of money to look an art. I thought it was wasted space you could have used for something fun for everyone.