Royal Caribbean allows you to choose your cabin location, so how do you pick the quietest one?
If you’re a light sleeper, you may need to find cabins that have the least amount of noise around them.
A noisy cabin makes for an unpleasant, inconvenient cruise.
You may have small children or light sleepers in your party who can be woken up by the slightest sound.
Or you could enjoy taking naps, or just want an undisturbed environment on your cruise.
Read more: Chill spots to get away from the crowd on a Royal Caribbean cruise ship
The best way to ensure this is to pick a savvy stateroom location.
If you know what to look for, you can choose the best cabin for your needs by carefully selecting the location and looking through deck plans.
This guide provides our best tips for selecting a cabin location that will offer a peaceful, quiet environment for your cruise vacation.
Analyze the ship’s deck plans
When guests (or travel agents) book a cruise without Royal Caribbean, they are given the option to select their own specific cabin location.
By picking this option, and selecting your stateroom carefully, you can ensure that you choose the quietest room available.
You’ll start by picking a particular room type, whether you’re looking for a suite, balcony, oceanview cabin, or a windowless interior.
Within this category, you’ll have the option to select the price you’d prefer.
Then, you can select the location (forward, mid-ship, or aft) and the particular deck you’d like to stay on.
Then, the website will display a deck plan and allow you to choose the exact stateroom you’d prefer.
Before you choose one, look through the ship’s deck plans to strategically pick out the location.
Make sure that you look through each individual plan for each ship because it’s also important to look at the decks above and below your potential cabin.
While looking through the deck plans, you can find the particular cabin number and field any research noise concerns before you choose your stateroom.
Read more: Your really dumb cruise ship cabin questions answered
Avoid high-traffic areas like the Royal Promenade
While looking through cabin location choices, make sure that you avoid areas that receive high traffic—especially at night.
Crowded areas, like the Royal Promenade or Esplanade, the dining rooms, entertainment venues, the night clubs, comedy clubs, the kitchen, and the casino, will consistently be noisy.
These areas fill up with guests throughout the day and even late into the night.
A cruise ship’s schedule is often non-stop, with trivia games in the day, dance parties late into the day, and restaurants open all day long.
Any cabins near these high-traffic locations will be subject to the noises of live music, pounding feet, loud voices, and cruisers having fun.
If you’re looking for a quieter cabin—especially if you’re a light sleeper or someone who likes to go to bed early—you don’t want to book a cabin close to these areas. Don’t forget to check the decks above and below your potential cabin.
Make sure you’re not located below the pool
Don’t just look at the deck the stateroom is on when you’re analyzing deck plans, also check what’s above and below that deck.
In particular, ensure you’re not choosing a cabin below the lido (aka the pool deck).
The location of the pool deck varies depending on the ship, so you’ll want to verify where it is through the deck plans.
A cabin directly below the pool deck could be subject to noises like music and splashing all day long. Not only are there ample activities and bars on the pool deck, but Royal Caribbean also often puts the Windjammer close by.
The Windjammer is a complimentary buffet that is open for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, so it ends up hosting many cruisers all throughout the day.
A cabin close to this location would not get much peace and quiet.
Stay towards the back of the ship
On my first cruise on Wonder of the Seas, I stayed in a forward cabin at the bow of the ship.
Although I’m usually a deep sleeper, I was shocked awake multiple times by a loud clanging, metallic noise.
Read more: Wonder of the Seas Cabins to Avoid
At first, I wondered if the ship was crashing into something!
However, I later found out that we were hearing the noise of the anchor chains running across the deck.
Forward cabins are often subject to noise from the anchor, which can be quite a shock when you hear it for the first time. Keep in mind this only happens in tender ports, which are not very common for a Royal Caribbean ship.
To avoid experiencing this terrifying early morning sound, look for cabins that are closer to the middle and the stern of the ship.
Check that your cabin is further away from elevators
If you’ve ever used an elevator on a cruise ship, you understand how crowded they can get.
Royal Caribbean ships run from 12 to 20 decks high, with activities packed on every deck.
And on a cruise vacation where guests are there to relax, no one really feels like taking the stairs.
Read more: Why you should skip the elevator on your cruise
Safe to say, elevators get a lot of traffic on board, and they make beeps and chimes every time they arrive and depart.
Staying close to an elevator could bring a lot of noise to your cabin, as people talk while walking to and fro, doors open and close, and the elevator chimes.
Especially at night, you will find that drunk cruisers don’t make their way to their staterooms very quietly!
Being away from areas like elevators ensures that you won’t get the late-night noises of the club brought to you.
Look for staterooms surrounded by other guest cabins
In general, the quietest stateroom locations will be ones with other guest cabins above, below, beside them, and across the hallway.
The walls are thick between staterooms, and you’re less likely to hear the noises of people getting ready or going to sleep.
The quietest locations are usually the ones next to other guests looking for a quiet room.
After all, there’s usually less traffic between staterooms than inside the casino, or near a dining venue.
Read more: Royal Caribbean cabins for 5 or more people
Don’t get a connecting cabin
One caveat to this previous tip is that you don’t want to get a cabin with connecting doors, especially if you’re not going to use it.
If you don’t need a cabin that connects to another guest’s, try to avoid booking one.
These rooms have a door that connects between them, usually with a thinner material than the walls.
Even if you keep the door closed and locked for the length of your cruise, the door can still let noise through and you’re likely to hear the guests in the other room.
The party staying in that adjourning room is out of your control, and you never know if they’ll be a loud group.
For your own privacy, it’s better to stay in an individual cabin.
