Hey there!
My husband and I (early 50’s) are big Disney fans and have sailed with Disney every few years since our (now grown) kids were young. We’ve sailed 4 night itineraries on both the Wish and Utopia.
Our Wish cruise was with our kids (who were both in college). It was enjoyable and we had a good time … we all love Disney.
Our cruise on Utopia of the Seas was just my husband and I and it was our first foray into a non-
DCL cruise. We actually really enjoyed the experience (with a few caveats) enough that we took a longer cruise on Star of the Seas later the same year (and booked Legend of the Seas for 2027). I think it’s a great choice for an adult couple (I’d absolutely recommend the Wish over Utopia if you were cruising with kids).
Disney is pretty strict with Port Arrival Times and won’t even let you into the cruise terminal until your designated arrival time (people will be waiting around outside to be let into the terminal). If you stay at a Disney World resort or at the MCO Hyatt and utilize Disney transportation, you can get a fairly early port arrival time and boarding group.
In my experience,
Royal Caribbean (we’ve cruised with them twice out of Port Canaveral now) is not strict with port arrival times - as long as you show up after 11:00am or so (they start boarding around 10:30am for suite level guests and high status Royal cruisers), they won’t even look at your port arrival time and will usher you into the terminal, through security and on to the ship (their lines move quickly - they are a bigger cruise line with more experience than Disney and it shows in some areas).
Boarding is incredibly smooth and easy with Royal - their terminal for Utopia in Port Canaveral is new, big and beautiful and designed for mega ships. Boarding with Disney involves more standing around and isn’t quite as smooth and the Wish pretty much sails out of a non-DCL terminal in Port Canaveral these days (which is not a huge deal … but some Disney fans really only want to sail out of the DCL terminal).
Utopia is LOUD. The minute you walk on the ship, the volume is full blast and obnoxious because they are promoting the party atmosphere (and apparently that means LOUD). Even the shows are LOUD (I wore ear plugs as if I was going to a concert and that worked well). The deck parties were so loud that we avoided at all costs (also have no interest in seeing adults twerking and having champagne from a squirt gun shot into their mouths … which I saw on several Utopia videos I watched in advance … that is NOT my scene!).
The drinking culture is huge on Utopia (and Royal in general) … it was not obnoxious drunk people everywhere (I was also in bed by 11:00pm and avoided anything labeled party, so who knows … there may have been obnoxious drunk people where I wasn’t), but more like bars every 20 feet, servers everywhere in the theaters, etc. and people constantly with drinks in hand. On Disney, drinks are available, but it seems to be more of the one or two drinks here and there crowd … but Disney does not offer a drink package, while Royal does.
Disney staterooms are terrific for families with split bathrooms, bathtubs, privacy curtains in the rooms, bunk beds for kids, etc. Utopia is great for couples … no split bathroom, but a walk in shower with an incredible exhaust fan that kept the bathroom mostly steam free. Utopia ocean view balconies are superior to Disney Wish because their balcony chairs recline and come with ottomans … Disney has regular chairs and no ottoman.
Service on both ships is very similar - efficient and friendly. Both ships also felt very clean.
Amenities are slightly different between the two ships.
On the Wish, your stateroom will be serviced twice a day (morning cleaning and evening turndown), while on Utopia, your stateroom will be cleaned once a day (your stateroom host might ask you if you prefer early or late cleaning).
On the Wish and on
Castaway Cay, pool and beach towels are freely available for the taking … on Utopia, you will have to present your room key card to check out towels on the ship and at Coco Cay and you have to turn them back in (or get charged a $25 fee). It’s not hard to check out towels and they will let you have as many as you want, but it’s nice not to have to deal with that on Disney.
And, of course, Disney has free Coke products onboard while Royal charges for soda. You can buy a soda package on Royal (around $10/person per day) for unlimited soda, or you can buy an individual soda from any bar or the dining room if you just want a Diet Coke or something with dinner. Both ships allow you to hand carry owns soda onboard and have beverage coolers in the stateroom.
Evening dining on the Wish is spectacularly themed … you’ll have three dining rooms that you’ll rotate through on the ship and your servers will follow you. You’ll be assigned 5:45pm or 8:15pm dining times (you can choose between the two of them … 5:45pm will fill faster). You’ll likely be seated at a table with other couples on the Wish for dinner. You can request a table for two, but your mileage may vary.
Evening dining on Utopia is in a very large multi story generic dining room. You’ll eat in the same place every night and will probably have the same servers. You can choose a set dining time (I think they are like 5,7,9) or choose My Time dining where you select your own dining time each night in the App before your cruise (or you can select onboard). You will be seated at a table for 2 on Utopia.
I thought main dining food was better on the Wish. I thought Utopia had better and more included quick service type options for food on the ship than the Wish. Utopia has a pizza place that’s open until like 3:00am … people seem to love it - I thought it was better than Disney pizza, but not terrific (but it’s good post bar food I guess). The buffets were similar on both ships, but the buffet on Utopia is open for dinner (Disney’s is only open for breakfast and lunch). Both have free unlimited soft serve - Utopia only offers chocolate and vanilla while the Wish normally have a third flavor that will change from day to day.
Utopia will have about a million things they try to upsell you on … specialty dining, snack shops, drink packages, private beach clubs and cabanas on Coco Cay, etc. You don’t need to purchase any of it … the included food is fine, the free beach chairs with umbrellas on Coco Cay are fine, ice water, coffee, tea, lemonade and a few varieties of fruit flavored fountain beverages (lemon lime, fruit punch, etc) are free and you can buy individual drinks, etc. On the Wish, they will maybe try to sell you a water package or drink of the day … no push to upsell (because they don’t have much to upsell).
Evening shows on the Wish are amazing Broadway caliber Disney productions in a beautiful theater - no reservations necessary, you just show up to the show that correlates with your dinner time.
On Utopia, they have three main evening shows … a production show in the theater (pretty good and had drones), an ice skating show in their ice arena (incredible … these are Olympic caliber figure skaters) and a water show in the Aqua Theater (jaw dropping … like Cirque Du Soleil). You have to make reservations for the shows on Utopia in the App. They do allow walk ins about 15 minutes before show time. Utopia is just a completely different experience in this area than Wish … I enjoyed the shows on both ships.
Castaway Cay is a very chill beach experience and incredibly well themed (everything on
Disney Cruise Line is incredibly well themed and just a joy to look at if you’re a Disney fan… everything on Utopia is like a nice generic Hilton or an upscale mall). CocoCay CAN be a very chill beach experience if you know where to go (far end of South Beach and get there early), but it can also be loud and chaotic with 101 upsells (water park, zip line, hot air balloon, adult only beach club, quiet exclusive beach club, etc). Food on Coco Cay is more varied and better (IMO) than Castaway Cay. Coco Cay also has a pool (that’s not heated - the beach clubs have heated pools) if the beach is not your jam.
My absolute favorite place on Utopia was the adults only Solarium. It’s a fully enclosed multi story indoor pool area (small lounging pools and hot tubs) that overlooks the ocean. It was so serene and relaxing … I spent nearly my entire Nassau day lounging in there. The Wish adult pool area is small, tucked in the back of the ship and crowded.
Anyway, that’s my comparison.
If someone asked me to choose today between Utopia and Wish for a 3 night cruise, I’d probably choose Utopia … mainly because I want to try Royal’s new beach club at Nassau. I prefer Castaway Cay or
Lookout Cay over Coco Cay … but not by a huge margin.
