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January 15, 2024

The connection between Cruising Journal and reviews goes back a long way. It is a project developed in 2016 that involved several university faculties, combining statistical subjects with the intention of providing a new and different tool for evaluating cruise experiences.

The primary inspiration was to equip users with a platform that could assess all aspects of a cruise, even in the brevity of completion, a fundamental requirement on the web today. However, we also wanted to obtain a review that was as real as possible, protecting it from any last-minute emphasis or disappointments. Hence, the elaborate software developed by researchers for Cruising Journal, capable of evaluating any contradictions in the review compilation and assigning differentiated scores to various aspects of the review. This format does not ask users, like many others, for an overall score or evaluation of the cruise but rather breaks down all the various aspects that make up the experience to automatically calculate a final score.

Over time, the system has gained international recognition as a reliable and profoundly useful tool, providing valuable opinions and serving as a valuable indication of the cruise that best suits individual needs. It also guides cruise companies, which rely on these neutral reviews to understand the satisfaction with their services.

The review system is integrated into the website with the destinations of all fleets. This allows users to identify their ideal ship on all itineraries through a clever intertwining of values. By entering some subjective criteria of importance, it is possible to see which ship, on the chosen itinerary, best suits one’s needs.

The rankings we compile every two months for publication in the magazine reflect the state of scores at the time of printing. They are always different and track the popularity of ships and cruise companies over time, providing an interesting snapshot of appreciation for services, itineraries, and all the novelties in the cruise industry.

Our internationality is naturally reflected in the review system. The platform is fully accessible in six different versions of the website, and reviews can be filtered by language and various other criteria, allowing readers to access experiences published in their own language. However, other criteria for selecting reviews are also crucial. It will be more useful to read those that are closest to our needs. For example, if I plan to travel as a couple in winter to the Caribbean, I will be less interested in reviews from families or friends during the summer in Northern Europe for the same ship.

The processing and querying systems are diverse and hold many other surprises that I leave to readers to discover. It is often fun to “browse” our vast catalog, which includes over 130 cruise companies and more than 2000 constantly and meticulously updated ships. In this aspect, Cruising Journal has become a reference point in the industry, thanks to timely updates and relationships established with all cruise companies for access to direct information.

Cruising Journal has now reached a year of publication of its Magazine. All the rankings published in 2023, resulting from user reviews, represent a small treasure trove of statistics, experiences, and advice that should be appreciated. For this reason, combined with the desire to recognize the various cruise companies for their commitment to services and innovation, the Cruising Journal Awards were born. The processing of the various rankings from the 6 editions of Cruising Journal 2023 represents an overall ranking, essentially reflecting the opinions of cruisers expressed throughout the year.

The structure follows the review criteria that underpin the site, with a general score assigned to each ship and a single score for various aspects of the cruise. The data that appears for the first time in the Awards is a ranking for cruise companies, which is the result of the sum of all scores obtained by the fleets’ ships.

Regarding the scores achieved by the ships, the system took into account the rankings obtained during the publication of the six editions of Cruising Journal in 2023, assigning 10 points for the first position, descending to 1 point for the tenth position. In case of ties, we gave priority to ships with a higher number of reviews. As for the cruise line rankings, we considered the average scores obtained by individual ships, redistributing them proportionally based on the number of units in the fleet. This is to avoid disadvantaging, of course, fleets with few ships compared to much larger fleets.

Further clarification is needed to explain our philosophy. At first glance, it might seem inadequate to compare extremely diverse cruise lines without a category distinction, which apparently could make judgments more uniform. In reality, we firmly believe that there is no ranking of cruise lines as “better” or “worse,” and that the cost of a cruise does not necessarily make it a superior experience compared to others. The level of a ship should be evaluated in proportion to our expectations. A good experience is not necessarily the most expensive one or with a more prestigious company, just as a bad experience is not necessarily on a ship that sells cruises at very low rates. A ship is considered good when it meets our value-for-money criterion, that is, our expectations for the journey we have undertaken. From this perspective, it is legitimate to equate a luxury cruise line with a more popular one. The experienced traveler knows well that these are two completely different products, but both can be evaluated based on their quality-to-price ratio and the efficiency experienced on board. For this reason, we chose not to differentiate between cruise lines in different categories, standardizing evaluations based on onboard experiences rather than luxury or non-luxury distinctions.

Another feature we want to emphasize is the international nature of the reviews collected on our site. This allows us to consider opinions as representative of a general perception, not subject to specific travel habits and cruise styles, as is often the case when reading comments exclusively from certain nationalities

We hope that readers will enjoy browsing through these rankings, the result of their own participation and the interest shown every day by thousands of site visitors. The choice of the word “fun” aims to indicate the spirit of appreciating reviews. An opinion does not represent reality and is extremely subjective. We believe that a collection of opinions can come closer to that same reality, but they are still opinions. It is normal, therefore, that many of us, including the editorial team at times, do not identify with these numbers. However, they are the result of those who have dedicated their time to our project, and we are happy to publish them. One more review could change any position in the rankings, so we always encourage all our readers to share their experiences on the site.

Finally, regarding the cruise companies, we like to emphasize that our relationship is one of constant collaboration with all brands. Positive and negative feedback is reported periodically and is of great interest to the companies themselves. Onboard forms, important as they are, often do not allow guests the time to process their experiences. They can do so much better a few days later, in tranquility, and through a tool that seeks to capture their opinion in a more detailed and “scientific” manner.

I leave you to “browse” and “enjoy,” as promised, confident that it is the cruisers themselves with their participation and evaluation who create services and improve products. We are happy to represent one of the vehicles that make all this possible.

Don’t miss more updates, news and reviews about the world of Cruises on Criusing Journal.

Gabriele Bassi

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