If you’re planning a Royal Caribbean cruise, one of the biggest decisions before you sail is whether to buy a Royal Caribbean drinks package. The packages can add hundreds of pounds to the cost of your cruise, and the price shown in your Cruise Planner can change from one day to the next. Even when Royal Caribbean advertises a large discount, that does not necessarily mean you are seeing the lowest price.
I used the Deluxe Beverage Package on a short Independence of the Seas cruise. But on my recent back-to-back cruises on Liberty of the Seas, I chose the much cheaper Classic Soda Package and paid separately for the alcoholic drinks I actually wanted. Both choices worked well, but for completely different reasons.
This Royal Caribbean drinks package guide explains the three main packages, how the pricing works, the most important rules and how to decide which option is likely to give you the best value.
Watch My Royal Caribbean Drinks Package Tips Video
What Royal Caribbean Drinks Packages Are Available?
Royal Caribbean currently offers three main unlimited drinks packages: the Deluxe Beverage Package, the Refreshment Package and the Classic Soda Package.
The Deluxe Beverage Package is the only option that includes alcohol. It covers eligible cocktails, spirits, beer and wine by the glass, along with a wide range of non-alcoholic drinks.
The Refreshment Package includes most of the non-alcoholic drinks available through Deluxe, including mocktails, speciality coffee, bottled water, freshly squeezed juice and soft drinks.
The Classic Soda Package is the cheapest option and focuses on fountain soft drinks and the Coca-Cola Freestyle machines.
You don’t need to buy any of these packages. They are all optional extras, and there are already several basic drinks included in your cruise fare. The important question is not simply which package includes the most. It is whether you will regularly use enough of what is included to justify paying for it on every day of your cruise.
What Is Included in the Royal Caribbean Deluxe Beverage Package?
The Deluxe Beverage Package covers alcoholic drinks up to the package’s individual drink-price limit. This includes eligible cocktails, spirits, beer and wine by the glass. If a drink costs more than the package limit, you normally pay the difference rather than the full price.
The Deluxe Package also includes most of the drinks found in the Refreshment Package. This means you can order mocktails, fountain soft drinks, bottled water, speciality tea and coffee from participating Royal Caribbean venues and freshly squeezed juices. You also receive a discount when buying bottles of wine.
Deluxe is most likely to work for passengers who regularly have several alcoholic drinks each day and also buy things such as speciality coffee, bottled water and soft drinks. It can be particularly appealing on a short and social cruise where you plan to spend most of your time onboard. However, it becomes harder to justify if you only drink occasionally or have several long port days.
What Is Included in the Royal Caribbean Refreshment Package?
The Refreshment Package is Royal Caribbean’s main non-alcoholic drinks package. It includes mocktails, bottled water, speciality tea and coffee from participating venues, freshly squeezed juice and fountain soft drinks. This package can suit passengers who don’t drink alcohol but still want more choice than the basic drinks included in the cruise fare.
It can also provide a middle ground for someone who regularly drinks coffee, juice, mocktails and bottled water but only wants the occasional alcoholic drink. You can use the Refreshment Package for the drinks you order throughout the day and then pay separately when you want a cocktail, beer or glass of wine.
The Refreshment Package offers much more variety than the Classic Soda Package, but it is also more expensive. Whether it is worth the additional cost depends on how often you would genuinely buy coffee, bottled water, juice and mocktails without it.
What Is Included in the Royal Caribbean Classic Soda Package?
The Classic Soda Package is the simplest and cheapest of the three main packages. It gives you unlimited fountain soft drinks from participating bars and restaurants. It also includes the activated souvenir cup needed to use the Coca-Cola Freestyle machines on ships that have them.
I chose the Soda Package for my seven-night Liberty of the Seas cruise because I regularly drink soft drinks but usually only wanted one or two alcoholic drinks on selected days. It meant I could use the Freestyle machines whenever I wanted and did not need to pay separately each time I ordered a Coke. When I wanted a cocktail, I simply bought one.
This worked well because I was not paying for mocktails, bottled water, juice and speciality coffee that I wouldn’t have used enough to justify the Refreshment Package. I also avoided the much higher cost of Deluxe.
The Soda Package is most likely to suit passengers who mainly drink soft drinks and want the convenience of the Freestyle machines without paying for a wider package.
How Much Does a Royal Caribbean Drinks Package Cost?
Royal Caribbean does not charge one fixed price for its drinks packages. It uses dynamic pricing, which means the price can change depending on your ship, sailing date, cruise length, demand and the promotion running at the time. This is particularly noticeable with the Deluxe Beverage Package.
When I was monitoring my back-to-back Liberty of the Seas cruises, the cheapest Deluxe price I saw for the two-night sailing was around £75 per person, per day. For the seven-night cruise immediately afterwards, the lowest daily price I saw was closer to £54. That was the same drinks package on consecutive cruises aboard the same ship, but the price was more than £20 per person, per day lower on the longer sailing.
A lower daily price does not always mean a lower overall cost. At approximately £54 per day, Deluxe would still have cost around £378 for my seven-night cruise. This is why you should always look at the daily price and the full cost for the cruise rather than making your decision based on the advertised discount.
Ignore the Advertised Discount and Check the Daily Price
Royal Caribbean regularly advertises its packages with percentage discounts or offers such as buy one, get one at a reduced price. The problem is that the percentage does not always tell you whether the package is genuinely cheaper than it was before.
A package advertised at 35% off could still cost more than an earlier offer with a smaller discount if Royal Caribbean has changed the underlying price. The figure that matters is the final cost per person, per day.
Whenever you check the Cruise Planner, take a screenshot or make a note of the daily price. This gives you something meaningful to compare when another promotion appears. You should also check the final total for everyone in your cabin. A daily price can appear manageable until it is multiplied by two passengers and the full length of the cruise.
When Should You Buy a Royal Caribbean Drinks Package?
Once you see a daily price you are comfortable paying, it usually makes sense to book it rather than waiting indefinitely for a better promotion. Black Friday can be a good time to find Royal Caribbean drinks package offers, along with other sales throughout the year. However, there is no guarantee that one particular sale will produce the lowest price for your sailing.
After buying the package, continue checking your Cruise Planner. If the price drops, you can usually cancel the original purchase and buy it again at the lower price. I have done this myself, and the refund returned to my account quickly. However, you may need to pay for the replacement package before the original refund reaches your bank. This is worth remembering when the total cost is high.
It can also help to join the Facebook group for your sailing. Passengers often post when they notice a reduction, which can save you from checking the price every day. The safest approach is to secure a price you would be happy to pay and then treat any later reduction as an opportunity to save more.
Do All Adults Have to Buy the Deluxe Beverage Package?
If one adult buys the Deluxe Beverage Package, every other adult of legal drinking age in the same cabin will usually need to buy Deluxe as well. This can have a major effect on whether the package provides good value.
One passenger may regularly drink cocktails, wine and coffee and get plenty of use from Deluxe. But if the second adult only has one or two drinks per day, requiring both passengers to buy it can make the overall cost much harder to justify.
If you have a genuine medical or other reason why one passenger cannot drink alcohol, contact Royal Caribbean before purchasing. You should not assume that an exemption will automatically be granted.
This rule applies to the Deluxe Beverage Package. The Refreshment and Classic Soda Packages can be purchased individually.
How Do You Use a Royal Caribbean Drinks Package?
Your drinks package is linked to your SeaPass card. When you order an eligible drink, you hand over or show your card and the drink is recorded against the package rather than added to your onboard account. The package is for your own use and cannot be shared with another passenger.
You can use it at participating bars, restaurants and cafés across the ship. It can also be used at Royal Caribbean’s private destinations, including Perfect Day at CocoCay, where the package is accepted at participating venues.
Room service, minibar purchases and drinks from standalone Starbucks outlets are not included.
Is Starbucks Included in a Royal Caribbean Drinks Package?
Drinks from standalone Starbucks outlets are not included in the Deluxe or Refreshment Package. This caught some passengers out on Liberty of the Seas after the new Starbucks was added during the refit.
Speciality coffee is included in Deluxe and Refreshment, but it must be ordered from a participating Royal Caribbean venue such as Café Promenade.
This distinction is important if branded Starbucks coffee is one of the main reasons you are considering the Refreshment Package. You would still need to pay separately at the standalone Starbucks.
What Drinks Are Already Included in the Cruise Fare?
Before buying a Royal Caribbean drinks package, remember that several basic drinks are already included. On Liberty of the Seas, water, lemonade, iced tea, standard tea and coffee were available in the Windjammer. Standard tea and coffee were also available from Café Promenade and Sorrento’s.
The exact availability can vary by ship, venue and time of day, but the complimentary selection may be enough for some passengers.
If you are happy drinking water, standard coffee, tea and the included cold drinks, you may only need to pay separately for the occasional cocktail, glass of wine or speciality coffee. This can cost considerably less than buying a package for every day of your cruise.
Can You Bring Drinks Onboard Royal Caribbean?
Royal Caribbean allows each guest of legal drinking age to bring one sealed 750ml bottle of wine or champagne onboard on embarkation day. Wine or champagne consumed in a public venue may be subject to a corkage charge.
You can also bring a limited quantity of non-alcoholic drinks onboard. These need to be carried on rather than packed in your checked luggage.
For my back-to-back Liberty of the Seas cruises, the wine allowance applied separately to each sailing. Additional bottles for a consecutive cruise may be stored and returned at the beginning of the next sailing.
Royal Caribbean’s policies can change, so check the current allowance for your departure port before travelling. Bringing the drinks you are permitted to take onboard, using the complimentary drinks around the ship and buying occasional extras can substantially reduce your onboard spending.
How Many Drinks Do You Need to Break Even?
You will often hear that you need five or six alcoholic drinks per day to make the Deluxe Beverage Package worthwhile. This can be a useful guide, but it is not the whole calculation. The break-even point depends on the daily package price you have been offered and what you would genuinely buy without it.
Deluxe does not only include alcohol. Bottled water, speciality coffee, soft drinks, mocktails and freshly squeezed juice can all contribute towards the value. However, you need to be realistic. You should not add extra drinks to your calculation simply because they would be available through the package.
Work out what you would normally order, compare that with the daily package price and remember to include both sea days and port days. If you would need to drink more than you actually want simply to reach the break-even point, the package is probably not the right option for you.
My Royal Caribbean Drinks Menu article shows the onboard prices, while the separate drinks package worth-it guide will compare realistic daily examples.
Does the Itinerary Affect the Value?
The same Royal Caribbean drinks package can be good value on one cruise and poor value on another. I bought Deluxe on a short Independence of the Seas sailing with my sister. We spent most of our time onboard, had soft drinks and several cocktails and probably did break even.
My Liberty cruises were different. I was travelling solo and usually only wanted one or two alcoholic drinks. Paying approximately £75 per day for Deluxe on the two-night cruise would not have worked for me.
The daily price was lower on the seven-night sailing, but the cruise included several port days. I would not have used the package in the same way every day.
Sea days normally make it easier to get value from a drinks package because you are onboard for most of the day. On a port-intensive cruise, you may leave the ship early and return shortly before dinner. That gives you much less time to use a package you have paid for from morning until night.
The length of the cruise also matters. A daily price may look reasonable, but the total cost becomes much higher when it is multiplied across seven, ten or fourteen nights.
Bar Queues Can Affect the Value
Another factor to consider is how easy it is to get served. On both my short Independence and Liberty cruises, the bars were particularly busy on embarkation day. On Liberty, some waits were around half an hour.
This will not happen on every sailing, but long queues can reduce how much practical use you get from a package, particularly on a short cruise.
Unlimited drinks do not offer much value if you are spending a large part of the day waiting at the bar. It can help to try less obvious venues. On Liberty of the Seas, the Solarium Bar and Cantina Fresca were sometimes less busy than The Lime & Coconut around the main pool deck.
The Hybrid Option I Chose on Liberty of the Seas
For my seven-night Liberty of the Seas cruise, I chose the Classic Soda Package and paid separately for the alcoholic drinks I wanted. This gave me unlimited soft drinks and access to the Coca-Cola Freestyle machines without the much higher daily cost of Deluxe. When I wanted a cocktail, I bought one.
Across the full nine days of my back-to-back cruises, I spent less than £200 onboard. That total did not only include drinks. It also included a speciality dinner and a few items from the shops.
By comparison, Deluxe would have cost around £150 for the two-night cruise and approximately £378 for the seven-night cruise at the lowest prices I saw. That was more than £500 for the drinks package alone. I never felt as though I was missing out. I still had the drinks I wanted, but I was not ordering alcohol simply to justify something I had already paid for.
This approach can work well for solo travellers, passengers on port-intensive cruises and anyone who drinks soft drinks regularly but only wants one or two alcoholic drinks on selected days.
The Refreshment Package can offer a similar middle ground for someone who regularly drinks mocktails, speciality coffee, bottled water and juice but only wants occasional alcohol. The key is to choose the package that covers what you drink regularly and pay separately for everything else.
Which Royal Caribbean Drinks Package Should You Buy?
The Deluxe Beverage Package is most likely to work for someone who has several alcoholic drinks every day, regularly buys speciality coffee and bottled water, spends plenty of time onboard and values knowing the majority of the cost in advance. It can also make sense on a short and social cruise when you are travelling with someone who drinks in a similar way.
The Refreshment Package is better suited to passengers who do not drink alcohol but regularly want mocktails, speciality coffee, juices, bottled water and soft drinks.
The Classic Soda Package is a good option for passengers who mainly drink soft drinks and want the convenience of the Freestyle machines without paying for everything included in Refreshment or Deluxe.
Paying as you go can be the best option if you are happy using the complimentary drinks and only want an occasional cocktail, glass of wine or speciality coffee.
For me, Deluxe worked on the short Independence cruise with my sister. On Liberty of the Seas, the Soda Package and individually purchased alcoholic drinks provided much better value.
That does not mean one package is better than another. The right choice depends on how you will actually cruise, who you are travelling with, how many days you will spend ashore and the real daily price shown in your Cruise Planner.
Peace of Mind Versus Real Value
For many passengers, the decision is not purely about reaching an exact break-even point. A Royal Caribbean drinks package gives you predictability. You know what you have paid upfront and can order eligible drinks without checking the price each time. That convenience has value, particularly if you want to control your holiday spending before you travel.
However, convenience should not be confused with saving money. If you only have one or two chargeable drinks each day, paying as you go will usually be cheaper, even though it may not feel quite as simple.
Key Takeaways
Royal Caribbean offers three main drinks packages. Deluxe includes alcohol, Refreshment covers a wide range of non-alcoholic drinks, and Classic Soda focuses on fountain soft drinks.
The price varies between ships and sailings, so compare the actual daily cost rather than relying on the advertised discount.Once you find a price you are happy with, book it and continue checking in case the cost falls.
Remember that every adult in the cabin will usually need Deluxe if one adult buys it. This can make a major difference to the overall cost.
Your itinerary, number of sea days and normal drinking habits matter more than the size of the advertised discount. For many passengers, a cheaper Soda or Refreshment Package combined with occasional pay-as-you-go alcohol can offer better value than Deluxe.
Related Royal Caribbean Drinks Guides
My Royal Caribbean Drinks Menu and Prices guide shows the onboard cost of cocktails, beer, wine, spirits, soft drinks and coffee, along with downloadable menu PDFs.
The Royal Caribbean Deluxe Beverage Package guide explains the alcoholic package in more detail, including its inclusions, exclusions and cabin rules.
The Royal Caribbean Refreshment Package guide covers the non-alcoholic package and compares it with Deluxe and Soda.
The Royal Caribbean Classic Soda Package guide explains how the fountain drinks and Coca-Cola Freestyle cup work.
My Royal Caribbean Drinks Package Worth It or Pay As You Go guide uses realistic examples to compare the cost of each option.
You can also read my Liberty of the Seas Bars Guide for a full look at the bars, lounges, coffee venues and Freestyle machine locations onboard.
Royal Caribbean Drinks Package FAQs
Is the Royal Caribbean drinks package worth it?
It depends on the daily price you are offered and what you would normally drink. Deluxe is more likely to be worthwhile if you regularly buy several alcoholic and non-alcoholic drinks each day. Light drinkers are usually better off paying as they go.
Do all adults have to buy a Royal Caribbean drinks package?
If one adult buys the Deluxe Beverage Package, every other adult of legal drinking age in the same cabin will usually need to buy Deluxe as well. The Refreshment and Classic Soda Packages can be bought individually.
Can you share a Royal Caribbean drinks package?
No. Royal Caribbean drinks packages are for individual use and cannot be shared.
Is there a daily limit on the Deluxe Beverage Package?
Royal Caribbean does not currently impose a fixed daily numerical limit, although drinks must be ordered individually and staff can refuse service when necessary.
Is Starbucks included in a Royal Caribbean drinks package?
No. Drinks from standalone Starbucks outlets are not included. Speciality coffee from participating Royal Caribbean cafés may be included with Deluxe or Refreshment.
Does the drinks package work at Perfect Day at CocoCay?
Yes. Royal Caribbean drinks packages can be used at participating venues at Perfect Day at CocoCay.
What drinks are free on Royal Caribbean?
Basic water, tea, standard coffee and selected cold drinks are available at various venues without a package.
Can you bring wine onboard Royal Caribbean?
Each guest of legal drinking age may bring one sealed 750ml bottle of wine or champagne onboard on embarkation day. A corkage charge may apply when drinking it in a public venue.
Useful Cruise Items to Consider
These are a few simple items that can make your cruise more comfortable and help you stay organised onboard. I personally use variations of these when cruising, and they’re all practical rather than essential.
Magnetic hooks Perfect for extra storage in your cabin
Packing cubes Keep your suitcase organised
Cruise luggage tags Protect your tags at the port
Travel Extension Lead UK For charging multiple phones, cameras, and laptops
Toiletry organiser Great for small bathrooms
You can also browse my full Cruise Essentials list for more useful items I use or recommend for cruise holidays.
This article may contain affiliate links. If you purchase through these links, I may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.
Staying Connected at Sea
If you don’t want to rely entirely on the ship’s Wi-Fi, another option is a cruise eSIM. Saily has recently launched cruise eSIM plans that provide mobile data both at sea and in supported ports. Depending on your itinerary and how you use your phone, this could be a convenient alternative for messaging, maps and general internet browsing.
You can check the latest plans and coverage here: Saily Cruise Esim
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Affiliate disclosure: This section contains an affiliate link. If you purchase through this link, I may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you. I haven’t personally tested Saily’s cruise eSIM yet, so please check the latest coverage, data allowances and device compatibility before purchasing.