Crystal vs Viking

i have been on 8 Crystal cruises and thy have all been fabulous.

I was thinking about Viking due to an itinerary.

I was wondering if anyone has sailed on both lines and could tell me if I would be happy with Viking.

Fran

I was on Crystal Serenity 2 years ago, I am on Viking Sea now.

My take after almost 2 weeks is this:

If you like dressing up stay with Crystal. VIking is very similar to Regent on attire, nice casual.

I have found service to be identical to what I have had on both Regent and Crystal.

If you want similar included amenities, i.e. Alcohol in room, comp dry cleaning and laundry then book an upper level room like I did.

The ships layout on Viking and room size is superior to Crystal by a long shot. Bathrooms and rooms are great.

Food is subjective, but I have found Viking to be superior across the board. One of my peeves with Crystal was the inability to get a good thick steak, on Viking no problem.

I know this goes against the conventional wisdom about Crystal food, but that is my experience.

The seafood has also been superior, not sure if that is because of the itinerary, mostly in Norway, or not.

Entertainmaent was better on Crystal.

New isn't always better, but the Viking ships are way ahead of Crystal , better wifi, interactive tv (I had 2 in my room) and a wonderful spa. Lots of open deck space and lots of nooks scattered about indoors to relax with an ocean view.

This is just my opinion, others may disagree.

A couple of more comments. On Viking they do not provide half and half with coffee, only milk. This is a negative but you can ask for cream.

While I think the main dining room is better than Crystal MDR, I think Nobu was better than the Chefs Table on Asian night, still very good though.

We are trying the Cuba cruise with Viking this November. We sailed the South Pacific this last winter with Crystal. We loved the entertainment and lectures. The Symphony standard rooms are small, the Serenity rooms are the same size as the Viking. The food was good in the special restaurants, the MDR was ok on Crystal. On two of the islands they tendered us onto the most beautiful beaches at no extra cost. We were the only ship there, really fantastic. We have booked the Crystal Symphony again for this March 2018 Tahiti to Chili, with 2 days on Easter Island. When you have a lot of sea days entertainment and great lectures are nice to have. I am concerned about Viking's limited entertainment, we have booked a 2019 cruise with Viking Hong kong to Tokyo. So we are trying this Fall cruise to check out Viking. We found Crystal is not real formal like it was in my parent's day 20 years ago.

We made friends with a couple on our Viking Star cruise that had sailed extensively on Crystal, and they felt that Viking compared very favorably - in fact they liked it better. They (and we) were surprised by that since none of us felt that Viking was really trying to compete with the luxury cruise lines like Crystal, but wanted to be more in line with Azamara and Oceania.

That said, this couple was in an Explorer's Suite, so right there I think the accommodations were better than Crystal. Not sure how a verandah cabin would compare.

The veranda rooms on the Symphony are smaller than Viking as far as sq footage goes. The veranda rooms on the Serenity are the same sq footage as Viking rooms. We are trying Viking in November. My big concern is the entertainment on Viking, We loved the entertainment on Crystal this last winter on a 21 days cruise of the South Pacific. We think this cruise to Cuba is a good way to try Viking. We have avoided Oceania because we have heard their entertainment is so poor. Love sea days so, the two days on Viking will be a good test as well.