Royal Caribbean just took the top seven spots for Best Cruise Ship Overall in the 2026 Member Choice Awards, and eight of the top ten places in all. The rankings come from cruise review site Cruiseline.com, and they’re built entirely from verified reviews left by members who sailed between January and December 2025.
Utopia of the Seas landed at number one. The only ships breaking up the Royal Caribbean run were two from sister brand Celebrity Cruises, parked at eighth and tenth. One line holding every spot from first through seventh isn’t something that happens by accident, so here’s what won, why these ships came out on top, and what it means if you’ve already got a Royal Caribbean sailing booked.
What Royal Caribbean Actually Won
The headline is the clean sweep. Positions one through seven all belong to Royal Caribbean, led by Utopia of the Seas, Wonder of the Seas, and Star of the Seas. Add Harmony of the Seas at ninth and that’s eight Royal Caribbean ships in the top ten.
The wins kept going past the ship list. Royal Caribbean was named Best Mainstream Cruise Line for the fifth year in a row, and also took the top spot among lines for onboard activities and entertainment.
Photo by Fernando Jorge on Unsplash
Several ships picked up their own category awards. Star of the Seas was named Best New Cruise Ship of 2026. Icon of the Seas took Best Ship for Activities and Entertainment for a second straight year. Utopia of the Seas went further still, topping the ship rankings for food and dining, for service, and for staterooms.
The Full Top 10
What stands out reading the actual numbers is how tight they are. Less than two tenths of a point separate first from tenth in the full rankings, and the seven Royal Caribbean ships in a row are bunched within a few hundredths of each other.
| Rank | Ship | Cruise Line | Score |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Utopia of the Seas | Royal Caribbean | 4.591 |
| 2 | Wonder of the Seas | Royal Caribbean | 4.502 |
| 3 | Star of the Seas | Royal Caribbean | 4.486 |
| 4 | Oasis of the Seas | Royal Caribbean | 4.461 |
| 5 | Mariner of the Seas | Royal Caribbean | 4.454 |
| 6 | Symphony of the Seas | Royal Caribbean | 4.453 |
| 7 | Icon of the Seas | Royal Caribbean | 4.451 |
| 8 | Celebrity Ascent | Celebrity Cruises | 4.446 |
| 9 | Harmony of the Seas | Royal Caribbean | 4.433 |
| 10 | Celebrity Silhouette | Celebrity Cruises | 4.420 |
Five more ships earned honorable mentions just outside the cut: Celebrity Eclipse, Celebrity Beyond, Holland America’s Koningsdam, Allure of the Seas, and Celebrity Summit. Between the top ten and those mentions, Royal Caribbean and its corporate sibling Celebrity account for most of the names on the board.
Why The Short-Cruise Ships Keep Winning
Look at the top of the list and a pattern shows up quickly. Utopia of the Seas runs nothing but short three- and four-night trips out of Port Canaveral to the Bahamas and Royal Caribbean’s private island, Perfect Day at CocoCay, and Wonder of the Seas spent the back half of 2025 doing short Bahamas runs out of Miami. Royal Caribbean has marketed Utopia’s quick getaways as “the world’s biggest weekend,” and guests clearly liked them enough to come home and leave glowing reviews.
That context matters, because this isn’t a panel of experts handing out trophies. It’s a satisfaction ranking built from real cruiser reviews, so ships carrying a lot of happy casual and first-time cruisers tend to float to the top. Short, affordable, activity-stuffed sailings are exactly the trips that fill up with people having a great first weekend at sea, which is part of the value pitch that comes up whenever people size Royal Caribbean up against Carnival.
Star of the Seas is the real surprise. The Icon-class ship only debuted in August 2025, so it cracked the top three on less than half a year of reviews. I’d read that less as “third-best ship afloat” and more as a brand-new megaship that landed extremely well with the cruisers who sailed it early.
What This Means If You’re Booking Royal Caribbean
If you’ve already got a Royal Caribbean cruise on the calendar, this is a reassuring read, with one asterisk. We’ve got Oasis of the Seas booked for this June, our first balcony and our first Oasis-class ship, so watching it land fourth overall is a nice sign heading in. I’m treating it as a good omen, not a promise.
Photo by Stephan Leuzinger on Pexels
Here’s the asterisk. The scores sit so close together that the gap between fourth and ninth is nearly noise, and the whole list tilts toward big, new, activity-heavy ships. If your ideal cruise is a quiet, scenic, port-focused itinerary, this ranking isn’t really measuring your kind of trip. It’s measuring which floating resorts sent the most cruisers home happy.
The result also fits the direction Royal Caribbean has been heading, leaning hard into mega-ships and short Florida sailings, which we get into with the bigger shifts hitting the line this year. On the review front, the strategy is clearly working.
What To Watch Next
The one to keep an eye on is Legend of the Seas, the third Icon-class ship, which recently wrapped up its sea trials ahead of a summer 2026 debut. If Star of the Seas can break into the top three on a few months of reviews, Legend could be a real contender once the 2027 awards come around.
For now the picture is clear enough. Royal Caribbean’s newest and largest ships are landing extremely well with everyday cruisers, the top of the list is razor-thin, and a ship that debuted in August still managed to outscore vessels that have been collecting fans for years. Just read the rankings for what they are, a popularity and satisfaction signal rather than a final verdict on quality.
Are you booked on any of the ships that made the list this year, or does a top-ten finish not move the needle for you?