Princess Cruise Line Announces Updates to its Main Dining

I just booked cruise with Princess (going solo) for 16 days to Hawaii. This will be first time with Princess. Thank God I don't drink alcohol or sodas. I will only dine / drink with what's included.

We always travel as a group and we always had traditional dining, same table, same dining room and same server. We had table numbers confirmed in advance before the cruise. And other times when I was just myself and spouse we always set it up the day of the cruise by speaking to the dining manager. This avoid having to wait for a table. But sounds good that Princess made those changes.

Horrible experience with princess arrived 1 day late in Sydney had to cancel and rebook with singapore airlines 3000 dollars down the drain never with princess again

the new system doesn't really do much for me. I used to always reserve my table and decent enough to let them know when I wasn't;t coming so they could use my table. Also they used the tables after waiting a set amount of time for those who had reserved and weren't there yet. I agree with you, main dining room is great. but I don't think they needed to go this route. there could be empty rooms when everyone decided to take the same route.

That’s interesting. As a platinum member on Princess I was able to book dine my way a year ago when I booked my cruise. I’m headed out on Caribbean Princess, July 2024. Is it applied to all cruise ships? I have not heard of this. Totally agree those “tables for two “ are crammed up next to each other a foot away from the next table for two.

I like how this video was titled NOT AGAIN to get me to watch it and then I figure out at the end that the wording was misleading and that she loves the new dining changes. Oh and RESERABLE is a nice touch.

I am over the moon happy about this. We have been loyal cruisers with Princess& will be elite next cruise. WE LOVE TRADITIONAL DINING! Same time, Same table, Same waiter. So happy that it’s back!!!!❤

Princess doesn’t hold the tables for your entire reserved table time if you don’t show up.

Princess Plus is the best deal at sea, especially if your travel agent knows how to search for deals tat include it in the fare.

Why was a sniper pointing a gun at your neck during the first half of the video? 🤔

i was very happy to see this change. My biggest disappointment on my last Princess cruise concerned the inability to have a traditional dining experience as a solo traveler (same time, same table, same waitstaff, same tablemates). I called that out specifically in my post-cruise customer survey. I think this new policy will accommodate dining for cruisers with the three main preferences.

I've taken one Princess TA and have another reserved for later this year. I cruise solo and used the MDR only once for dinner and twice for lunch, each time only when I particularly liked the menu. For lunch I had shared tables, and for dinner I was placed at a solo table. No complaints from me in either case. The walk-up wait was short each time.

So excited to hear of these changes. We were on the Sky in late January.
There also happened to be 800 people with a music cruise.
Dining was almost impossible!
Next year we are on a 10 day, so will love the option to just show up. I don't care for dining room every night, so hope this works.
Thanks for explaining!

Interesting change. I will not be impacted by the change yet. My next cruise is before the change. Not yet sure how I feel about it personally, but I can follow the business logic and accept it.

Why is your background music so loud? You don’t need that and it’s louder than you.😊

Once I make my full payment I then make my dinner reservations for the week usually for the same time about 30 to 40 minutes later than the traditional dining time! I think this new system benefits Princess as well ,😊especially the traditional dining! Instead of constantly setting up tables at different times they only have to turnover the whole room once!!!

We reserved our table for each night for our upcoming cruise in June. I alternated the dining rooms. This will be our first Princess cruise and we are trying the Premier package as a treat for our 25th anniversary. We prefer the traditional dining option.

Why do you want background music to drown out what you are saying?
Please kill the music.

Are you talking in Australian or US dollars ?

In our experience on our last Princess Cruise a month ago was that the casual dining was okay as was the main dining room fare. A far cry from pre covid days where we thought the dining was very good. So they do need to make changes.

I wonder what I signed onto on my last cruise, each night different table different people? I was told you could ask to stay at the same table if you wish so the whole table did just that, but it was the third day of the switch about. And the two-person table was a joke, you had to move the table to get someone out or have your plate moved by a fanny.

Hi Loved you video! First time Princess cruiser here. We are booked Sept on the Enchanted Princess. I’ve never booked dining before so I can’t compare. I just tried to book our main dining and it says no availability. So confused. We’re 90 days out and final payments have been made. Any suggestions?

Hi! Is the main dining complimentary for princess standard? Thank you

I prefer to eat in a different dining room every night. So what I did was reserve a table at the dine my way MDR for all 12 nights. Then for the traditional seating MDR I reserved the late seating as well for all 12 nights. As far as the walk in MDR ( no reservations needed) we can play around with that one as well as the casual dining and the specialty restaurants. My goal is to sit in a different restaurant each night and that’s exactly what I’ll do. If I can’t make it to a specific restaurant that I have reserved, then it’s nice to know that it’ll be given to someone else after 15 minutes.

Really great info thank you. The background music is a bit loud on your video, a little distracting.

I love the new walk in option. We are cruising in May2024 to Alaska out of Seattle. We don’t like to make reservations and possibly leave a table empty if we are occupied with something else. 😊

I hope this improves things on Enchanted. We had good to great service on Royal and Regal but terrible on Enchanted. We reserved all 3 dining rooms and getting seated was easy. It took forever to get food and drinks

Why do you sound angry even when you are trying to be positive?

I'm almost 2 months out and I cannot make any reservations at any restaurant online... It shows me availability and when I click on it it says no tables are available. No matter what time I do it for no matter what day I do it for it keeps showing me that everything is reserved what do I do

It's about time! What took them so long? Why don't other cruise lines, (I'm looking at you Celebrity) do this?

Thank you. Great job on this video. Keep after them. Bring back free Alfredo's.

Start nickling and diming me and I won't cruise.

I think if you aren’t going to make your allotted time for dining, just cancel, it’s common courtesy to both the wait staff and other passengers.

We made our reservations in 2023, then Princess cancelled them. When we were able to rebook they changed everything. The reserved dining didn't have good times and some of us are ADA and can't walk all the way to the back of the ship. We are a group of 28 women who can't get any reservation unless it's 7:30pm where we can't walk all the way to the front of the ship to Princess theatre for the early show. New system is not appropriate. I am Elite with 28 cruises under my belt. Unhappy with new system.