What does Princess Plus really cost once I strip out crew appreciation?
Princess Plus runs $65 per person, per day on standard ships when you book at least 96 hours ahead ($70 on Sun Princess and Star Princess, or $70/$75 if you're late). Crew appreciation — $18 per person, per day for interior, oceanview and balcony staterooms — is included in that bundle, but it's a cost you would owe on almost any Princess sailing anyway. Remove that unavoidable $18/day and you have roughly $47 per day left to justify through drinks, one-device Wi-Fi, casual dining allowances and the other Plus perks. That is not the price of Plus — it is the bundle value you still need to use.
Why does the standalone drinks package change the comparison?
Only if you were already planning to buy Princess's drinks package. Sold on its own it costs $77.99 per person, per day — about $13 more than the entire Plus bundle at $65, which includes those same drinks plus crew appreciation, Wi-Fi and four casual meals. Princess has priced standalone drinks to make the bundle look inevitable. That comparison does not help a light drinker who would never pay $77.99 for a package in the first place — for them the question is simply whether $65/day matches what they would really use.
Who should choose Princess Plus?
Plus probably fits if you would pay crew appreciation anyway, want daily ship Wi-Fi on one device, drink regularly within the caps — 15 drinks a day (soft drinks included), $15 a drink — and both guests in the stateroom will use it — Princess requires the same package for guests 1 and 2. The moderate-user math later in this guide recovers roughly $49/day in drinks and Wi-Fi against the ~$47/day you still need to justify — but only if you use the package every day of the sailing, not on port days you skip.
Who should skip both Plus and Premier?
Skip both if you barely drink alcohol, do not need ship Wi-Fi, and are unlikely to use the casual dining extras — Scenario 1 in this guide recovers close to nothing beyond unlimited coffees. Pay crew appreciation separately and add Wi-Fi only if you need it. Also think twice when only one guest drinks: both adults must buy the same tier, which often means paying twice for a package one person will not use.
When does Premier make more sense than Plus?
Premier costs $35 per person, per day more than Plus and adds unlimited specialty and casual dining, drinks up to $20, four-device Wi-Fi, a shore-excursion credit, professional photos, and reserved theater seating. It tends to pay off when you'd book a Princess shore excursion and want three or more specialty dinners a week — at 2026 prices a specialty dinner costs $66–$72 out of pocket once Princess's 20% service charge is added. We price every added benefit in whether upgrading to Premier is worth the extra $35 a day.
Take the fare you've found, add your nights and guests, and the calculator weighs Plus against paying separately for the drinks, Wi-Fi and crew appreciation you'd actually use. Princess is already selected.
Price this for my Princess sailing →Common questions about Princess Plus
What does Princess Plus include?
It folds crew appreciation (the daily gratuity), a drinks package, Wi-Fi and a few extras onto your fare. The drinks package allows up to 15 drinks a day, each capped at $15 — and soft drinks count toward that total, not just alcohol.
How much does Princess Plus cost?
$65 per person, per day on standard ships if you book at least 96 hours ahead, rising to $70 if you're late. Sphere-class ships start at $70, or $75 bought late or onboard.
What are the Princess Plus drink rules?
Up to 15 drinks per person, per day, each capped at $15. The count runs 6am to 6am, and it isn't alcohol only — fountain soda, zero-alcohol cocktails and Red Bull all count. Specialty coffees and teas don't, and bottled water has its own limit of 12 a day.
How much are gratuities on Princess?
$18 per person, per day for interior, oceanview and balcony staterooms, $19 in mini-suites, and $20 in suites. Princess Plus includes this; without the package it bills daily to your account.
What Princess Plus includes
Princess Plus is a convenience bundle: prepaid crew appreciation, a drinks package, one-device Wi-Fi, casual dining allowances, OceanNow delivery and room service — all wrapped into one daily rate.
The pitch is simple. Buy separately and it costs more. Bundle and relax.
Princess also tells you it saves you 50%. Read the footnote: that figure is based on a 10-day cruise, purchased before sailing. Your sailing may look different.
On Sphere-class ships — Sun Princess and Star Princess — the same package costs more.
What the Princess Plus pitch leaves out
Princess Plus works brilliantly, mostly for Princess.
The package is built around the assumption that guests hate friction more than they love arithmetic. Nobody likes signing receipts for every coffee or watching Wi-Fi charges stack up. I've seen this from the other side of the desk. Once you prepay, the spending feels done. You stop asking whether you're getting value.
Is Princess Plus really all-inclusive?
Not quite. A few things to know before you commit:
- You're limited to 15 drinks per person per day, each capped at $15. The count runs 6am to 6am. Order a premium wine or top-shelf cocktail above the $15 ceiling and you pay the difference yourself.
- The 15 is not 15 alcoholic drinks. Fountain soda, zero-alcohol cocktails, frappés and Red Bull all come out of the same allowance. Only two things sit outside it: specialty coffees and teas, which are unlimited, and bottled water, which has its own cap of 12 bottles a day. A heavy coffee drinker is well covered. Two sodas by the pool and a mocktail at dinner, though, spend three of the day's 15 before the first glass of wine. Canned soda isn't included at all — you get 25% off, and if the bar opens one for you it still counts.
- Wi-Fi covers one device only. Traveling as a couple and both want to be online? You're paying for a second connection separately — or using a local SIM or eSIM ashore, which is often cheaper. One point in Plus's favor, though: the tier it includes is MedallionNet Max, Princess's fastest, and Max isn't sold on its own at any price. The $25 used in the scenarios below is what the cheapest plan Princess does sell separately would cost you — a floor on the benefit, not a ceiling.
- Specialty dining isn't included. Plus covers four casual meals, but the specialty restaurants — Crown Grill, Sabatini's — still carry a cover charge: $55 a head on most ships, $60 on Sun and Star Princess, plus a 20% service charge, so about $66–$72 out of pocket. Only Premier folds those in.
- Both guests in a stateroom have to buy the same package. Guests 1 and 2 can't split: if one wants Plus or Premier, so does the other. When only one of you drinks, that usually means paying twice or skipping the package.
- Crew appreciation, once bundled, cannot be removed, exchanged or refunded. That's not buried in the fine print — it's confirmed in their FAQ. You're committed.
The biggest thing to watch is how Princess presents crew appreciation. It's shown as a bonus, but for most guests it was always an unavoidable cost. Strip it out and the package looks a lot less generous.
Princess Standard vs Princess Plus
Plus costs $22 a day more than Standard if you were buying Wi-Fi anyway, and $47 more if you weren’t. Everything else in the bundle you’d have paid for regardless.
Standard fare buys the cruise and your meals in the main dining room. Everything else is billed separately: crew appreciation at $18 per person a day, Wi-Fi from $25 a day for one device, and every drink priced individually.
Plus is $65 per person a day and folds all three into the fare. So the comparison isn’t $65 against nothing — it’s $65 against what you were going to spend anyway.
| Standard fare | Princess Plus | |
|---|---|---|
| Crew appreciation | $18 pp/day · mini-suite $19 · suite $20 | Included |
| Wi-Fi | From $25 pp/day, one device | Included, one device |
| Drinks | Charged individually | Up to 15 a day, each capped at $15 |
| Before your first drink | $43 a day | $65 a day |
Which leaves the drinks to cover the difference.
What Princess Plus costs and what it takes to break even
Princess Plus costs $65 per person per day on standard ships — provided you book at least 96 hours, or four days, before departure.
Miss that window and the rate rises to $70. On Sphere-class ships the advance rate is $70, rising to $75 if you buy late or onboard.
For two guests on a standard seven-night sailing, that's $910 up front — and $252 of it is crew appreciation you'd owe with or without the package. The package itself is the other $658, about $47 a day each to earn back.
One number frames the whole decision. Princess sells the drink package on its own for $77.99 a day — about $13 more than the entire Plus bundle at $65, which includes those same drinks plus gratuities, Wi-Fi, and four casual meals. Standalone drinks are priced to make the bundle look inevitable. So the real question isn't whether Plus beats buying drinks à la carte — Princess has made sure it does — it's whether you'll actually use enough to clear the bundle's own price. That's what the scenarios below test.
The casual cruiser
- No alcohol
- A couple of coffees (unlimited — not counted against your drink allowance)
- No ship Wi-Fi
- No interest in casual dining extras
Daily value recovered: close to zero beyond the coffees. You're paying $65 a day. Over a seven-night sailing that's about $455 per person, before you've bought anything else.
The moderate package user
- Wi-Fi (one device): ~$25 — what you would otherwise pay for the cheapest plan Princess sells separately
- Coffees: covered, unlimited, no cost against the cap
- Two cocktails within the $15 ceiling: ~$24
Total: ~$49/day. You're just above break-even — but only if you use the package consistently, every single day of the cruise.
Sphere-class reality
- Same as Scenario 2 — but on Sun Princess or Star Princess
- Package rate: $70/day pre-booked
- After crew appreciation: $52/day to justify
That same moderate user is now behind from day one. On the newest ships, the package doesn't need to be a bargain. It just needs to feel easier than saying no.
Why Princess Plus is harder to justify on a 14-night cruise
On a 14-night sailing, Princess Plus at $65 per person per day costs $1,820 per couple — before you've spent a cent on anything else.
If you only break even on your best days, that total gets harder to justify as the cruise goes on. The longer the sailing, the more the math matters.
Princess Plus vs Princess Premier
$35 more per person, per day — and it buys specialty dining and an excursion credit.
| Princess Plus | Princess Premier | |
|---|---|---|
| Price (standard ships) | $65 pp/day pre-booked · $70 onboard | $100 pp/day pre-booked · $105 onboard |
| Price (Sun & Star) | $70 pp/day · $75 onboard | $105 pp/day · $110 onboard |
| Drinks | 15/day (soft drinks count), up to $15 each | Unlimited, up to $20 each |
| Specialty coffee & tea | Unlimited | Unlimited |
| Casual dining | 4 meals | Unlimited |
| Specialty dining | Not included | Unlimited |
| Wi-Fi | 1 device | 4 devices |
| Crew appreciation | Included | Included |
| Shore excursion credit | Not included | $100–$300 pp (by length) |
| Photos | Not included | Unlimited digital + 3 prints |
| Reserved theater seating | Not included | Included |
The tier above Plus is Princess Premier: $100 per person, per day pre-booked on standard ships and $105 on Sun Princess and Star Princess — $35 a day more than Plus. Whether that upgrade pays depends almost entirely on specialty dining and the shore-excursion credit, not on drinks or Wi-Fi. We run the full numbers at current 2026 prices, including three break-even scenarios, in Princess Premier: is the $35-a-day upgrade worth it?
Skip both if you barely drink — pay crew appreciation and add Wi-Fi only if you need it.
Princess Plus if you'll drink within the $15 cap, want daily Wi-Fi, and casual dining is enough.
Princess Premier only if you'll use a Princess shore excursion and want three or more specialty dinners a week — see our Premier upgrade analysis for the break-even math.
Is Princess Plus worth it? The verdict
Princess Plus makes sense if you were already going to pay gratuities, you need daily Wi-Fi, and you drink regularly — within the $15 per-drink cap.
For everyone else, it's prepaid convenience sold at a premium. Reassuring at checkout. Less so when you do the arithmetic.
Book before the 96-hour cutoff or you're paying $5 per person per day extra for the same package.
The arithmetic above is one sailing at list prices. Put in your own fare, nights and guests and see where Plus lands against paying separately — or compare the all-in cost against other lines.
Run my Princess numbers →All prices in US dollars, sourced directly from Princess Cruises, July 2026. Rates can change — verify at princess.com before booking.