Norwegian Prima Cruise Reviews - Reviews

I’ve been on the Bliss prior to the Prima. The Bliss was by far a better ship.

The ship was not good ,very unorganized,. the ports on Cozumel,Belize,Rotan bay island were all good

The NCL Prima is a different ship that take a little getting used to but nice, new and refreshing.

Some fantastic ideas and areas on the ship but some massive issues with the layout. No one could get in syd Norman’s, far too small, along with the Buffet and food Hall. First time on NCL we’ve encountered some very rude staff too which was a real shame. Lovely cabins,

I really wanted to cruise on the Prima since it was a new ship. I was underwhelmed by the experience.

Question: Would I ever cruise with Norwegian Cruise Lines again? I gave my son a cruise to Iceland, Norway, Belgium and Amsterdam as a graduation gift. I booked with NCL because I thought that some of the fellow passengers would be younger (30 to 45). I was wrong. The deal that was offered to us included free drinks, including liquor priced at under $13. I really do not drink that much, but it was free. Well, not really. NCL charges you a gratuity on everything at 20%, so the free drinks ended up costing us $198 per person. Unless you plan on consuming your weight in vodka, the premium liquor package is not worth the month. If you have the free liquor package, the first $13 on the cost of any drink is covered; you only pay the difference. If a glass of wine is listed at $19, you pay $6, plus the 20% gratuity. Then there is the free WiFi. Turns out that you get 150 minutes per cabin, but you cannot use the WiFi at the same time as your cabinmate. We’re in the practice of communicating by text, but in order for this to work, both of us need to use the WiFi at the same time. So, in order to be able to find each other on this huge ship, we had to pay $399.80 so that we could both use WiFi. We arrived at 11:00 a.m. to check onto the ship. Check-in went very smoothly and was very efficient. We wanted to check in early because we were told that this is when we could book seats for the shows and spa treatments. Turns out that this wasn’t true. At no time could we book seats to anything. On the night of the show you stand in line for over an hour and the seats are assigned on a first come first served basis. We were not given access to our cabin until 2:00 p.m. (and we were the first group called), so we spent 3 hours sitting in the common area. Unfortunately, the ship does not have enough common area to accommodate everyone, and the majority of the guests were sprawled on the floor. The tour was supposed to have 3 stops in Iceland, but a few weeks before the cruise started, we received an email telling us that the stop to Isfjordur had been canceled. It turns out that this was hardly the first time that NCL had canceled a port on a cruise. I did a little research and found out that the port was probably removed from the itinerary because NCL failed to reserve a spot at the port or failed to pay the port for the right to stop there. We were now going to spend 36 hours on the ship before stopping at Akureyri at 3:00 p.m. We used this time to explore the ship, but unfortunately, the go-carts, darts, video games, and mini golf close at 9:00 p.m. You want to pass on the video games. The tech is at least 20 years old. We tried the casino, but there were only two other passengers there and it was depressing. Not much to do on the ship after 9:00. Luckily, I had booked reservations for dinner every night. When we arrived at Hudson’s for our reservation there was a huge crowd in front of us. It turns out that if you do not have a reservation, the wait for dinner can be up to 90 minutes. The food and the service at Hudson’s, Cagney’s Steakhouse and Palomar was wonderful. Just be sure to book a reservation. Finding a seat for breakfast at Surfside or a seat for lunch at Indulge Food Court is virtually impossible. We finally paid the extra $5 (plus 20% gratuity) to have breakfast in our room every morning because we did not want to roam around Surfside looking for 2 empty seats. If you want a seat, you have to arrive at Indulge Food Court at 11:45 a.m. and wait 15 minutes until they open. Indulge Food Court is very efficient, and the food was very good. I would pass on the food at Surfside. We arrived at Akureyri, but instead of pulling up to the pier, we parked in the middle of the fjord. The captain comes over the intercom and tells us that because of our “safety”, we would not dock until the following morning. I guess no one told the captain that there is an app that locates every registered ship located anywhere in the world. The true reason that we were not docking that afternoon was that there was another ship using the dock. Seems like NCL forgot to book this dock too. At this point we had missed out on our tour of Puffin Island and our opportunity to ride Icelandic horses. The following morning we received the NCL daily newspaper with the headlining “The Adventure Continues” and I thought, do these people think that this is fun? We also learned that our tour for 9:30 a.m. had been moved to 7:30 a.m. I personally do not want to get up at 6:00 a.m. on my vacation, but I wasn’t angry until we reported to the meeting area and sat there for two hours while NCL got their act together. Have these people ever planned a cruise before (I found myself asking this question every day)? It turns out that getting up at 6:00 a.m. was going to be an everyday thing. The ship claims that it spends 10-12 hours at each port. They do not tell you that for the first 4 hours it is dark and nothing is open. Of course, this does not stop the staff from getting on the intercom at 6:00 a.m. and telling everyone that the ship has been cleared for disembarkment. Yes- we did turn the intercom off in our room. It doesn’t matter. You can still hear the announcements through the walls. Finally they loaded 500 of us on buses and started to take around Akureyri. Most of the places that they took us to could not accommodate this many people. It felt crowded, it was impossible to take photos without someone’s head in the frame, and using the bathroom was a challenge because the lines were so long. The tour was poorly planned and when we finally reached the botanical gardens, our main reason for booking this particular tour, we were told that we had 20 minutes before the bus left for the ship. Have these people ever planned a cruise before? Two of the tours that we had signed up for were substantially changed before we left for the cruise. We cancelled these excursions and booked through Viator instead. It was refreshing not to be jammed into a location with 500 other people. We could walk around at our own pace, we took great photos, and we paid 70% less than we would pay through NCL. Plus, Viator actually followed the schedule that they sold you; no changes to the time that the tour started and no changes to the places that they would take you. We had signed up for beer tasting in Belgium. The tour that we bought was to start at 11:30 a.m., but once on the ship we learned that the tour time was changed to 9:30 a.m. I gave up drinking beer for breakfast when I graduated from college. What were they thinking? Have these people ever planned a cruise before? The first excursion that we booked was for the Flam Railroad. I realize that it wasn’t the fault of NCL that a rockslide had closed the road to the railroad, but NCL waited until 5 minutes before the tour to tell us this and at no time gave us the option to cancel. If we had known before we were walking out the door of our cabin, we would have cancelled the excursion; but that was probably why they waited to share the news. We were promised that the replacement excursion would be just as fun and just as wonderful. They lied. We spent 9 hours sitting on a bus. We were allowed off of the bus for a one-hour lunch and three more stops at 20 minutes each. Because there were 200 of us, some people spent most of the one-hour lunch waiting to get their food. The three stops included seeing 2 waterfalls and looking at the same fjord that we could see from the ship. Can you imagine sitting on a bus where every seat was taken for seven hours? I spent the last day at sea sleeping and planning my funeral. It turns out that there was a covid outbreak on the ship, but this information was not shared with the passengers. I managed to go 4 years without ever getting covid, but one week with NCL and there wasn’t enough medication in the world to make me feel better. Because NCL decided to be concerned about the health of their passengers on the last day of the cruise, everyone with covid had to exit at one of two specific times. Based on the number of people in our group and extrapolating from there, I believe that approximately 80 people on the ship were infected with covid. Imagine how many people were not feeling well, but did not want to pay to see the ship’s doctor. I understand that there are HIPPA regulations, and I did not want the names of the infected people, but I did want to know that they existed. I would have taken steps to safeguard myself and my son. NCL comes off as a less expensive option for cruising, but while the charges on the other cruise lines are included, NCL nickel and dimes you for everything. This cruise ended up costing me as much as my Viking Cruise to Venice. This does not count the $1100 bill from the ship’s doctor. There are better option out there and the daily calls from NCL while we were on the cruise to book my next cruise with them is not going to change me mind.

For all the planning NCL put into these new ships they really missed on layout which played a big factor on the upper decks being so disjointed. The buffet and pool deck were too small but the indulge and new design of deck 8 are great additions. A spacious ship well worth going on but don’t think it’ll be my favourite NCL ship or class.

Just an exceptional experience of Cruising. I enjoyed this very much

We loved the ports but feel we paid too much for this cruise. After final payment, we saw that the price dropped $3000 CA. I asked our agent to ask what we could do and he said we were locked in. A gentleman on the ship at dinner shared that he called NCL when he saw this and got a $2200 Future cruise credit. It put a real damper on the cruise but at that point it was too late to do anything about it. Keep checking the prices and don't take no for an answer. They also cancelled two of our ports after final payment. The Belgium stop was important to us. They said it was because of the tides. The Iceland stop of Isafjordur was due to dock extensions being done. These were being done for the entire year so NCL knew in advance but didn't let us know until after we had paid and would lose big bucks if we cancelled. We complained and got a $200 OBC but really this was just a refund of the port taxes we would have been charged for these ports. Other reviews indicate that port cancellations on this cruise itinerary seem to occur often. What you see may not be what you get.

My biggest issue was with the Vibe Beach Club. There is a dangerous soot issue that results in soot being spewed all over everything on deck, including chairs, clothing, hot tub and your lungs.

Beautiful ship and outstanding crew. Everything was wonderful. This ship is a great ship for port intensive itineraries. We would definitely criuse in the Prima again.

This is not just another review. This is a very well thought of explanation of why, no matter who you are, or what you do, and what you like, you should avoid spending a dime, and any of your time on an NCL cruise. We should have read the reviews. They voice the same things. And yet NCL carry on disappointing. I’ve attached the first review that comes up on google. First of all I have to say that the general design standard of the NCL Prima is like a premium hotel. It’s well made. And the bathrooms in the cabins are big compared to Royal Caribbean. Also the staff on board are really nice people. And they make you feel welcome. It’s the layout, the standards and the rules that are a big problem. HYGIENE & CLEANLINESS On the hygiene side. The room attendant is a lovely person. But the cleaning standards are lower than they should be. And I’m talking everywhere. To the point where sometimes the toilet which is an obvious element wouldn’t be cleaned. And I’m not talking minor things. Not to be too inappropriate, I’m talking major toilet dirt, hair on the counter… multiple times. Then you notice in the restaurants the washed knife with some food left on it. The glass that’s not clean on the ring, or worse that is chipped where it touches your mouth. When it happens often it feels like a standard. Or in this case a non-standard. We got to the room and the couch had stains. Big ones. The coffee mugs were dirty. And when I say dirty I don’t mean something most people won’t see. We’re not that picky. I mean black goo on the ring. We complained. Came back to the room to see that the couch cushions were turned. And the coffee mugs were not washed, just wiped with a tissue! And the tissue WAS UNAPOLOGETICALLY THROWN IN OUR BIN!! Motel standards at best. ROYAL CARIBBEAN: A BENCHMARK Having been on Royal Caribbean Wonders of the Sea before the NCL Prima. Both newest ships of both companies. The difference is HUMONGOUS. It’s like NCL are 20 steps behind. Or, as the Financial Times coincidently reported while I’m on the ship this week: while in 2022 they were at the same level, Royal Caribbean’s stock is now worth 3 times more. And now I know why. A FAIR COMPARISON The Royal Caribbean ship is spacious. The restaurants are in Avenue type spaces. Where there’s a pathway or greenery in the middle and restaurants on the sides. Which have seating outside, where the ceiling sometimes is full glass, or open sky. One of the avenues is kids friendly with a Johnny Rockets, a toy store, a show pool, climbing wall, and arcade basketball and such games. Restaurants that are not in the avenues are adjacent to the adult pool area. They’ve got a park on the ship! A water park for the kids, next to a big kids pool area. Even on the inside. It’s like a small city. Where rooms are rooms. And entertainment spaces are big, obvious, different. On NCL the open Space is just one. And it’s small. Like the lobby of a small building. And has Starbucks and customer service. A couple of wide corridors that have shops that don’t sell anything useful or interesting. And then then most restaurants are at the side of a kind of a labyrinth. Free included dining is good at the surf side bar on NCL. Which is a buffet. Always crowded. Food dropping on the floor is too frequent. But when there’s an excursion (that is very expensive) that comes back after lunch time is closed, they don’t change the schedule. They let you miss major lunch time and figure it out on your own. DINING The outlet called The Local has such a dreadful kitchen. Food is very bad. And always has that smell of cheap restaurants who don’t clean well after food production or after customers leave. Premium dining on NCL is good quality. But it should be great. Shouldn’t it?. But that’s just the main course and the desserts. For some reason the appetizers are generally bad in most of the restaurants. And the understanding of meat cooking has nothing in between medium and very well done. So either soft pink or burned. NCL has less outlets. And they only open at night! While on RC they open for lunch too. And are much much more pleasant. On RC we practically never had to dine in free included dining areas. Unless we wanted to. And when we chose to, at breakfast for example, their version of the buffet is separate areas that don’t intersect with each other. There could be 1,000 people there and you wouldn’t feel it. And the food options were bigger. On RC there’s even an afternoon big dessert buffet, just in case you wanted to indulge. While on NCL it’s just the dessert decision of the lunch or dinner buffet. And they close from 3 till 5:30. You buy a dining package on NCL you’re likely to waste a part of it. Unless you know beforehand that they only open at night. Then you buy less meals. You buy a soda package on NCL you get normal soda while you’re dining, or at the bar. Using your card. On RC, on top of the above, you get a beautiful souvenir cup with a chip that activates many Coca Cola machines on the ship with infinite choices of drinks. ENTERTAINMENT Entertainment on Royal Caribbean is a multitude of shows that are almost at Cirque du Soleil level. Amazing. And there are many. With actors flying around. Professional stuntmen doing mind blowing acts. Professional ones! Mechanical stages that change shape. One that turns into a pool with a superb water show. There’s so much entertainment that you can’t do it all on one trip. And you feel that you got so much value for your money. On NCL you’ve got ONE theatre that has a magician, one singing show and the game the price is right. And is too small to accommodate for the demand. So we’ve never been. And it’s incomparable. And since they don’t have any other decent space. They turn this theatre into a night club at night. Clubbing on RC is in the adults area with a view of the sea all around. A very different experience. OUTDOOR ENTERTAINMENT That’s beside the fact that when you’re going to put a cruiser in a part of the world where your outdoor facilities aren’t useable because of bad weather, you have to find replacement indoor entertainment, or just don’t put it there and disappoint! Iceland to England, there was barely an hour of sun in ten days. The rest was too cold. We tried the infinity pool on NCL it’s nice. But if people knew there was going to be good weather, and brought swimwear, the pools would’ve been too crowded. But either way, people would go out wearing layers. Only to find that the mini golf games didn’t work. “They need maintenance”. The darts they give you are bent and worn out like a cheap bar. The ping pong and such games area is dirty and unpleasant. And too small for the ship. The karting track is nice. The idea of doing that on a ship is cool. But you do it once. Then it’s not that great. They could’ve used that space to create four or five things. Like maybe a climbing wall, more theaters or things that entertain a big number of people. INDOOR ENTERTAINMENT They advertise that they have a VR place instead of an arcade. First it’s too small for such a ship. Second most of the games are low level. Low resolution. And all of the interesting games didn’t work. And, again “needed maintenance!” What?? I paid an arm and a leg to be here. And I get bad quality games or ones that don’t work and mediocre entertainment?? Are they allowed to claim that anything on such a ship with such a ticket cost “needs maintenance”?? HOW THEY RUINED OUR VACATION WITH UNREASONABLE COVID RULES And the cherry on top of the experience is when my son got mildly sick for one day mid trip and it turned out to be Covid. They forced us to keep him in the room, even without symptoms, for 5 days which killed the remaining days of the trip for him. And for us. And the hypocrisy is that the child who gave him Covid is also one who goes to the kids area, and is without symptoms (or mild ones) and who is running free in the ship. We said you, NCL, gave us Covid because of nonchalance or because you don’t care if someone comes in with Covid and roams on board. Then how come you ruin our kid’s vacation when his situation is not any different from the people carrying the virus, which you don’t care to identify? Their answer: because you were responsible and came to us. We have to apply the Covid rules to you. And keep your son in your room and unfortunately ruin his vacation. If you hadn’t come into the infirmary, even with extreme symptoms, we would let you go about the ship and risk infecting everyone. They got to a point where they had SIXTEEN confined guests with screwed vacations!! SIXTEEN. And the one who spread the virus was still free on the ship. Him and anyone who didn’t go to the infirmary when they got symptoms. Either you’re concerned about the general safety and so you treat the virus as a threat or you don’t. And you let the people who are without symptoms wear masks and enjoy their vacation. Whenever I said or pleaded didn’t work. They had security on us. Threatened us to throw us out of the ship at the next port if our son went out of the room. But oh by the way, we, his parents, who are in the same room as him, could go anywhere we want. No masks needed. They even didn’t let us take him off the boat to see the cities where we docked. Even with no symptoms. Even with a mask. The only way to get out of this was to disembark and leave the ship for good. Then they’d let him out. The irony on top is that they know some people have Covid on the ship and they only confined the responsible ones who came forward. And yet they apply all the “precautions” like cleaning our room last, asking our son to be escorted by security on the day of disembarking to “protect other passengers”. While they know that they can simply ask our son to wear a mask and enjoy his time. And he’d be acting safer than the loose people who carry the virus carelessly. All this hypocrisy in the approach to safety while they know that the virus carriers who didn’t come forward are probably breathing in everyone’s face, especially in the kids area and such. This remained till the last day. As we were asked to leave after everyone even though we paid for priority. Our luggage that was supposed to be in priority but it was in a “Covid area” partially wrapped in plastic. The most stupid thing I’ve ever seen. The funnier part is that they said that we have priority in-room dining because they confined us. As I write this review we have been waiting for close to TWO HOURS for lunch. The kids are cranky and hungry. And every time we call they ask us to wait. I’m glad that I am able to voice this to the world. Because NCL is not cheaper than Royal Caribbean. In fact it might be more expensive. And the difference in the experience between both companies is absurdly high. This is their best ship. The epitome of the NCL experience. Feels like a Royal Caribbean knock-off at best. The difference in the experience is so high, that even if NCL was 10 times cheaper. Which it should be. I wouldn’t buy a trip with them ever again.

NCL has already cancelled 2 ports of call and given zero accommodation for the cancellations. That was the bad start. The ship is beautiful, each common area is inviting and elegant, restaurants are excellent. Shops are lacking in both choice and options. Entertainment is unusual - lot's a game show / trivia. Donna Summer show was good. Magician show was average. Live music was good but venues got very crowded. Spa seems very crowded and pricey. Fitness center is small and way too warm. It's annoying to have t walk through the spa to get to the fitness center but not the end of the world. Nice video game room and games on the deck for families. overall we loved it - we had a great time. NCL crew was great!

Loved the itinerary despite the many issues we had with the ship. Staff was amazing and did their best. Food was outstanding.

We loved the Indulge Food Haul, wish the hours were longer, the ports were wonderful with breathtaking scenery, Wish the entertainment was better and they had more of it.

Just wanted to share with everyone that my trip was absolutely perfect until on the last night before our arrival to a final destination mine and my husband stuff was stolen from our bags . We were stying in Haven vip suites and this happened . I am so disgusted by this whole incident that my whole overall trip which was wonderful got ruined completely. We believed that our butler and the cleaning person were involved in this scheme . So disappointed, we filed multiple claims and awaiting for some sort of resolution . So for everyone who stying in the Haven and will be planning on stying beware!!!!! The working personal can steal your expensive stuff and they will do it on the last night of you journey !!!! Check u items and make sure nobody takes it away from u !!!!

Overall, I'd rate our trip a B-, mainly due to a lot of little hiccups that tarnished an otherwise great vacation. The ports were wonderful, great scenery and a lot of walking. This is not a "lay on the beach" cruise.

great destination but not the best experience that we have had. Norwegian needs to assess how it operates its cruise and also be a little flexible within its restaurants , people will pay for stuff but they hate to feel nickeled and dimed. We Will not cruise this cruise Line again. Tried it a second time and this confirmed the experience from the first cruise with this company.

Was expecting the worst from all the other reviews that I had read for a few months. Had the most magnificent time on this ship. The most we ever had to wait in line for a meal was 10 minutes. When you go out for dinner to a rest you wait much longer. I never saw any shortage of staff. They didn’t look miserable like they disliked their jobs. Couldn’t find a seat at one bar another had a seat. Never waited to be served at any bar. By the way the ship was a capacity. Loved this ship. Might do the return transatlantic in November

Some design issues, but I’m sure they’ll make some changes in the future.