COVID-19 and the $1 billion cruise ship: Symphony of the Seas by the numbers

Through much of 2020, cruise ships sat moored in harbours around the world, idle for months at a time — a visible symbol of an industry stopped in its tracks by COVID-19. Set against that shutdown, the vital statistics of the world's largest cruise ship show just how much revenue a single vessel needs to generate, and how far short of that the pandemic left it.

A ship built for scale

Royal Caribbean's Symphony of the Seas, delivered in 2018, was at the time the largest cruise ship in the world by gross tonnage, at 228,081 GT. She measures 361 metres in length across 18 decks, carries 5,518 passengers at double occupancy (rising to a maximum capacity of 6,680 passengers) and a crew of around 2,200. Building her is widely reported to have cost about US$1.35 billion — roughly £959 million at 2018 exchange rates — a figure repeated consistently across cruise and maritime trade press, since shipyards rarely disclose an exact contract price.

What a week on board costs

Fares on Symphony of the Seas span an enormous range. Standard interior and ocean-view cabins on a typical Caribbean sailing have historically listed from a few hundred dollars per person, while the ship's showcase two-storey Ultimate Family Suite — complete with its own slide — has been advertised from roughly $20,000 a week in low season up to $80,000-plus during Christmas week, a range that has since drifted toward $45,000–$85,000 as of the mid-2020s. That top-end pricing sits alongside a ship built to carry thousands of passengers a week at far more modest fares — which is the more useful number for judging how a ship this size actually earns its keep.

A single sailing of the Symphony of the Seas can carry more passengers than a small town — and in March 2020, Royal Caribbean idled every ship in its roughly 26-strong fleet at once.

How COVID-19 grounded the fleet

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention issued a No Sail Order on 14 March 2020, formalised in the Federal Register ten days later, halting passenger cruise operations from U.S. ports. Royal Caribbean suspended sailings across its entire global fleet that same month, initially targeting a return to service later in 2020. In practice the order was extended repeatedly — through July, September and finally October 2020 — before being replaced on 30 October 2020 by a Conditional Sail Order requiring simulated voyages and health protocols. Most major lines, Royal Caribbean included, did not resume meaningful passenger sailings until well into 2021.

The scale of the losses

The collapse was not confined to one company. Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd's own annual revenue fell from about $11.0 billion in 2019 to roughly $2.2 billion in 2020, a drop of nearly 80%, as its full fleet sat idle for most of the year. Across the wider industry, Cruise Lines International Association figures show global ocean-cruise passenger volume falling from around 29.7 million in 2019 to roughly 5.8 million in 2020 — also an 80% decline. For an industry that had spent a decade building ever-larger ships on the assumption of ever-rising passenger numbers, 2020 reversed that trend almost overnight.

Rough math: what one ship needs to earn

The following is an illustrative estimate, not a published Royal Caribbean figure. Using the line's own pre-pandemic price list for a 9-night, cruise-only western Caribbean sailing — Interior from £1,099, Promenade £1,199, Ocean View £1,299, Balcony £1,499 and Suites £2,399 (as advertised, 2018–19) — and assuming a plausible cabin-type mix across the ship's roughly 6,680-berth capacity, an 80%-occupied sailing would generate in the region of £6.7 million in ticket revenue alone, before onboard spending. Run at that rate for around 32 sailings a year, that is roughly £214 million in annual ticket revenue — enough, in theory, to cover the ship's ~£959 million construction cost in under five years, ignoring running costs, which for a vessel carrying over 2,000 crew are substantial.

• Every 9-night sailing cancelled during the 2020 shutdown meant forgoing an estimated ~£6.7 million in ticket revenue from this ship alone.
• Royal Caribbean's roughly 26-ship fleet was suspended simultaneously, not just Symphony of the Seas.
• The Conditional Sail Order (October 2020) required simulated voyages before any line could carry paying passengers again.
• Full-scale passenger sailings did not meaningfully resume until 2021, well beyond the industry's initial hopes for a late-2020 restart.

Frequently asked questions