Most people you meet on a cruise are genuinely lovely.
You’ll swap port tips with strangers at the bar and end up with dinner friends by night two.
But every sailing has a few passengers who make everyone else’s week a little worse.
The tricky part is that almost none of them think it’s them.
That’s the whole reason this list is worth reading. A few of these habits are easy to slip into without noticing, especially on your first cruise when you don’t yet know the unwritten rules.
So here are ten of the most common ways cruisers get on each other’s nerves, and how to make sure you’re not the one doing it.
1. Saving Pool Loungers At Dawn And Disappearing All Day
This is the big one. Ask any group of cruisers what drives them up the wall, and chair hogs come up first. They top nearly every list of the behaviors cruisers most wish would disappear from ships.
The routine is familiar. Someone drapes a towel, a paperback, and a pair of flip-flops across two prime loungers at 7 a.m., then vanishes to breakfast, the gym, a shore excursion, and lunch.
The chairs sit empty for hours while everyone else circles the pool deck looking for a spot.
Most lines technically have a policy against it, and some crews will clear unattended chairs after 30 or 40 minutes. In practice, enforcement is patchy and depends heavily on the ship.
The fix is simple. If you’re not going to be near the pool within the next half hour, don’t claim a chair. Grab one when you actually arrive.
You’ll survive without the front-row spot, and the people behind you will quietly thank you.
2. Treating The Buffet Line Like Nobody’s Watching
The buffet brings out some genuinely baffling behavior.
People taste food straight off the serving spoon and put it back. Others use their fingers, sneeze near the sneeze guard, or cut the line because they only want “one quick thing.”
None of it takes much to avoid. Use the tongs, take a clean plate for seconds, and wait your turn like everyone else.
Photo by Ulysse Pointcheval on Unsplash
The hand-washing piece matters more than people think, too. Norovirus spreads fast in a closed environment, and the buffet is ground zero.
Most ships now station a crew member at the entrance with hand sanitizer or even a sink, and they will absolutely call you back if you try to skip it. When we asked cruisers whether buffet handwashing should be mandatory, the answer was nearly unanimous.
What we learned: On our June 2025 Vision of the Seas sailing, the Windjammer got slammed around 1 p.m. on embarkation day. We gave up, grabbed lunch at the pool grill, and walked right up to the counter. Off-peak is your friend.
3. Blasting Music On Your Balcony Like It’s Your Backyard
A balcony is a shared wall away from a stranger trying to read in peace.
That’s worth remembering before you set up a Bluetooth speaker and start a playlist at full volume.
Sound carries between balconies far more than people expect, especially at night when the ship is quiet and you’re sailing in calm water.
Nobody is saying you can’t enjoy a drink and some music out there. Just keep it low enough that your neighbor two cabins down isn’t hearing your entire party.
The same goes for loud phone calls, late-night arguments, and smoking where it drifts into the next balcony.
If you want the full breakdown, we covered the balcony habits most likely to annoy your neighbors in a separate guide.
4. Showing Up Hours Before Your Boarding Window
Cruise lines assign staggered arrival windows for a reason. They keep the terminal from turning into a crushed mass of luggage and frustrated families all at once.
Ignoring your window doesn’t get you on the ship faster. It just means you stand in a longer line with everyone else who had the same idea.
The cabins usually aren’t ready until early afternoon anyway, so an extra-early arrival often buys you nothing but a crowded waiting area.
Stick to the window you’re given. If you want to be among the first aboard, book an earlier slot when check-in opens rather than just showing up and hoping.
Heads up: Arrival windows are real, and some terminals will hold you outside until your slot opens. If you’re curious how the whole day flows, here’s what embarkation day actually looks like from check-in to sail-away.
5. Letting The Kids Run Wild While You Switch Off
Cruise ships are built to entertain kids. The kids’ clubs are genuinely good, and most parents get a real break.
The problem starts when “a break” turns into kids roaming the ship completely unsupervised.
The complaints are always the same. Kids sprinting down quiet corridors at 11 p.m., pushing every elevator button, jumping into the adults-only hot tub, treating the stairwells like a racetrack.
Photo by Mikely Joainee on Pexels
Beyond the annoyance, there’s a real safety angle. A ship is a big, busy place with a lot of water and a lot of strangers.
You don’t have to hover every second. Just know where your kids are and what they’re doing, especially in shared spaces that other guests are trying to enjoy.
6. Pushing Into The Elevator Before Anyone Can Get Out
This one feels small until it happens to you for the fifth time in a day. I’ll admit it’s the one that gets me.
The elevators get busy on a big ship, and the doors open onto a wall of people pressing forward before anyone inside can step off.
It’s slower for everyone. People get wedged, the doors try to close, and the whole thing turns into a scrum.
Let passengers exit first, then board. It’s basic, but on a ship with thousands of guests it makes a genuine difference.
Tip: For one or two decks, just take the stairs. They’re almost always faster than waiting for a packed elevator, and your daily step count will thank you after a week of buffets.
7. Taking It Out On The Crew When Something Goes Wrong
Things go sideways on cruises. A dinner reservation gets lost, a cabin isn’t ready, an excursion gets cancelled because of weather.
None of that is a reason to yell at the nearest crew member.
The staff on board work long contracts away from their families and, in our experience reading countless cruiser reports, genuinely want your trip to go well. The person you’re snapping at almost never caused the problem.
Raising an issue is completely fair. There’s a calm, polite way to do it that gets far better results than losing your temper at guest services.
Remember that the daily gratuity is what pays much of the crew’s wage, not a bonus. We broke down exactly what that automatic charge covers if you’ve ever wondered where it goes.
8. Putting Your Phone Call On Speaker In A Quiet Lounge
Onboard WiFi has gotten good enough that people take calls and video chats from anywhere now.
The issue is doing it on speaker, at full volume, in a lounge or library where everyone else came to relax.
A quiet bar in the afternoon is not the place for a 20-minute speakerphone catch-up with your sister back home.
Take the call somewhere open, like a deck or your cabin, and use headphones if you’re video chatting.
The same logic applies to watching videos without earbuds. The person next to you did not sign up for the soundtrack.
9. Filming The Whole Show On A Bright Phone Screen
The evening shows are one of the best free perks on a cruise, and they’re worth being present for.
What pulls everyone out of the moment is the sea of glowing phone screens held up for the entire performance.
A quick photo is fine. Filming the whole production on a screen cranked to full brightness, right in the eyeline of the people behind you, is not.
You’ll almost never watch that shaky footage again anyway.
If you do want a clip, grab a few seconds, dim your screen, and then put the phone away and actually enjoy the show.
Tip: The same courtesy applies to comedy shows and the late-night sets. If you arrive after a show has started, slip into a back row quietly instead of climbing over a full row in the dark.
10. Treating The Drink Package Like A Personal Challenge
There’s a particular kind of cruiser who buys the drink package and then treats “getting their money’s worth” as a competitive sport.
It usually ends with someone loud, unsteady, and occasionally picking a fight near the pool bar by mid-afternoon.
Nobody’s saying don’t enjoy a few drinks. That’s a big part of the fun.
But the package isn’t a target you have to hit, and crews will cut off visibly intoxicated guests. In the worst cases, rowdy passengers get removed at the next port.
If you’re trying to decide whether the package even makes sense for how you actually drink, we ran the drink package math so you don’t have to.
Drink for the vacation you want, not to beat a spreadsheet.
So How Do You Avoid Being THAT Passenger?
Almost everything on this list comes down to one idea. The ship is a shared space, and a little awareness goes a long way.
You don’t need to memorize a rulebook. Claim a chair only when you’ll use it, keep your noise to yourself, give the crew some grace, and stay present for the parts of cruising that are actually worth being present for.
The cruisers everyone remembers fondly aren’t the ones who got the best lounger. They’re the ones who were easy to be around.
What’s the most annoying thing you’ve seen another passenger do on a cruise?