This past week, Royal Caribbean’s newest cruise ship, Wonder of the Seas, debuted with a week long cruise to the Caribbean and Bahamas. Wonder of the Seas is the largest cruise ship ever built and is the cruise line’s fifth Oasis class vessel. You can read our first impressions of the ship here.
On embarkation day, Royal Caribbean held a press conference for members of the media to discuss Wonder of the Seas and a few of the cruise line’s future plans.
While Royal Caribbean placed an order for a sixth Oasis class ship back in 2019, Mark Tamis, Senior Vice President of Hotel Operations for the cruise line, said that the ship will be even larger than Wonder of the Seas.
This isn’t much of a surprise as each Oasis class ship has been slightly larger than the previous and has debuted as the “world’s largest cruise ship”.
Oasis of the Seas forever changed cruising in 2009 and entered us into the age of mega-cruise ships. Allure of the Seas debuted a year later with Harmony of the Seas and Symphony of the Seas coming out in 2016 and 2018.
With a sixth and currently unnamed Oasis class ship coming out in 2024, will there be a seventh? This question was asked during the press conference and executives for Royal Caribbean said that right now, there is not a seventh Oasis class ship on order.
However, they also did not say that the sixth one coming out in two years will be the final Oasis class ship. Usually cruise lines will say when a ship is the final in its class.
Is the door open for a seventh Oasis class ship? We will have to wait to find out.
Other plans that Royal Caribbean talked about during the press conference were eventually putting an Oasis class ship in Asia. Wonder of the Seas was originally built for the Asian cruise market but Royal Caribbean decided to bring the ship to the U.S. and Europe last fall.
Because the ship was made for Asia, the ship is slightly modified from her sister ships and has an enclosed Solarium and a more enclosed Aqua Theatre.
The enclosed Solarium has heat and air conditioning allowing them to control the climate and it makes this area usable no matter what the weather is.
Royal Caribbean said they will be adding an enclosed Solarium on the sixth Oasis class ship that will debut in a few years.
