WIFI at Sea

[Ima Desert Diva]

I have read many articles WiFi on cruise ships is not that great. In fact, mostly pretty bad.  I did purchase a package on a previous cruise, (which was not Norwegian) and it was awful, and a waste of money.  I spoke with a Customer Service Agent @ Norwegian about this, and she assured me the service on "The Joy" would be great, as it is a newer ship, and technology was better.  But really, would a Norwegian employee tell me their WiFi was terrible like most of their competitors??  I have little interest in emails or Facebooking while enjoying my cruise.  But I am traveling with two other couples, and I want for us to be connected, as it seems it would be easy to lose one another in a crowd of 4,000 on such a large ship.  I was told, by this same Customer Service Agent, if I had the Norwegian phone app, for a $10.00 fee, I could attach a chat feature to this app to enable me to stay in touch with my travel companions while on the ship.  Has anyone done this, and does it work effectively?? 

[Funky Fusion FoodsJ]

You do not need to pay for/have the wifi in order to use the $10 app.  I've used it on the Sun and Jade earlier this year and worked fine on both.

[zqvol]

3 hours ago, Ima Desert Diva said:

I have read many articles WiFi on cruise ships is not that great. In fact, mostly pretty bad.  I did purchase a package on a previous cruise, (which was not Norwegian) and it was awful, and a waste of money.  I spoke with a Customer Service Agent @ Norwegian about this, and she assured me the service on "The Joy" would be great, as it is a newer ship, and technology was better.  But really, would a Norwegian employee tell me their WiFi was terrible like most of their competitors??  I have little interest in emails or Facebooking while enjoying my cruise.  But I am traveling with two other couples, and I want for us to be connected, as it seems it would be easy to lose one another in a crowd of 4,000 on such a large ship.  I was told, by this same Customer Service Agent, if I had the Norwegian phone app, for a $10.00 fee, I could attach a chat feature to this app to enable me to stay in touch with my travel companions while on the ship.  Has anyone done this, and does it work effectively?? 

 

I can tell you that on Getaway, the Internet is acceptable. Not as good as at home, but it is workable, especially for web browsing and email, just don't try to steam video.

[Mrdell]

I can tell you that while on the Breakaway the internet wasn't that bad. We were able to stay in touch with family using "Audio Facetime" (no video) and also had very few issues with reception. Keep in mind it is nothing like your wireless internet at home  but with a little patience you will get by.😊 

[BirdTravels]

7 hours ago, Ima Desert Diva said:

I have read many articles WiFi on cruise ships is not that great. In fact, mostly pretty bad.  I did purchase a package on a previous cruise, (which was not Norwegian) and it was awful, and a waste of money.  I spoke with a Customer Service Agent @ Norwegian about this, and she assured me the service on "The Joy" would be great, as it is a newer ship, and technology was better.  But really, would a Norwegian employee tell me their WiFi was terrible like most of their competitors??  I have little interest in emails or Facebooking while enjoying my cruise.  But I am traveling with two other couples, and I want for us to be connected, as it seems it would be easy to lose one another in a crowd of 4,000 on such a large ship.  I was told, by this same Customer Service Agent, if I had the Norwegian phone app, for a $10.00 fee, I could attach a chat feature to this app to enable me to stay in touch with my travel companions while on the ship.  Has anyone done this, and does it work effectively?? 

There were 4500 on the Joy a couple of weeks ago and the Wi-Fi was pretty bad compared to other NCL ships. 

[gmbhardy]

4 hours ago, Mrdell said:

I can tell you that while on the Breakaway the internet wasn't that bad. We were able to stay in touch with family using "Audio Facetime" (no video) and also had very few issues with reception. Keep in mind it is nothing like your wireless internet at home  but with a little patience you will get by.😊 

I was on the Breakaway last week and the wifi in our cabin was just about useless. The only thing that worked was FaceTime.

[BNBR]

I'd say Carnival and NCL internet are comparable. Both barely usable but enough to slowly browse the web and email.  Royal Caribbean is a different story. Similar pricing and their speeds are substantially faster. We stream Netflix on Royal. So the technology is there, it's just not widespread across all brands yet. 

[chill6x6]

Lately I've used internet on three different cruise lines/ships; Holland America Rotterdam, Royal Caribbean Oasis, and Celebrity Silhouette.  The Rotterdam was okay....it worked.  Now the other two...they ROCKED.  MUCH better than I anticipated.  

[Mrdell]

8 hours ago, gmbhardy said:

I was on the Breakaway last week and the wifi in our cabin was just about useless. The only thing that worked was FaceTime.

Cabin location plays a big part of your WiFi experience. We had a decent signal in our cabin so everything was pretty smooth. I think that some of these ships need a few more repeaters to distribute the WiFi a little more evenly.

[laurabegorrah]

The NCL app for messaging works well-ish.  The app itself is free, but you pay the fee when on board to get the communication functionality.  That fee is per person, not per room.  It works well enough to figure out where someone is or to make quick plans....but it's far from instant, and that lag can make it frustrating at times

[graphicguy]

3 hours ago, Mrdell said:

Cabin location plays a big part of your WiFi experience. We had a decent signal in our cabin so everything was pretty smooth. I think that some of these ships need a few more repeaters to distribute the WiFi a little more evenly.

Yeah...your location on the ship makes a huge difference.  I know when I was near a repeater (look in your hallway) right outside my cabin, I was getting consistently getting 20Mbps up and down.  But, when I went outside on some decks, wifi was barely useable.

 

That said, I've always been able to find a good WiFi signal somewhere on the ship.  It may not be in your cabin, or around the places that are crowded (thinking Garden Cafe), but you'll find a good signal somewhere.  Depends on where you look, however.

[ATXBecky]

We just got off the Getaway Aug 27th and wifi was good. We used NCLs computers with no problem, even at sea. Still had some mins. left after checking emails.

[GrabMyWrist]

I had the premium package on the Bliss in July for two weeks. Worked perfectly the whole time. I did have to visit the Internet Cafe between cruises to have them remove cached info in their system Other than that, no issue.