Great Mega Ship to sail on! Went for 30th anniversary...stayed in 1-bedroom aqua theater suite on deck 12...cannot say enough about the room. Great sized deck, roomy suite and good amenities! Best way to watch aqua shows on the back of the ship, along with movies played on the big screens. Main dining room menus were about average with good service in the 3rd deck dining room. Chops Grille was exceptional, Izumi was phenomenol and the Coastal Kitchen was second to none for breakfast and dinner! Blue Planet, Mama Mia and Ice Games were all awesome in their own rights! Ship is 8 years old and scheduled for dry dock in two years... some dated furnishings, but not too bad. Missed some updated venues that Harmony of the Seas had - robotic bar, 10-story slide of aft end of ship, etc. Nothing that will take away from the experience. Went to Barefoot Beach on Labadee and cannot wait to go back! Cabanas are the way to go! Read Less

We love the Allure as well as the Mamma Mia show! The ship is showing a few age signs but for the most part was very nice. The crew is awesome! At the end of the week my wife noted that she never saw a crew person not smiling! The food was surprisingly good and the selections in the Windjammer were amazing! The Asian and Indian food was very impressive. Choose and Giovanni’s menu was very good and the amount of food served was enormous! For instance in Chops we ordered an appetizer. Not only did we get that appetizer but two more that the waiter said we should try. Drinks were equally potent. The Mamma Mia cast was fantastic! One of the best productions we have seen including the Broadway and traveling Broadway productions. We sailed from the new RCCL Terminal in Miami. It was by far the fastest embarkation we have ever experienced. Leaving the ship was done within 10 minutes at 8:15 am!!!! Scanned off the ship, picked up two bags, used the facial scan customs and out the door. Wow!! Read Less

This was our 30 something cruise, 4th of Royal Caribbean, and 1st on an Oasis Class ship. We cruise out of Miami 12/2 – 12/9. We had an ocean balcony cabin: 11536 Before this cruise I had always avoided the Oasis Class ships because I was worried about the number of passenger and crowd control. I would not have booked this cruise but thanks to my gambling hobby, this was a free cruise for us, so I figured what the heck. My worry regarding crowd control was unwarranted. Royal Caribbean knows how to handle large numbers of guests. The Allure of the Seas turned out to be the most impressive ship I have sailed on and here’s why: MIA-Port: We flew in to MIA. We purchased transfer through Royal Caribbean. Their shuttle buses did not start transporting guests until 10:30 am. There is very limited seating in the baggage claim area where Royal Caribbean passengers gather for the shuttle to the port. If you arrive early you can go up one level an eat breakfast but you must take all of your luggage with you. Embarkation: Embarkation was unbelievably fast and easy. From the time we arrived in the terminal until we walked onboard the Allure was maybe 15-minutes. Once we got on board, we went to Deck 15 Forward (the Solarium) to eat lunch. They have a limited buffet selection but they were not crowded like the Windjammer buffet and the view was incredible. After lunch we explored the ship until our cabin was ready at 1:00 pm. Cabin: We had an Ocean Balcony on Deck 11, Starboard, Forward, 11536. This was a nice enough cabin – no complaints. Adequate storage, good water pressure, clean, and a nice view. Ship: There is so much to write about this incredible ship that it would take a couple of pages, which I’ll write on my blog. I’ll touch on the main things: Food: The was good, not great, but the selection of eateries was impressive. We ate most of our breakfasts in the Main Dining Room (MDR) or Johnny Rockets. In the MDR you have a choice of a buffet or being served, I did both, at the same time. Johnny Rockets has a limited menu, but was never crowded. We at in the Solarium on our last morning. We ate all of our dinners either in the MDR or in a “specialty” restaurant. We rarely eat dinner in the buffet restaurant. The food selection and taste were good. I think that Royal Caribbean has the best onion soup of any cruise line. Their specialty restaurants are very good, although you will pay extra to eat there. We only ate at one specialty restaurant this cruise, Samba. Usually the MDR menus are mine for us, this cruise was no different. Purchase a dining package if you want to try several specialty restaurants – it saves you money. Royal Caribbean’s Coconut Commander Cookies are to die for! I ate about a million of them! The pizza is the best I’ve had at sea and it’s free down on Deck 5. Entertainment: Where do I begin? There is so much to see and do on this ship that you’ll almost need to book a B2B to see it all. The ice-skating shows (2 different ones on our cruise) was very impressive, even though the skaters fell several times. The Aqua shows (2 different ones on our cruise) were beyond incredible. The comedy shows were a 10. The Long Road was great. The entertainment around the ship was top notice. My wife and I really enjoyed the Jazz Club on Deck 4. The 3D movie was a nice touch (no extra charge). The outdoor areas were great too. Several pools, miniature golf, a basket ball court, twin Flow Riders, twin rock-climbing walls, zip line, carolsail, and the list goes on. Lots of stuff for the kids too. Service: Service was as good as it gets. Our cabin attendant was ‘spot on’ and the other servers/employees did a great job. No complaints! Cons: There seemed to be a water leak on our Deck. The carpet in the hall near our cabin was wet and there was a slight mildew smell in the hall. We could not smell it in our cabin. The only complaint I c=had regarding our cabin was that the door to our balcony whistled when the wind was strong. You needed to open it slightly to stop it. I think I forgot to mention it to our cabin attendant…..I’ll send them an email. And, when we arrived back in Miami at 3:20am the side thrusters, used for docking, shock the ship so bad that it woke us up and kept us up for 30-minutes. Other than that, everything met our expectations. Disembarkation: This is always the saddest part of my cruise – I don’t want to leave! The disembarkation process went very smooth and ahead of schedule. From the time out number was called until we found our luggage in the terminal was maybe 10-minutes. Very good job Royal Caribbean! Getting through Customs was made easy by the facial recognition system they use now. Conclusion: If you want to take your family on a cruise that will almost guarantee that they have the time of their lives then book on the Allure of the Seas or one of the other Oasis Class ships! I had a great time and will definitely book another cruise on an Oasis Class ship…. Very soon. I forgot to mention the ports-of-call (we’ve been to them so many times): St. Maarten, San Juan, & Labadie. They were good especially Labadie, Haiti – make it a point to visit there for a fun filled day. My wife’s favorite stop is always St Maarten. Read Less

My husband and I have been cruising for over 20 years on numerous cruise lines but this was our first time on a mega-ship. We loved all of the entertainment options and found the ship to be beautiful, easy to get around and we never felt crowded or rushed. Our balcony cabin overlooking the Boardwalk gave us a terrific view of the Aqua Theater. We loved having breakfast daily in the Solarium Bistro and lunch at the Central Park Cafe. We ate most dinners in the Windjammer Buffet because I didn't care for the food choices in the main dining room. We did not eat in the extra fee restaurants. The included coffee in the Royal Promenade was good as was the pizza at Sorrento's. There were many families and children on board but there were always lounge chairs at the pools and few if any kids except in the play pool area which was in its own area and was not noisy or unpleasant for us older cruisers. Embarking and debarking were the fastest and easiest we have ever experienced. The service was fine. Our cabin was very nice. I was surprised that movies were not offered on the in-cabin TV and would like to have had that but it's a minor issue that didn't adversely impact our cruise. With so much to see and do on board, we were kept busy and entertained every day. We went for the ship rather than the ports so we didn't take any shore excursions. We thoroughly enjoyed the cruise and recommend anyone who wants to cruise to give this or any of the other RC mega-ships a try. Read Less

This was the second time that we travelled on the Allure o/t Seas. 1. The most impressive improvements were embarkation and debarkation. Not doubt RC has done a great job with Terminal A at Miami cruise port and the new procedure. Getting on board worked like a breeze. Also impressive reentry to the US just with facial recognition! 2. The second improvement to mention is the new RC phone-app, which makes it easy to see what is going on, during your stay at the ship. But there are still improvements possible. i.e. I found it difficult to find the arrival and all aboard times for port of calls in the abundance of activities listed. The same activities were also listed on the cabin-tv. While booked shows and shore excursions carried over to the phone, individually entered calendar events at the tv (non ship) would not be shown on the app. At one time the app froze and had to be reinstalled. Mostly though it worked fine. 3. We thought that this time the food in the main dining room was better than the first time we traveled on her. 4. The whole experience on board was also more enjoyable, but this I contribute more to our experience from last time, which helped tremendously to get the most out of a 7 day cruise on a ship of this size. 5. The shows, the main reason we returned to the Allure, were as good as ever, you just have to make sure you book the most convenient time for you beforehand. 6. The hostess in the Elite and higher lounge was of exceptional help with getting thigs organized and clarified as needed! Read Less

We chose this cruise as we have sailed Norwegian twice before and loved it and wanted to try this line as we’d heard great things. Embarkation and disembarkation - so smooth and hassle free I don’t know how they managed getting so many people on and off without any line whatsoever truly amazing. When we got on the ship is certainly impressive but the main deck just feels like a mall, with constant announcements and noise about art auctions, watch sales, drinks package and internet sails, it really did spoil the cruise for us as in the evening this was where all of the bars were and I just felt Like I was sitting in a shopping centre. The boardwalk deck was mostly geared towards children so we didn’t go there, we went to deck 8 often as we purchased the ultimate dining package and that deck was always quiet and pleasant as it’s open air. We went to Giovannis the most we loved it there, we also enjoyed Central Park and the Mexican but we weren’t keen on chops really. Overall choice and food quality was much better on Norwegian and I’d say the food was average even on the package. I wouldn’t go for the package again for dining as you can’t go to the Japanese tables or chef table without extra charges so it wasn’t worth it for us and on our day at sea we really Struggled to get into any restaurant at all. Cabin- we had an ocean view balcony it was a decent size and lots of storage and everything worked well. Staff - all amazing all so mega keen to please and very smiley and genuine no complaints at all. Shows - mama Mia we didn’t like we were both utterly bored but tbh musical theatre isn’t our thing, blue planet was great and the cruise director was really funny . Entertainment we found quite limited as you can only do each show once and there was very limited entertainment in the bars and we just plain didn’t like sitting in the shopping centre bars so we were in bed early most nights Sun decks - not much outside space plenty of hot tub space and good they have adults only area. We never ever queued for a drink and always bottles on offer in mobile bars so can’t complain about that. Again entertainment was lacking it seemed to be always really noisy with pretty average bands which were actually more irritating than entertaining It’s a great ship, it was spotlessly clean and service was impeccable but unfortanately The contact focus on shopping Really spoilt it for us and the main deck was totally focused on shopping . Read Less

We chose because we are crown and anchor members and were sailing with family and wanted these first timers to experience the great shows and mega ship As far as embarkation went it was fast and smooth as is with all our Royal Caribbean sailings, but the new terminal in Miami with facial recognition there were six of us and I was the only one that sailed through the new machines, the other five had to get into an extremely long and slow line, this caused usmt miss our shuttle to Ft Lauderdale so we had an hour to wait for the next! My husband was in a wheelchair and the rest of us stood waiting there are a few benches up against the wall of the terminal but with over six thousand passengers you can imagine no seats were available. We Enjoy Royal Caribbean but the dining experience has not been good on this cruise! Entertainment was very good! We sailed on the Oasis five years ago and thoroughly enjoyed the entire experience! One crew member was a complete waste of time in the dining room but the cruise director and his staff were fantastic .....and the rest of dining room crew were more than good! Our stateroom attendant Anne went above and beyond! The food in thnmain dining room was just acceptable there were no wow moments! Chops grill filet mignon was the one highlight for dining pleasure We have a cruise booked for the Spring and hopefully we will regain our enjoyment on that cruise. Our family felt the same which unfortunately made it a bit disappointing for first time cruisers think their expectations were high based on our previous experience. We will still recommend Royal Caribbean our motto can't be perfect all the time Read Less

So I’m going to break this down into sections starting from the beginning. We are a family of four with twin 23-month-old toddlers. We also traveled with the grandparents (80’s). We have been on several cruises, but this is the first with Royal. We booked a suite, so embarkation was a breeze through the suite lounge. The Miami port is beautiful and unloading our luggage was easy! You just drive into the parking garage and go to floor 3. The porters take your luggage and off you go to find parking. We went at 10 and it wasn’t too crowded. Once we got on board, it is a lot to take in. It’s a beautiful ship with so much to see. You enter into a promenade that has a bar, pizza parlor, other restaurants, and shopping. It really is stunning. We proceeded to floor 14 where the Royal Babies and Tots were located. We were allowed to book 16 hours initially. There is just one main play room with a tv and toys. The ladies are very nice there and the kids enjoyed their time. After day 3, they opened up additional hours. They are open for port days and go through til midnight. It is $6 an hour before 6 and then $8 an hour after 6. They give you a phone so they can reach you or you can call. It doesn’t work off of the ship though. There is a wonderful play area for the kids from 10-9 every day. You can also check out toys to take back to the room. There was only a night or two that we weren’t able to get time. We went and had pizza for lunch, which was actually pretty good. The cafe had sandwiches available also. The bar was easy to get to and we used our paper pass for drinks. The cards are on the door when the rooms are ready. At 1 o’clock we went to our room. I thought the rooms would be a little more modern, but they were a little run down. The ac didn’t work in the room and we had to wait for someone to come and fix it. Our room steward was so nice and very accommodating. We tipped him extra at the beginning, middle and end since our boys made quite the mess. We didn’t get our pack n plays until late in the evening and one was broken. So we had to wait into the evening and had to call several times to get a replacement. The boys were unable to nap so we had a pretty miserable afternoon and evening. We had a problem in that we didn’t get our in room purchases until 3-4 days into the cruise. We had ordered champagne, chocolates and other items that took several days to get and then it was also wrong. So it took quite a while to get that situated. We went to the dining room the second night. It took them 15 minutes to seat us and then we had to stand in the middle of the dining room because the individual that was supposed to seat us left us standing there because he didn’t know what table to take us to. Then we had to wait for a high chairs. It was a huge mess. We had wonderful service once we sat down and had a very nice meal. The dining room staff is hit and miss. We were able to dine three of the seven nights. The staff was also hit and miss. Some were wonderful, while others were very abrupt and didn’t smile at all. The food was better than average. The portions depend on the meal. The prime rib was huge and the lobster tails were very delicious. The desserts were also yummy. We doin that people wore whatever they wanted in the dining room. We even saw sweat pants on formal night. Which we personally dressed up because you’re cruising and it’s fun! We did dine at the Brazilian steak house and really enjoyed the food and the service. The service was really exceptional here and worth the price we paid. The food was hot and delicious. The roast beef sandwich at Park Cafe was everything we read about. Really delicious and the salads were good too! We definitely spent a lot of time at Park Cafe. The Dog house was a good pit stop for a delicious dog! I was disappointed that all of the food areas closed at 6. The buffet area was small so it was always hard to find a table at night. The food was pretty good at the buffet with lots of options. Again, the staff wasn’t very friendly. Finding high chairs was a bit of a challenge as well. The amenities on board are wonderful. There are plenty of pools. Although the kids pool area was sub par. The fountains were rarely on so the kids got bored easily. They do have life jackets on board for kids of all sizes. You can use them free of charge. We tried all of the onboard activities and we were quite happy with them. The golf is fun and they even have small clubs for toddlers. The Flow Rider is oodles of fun!!!! We even ice skated. There are limited amounts of time slots, but we never had any issues getting some ice time. There were plenty of areas for the kids to run off energy. We brought sweaters, but I would say that a majority of the ship was on the warm side. I never used my sweater on the ship or the dining room. On past cruises, I was freezing! If you are a poker player, then you’ll have table time every night with limited wait times. The slots are super tight. Super super super tight. There are plenty of black jack tables, craps and some other table games. The spa was wonderful and I really enjoyed my massage. Although I did pay for the additional time and didn’t receive it. So I paid for an additional 20 minutes that I never got. The massage was started late and I know what time we started because I texted my husband right before we began. So not too pleased about that. The upselling is rampant and so is the product push. We both had beverage packages so never had to worry about drinks. I would definitely recommend buying it precruise on discount. It is not discounted onboard. All of the drinks are delicious and they are not skimpy with alcohol. We did several excursions. The boys went to RB&Ts while we went ashore. The Secret River was amazing! We highly recommend it. The WiFi was a bit sketchy and I definitely couldn’t stream movies. It was good enough to text and to google. The app was really great. We could see all of the dining, activities and communicate with other people onboard through the app. The shows that we managed to catch were really well done. The comedians, not so much. We did have fun at the onboard games. They had movies every night wth lots of options and family friendly options. There are so many onboard activities! The kids had fun at all of the Dreamwork events with the animals. The parades are a lot action and happen on a regular basis. It’s really great and quite the event. We also did the DreamWorks breakfast. Although for a child event they didn’t have high chairs readily available. We had to stand around while they found us a table...again. It wouldn’t have been bad had it been at the entry but we were left standing in the middle of the dining room next to other seated guests giving us stares. For $10 a person it was ok. There are 3 different characters that come around for a picture about mid way through breakfast. We also did portraits in the Picture This studio. The photographer was super nice and our portraits turned out amazing. Expensive, but amazing! We pre-purchased the photo package, so we took advantage of that and had about 60 total pictures at all of the different photo stations. The concierge was lack luster. We called several times and we were told to go to guest services or our message was never returned. We did go to the suite lounge and they are pretty strict about children being well behaved as well as the dress code. We did not get to Coastal Kitchen this trip. Overall, we enjoyed ourselves because we didn’t let all of the inconveniences mess up our vacation. We did book another cruise, which we were super disappointed in the NextCruise office experience. Luckily, we have a travel agent so we got the onboard credit from the NextCruise office. We booked on a smaller ship with the hopes that maybe they would have a more personable experience. The staff was either super friendly or grumpy on Allure. There didn’t seem to be an in between. I would say that if you’re a couple with no kids, it’s probably a different experience. If you have super young kids, the options are much more limited. I would say if you have kids below the age of 3, save your money. A - Activities A - Royal Babies & Tots B+ - Food quality - dining room is ok, other venues are much better A - Embarkation/Debarkation A - Entertainment C/D - Friendliness of staff D - NextCruise office B - Food options, close too early C - Guest services - always long lines A - Room steward B - Wifi D - Casino - super tight slots and super Smokey but lots of fun (A for fun) A - Photo studio F - Upsellling is rampant and there’s always someone pushing something Read Less

We chose this cruise due to our parties schedules around the end of the year. This is the 3rd time we've cruised the Allure and each time gets better. We booked 5 of us into a Royal Family Suite with 2 bedrooms and 2 baths. This gave us the sky class. For those who have never experienced a suite class if you enjoy cruising try it at least once. You won't go back. Everyone on the ship was friendly and accommodating. We didn't eat in the Windjammer or the MDR; instead we booked 4 night specialty dining and dined the remaining nights in the Coastal Kitchen. We did not experience a bad or even disappointing experience anywhere. If there was any issue it was the pool was very cold. Of course we were cruising in late November so that was expected. Terminal A during embarkation was a breeze. Less than 10 minutes from shuttle to the ship. We arrived 1/2 hour after the rooms were available so we went right there and settled in. Luggage arrived just a couple of hours later Debarkation was a breeze too. The porters (and unfortunately the dispatcher from the shuttle service need to be better trained. There was no signage for the shuttle areas and it was very confusing. The dispatcher (from JetPort parking) kept stating we should go to area 7-8 but that was for private cars. The only areas that were actually marked was for buses. Read Less

We sailed on the Allure over Thanksgiving, as a family of six; parents, two teens (15 and 16), and grandparents. We had three balcony cabins, that we had connected, and two of our cabins connected from inside. This was the first time we had sailed on such a large ship, and the ship was full. We embarked through the new Miami terminal, and having the app with the Set Sail pass on it, embarkation was seamless. Of all the cruises we had ever done this embarkation, on the biggest ship we had ever sailed, was by far the easiest and most pleasant. Once we boarded, we headed to Windjammers for lunch, and fortunately we boarded early, because shortly thereafter it was packed! One of my pet peeves about RCL is the lack of attention to detail, and it especially shows in the cabins. Our cabin had a broken soap holder on the basin, and in the shower, the back of the toilet was icky, the overflow on the basin grubby, and there were some mysterious hairs behind the basin (I washed them away.) Our closet door also stuck, and even though my white socks were clean after walking on the carpet, the carpet had dirty marks on it. The air-conditioning in our kids adjoining cabin broke toward the end of the trip, and even though we reported it nobody came to fix it. And the cabins get hot without air! Food on the ship was our biggest let down. The food in Windjammer and the main dining room was mediocre at best. I still find it odd that for dinner the servers take the appetizer, entrée, and dessert all at one time. Windjammer had a good selection of different foods for all the different nationalities on board, but toward the end of the week the choices became repetitive. Also, the ongoing announcement in Windjammer at breakfast to leave if you had finished was intrusive (and rude). We had dinner one night at Johnny Rockets, and it was just okay. Same with breakfast there. My favorite for breakfast was Park Café. The choices are limited, but it was quieter, and I preferred the food. The kids had donuts a couple of times and said they were good. We had lunch at Chops and the food was outstanding – the tator tots were delicious. Like all the RCL ships, iced tea, lemonade, tea, coffee, and water (not bottled) were free. We used the Starbucks several times too but be aware it is more expensive, and they do add the 18% gratuity to every order. My usual $4.25 drink onboard was $5.75; significantly more. Entertainment was a mixed bag. We saw Edge Effect (acapella), which we have seen before and enjoyed. However, there were long pauses between songs (and sets) which seemed to confuse people, and we heard people complaining how they had butchered popular songs; but we enjoyed the show. Ocean Aria was, as my son described it, interpretive dance with diving. The high dives had me on the edge of my seat, but it irked me that the dancers were often noticeably out of sync with each other. Hubby and daughter saw this show twice, but once was enough for me and son. Blue Planet was a show that really did not appeal to any of our party. We all came out questioning what we had just seen. The backgrounds to the show were outstanding, but the song interpretations were awful, and again the acrobats were out of time with each other. Games on Ice (based on Monopoly) was boring. The most exciting parts were when the skaters kept falling (I lost count how many times), and again everyone was out of sync. The two comedians (Long and Grey) were both very good; in the adult and family shows. Of course, the highlight was Mamma Mia. I’d seen Mamma Mia three times before this production, and this production was as good as all the theater shows I’d seen. It was however, the first time I’d seen it with British actors and it took me by surprise at first. We participated in the trivia in the Schooner Bar several times. The bar is not an ideal location for the trivia. One end is completely open to the shopping deck below, and with the noise it is difficult to hear. Four of us did the zipline, which was short but fun. We stopped at Philipsburg, St. Maarten and we just walked around. You can still see some of the after affects of the hurricanes, but the main shopping area is mostly rebuilt. It was mostly jewelry so did not appeal to us. We took a taxi back to the ship, and at $20 for six it worked out cheaper than the water taxi. The tourist areas in San Juan in Puerto Rico were beautiful, even though you could still see some minor hurricane damage. In addition to the main tourist area, we walked to the Old Fort, but didn’t go in. Labadee, as it turns out, is not an island, but a part of Haiti. Who knew! We reserved a bungalow here, and it was well worth it. We got bottled water and two floaties included. There is no doubt the Allure is a beautiful ship, but we missed not being able to see the ocean at all times. Sometimes it felt more like we were in a mall than on a ship. I did enjoy the neighborhood concept, and Central Park was my favorite. It was so peaceful with all the live plants and chirping birds. I also loved the nostalgic feel of the Boardwalk neighborhood. Allure does a good job in catering for families – there is something for everyone. Overall, we had a wonderful trip, but the jury is out on whether we’d sail on the Allure again Read Less