Southampton Cruise Port: 5 Terminals and How to Get There

Southampton cruise port is five terminals in two dock areas, one either side of the city centre: QEII, Ocean, City, Horizon and Mayflower. Which one you get is decided per sailing, not per cruise line, so trust your boarding documents and the live berth list over any general rule. City and Horizon are a short walk from Southampton Central.

Which Southampton cruise terminal is my ship using?

Your terminal is written on your boarding documents: the e-ticket, the line’s app or the pre-cruise email names it, and usually gives you the dock gate as well. If you can’t find it, the port’s live schedule lists each ship against a berth number, and the berth number tells you the terminal.

The port asks passengers to check both the terminal and the boarding time with their cruise line before travelling, and the reason is simple: berths get allocated per sailing, not per ship or per brand. The same ship can turn up at a different terminal on different dates.

Keep the berth numbers handy, because the schedule uses those instead of terminal names:

• Berth 38/39: QEII Cruise Terminal
• Berth 46/47: Ocean Cruise Terminal
• Berth 101: City Cruise Terminal
• Berth 102: Horizon Cruise Terminal
• Berth 106: Mayflower Cruise Terminal

The five sit in two dock areas split by the city centre. QEII and Ocean are in the Eastern Docks; City, Horizon and Mayflower are in the Western Docks, and driving between the two takes about ten minutes around the centre. Horizon and QEII are the pair people mix up most, because they’re separate buildings on opposite sides of the port.

Current allocations give you a rough idea rather than a guarantee. P&O Cruises, Cunard, AIDA and Princess turn around at Ocean, Mayflower and QEII; Royal Caribbean, Celebrity and MSC use Horizon; Fred. Olsen uses City.

Cunard splits across three, with Queen Mary 2 mostly at QEII, Queen Anne at Ocean and Queen Victoria varying by date. P&O’s Iona, Britannia and Arvia show up at Ocean, while Ventura, Aurora and Arcadia are mostly at Mayflower, and the complete list of cruise lines sailing from Southampton covers the rest.

Royal Caribbean has scheduled a ship out of Horizon and back into City on the same sailing, at the line’s request for shore power. Guests got an email about the change, were told to use Dock Gate 8, and were given the distance between the two: about a quarter of a mile. The terminal on your outward paperwork isn’t always the one you come home to.

What each terminal is like inside is a shorter story than the facilities lists suggest, and what to expect at Southampton’s cruise terminals is a queue, a scanner and not much else.

If you’re still working out whether Southampton is the right departure port at all, the comparison with Portsmouth and Dover comes down to how you reach the port and where the ship goes.

Southampton cruise terminals map

Southampton’s five cruise terminals are split between the Eastern Docks (Ocean and QEII) and the Western Docks (City, Horizon and Mayflower), each with its own dock gate and postcode. Tap a pin for directions.

• Ocean Cruise TerminalBerth 46/47 · Eastern Docks, Dock Gate 4 · SO14 3QN
• QEII Cruise TerminalBerth 38/39 · Eastern Docks, Dock Gate 4 · SO14 3GG
• City Cruise TerminalBerth 101 · Western Docks, Dock Gate 8 or 10 · SO15 1HJ
• Horizon Cruise TerminalBerth 102 · Western Docks, Dock Gate 10 · SO15 1AW
• Mayflower Cruise TerminalBerth 106 · Western Docks, Dock Gate 20 · SO15 0GN
• Southampton Central stationTrain station · 5 to 10 minutes by taxi to any terminal
• Southampton Coach StationNational Express coach stop · a taxi ride to the terminals
• Dock Gate 4Dock gate · for the Ocean and QEII terminals
• Dock Gate 20Dock gate · for the Mayflower terminal

Southampton’s five cruise terminals, berth by berth

All five do the same job in the same order. The differences are size, age, whether you board by air bridge and what’s within walking distance.

Inside every terminal the routine is the same: porters take the cases at the drop-off lane, check-in runs by cabin grade or boarding window, bags go through an airport-style scanner without the liquid rules, and then it’s the gangway or the air bridge.

Terminals are working buildings rather than destinations. Expect seating, toilets and a small café or vending machine in most, and nothing beyond a kiosk in the way of shops: no left luggage, no restaurant, and no admission before your boarding window.

Southampton port schedule: ships, times and berths

Southampton’s live schedule is published by Southampton VTS, the port’s vessel traffic service, with arrival and departure times and berth details fed from the port’s live data and refreshed every ten minutes. It’s the closest thing to a departures board the port has.

Treat it as provisional. The published schedule can be altered, and precise times appear under Planned Movements within six days of the arrival date. There’s no airport-style board listing every sailing: your booking confirmation carries your check-in time, and the live list tells you which berth the ship is on.

Most Southampton calls are turnarounds, so the same ship appears arriving and leaving on one date. Ships normally arrive between about 04:30 and 08:00 and sail between 16:00 and 22:00, with passengers clearing the terminal from about an hour after arrival in waves until roughly 10:00.

Weekends are the heavy days. A date with three or four ships listed means queues at the station taxi rank, hotels at their fullest and slow going at Dock Gate 10. If a ship-tracking app shows your ship still approaching at breakfast, that’s normal rather than a delay.

Dock gates and postcodes: why a generic search sends you to the wrong gate

Each terminal has its own postcode and its own gate, and a generic search for Southampton docks or Southampton cruise terminal can drop you at the wrong one. Put the terminal postcode in the satnav and follow the gate number.

• QEII and Ocean: Dock Gate 4, SO14 3GG and SO14 3QN
• City: Dock Gate 8, with Gate 10 as a workable alternative, SO15 1HJ
• Horizon: Dock Gate 10, SO15 1AW
• Mayflower: Dock Gate 20 recommended, Gate 10 possible, SO15 0GN

Mayflower is the one that catches people out. It often gets given the SO15 1HJ postcode used elsewhere in the Western Docks, but its own is SO15 0GN, and the approach runs via Western Avenue, over the level crossing to West Bay Road and then Imperial Way.

From the M27, leave at junction 3 onto the M271 and then the A33 signed City Centre and Docks, following the dock gate signs. From London it’s the M3 south, then either the M27 west or straight on from junction 14 along the A33.

The port is a working dock estate rather than a single address, and anyone without a boarding pass gets stopped at the gate.

Getting to Southampton by train from London

Most of the UK can reach Southampton without flying, which is the quiet reason cruising from Southampton without airport stress works so well, and the train does most of the heavy lifting. London Waterloo to Southampton Central is direct on South Western Railway, with about two trains an hour.

The fastest take 1 hour 12 minutes and most take between 1.5 and 2 hours, with the first direct train around 05:30 and the last around 23:35. Book ahead: advance tickets are far cheaper than a walk-up fare on the day, and first class costs little more on an advance fare while giving you the luggage space.

Check the travel time as well as the price. Fast services stop only at Woking, Basingstoke, Winchester and Southampton Airport Parkway, while slower trains add Eastleigh and a dozen small stations and can take two hours.

There’s no luggage limit on South Western Railway, but racks fill on Saturday sailings, and a mid-morning train still makes a 13:00 boarding. The trap is a fixed advance ticket, which ties you to one train at a time when a boarding time can move. If your check-in slot isn’t confirmed, a flexible ticket costs more but saves the argument.

Get off at Southampton Central, not Southampton Airport Parkway. Parkway is the stop before Central and serves the airport, not the port.

Getting there by coach: cheap, but the coach station is not the port

National Express serves Southampton Coach Station on Harbour Parade, which is a city-centre stop rather than a cruise terminal; you still need a taxi or a lift with the luggage at the other end. London to Southampton by coach averages around 2 hours 10 minutes to 2 hours 35 minutes depending on the service and the stops.

Luggage is the catch. The allowance is normally two hold items up to 20kg each plus a small cabin bag, and cruise luggage often blows past it, with excess charged or refused at the driver’s discretion.

If you’re packing to the coach allowance rather than an airline one, a luggage scale settles it at home rather than at the kerb. There are no porters at the coach station.

Tickets can be moved on the day for a small fee, and drivers are often flexible if a flight is late. On a busy turnaround day coaches can sell out well in advance, and a scheduled service carries no obligation to get you to a sailing on time: M3 and M27 delays are routine on a Saturday.

P&O Cruises’ own coach transfers, run through Cruise Connect, collect from around 50 points across the UK and must be booked no later than 35 days before departure.

From Southampton Central station to your ship

Southampton Central to any of the five terminals is a 5 to 10 minute taxi ride, roughly £8 to £15 depending on the terminal and the traffic. There’s no free shuttle between the station and the terminals, so plan the last mile rather than hoping for one.

• City: 0.6 miles via Dock Gate 10, about 15 minutes on foot
• Horizon: 0.5 miles, about 12 minutes
• Ocean: 1.5 miles, about 30 minutes
• Mayflower: 1.5 miles, about 30 minutes
• QEII: 2.5 miles, 45 to 50 minutes on foot, realistically a taxi

Which of those is realistic with two large cases is the question, and getting from Southampton train station to your ship sets out the taxi, walking and pre-booked options.

Walking works for City and Horizon with wheeled cases. Ocean is half an hour along dock roads, and QEII is effectively a taxi terminal: the nearest bus stop is a mile away at the Platform Tavern.

Southampton Central has two exits. The south exit by Platform 4 on Western Esplanade has the main taxi rank and the walking route to the docks, and it’s often the quicker of the two. On a Saturday with four or five ships turning round, the ranks thin out between about 09:00 and 11:00, so pre-book if you land in that window with luggage.

Hackney carriages add a £2 surcharge when you hire one from a marshalled cruise terminal rank. That’s the sort of thing you find out while counting out change at the end of the day.

Flying in: Southampton, Heathrow and Gatwick

Southampton Airport is the nearest, about 5.3 road miles from the Western Docks hotels, with a train to Southampton Central taking about 7 minutes. Heathrow is about 65 road miles from the Western Docks, roughly 84 minutes with no traffic on the road.

National Express runs Heathrow terminals 1, 3, 4 and 5 to Southampton Coach Station roughly every one to two hours, and takes a little over two hours. Gatwick has no direct rail link to the port without a change, so the options that work are a coach to the coach station or a booked car.

Allow 45 to 75 minutes to clear customs and baggage reclaim at Heathrow or Gatwick before the onward transfer. A same-day flight into a Saturday turnaround is the biggest missed-ship risk on this coast, because the ship won’t wait and the coach seats are already sold.

For the transfer itself, the coach from Heathrow is the cheapest option and a booked car the most reliable, and getting from London airports to Southampton cruise port works through both.

Travel insurance is the dull answer to the flight risk: check the policy covers missed departure before you book anything, and get a quote that does.

Parking at Southampton cruise port

There are two official schemes inside the port estate, and booking the wrong one gets refunded eventually, just not on the day you sail. ABParking is port-owned and used by Royal Caribbean, Celebrity, Fred. Olsen, MSC, Disney, Silversea, NCL, Oceania and Regent Seven Seas.

CPS is the only authorised parking inside the port estate for P&O Cruises, Cunard and Princess, and it’s a valet service: you hand the car over at the terminal.

Whichever you use, book it. Long-stay spaces must be pre-booked at every terminal, summer spaces sell out and prices rise as they fill, and a booking three months out is cheaper than one three weeks out. Cancellation is usually free up to 48 hours before.

ABParking gives you a permit showing the recommended dock gate and your designated terminal, and expects you at your selected arrival time. Turn up early and you can be sent away, so book a long-stay space in the port for the slot you can actually make.

CPS has a deadline that costs people money. You can book no earlier than 72 hours after booking the cruise and no later than 35 days before departure, so reserve a valet space at Southampton as soon as your booking is confirmed.

What it costs. On-port parking is quoted per cruise rather than per day, and the quote covers the exact span you’re away, so there’s no single rate to compare. Off-site meet-and-greet operators, which meet you in the terminal short-stay car park and keep the car in a compound within three miles, run at about £8.40 to £12.70 a day.

CPS valet is roughly £9.50 to £20 a day depending on cruise length, though the quote engine is the only figure you can rely on. Check the current rate when you book.

Southampton City Council’s long-stay car parks at Bedford Place, Eastgate Street and Grosvenor Square charge about £9 to £11 for the first 24 hours and then about £5 a day, roughly £39 to £41 a week, plus a taxi each way. The Westquay multi-storey on Harbour Parade is about £15 a day flat, around £105 a week, and it’s ten minutes on foot from City and Horizon so no taxi is needed; check its 24-hour access rules before you rely on it.

Triangle car park on Cunard Road has 270 spaces next to Ocean Terminal and runs as park-and-ride or valet, paid on arrival.

A fortnight away roughly doubles the bill against a week, which is where hotel-and-parking packages start to win. Cheapest on paper is rarely cheapest in total once the taxis are added, and where to park at Southampton cruise port compares them properly.

CPS valet keeps the car in a compound at your terminal, though it may move the vehicle to another CPS car park within the port, up to 4.5 miles each way. If you board at one terminal and get off at another, CPS moves the car for you, and it can’t do that for a wheelchair-accessible vehicle where the chair is the driver’s seat, arranging an assistance taxi instead.

At QEII, CPS parks in the multi-storey short-stay car park and the terminal entrance is a 5 to 10 minute walk including a small incline. Motorhomes aren’t accepted inside the port; large vehicles need prior arrangement with ABParking and a surcharge.

Check what your fare already includes before buying anything. P&O Cruises’ Select Price on Southampton round-trip cruises of seven nights or more includes a choice of on-board spending money, car parking in Southampton or return coach travel, while Saver and Early Saver fares include none of it.

The included parking still has to be reserved with CPS no later than 35 days before departure, or you may be charged the full on-the-day rate and not reimbursed. World cruises, Classic Southern Hemisphere Journeys, exotic fly-cruises and Grand Tours are excluded, and Cunard works the same way under the Cunard Fare.

Drop-off and pick-up at each terminal

Every terminal has a drop-off lane at the entrance. The driver can stop to unload and porters take the cases from there, but the car then has to leave or move to short-stay parking; you can’t sit at the kerb, and the drop-off itself costs nothing.

Don’t arrive before your boarding slot. CPS asks passengers to arrive at their allocated time and no earlier than 10:45, and early arrivals get pushed into chargeable short-stay car parks. The terminals don’t admit anyone before their window and there’s nowhere to wait inside.

At Horizon the lane is at the entrance, and the ABParking car park serving City and Horizon is a five-minute walk away, so either take the cases with you when you park or drop them at the lane first.

On a busy Saturday, marshals at Dock Gate 10 route private cars to the lane for the right terminal, so have the terminal name ready rather than the ship’s name, and allow 30 minutes more than the satnav says for the queue. If it’s your first time, these tips for a first cruise from Southampton cover the other bits that catch people out.

Picking up at the end of the cruise is the same lane in reverse. Self-help with your own bags goes first, groups are called from about 07:00 and it’s usually finished by 10:00, with the car parks busiest between 08:00 and 09:30. If you’ve booked a meet-and-greet or a flight, work from a realistic time for getting off the ship rather than its scheduled arrival, or you pay waiting time.

Passengers without a boarding pass can’t get past the gates, so anyone seeing you off says goodbye at the lane.

Boarding day: arrival slots, security and the wait

Go for the middle of your boarding window rather than the start. The first wave arrives together and the queue outside is longest at the opening time, and since nobody is admitted early, an early arrival means standing on the forecourt.

Inside, it’s check-in desks by cabin grade or boarding window, passport and documents or the app, a card for the on-board account, then the cruise card. Bags go through an airport-style scanner without the liquid rules, and twenty to forty minutes is typical from door to gangway.

If your slot is late in the afternoon, go into the city rather than queue on the forecourt: Westquay is ten minutes from City and Horizon and Ocean Village ten from Ocean, both easy for a late breakfast, and the shopping centre fills an hour.

For the rest of the old town and the waterfront, 15 things to do in Southampton before your cruise and things to do in Southampton with kids cover a longer gap.

If you want to know where the time goes on the day, Southampton’s departure day from the gate to the gangway runs through it.

Where to stay near Southampton cruise port

Stay in the city centre or on West Quay Road. The Western Docks terminals are walkable from there, the Eastern Docks are a five-minute taxi, and the station and coach station are close. The same patch works on the way home, when a late finish and a long drive don’t mix.

Hotels that make sense for cruise passengers:

• Leonardo Royal Southampton Grand Harbour, West Quay Road: 9 minutes on foot to City, 15 to Horizon or a 7-minute taxi, and about 5 minutes by taxi to Ocean and 5 to 7 to QEII and Mayflower. Parking is about £14 a night, and cruise packages cover 4, 8, 15 or 21 days of parking.
• voco Southampton, Herbert Walker Avenue: the closest hotel to City at 6 minutes on foot and 12 to Horizon. Its park-and-cruise package includes up to 15 days of parking, a one-way taxi to the terminal and breakfast, which for a fortnight away beats any port car park.
• Moxy Southampton, 96 Harbour Parade: 13 minutes on foot to City, 18 to Horizon and Ocean, and a 6-minute taxi to QEII and Mayflower. Parking is about £13.50 a night and the rooms are compact, which matters with several large cases.
• Premier Inn Southampton West Quay, also on Harbour Parade beside the coach station: 5 to 10 minutes by taxi to all five terminals and the obvious pick if you’re arriving on a National Express coach from Heathrow. It has no car park of its own and points drivers to the West Quay multi-storey next door.
• Southampton Harbour Hotel and Spa, Ocean Village: 5 minutes by car to QEII and Ocean, with cruise-and-stay packages including 7, 14 or 21 days of parking.
• ibis and ibis budget Southampton Centre, West Quay Road: the cheapest beds within walking distance of Horizon and City.

A hotel car park on the wrong side of the docks is money wasted. The voco and the Leonardo serve the Western Docks, the Harbour Hotel serves Ocean and QEII, and neither is a sensible base for the other.

An overnight also buys you a morning in the city. Walking Southampton’s ancient walls takes about an hour from the Western Docks hotels, and following Titanic’s footsteps through the old town fills a morning. A third night opens up day trips from Southampton to Stonehenge and the New Forest.

For a longer stay there’s Southampton’s cultural side and the local spots most cruise passengers miss, both worth the extra night. Rooms near the terminals go first on a Saturday, and where to stay in Southampton for cruisers covers the rest by terminal.

Luggage storage at Southampton cruise port

No terminal at Southampton keeps bags: there’s no left-luggage facility inside any of the five and no permanent left-luggage office at Southampton Central station either. Porters take the cases at the drop-off lane and you don’t see them again until the cabin, so tag everything before you reach the lane.

That leaves three options. Bag-storage apps book space in shops and hotels around the station and the coach station, from about £3.50 to £5 a bag a day and usually only during shop hours, so book luggage storage near the terminal before you travel rather than turning up.

Most hotels hold bags free for guests until you leave, and the Western Docks hotels will often hold bags for departing guests for a few pounds if you ask the day before.

Pack for a short carry. Trolleys exist inside the terminal and in the car parks, but not beyond the gate when you get off, and you lift your own bags on and off the train. What to pack for your Southampton cruise is worth working through while the cases are still empty.

Accessibility at Southampton cruise port

All five terminals are step-free, with accessible toilets, designated seating and hearing loops, and each has a drop-off zone at the entrance. Cruise lines ask for 48 hours’ notice to arrange assistance, and Fred. Olsen provides port wheelchairs and gangway help from the terminal.

Parking is where the schemes differ. City and Horizon have Blue Badge bays at the terminal, ABParking reserves accessible spaces on request and runs a complimentary accessible shuttle between car park and terminal for Blue Badge guests who can carry wheelchairs and mobility scooters.

CPS and P&O state there are no accessibility bays at the cruise terminal, and send passengers with accessibility needs to a dedicated mobility receiving lane for check-in and porterage instead. CPS doesn’t offer complimentary parking for Blue Badge holders, so ask before you assume. For limited mobility, CPS valet is the simplest option of the lot because you hand the car over at the terminal door.

Wheelchair-accessible taxis should be pre-booked with the city’s radio firms, especially on cruise Saturdays. Southampton cruise port’s accessibility guide goes through each terminal in turn.

Southampton cruise port FAQs

Where can I watch a cruise ship leave Southampton?

Mayflower Park, on the waterfront below the old walls, suits departures from the Western Docks; Town Quay and the Royal Pier suit the Eastern Docks. Ships usually clear the berth 15 to 30 minutes after the published departure time, so arrive for that rather than the timetable.

Is there somewhere to eat inside the terminal?

Most of the five have seating, toilets and a small café or vending machine, and nothing beyond a kiosk in the way of shops. For a proper meal, eat in the city before you travel to the gate.

How many cruise ships can dock in Southampton at once?

The port’s own figure is more than six at once across its five terminals, which is why several ships can be turning around on the same morning.

Is Southampton cruise port the same as the Port of Southampton?

Yes. The five cruise terminals sit inside the commercial Port of Southampton, which is why there are dock gates, security checks and no access beyond them without a boarding pass.