I’ve been on more than 60 cruises, but P&O Cruises is the line I’ve sailed with more than any other…
After nine P&O cruises, I’ve still got another two booked, so it’s fair to say there’s plenty that keeps me coming back. But why?
Part of it is the price, and it’s fair to say that I’ve had some absolute bargains, but a cheap fare wouldn’t tempt me back if I didn’t enjoy the holiday.
P&O Cruises works for our family trips and I’ve had some brilliant girls’ holidays on board. I love how the whole experience is easy and stress-free. But, there are also a few things that I wish P&O Cruises did better as well.
Here are the eleven things I love about P&O Cruises, followed by four things I think could be better.
(Ad disclaimer: My most recent cruise on Azura was a press trip with P&O Cruises. My other ten P&O cruises have all been self-funded.)
1. The fares offer fantastic value for money
I’ve booked P&O cruises for less than £50 per person per night, which is bonkers when you think about it. I mean, I’ve also booked a London Premier Inn for £200 per night and that didn’t come with any food, activities or entertainment!
You can’t deny that P&O cruises offer fantastic value for money compared to other cruises and also compared to holidays on land.
Unlike many other cruise lines, gratuities are included too, so you don’t have a daily tipping charge added to your onboard account.
My usual approach is to book as soon as the sailings are released, around two and a half years before departure. I’ve been tracking prices and the best deals are almost always at launch, then they rise as you get closer to the sailing date.
I also look out for offers where the third and fourth guests in a cabin sail free. If you’re sharing as a family of four, or even as four adults as we sometimes do on a girls’ trip, those offers can make a big difference.
2. The travel arrangements make starting your holiday easy
One of the things I appreciate most about a P&O cruise is how straightforward it is to get to the ship.
P&O Cruises is quite unique in that its cruises from Southampton can be packaged with an included coach. There are pick-up points all over England, Scotland and Wales, which makes starting your holiday so easy!
Suggested read: Where P&O Cruises Coach Transfers Pick Up
Because everyone on the coach is going to the ship, you know that it’s very unlikely to set off without you. That means that you can travel on the morning of your cruise, rather than having to head down the day before and stay in a hotel.
The fly-cruises are really convenient too, with flights and airport-to-ship transfers included in the package. Again, you can fly on the morning of your cruise, so you don’t need to factor in an extra day for travel.
And at the end of your cruise, you can relax onboard until it’s time to be taken to the airport, rather than have that awkward gap between the end of your cruise and your flight home.
3. There’s a choice of ship sizes
I really like P&O Cruises’ biggest ships, Iona and Arvia. They’re some of the biggest ships in the world and there’s so much to do onboard with a four-screen cinema, four swimming pools, at least 18 hot tubs and around 30 bars and restaurants! Arvia also has a high ropes course and mini golf!
However, I know a mega ship isn’t everyone’s idea of a relaxing holiday! And that’s okay. P&O Cruises has ships of all sizes to suit different tastes.
My own sweet spot is the size of Azura and her sister ship, Ventura. On these medium-sized ships, I feel there’s enough choice to keep me busy, with different places to eat, multiple entertainment venues and several swimming pools. But it doesn’t feel as though I spend the whole holiday walking from one end of the ship to the other.
I also like being able to find my way around without it taking most of the cruise. Having different ship sizes within the same cruise line gives you a better chance of finding one that suits you.
P&O Cruises has some smaller ships too – Aurora has just 1,900 guests while Arcadia has around 2,000. These are adults-only for most sailings, although the line has recently announced that children will be welcomed on certain itineraries.
I’m very excited to try Aurora with the kids in December. Be sure to subscribe to my YouTube channel if you’d like to see how we get on.
I’m also looking forward to when Queen Anne moves over from Cunard to P&O Cruises in 2029. While I’m not a huge fan of Cunard, I do love Queen Anne and her sister ships such as Holland America’s Nieuw Statendam. I think this ship will fit into the P&O Cruises fleet wonderfully.
4. I love the food
Food is one of the highlights of a P&O cruise for me. I really enjoy the main dining room with the option to arrive when you like rather than having to eat at a set time every night.
There’s always plenty of choice in the buffet, and I’ve found the vegetarian and vegan options better than on many other cruise lines I’ve tried.
One little tip is to ask about vegan bacon and sausages at breakfast. I’ve been able to get them even when they weren’t out on display, and the ones I’ve had have been really good.
Suggested read: 10 Secret Menu Items You Can Ask For On Any Cruise
My children are fussy eaters, so the children’s tea has been useful for us too. On our family cruises, we’ve often taken them to eat at around 5pm, then they’ve headed to the kids’ club when it opens in the evening. That leaves us free to enjoy a meal together, just the two of us.
There are enough included options that I don’t feel I need to pay extra for dinner, but I do enjoy the speciality restaurants which offer great value for money.
Sindhu is my favourite, both for the Indian food and the lovely service.
I also really like The Beach House, where I’d recommend arriving hungry because the portions I’ve had have been enormous.
5. Individual drinks are reasonably priced
When I buy a drink on a P&O Cruises ship, the prices feel much closer to what I’d expect in a pub at home than some of the prices I’ve seen on other cruise ships. In some cases, I’ve thought they were cheaper than my local.
I also appreciate not having an extra service charge added to every drink. It makes it easier to see what I’m spending, which matters when you’re deciding whether to buy a package or simply pay as you go.
For me, affordable individual drinks are one of the reasons P&O Cruises can still feel good value even when I spend a bit extra on board.
6. My children love the kids’ clubs
There are kids’ clubs that children will tolerate, and then there are the ones they keep asking to go back to. P&O Cruises’ clubs have very much been in the second category for my two.
They love the games consoles, but there are other activities too, such as friendship bracelets, board games and organised games with other children. Having somewhere they actively want to spend time makes the holiday easier for all of us.
I like that we can enjoy time together as a family without spending every minute doing the same thing. We’ve also found family sessions where adults can join in, which is handy if you fancy a game of Mario Kart together.
P&O Cruises has facilities for younger children too, including a night nursery which offers a free babysitting service for under fives from 6pm until midnight. That’s something I’ve never seen on another ship.
7. A P&O cruise works really well for a girls’ holiday
Although I’ve had lovely family holidays with P&O Cruises, I’ve enjoyed it just as much with a group of friends. It’s a really affordable and stress-free break for a group trip.
One of my favourite things is simply sitting down together for a three-course dinner in the main dining room, chatting and enjoying the evening. When you’re eating from the included menu, there’s no food bill to divide up afterwards.
We’ve had great fun at the silent discos, and on Iona I’ve loved going to the 710 Club. The pubs are good places to spend an evening too, so there are options even when the main theatre doesn’t appeal.
And if you fancy something more wholesome the following morning, I’ve been impressed by the gyms. The ones I’ve used have had plenty of equipment for the size of the ship.
8. The crew make me feel welcome
The crew on my recent Azura cruise were particularly friendly. People smiled, said hello as I walked past and were happy to have a chat when I wanted one.
It sounds like a small thing, but it makes a difference to how a ship feels. You spend a lot of time passing the same people during a cruise, and those little interactions help make it a lovely place to be.
9. P&O does a good job of stopping sunbed hogs
If there’s one thing that grinds my gears on a cruise, it’s when people put a towel down on a sunbed and disappear for hours. No cruise ship has enough sun loungers for every guest to have one to themselves, and this selfish behaviour can really spoil your holiday if there’s nowhere outdoors to sit on a sunny day.
While many other cruise lines choose to turn a blind eye to such activities, P&O Cruises is setting a great example by cracking down hard on sun lounger hogs.
There are covers across the loungers all over the ship that remind people they’re not allowed to leave their belongings unattended on them for more than 30 minutes. There’s also a ‘lonely lounger pickup point’ where guests have to make the walk of shame if they find that their belongings have been removed.
10. The itineraries keep tempting me back
I’ve repeated P&O Cruises itineraries because I’ve enjoyed them so much the first time. One favourite is a week visiting Northern European cities from Southampton, with ports such as Rotterdam or Hamburg and calls that let you visit Bruges, depending on the sailing.
I think these cruises work really well for a winter break with friends. An overnight stay, when the itinerary includes one, gives you more time to enjoy a city without rushing straight back to the ship.
The Canary Islands are another favourite. We’ve enjoyed the 14-night cruise from Southampton around Easter, with sea days on the way there and back, as well as the shorter 7-night fly-cruise options.
11. The excursions are affordable
I’m not usually a huge fan of cruise line excursions because a lot of them can be quite expensive. However, I am pleased to report that P&O Cruises’ excursions are quite affordable.
I’ve taken lots of different excursions with P&O cruises, and they’ve all been organised really well. The coach picks you up right outside the ship and takes you to a few different places.
I always price up an excursion against doing it with a third-party company, just getting an Uber, and doing it yourself. Quite often, the P&O Cruises excursion comes out cheapest.
4 Things I wish P&O Cruises did better…
So, you’ve read about the things that keep me booking. But there are a few areas where P&O Cruises doesn’t quite tick all the boxes for me. And I’d like to mention those, in the interest of fairness.
1. The drinks packages have never offered good value for me
I’ve had a drinks package on roughly half of my cruises, so I’m certainly open to buying one when the numbers work.
I like a drink, and our girls’ holidays can be quite boozy, but I’ve never ever bought a drinks package on P&O Cruises. And there are two reasons for that…
Firstly, the packages are quite expensive, when you consider how cheap the drinks are.
Yes, it’s true that on some other cruise lines, the drinks packages will cost more, but on those lines, the drinks are literally twice as expensive as they are on P&O cruises. You just have to do the maths.
The second reason why I haven’t ever bought a P&O Cruises drinks package is because the Classic drinks package really doesn’t include much at all.
You get just seven cocktails to choose from, which I would get bored of quite quickly. When it comes to wine, you’re limited to a very small 175ml glass. You can’t have double measures of spirits, and even a medium-sized coffee or a bottle of diet coke isn’t included.
Those restrictions mean that the Deluxe package is the only one that really makes sense. But if you get that for £65, you’re looking at 11 pints of beer or 8 cocktails per day to break even. You would have to hit that on every single day of your cruise, including embarkation day and the days when you’re off the ship in port, until the evening.
While it is great news that the drinks are affordable on P&O cruises, it does mean you should definitely think twice before getting a package. Even if you drink a lot, it’s still probably better to just pay for your drinks at the end.
2. I don’t love the cocktails
I really love drinking cocktails on a cruise, whether it’s a refreshing, frozen cocktail by the pool or a salty margarita in the evening. Trying the different cocktails is usually one of the highlights of my trip.
I’m not saying that P&O cocktails are bad, but they just don’t live up to the very high standards of cocktails you’ll find on other cruise lines, in my opinion.
The first issue is that there isn’t a very large choice. Most of the bars have the same menu, which has just a handful of options. After the first two days of my cruise, I’ve usually tried them all, and I’m wanting something new.
This leads me on to the second problem, which is that the bartenders are unable to make any cocktail that’s not on the menu. This is quite disappointing, as I love it when I get chatting to a bartender and they suggest a personal speciality they think I’ll like.
I’ve found that many of the cocktails I’ve tried on P&O Cruises have been made using premixed ingredients. Personally, I much prefer watching a bartender make my cocktail from scratch.
For example, on my most recent cruise, I wanted a margarita with salt around the rim, but I couldn’t get one made that way. The option I was offered was a frozen margarita mix, and that was only available in certain bars. Also, I could get a plain mojito, but they weren’t able to make any flavoured versions.
The cocktails I had were fine, and I was happy with the prices. But if you particularly enjoy having lots of choice or ordering something that isn’t on the menu, my experience suggests you might find the options frustrating.
3. The theatre entertainment doesn’t excite me as much as it used to
There’s a good variety of entertainment overall, but I just don’t love the main theatre offering. I miss the huge West End-style shows you get on some other cruise lines, and while P&O Cruises does sometimes have magicians, acrobats and other variety acts, you won’t necessarily get them on your sailing.
On my last cruise, I didn’t go into the main theatre at all. The programme was singers and dancers, and after taking more than 60 cruises, I felt as though I’d already seen plenty of that.
That’s partly down to my own tastes and how often I cruise. If you love that style of show, you might happily go every night, but it doesn’t particularly tempt me away from the other things happening around the ship.
I can still have a brilliant evening at a silent disco or in a bar with friends. I’d just love a theatre programme with more acts that make me think, “I really want to see that.”
4. There are too many formal nights
I appreciate that this is very subjective, but in my opinion, P&O Cruises has too many formal nights.
Don’t get me wrong, I like formal nights just as much as the next person, but I think that four formal nights in a two-week holiday is way too much. There’s no way I’m packing four different ball gowns in my suitcase.
I do like that Arvia and Iona have fewer formal nights than the other ships, and you would only get two on a 14-night holiday instead of four. This makes so much more sense to me.
The dress code on these evenings, which are also known as celebration nights, is super strict, especially for men. Gentlemen must wear a jacket, and that rule applies even when it’s 35° outside. Wearing a smart waistcoat and a tie as you may do to a summer wedding is not enough to get entry into the main dining room.
That said, there are plenty of places you can go if you’d rather avoid formal nights. On some of these nights, you’ll find me in the buffet or in the Beach House restaurant where there’s no formal dress code.
I’ll still be booking more P&O cruises
For me, the things P&O Cruises does well comfortably outweigh the things I don’t love. The fares I’ve found, the food, the family facilities and the ease of putting a holiday together are all reasons I keep coming back.
I’ve already booked Aurora for December 2026 and another girls’ trip on Iona in February 2027. The Iona holiday is a repeat of a trip we enjoyed so much that we decided to do it again, which probably tells you more than any list could.
Have you sailed with P&O Cruises? Let me know what you loved, what you didn’t, and whether you’d book another cruise with them.
