After eight Cunard voyages spanning a decade, I can tell you that comparing Cunard to other lines isn’t like choosing between similar products with different logos. It’s more like deciding whether you want a country house hotel or a boutique city break. Both are good holidays, but the experience is fundamentally different. If you’re weighing up Cunard versus Princess Cruises, Cunard against Royal Caribbean, or how Cunard compares to Celebrity, you need to understand what actually sets this line apart before you book.
This guide covers what makes Cunard genuinely different from other cruise lines, the Grills dining structure, dress codes and formality expectations, how Cunard compares to Princess and Royal Caribbean, enrichment programmes versus entertainment focus, and whether the traditional British style suits your cruise preferences.
What Cunard Is (And What It Isn’t)
Cunard Cruise Line operates four ships: Queen Mary 2, Queen Anne, Queen Victoria, and Queen Elizabeth. It positions itself as a traditional British luxury line with heritage dating back to 1840. The key word there is traditional. This isn’t a line chasing trends or adding water slides to appeal to families. Cunard leans into formality, history, and what it calls “the golden age of ocean travel.” That’s either exactly what you want or completely wrong for you.
Queen Mary 2 remains the only true ocean liner still operating regular transatlantic crossings. This isn’t a marketing gimmick. The ship was built differently, with a reinforced hull and more powerful engines to handle North Atlantic weather year-round. If you’re sailing Southampton to New York, you’re doing something most cruise passengers never experience: a proper crossing, not a repositioning cruise.
The Grills System: How Dining Really Works on Cunard
This is where Cunard divides opinion more than anywhere else. Your dining room and level of service are determined by which cabin you book. It’s a tiered system:
- Queens Grill – Top suites only, dedicated restaurant, butler service, priority everything
- Princess Grill – Mid-range suites, separate restaurant, concierge service
- Britannia Club – Select Britannia-grade cabins, smaller dining room, single-seating dinner
- Britannia Restaurant – Standard cabins, main dining room, two sittings (early or late)
Some people hate this. They see it as class division on a ship. Others value it because it genuinely does create a different experience depending on what you pay. I’ve sailed in both Britannia and Grill accommodations. The service gap is real. In Grills, your waiter knows your name by the second night, remembers your coffee order, and the dining room feels more like a small hotel restaurant. In Britannia, service is perfectly competent but you’re one of hundreds.
Compare this to Princess Cruises or Celebrity Cruises, where all passengers have access to the same main dining rooms regardless of cabin grade. There’s no separate restaurant for suite guests. You might get priority reservations or other perks, but everyone eats in the same spaces. Cunard’s approach is more segregated, which creates both intimacy for those in Grills and potential resentment for those who aren’t.
| Aspect | Cunard | Princess | Celebrity |
|---|---|---|---|
| Dining allocation | By cabin grade (Grills or Britannia) | Open to all passengers | Open to all passengers |
| Dress code | Gala nights (black tie preferred), smart evening attire expected | Formal nights optional, smart casual accepted | Evening chic, more relaxed interpretation |
| Suite perks | Separate restaurants, priority embarkation, butler | Priority embarkation, better bathroom amenities | Exclusive lounge, priority tender tickets |
| Specialty dining | Limited (Steakhouse, specialty venues vary by ship) | Multiple specialty restaurants across fleet | Strong specialty dining programme, modern cuisine focus |
| Afternoon tea | Daily in Queens Room, white-glove service | Occasional, less formal | Not a regular feature |
Cunard vs Royal Caribbean: Why These Aren’t Comparable (But People Ask Anyway)
Someone always asks about Cunard compared to Royal Caribbean. The short answer is they’re aimed at completely different passengers. Royal Caribbean builds ships around activities: surf simulators, rock climbing walls, ice rinks, zip lines. The atmosphere is casual, family-friendly, and high-energy. Cunard’s ships are smaller, with more deck space given to lounging, reading, and afternoon tea service than adventure sports.
Royal Caribbean’s evening entertainment leans toward West End-style shows and acrobatic performances. Cunard offers Royal Court Theatre productions, but the real evening draw is often ballroom dancing in the Queens Room or a classical music recital. If you’re under forty and travelling with kids, Royal Caribbean makes far more sense. If you’re over sixty and want to dress for dinner without feeling overdressed, Cunard fits better.
Cunard Cruise Line Style: What Formal Really Means
- Cunard still uses the term “gala evenings” instead of formal nights. On a seven-night cruise, expect two or three gala nights where the line strongly encourages black tie or formal evening wear in the main dining rooms and public spaces. You’ll see plenty of dinner jackets and gowns. You’ll also see some passengers in dark suits or smart dresses who couldn’t be bothered with full formal. Nobody is turned away, but you will feel underdressed if you show up in chinos and a polo.
- The key difference from other lines: formality on Cunard isn’t limited to one designated formal night. There’s an expectation of smart dress every evening in the dining rooms. The dress code chart in your cabin will specify “smart attire” for non-gala nights, which means no jeans, no shorts, no trainers. After 6pm, the Britannia Restaurant shifts into a different mode. If you’re used to the relaxed vibe on Holland America or Princess where you can get away with smart-casual year-round, Cunard feels stricter.
- That said, there are escape hatches. The buffet (Lido) stays casual all day and evening. If you can’t face another night in a suit, you can eat upstairs in shorts if you want. But you’ll miss the main event, which is the theatre of dinner service in the main restaurant.
Cunard vs Princess Cruises: Key Differences
This is the comparison I get asked about most, partly because both lines attract a similar demographic: British passengers, older average age, traditional cruise preferences. I’ve sailed both enough times to give you the practical differences.
- Princess is more relaxed in every respect. Formal nights exist but aren’t enforced with the same seriousness. The dining room doesn’t feel like an occasion the way it does on Cunard. Afternoon tea on Princess is served in the buffet with self-service pastries. On Cunard, afternoon tea in the Queens Room comes with waiter service, tiered cake stands, and a harpist. It sounds like a small thing until you’re sitting there and realise how rare this sort of service has become at sea.
- Princess offers more specialty dining variety and tends to have better-equipped cabins for the same price tier. Balconies are more common across Princess’s fleet, and the ships are generally newer with better air conditioning and shower pressure. Cunard’s ships, particularly Queen Victoria and Queen Elizabeth, feel more dated in the cabin bathrooms. Princess also includes more in the fare: service charges are often bundled in UK-marketed packages, whereas Cunard typically adds them as an extra.
- Where Cunard wins: embarkation and disembarkation feel more organised, the Grills experience has no equivalent on Princess if you’re booking a suite, and the onboard atmosphere is quieter and less family-focused, even during school holidays. For a detailed breakdown of how these lines compare across the Caribbean specifically, see our full Cunard versus Princess guide.
Enrichment Programmes vs Entertainment: What You’ll Do at Sea
- Cunard invests heavily in enrichment programming. Queen Mary 2 has Illuminations, a full planetarium and lecture hall. Across the fleet, you’ll find guest speakers, authors doing book readings, historians giving talks on the regions you’re visiting, and art classes that aren’t just token activities. The Royal Masquerade Balls are elaborate themed evenings with live orchestras and proper waltzing. If this sounds appealing, Cunard delivers it better than any mainstream line.
- If you prefer trivia contests, pool games, and live sports on big screens, you’ll find Cunard boring. The atmosphere at sea is genteel and quite quiet during the day. The buffet doesn’t have the constant background music and activity you’d get on Royal Caribbean or even Princess. Some passengers find this peaceful. Others find it dull.
- Queen Mary 2 also has kennels for dogs and cats, the only cruise ship currently offering this on transatlantic crossings. If you’re relocating or just can’t bear to leave your pet in kennels ashore, this is a genuine point of difference. The kennel master provides daily care, there’s an outdoor deck area for walks, and I’ve met passengers who’ve crossed multiple times with their dogs. It’s niche, but if it matters to you, no other line offers it.
Cunard vs Other Luxury Cruise Lines: Where Does It Sit?
- Cunard occupies an odd middle space. It’s more formal and traditional than premium lines like Celebrity or Holland America, but it doesn’t offer the all-inclusive, high staff-to-guest ratios of true luxury lines like Regent, Silversea, or Seabourn. You’ll still pay extra for drinks, Wi-Fi, and specialty dining on Cunard. Gratuities are added automatically. Shore excursions cost the same as any mainstream line.
- What you’re paying for on Cunard isn’t luxury in the modern all-inclusive sense. You’re paying for heritage, formality, and the specific experience of sailing on ships that still operate transatlantic crossings. If your priority is having everything included and feeling pampered at every turn, Oceania or Viking Ocean Cruises offer better value. Cunard charges closer to luxury prices but delivers a premium product with luxury touches rather than full luxury service across the board.
- The comparison with Cunard versus Viking is particularly interesting. Viking offers a more modern, Scandinavian-minimalist aesthetic with included excursions and a focus on destination immersion. Cunard leans into British tradition with white-glove service and formal evenings. Both attract older passengers but for different reasons. If you want your cruise to feel like a cultural deep-dive with a modern hotel vibe, Viking makes sense. If you want it to feel like stepping back into 1950s ocean travel with all the ceremony intact, that’s Cunard.
Transatlantic Crossings: The One Thing Cunard Does That Nobody Else Does
- Queen Mary 2 operates regular Southampton to New York crossings, typically seven nights, year-round. This isn’t a cruise. There are no port stops. You’re at sea for the entire voyage, which is the point. It’s a completely different rhythm from a standard cruise: more formal, more focused on onboard life, and weirdly meditative if you let yourself settle into it.
- The crossing attracts a mix of passengers. Some are relocating or connecting with work in New York and want to avoid flying. Others are doing it purely for the experience. I’ve crossed three times, twice westbound and once eastbound. Westbound feels more special because you’re arriving in New York at dawn and sailing up the Hudson past the Statue of Liberty, which Queen Mary 2 salutes with a horn blast. It’s pure theatre.
- If you’ve never done a crossing, it’s worth doing once, particularly if you’re already interested in Cunard’s style. It strips away the distraction of ports and forces you to engage with what the ship offers. You’ll either love the slower pace or find yourself climbing the walls by day four. No other line offers this experience regularly, which makes it Cunard’s signature product and the clearest differentiator from everyone else.
Practical Considerations: When Cunard Doesn’t Make Sense
Be honest about whether Cunard’s style suits you before you book. Here’s where it doesn’t work:
- If you hate dressing up – You can avoid gala nights by eating in the buffet, but you’ll miss the core experience and spend a week feeling like you’re at the wrong party.
- If you want included drinks – Cunard doesn’t include alcohol or soft drinks except at breakfast and afternoon tea. Drinks packages exist but aren’t cheap. Budget accordingly.
- If you want cutting-edge dining – Cunard’s cuisine is good but traditional. Don’t expect molecular gastronomy or trendy small-plate concepts. If food is your primary interest, Oceania’s culinary focus delivers better menus.
- If you’re travelling with young children – Cunard has kids’ clubs but the ships aren’t designed around family travel. You’ll see far fewer children than on Royal Caribbean or even Princess, which is a selling point for some passengers and a drawback for others.
- If you prefer modern ship design – Cunard’s ships lean into classic decor: rich wood panelling, brass fixtures, oil paintings. The cabins, particularly on Queen Elizabeth and Queen Victoria, feel traditional rather than contemporary. If you prefer clean Scandinavian lines and modern minimalism, you’ll find the interiors dated.
Cunard in the Caribbean: Does the Style Translate?
- Cunard operates Caribbean itineraries, typically in winter when Queen Victoria or Queen Elizabeth repositions from Europe. The formal, traditional style feels slightly incongruous in the Caribbean. Afternoon tea in 30-degree heat after a beach day requires a certain commitment. You’ll still have gala nights and the same dress codes, which some passengers find absurd when you’ve spent the day snorkelling in St Lucia.
- That said, if you want a Caribbean cruise with a quieter, more refined atmosphere than you’d get on most ships in that region, Cunard delivers. The ships are smaller than the mega-ships dominating Caribbean routes, so ports feel less crowded. The passenger demographic skews older and more sedate, which means the pool deck isn’t a party zone and you won’t hear thumping music at 11pm.
- For pure Caribbean experiences, Princess and Holland America offer better value and itineraries that feel more suited to the region. Cunard in the Caribbean works if you want Cunard’s style applied to Caribbean ports, not if you want the best possible Caribbean cruise.
Is Cunard Worth the Premium?
- Cunard typically costs more than Princess, Holland America, or P&O for equivalent itineraries. Whether it’s worth the extra depends entirely on how much you value what makes it different: formality, heritage, the Grills system, enrichment programming, and the overall sense of occasion.
- If those things matter to you, the premium feels justified. If you’re indifferent to dress codes and would rather have more specialty dining options or better-equipped cabins for the same money, you’ll feel you’ve overpaid. I’ve met passengers who sail Cunard exclusively and wouldn’t consider another line. I’ve also met people who did one Cunard cruise, found it stuffy and old-fashioned, and went back to Princess or Celebrity.
- The clearest way to decide: if the idea of formal gala evenings, afternoon tea service, and ballroom dancing appeals, book Cunard. If it sounds tedious or pretentious, don’t. There’s no middle ground where Cunard’s style works for people who aren’t already inclined toward traditional cruising.
Common Questions
Is Cunard more expensive than other cruise lines?
Cunard typically prices higher than Princess, Holland America, or P&O for similar itineraries and cabin grades. The gap narrows during promotions, but you’ll generally pay more for the formal style and heritage positioning. Drinks, Wi-Fi, and gratuities aren’t included, which adds further cost.
Can I dress casually on Cunard or are formal nights compulsory?
Gala nights aren’t compulsory but the expectation is black tie or formal evening wear in main restaurants. You can always eat in the buffet if you prefer casual dress, but you’ll miss the primary dining experience Cunard is known for.
What age group cruises with Cunard?
The average passenger age skews over sixty, particularly on transatlantic crossings and longer voyages. You’ll find younger passengers on Caribbean itineraries and shorter European cruises, but Cunard doesn’t attract a broad age demographic the way mainstream lines do.
Do I need to book a Grills suite to enjoy Cunard?
No. Britannia-grade cabins offer the same access to public spaces, enrichment programmes, and gala evenings. Grills provides a noticeably higher service level and separate dining, but the core Cunard experience exists across all cabin grades.
Is Queen Mary 2 the best ship in the Cunard fleet?
Queen Mary 2 is the flagship and purpose-built for transatlantic crossings with features like the planetarium and kennels. Queen Anne is the newest ship with more modern facilities. Queen Victoria and Queen Elizabeth are smaller and feel more intimate. Best depends on your itinerary and preferences, not an objective ranking.
Does Cunard suit solo travellers or is it geared toward couples?
Cunard attracts a high proportion of couples, particularly older retired passengers. Solo travellers will find the atmosphere less socially dynamic than lines with dedicated solo lounges or group activities. The hosts programme provides male dance partners for single female passengers on some sailings.
What’s included in a Cunard cruise fare?
Main dining room meals, afternoon tea, most entertainment, and use of pools and fitness facilities are included. Drinks (except breakfast tea and coffee), specialty dining, gratuities, Wi-Fi, and shore excursions cost extra. Cunard operates a traditional pay-as-you-go model rather than all-inclusive pricing.
How does Cunard compare to P&O Cruises for British passengers?
Both are British-focused lines under the same parent company, but Cunard positions as traditional luxury while P&O is more accessible and casual. Cunard enforces stricter dress codes, operates a Grills system, and charges higher fares. P&O feels more relaxed and family-friendly with wider demographic appeal.
Why Trust About2Cruise
- I’m Jo. I’ve sailed eight Cunard cruises over ten years, including three transatlantic crossings and voyages in both Britannia and Grills accommodations. This article draws directly from those experiences.
- We update content when fleet changes occur or when reader questions reveal gaps. This article reflects Cunard’s 2026 programme including the dual world voyages.
- We receive no payment from cruise lines for editorial content. If we recommend something, it’s because I’d book it myself, not because someone paid us to say it. Read more about our editorial approach.