MSC Cruises is a global cruise line offering a wide range of vacation experiences at sea. The company operates a modern fleet of cruise ships that cater to diverse customer needs, including family vacations, romantic getaways, and group travel. With itineraries that span the Mediterranean, Northern Europe, the Caribbean, and beyond, MSC Cruises provides travelers with various onboard activities, dining options, and entertainment designed to enhance their cruising experience.
Targeting a broad market, MSC Cruises appeals to both seasoned cruisers and first-time travelers looking for memorable journeys. The company emphasizes its commitment to sustainability and innovation, positioning itself as a responsible choice for travelers who value environmentally friendly practices. Through its user-friendly website, www.msccruises.com, customers can explore cruise options, plan their trips, and access customer support, making it easier to navigate their vacation planning process.
MSC Cruises receives a mixed reception from its customers, with many praising the ships and onboard entertainment while expressing significant dissatisfaction with staff and service quality. Reviewers highlight the impressive size and amenities of the ships, such as the MSC Virtuosa, and some enjoy the variety of activities available for families.
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However, a substantial number of complaints focus on overcrowding, long wait times, and poor staff attitudes, which detract from the overall experience. Many travelers report feeling stressed in busy dining areas and criticize the high costs of onboard extras, which can lead to an unmemorable cruise. While some guests have had positive experiences, particularly in the Yacht Club, others find it overpriced and lacking in luxury.
Each source counts by its number of reviews. Only reviews written by people are scored.
Rating, volume, share of the score, six-month trend and fake-review risk for each source
Source
Rating
Reviews
Weight
6-mo
Fake risk
★
Trustpilot
Imported Trustpilot reviews
2.2
74
100%
+0.4
● Low
2.2 / 5 overall
=
74 reviews across 1 scored source
How fake risk works ⓘ
Reputation trend
Monthly average rating from reviews written by people · latest review Jul 2025.
Last 3 months
2.4▲ 0.4
12-month avg
2.0
All-time
2.2
Category avg
4.0
Monthly averageCategory average
Monthly average rating and review count
Month
Average
Reviews
Sep 24
2.0
6
Oct 24
—
0
Nov 24
1.0
4
Dec 24
3.0
2
Jan 25
1.0
1
Feb 25
1.5
2
Mar 25
1.0
1
Apr 25
3.0
2
May 25
2.2
6
Jun 25
2.3
3
Jul 25
4.0
1
What people praise & complain about
Share of positive (4–5★) and negative (1–2★) reviews mentioning each topic · based on the 74 most recent reviews.
Top praiseof 17 positive reviews
Friendly staff29%
5 mentions
Customer service24%
4 mentions
Prices & value24%
4 mentions
“Friendly crew, fantastic service and very comfortable accommodation”
On “Friendly staff” · Apr 27, 2025
Top complaintsof 48 negative reviews
Customer service38%
18 mentions
Shipping38%
18 mentions
Pricing31%
15 mentions
Payment issues21%
10 mentions
“Overall I feel that MSC, after several trips, does not seam to value me as a customer, and lacks the service or treat...”
On “Customer service” · May 28, 2025
How it compares
Same method for every company: overall rating, legitimacy checks, the average rating of reviews mentioning each area and the 6-month trend · Cruise Lines.
Overall rating and review count for this company and similar companies
Whenever I take a ride to my memory lane and go back the the experience I had with MSC Euribia and the tour around the northern seas, immediately I feel better and makes me want to repeat that kind of vacation.
Maybe next time I will go for a longer cruise. I checked their website they have some nice deals such as the Caribbean one.
Anyway, I recommend the Northern Europe cruise. The scenery over there is amazing and I think the best way to explore that part of the world is by ship.
As for the ship, Euribia was fantastic. Modern and huge 😀
The staff was pleasant and friendly 👍
I have allocated by MSc Armonia an Obstructed ocean view cabin to Mediterranean countries from 24/11/23 to 02/12/23. There was a huge boat (not a life boat, more like a boat which MSc uses to transfer guests from port to the cruise) next to the window blocking the window. Therefore there wasn’t a any view of the ocean from the cabin.
I have raised the issue with Lawrence Ford( customer service supervisor ) . I have sent several emails to customer service but Laurence Ford claimed “ It is a obstructed ocean view cabin” though view was totally blocked.”
Laurence Ford asked me to send photo but my point is that cabin should be investigated so no other guest’ s holiday will not be ruined as mine did.
MSc also took seven hours to separate double bed to tween bed.
If there was “0 “ rate that’s what I will give MSc .
Entgegen den vielen schlechten Bewertungen hatten wir eine super Erfahrung mit MSC, Natürlich benötigte das Boarding von mehr als 6000 Passagieren eine gewisse zeit, es war aber gut Organsiert und völlig in Ordnung. Das essen war manchmal gut und manchmal ganz OK. Es ist nun mal kein Sterne Restaurant, das essen ist bei Premium Redereien wie Gunnar auch nicht wesentlich besser. Ocean Cay war traumhaft schön und auch super organisiert. Preis Leistung ist super. Wir vereisen sicher wieder mit MSC.
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MSC Europa im Yacht Club Dublex Suite mit Whirlpool gereisst.
Wir werden wieder kommen einfach perfekt und wunderschöner Urlaub.
Da nicht alle nur deutsch sprechen, fühlt man sich auch wie im Urlabu
PLEASE AVOID AT ALL COSTS
RIDICULOUSLY OVER CROWDED
BUFFET WAS LIKE QUEUING AT A CATTLE MARKET
NO WAY NEAR ENOUGH SEATS TO ACCOMMODATE THE VOLUME OF PEOPLE ABOAD
IF YOU ENJOY QUEUES THEN BOOK MSC THEY ARE SPECIALISTS
30MINS EVERYTIME FOR A DRINK
NO SEATING
VERY VERY VERY POOR
FUN PASS COULDNT EVEN BE SPENT AS BOWLING AND OTHER THINGS WAS FULLY BOOKED
SO HAD OVER £100 LEFT ON THE FUN PASS AND THEY WOULD NOT REFUND
AFTER 2 EMAILS THEY INSULTINGLY OFFERED ME £50 OFF VOUCHER AGAINST A FUTURE CRUISE
HOW GENEROUS
I WOULDNT WANT A FREE CRUISE FROM THEM
COULDNT WAIT TO GET HOME
PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE AVOID AVOID AVOID
It was my first cruise on the Euribia to Norway. It was fantastic! We had a balcony hut with a lovely host - Manda. He took care of our hut and was always in for a chat or a joke. The ship was amazing. It was a bit busy on sea days but overall it was a great experience. The only thing that could be better is the volume of the music in the lounges. That was very loud sometimes.
We loved the cruise, the ship and especially the employees on the Euribia. Respect for these hard working people who are always happy.
We will meet again!
My second time trying to book with MSC.
Both times the cruise has been rescheduled to different dates with the original cancelled.
They didn't want to refund but offer an alternative instead - which I couldn't do. It took them a month to refund the deposit
To start off, 1 star is 2 or 3 too many. I sailed with my wife to Spain and France July this year. I chose this company because it was said that your holiday starts when you board the bus, as next time you see your luggage is at your cabin door, to take you to the port. I got the bus from Preston to Southampton. Wrong!! when we got to the port we were told to take out own luggage to the ship. I am recovering from a broken hip and my wife from full hip replacement, I was in agony and only got help on the 3rd request. 2 days into the cruise i developed a slight tummy bug and spent 2 hours at the ships sick bay, resulting ina 20 minute drip, 4 Imodium equivalents, resulting in a bill very near £300, the insurance paid this bill. 1st excursion went well, I use a walking stick and was slower than most, the bus left without us, wonderful, they clearly did not check passenger listings for the trip. Now the mini bar, a 10cl bottle of whiskey was £9, that works out at £90 a bottle, some price hike. a can of shaving foam from tesco was £1.5o, on board £5.50. Irish coffee £9.00 each seems all they wanted to do was fleece everyone at every opportunity. The ship was fine, just far to many passengers. Got to be honest, staff were excellent on all levels. Lunch and evening meals were set menus, food was very good but choice was very limited. You had to set your alarm for 5 am to get a sunbed notices saying not to do this were there , but I saw some sunbeds with personal towels on it for 4/5 hours and no sign of the owners. Notices were there telling bathers not to do this and towels would be removed, never saw that happen.
We booked a cruise in July so high season, overall good experience, very busy but well that was expected. The offer for little kids was not as good as pools were mainly for adults and older kids and the kids club was not engaging the littles ones, hence the 4 stars. The rest of team on board was great though.
MSC Virtuosa Southampton, Spain, France, Portugal
The good parts:
Plenty of choice for food at the buffet
Cabin attendant was fantastic
The bad parts:
The ship was overcrowded, everything was busy almost all the time.
Not enough bar staff, even double the number of allocated staff would not have been enough in most cases.
MSC cruises are a budget option (compared to the likes of Princess) however, everything costs money on the ship. Surprised that you get air conditioning for free to be honest as MSC seem to try their best to monetise everything.
The Arcade was run down, and the prices of the machines were just unbelievable given the quality. The kids had been promised some time on the games, but it was money not well spent.
3 evenings in the first week I had cold showers.
No management of people ‘reserving’ loungers with towels. There were cases where people would ‘reserve’ a lounger by the pool at 5am, get off the ship at dock and not actually come to their lounger until 3-4pm. Given that people were already having to sit on the floor because there weren’t enough loungers for the number of customers (see point 1) …
You can’t do your own laundry; you must buy a package which, like everything else on the cruise is overpriced.
The terrible:
There was a single lifeguard for the indoor pool, shared by at least 2 members of staff at any one time. Both staff spent time on their mobile phones instead of doing their job, given the nature of the job this is just unbelievable. They got called out by paying customers.
The people on the ground are largely over worked. There appears to be next to no management happening on board. Two examples:
1. It appeared that each bar was allocated 2 staff behind the bar and up to 2 staff taking orders from tables. Some bars are smaller than others and some bars are in far greater demand. I.e., the outdoor bars were in higher demand on warm evenings. However, there was no reactive measures taken when bars filled up with customers. It’s almost as if the company expects customers to manage the bar numbers their staff. Why not have members of staff acting as floaters that move between bars based on the demand at each bar??
2. Disembarkation. The ‘plan’ was that ‘self-assisted’ customers would leave from the two gangways from 0700-0730. All other customers had been assigned groups and would be called down by group every 5 minutes from 0730.
However, one gangway was down from 0700 until 0730 at the latest (possibly earlier). This meant that groups could not exit as scheduled and had to wait in their designated waiting areas. This was the first issue. The designated areas were only set up to take 2-3 groups at a time.
The delay went on for nearly 2 hours, which meant the designated areas now contained up to 12 groups instead of the planned 2-3.
During this time there was no member of staff allocated to the designated area to provide updates. There was no air conditioning, there was no way to get water or food. The only updates were that there was a ‘delay’.
No members of staff took responsibility.
How can one of two gangways being down for 30 minutes result in the ‘self-assisted’ customers taking 120 minutes to disembark instead of 30 minutes. Surely if x number of people that were due to disembark in 30 minutes via two gangways would take 60 minutes to disembark, maybe 75 minutes at most?? Bearing in mind that the second gangway was available after 30 minutes at most it should not have taken 120 minutes.
In the end we just left, I refused to be stopped. My young children were in tears and my elderly father in law was suffering.
Here’s some advice for MSC:
You should be able to obtain an average time to disembark a customer.
You know the number of customers requesting self-assisted disembarkment 2 days before the cruise reaches destination, so this first group will have an expected processing time.
You have a member of staff at each designated grouping point, this person is there to provide updates to the group and call each number as they should start their move to disembark.
A disaster happens, you can’t disembark as planned. Suddenly planned time to disembark self-assisted is going to take more time than planned. You provide the waiting customers with an ETA. You’ve already planned for a disaster, so the designated grouping plans are already capable of supplying waiting customers with water, food, air conditioning and entertainment. You open staff elevators and corridors to support the unexpected movement of customers. You open all restaurants with the offer of free food and water whilst they wait.
What you don’t do is just leave everyone without any update, hot, tired, hungry, thirsty, and unable to use toilets due to the unexpected numbers trying to share the location.
I'll never cruise with MSC again, I'll tell everyone to avoid
3rd - 17th June - MSC Virtuosa - Scotland, Iceland and Norway cruise.
Don't go on this ship if you are disabled. On 8th June we were taken to Isafjordur in Iceland. A tender service was required. This was a total, unorganised disaster. Only two tender boats were in operation to get 4000 passengers onto shore.
A lift that they were using for the disabled, broke and we were asked to go to the other side of the ship. We finally reached shore only to find that there was absolutely nothing at Isafjordur. We then had to try and get back. We waited several hours! When we finally were able to get off the tender boat, my disabled husband's rollator (walking aid) had been put somewhere else and he was left trying to balance on a moving platform until it finally appeared.
Disaster happened again the following morning when we were docked in Reykjavik. We had a coach trip booked for 9.30. We tried to leave the ship, only to find that, at that time, the only access was one steep access ramp at deck 6. Dangerous even for the able bodied and someone fell down it.
We were then sent to various decks only to find unorganised crew members trying to get suitable ramps arranged. When the ship docked all ramps should have been safely in place and organised ready for passengers to get off. This has been the case when we have travelled with other cruise companies.
At every port it wasnt easy getting on and off the vessel.
We have cruised before but have never experienced such appalling service.
For the reasons stated we would never cruise with MSC again. We would worry about getting off one of their ships if there was an emergency. There seemed to be a lack of experienced officers onboard.
It was also mentioned several times by various passengers that for a large ship and the volume of passengers involved, there didn't seem to be enough lifeboats and 4 tenders should have been used when we went to Isafjordur.
The whole ship seemed to be run by young, poorly trained, inexperienced people. It was badly managed.
Don't go on an MSC cruise, even if it is cheap, if you are disabled. It wasnt a pleasant experience.
Overcrowded hellish experience , Misery Sea Cruises.
The ship is impressive , however running at full capacity should never of happened as staff and venues cannot cope.
This causes passengers to become irate having to queue for the MDR's, Buffet and Bar's then once drinks ordered there was never enough seating so left to stand having pre dinner drinks. Before then onto a queue of over 1000 people to get into the main restaurant.
Alternatively enter the very definition of chaos that was the Buffett , an experience similar to a school dinner hall with decibel levels so loud you cannot have a conversation with your family and again no where to sit.
We are a fortunate and well travelled family with a positive mindset , who have been lucky enough to have travelled many countries throughout the world , staying at some fantastic and beautiful locations in brilliant hotels. We have also in recent years got into cruising and MSC is the 4th cruise line we have travelled with. I can honestly say the 5 nights we endured with this shambolic company onboard with their unfortunate staff was the worst experience of our travelling life.
Take notes MSC , your staff are at breaking point (after an interesting chat with the bar staff) , your passengers are disappointed and future repeat business will not happen.
Senior level management need to address these major issues, the dedicated crew providing the customer service cannot deliver a good experience for passengers if the ship is over crowded , reduce the numbers and give your paying customers a better experience.
Just got back from a 5 night cruise. The ship was packed to the gunnels with an extra 2000 children of the 4300 capacity. They se e Ed to enjoy themselves and naturally confined themselves voluntarily to the children’s zone. All the parents I met said their kids loved it in there.
Yes stuff was busy but the crew were always friendly and there was always somewhere else to be if a place was too busy. Passengers I encountered were all friendly and happy. I enjoyed the food (& the drinks) and being looked after for s few days. Overall unbeatable value and really enjoyable. (I’m sure the weather contributed too)
if i could give this company 0 stars i would. got back from a cruise today and iv never been treated so badly in my entire life. last night i went to the med centre where i was kept prisoner against my will, i was assaulted lied to and man handled because i went there because i was upset they said i had threatened to throw my self off the side which is a total lie.
They threatened to handcuff me to the bed and tie my legs together to stop me from moving i asked to speak to my family it was refused i was told that they didnt want to speak to me which is also a lie.I was then dumped at the hospital with no money and no battery power on my phone and had to get back to nottingham from southampton on my own and the trains on strike i had to hitch a ride a lone woman on her own who got locked up for crying
Just off the MSc Grandiosa in the 12th May and never again will I cruise with MSc.
Check in:
Download the app and register a credit card.
App doesn't like to accept your card the first 20 times, appears to be a common issue and you can resolve it by trying it time and time again or waiting on the phone for 15 mins.
Embarkation:
Absolute breeze. Handed over paper work, took our luggage and off we went to security. Over an hour wait with no seats no refreshments and no indication of wait time. There was only one security stand open.
Buffet:
The buffet is a war zone. People cut in everywhere, there's no space to get past, searching for seats for ages only to sit down and your food is cold. The food was decent but they don't change it so had the same breakfast and dinner for a week.
Staff:
There were 4 members of staff that were truly lovely and I could have chatted with them all day. However most barely acknowledged your presence, I dare say it was so busy for them they had lost motivation.
Bar service:
My partner was unwell for 2 days of the cruise and despite explaining water was for our cabin at night they would only give me 2 or 3 bottles at a time. This meant I had to run back an fourth waiting 20 mins at the bar, fighting through crowds or pay the extra charge for room service every time.
Alcoholic drinks are served 1 at a time and many a time others that had been waiting less time were served first ( an experience shared over 4 cabins -11 people)
Photos:
They try very hard to get you in for pictures and take them so quickly you feel flustered. We were a group of 11 and the pictures were assigned randomly across our 4 cabins meaning if 1 cabin wanted to buy pictures they didn't have all of them attached to there card/cabin number.
Kids club:
The kids ran out and thanked me for saving them!
There were English and Spanish kids in the club at the same time so over 3 hours they watched 1 film in English and another in Spanish. What a joke!
Disembarkation:
We went to our allocated area to disembark at the time stated (5 mins early, again as instructed) only to find no one else there and no staff nearby. We joined the other crowd in another area but didn't have anyone to ask if this was ok and our luggage would still be accessible. Luckily we were not in a rush to get off the ship!
The ship was so overcrowded it was nothing but a stressful experience.
If you enjoy fighting crowds save yourself the money and go shopping on Xmas Eve.
We have been with 2 other cruise lines and I will say MSC'S entertainment was the best yet but customer service and ease of access to food and water was unbelievably poor!
Never again!
Enjoyed the cruise but the aftercare is abysmal and they ripped us off.
Prepaid for two internet packages at a discounted rate but could only activate one of them due to a systems issue, leaving the other (cost £75) unusable. We had to pay an additional €125/£110 on board to buy another one. We were directly told by the MSC rep on board that it would be a simple matter to contact them and get a refund for the higher-priced replacement package after we disembarked.
I contacted them the day after, they told me to write an email. Turns out that that then gives them 28 days "to refer to our head office in Italy" as it gets treated as a "complaint" under ABTA regulations. 28 days almost exactly comes and goes and then I get told they'll only refund £75 (leaving us £35 out of pocket), with no explanation as to why. They ignored three emails over three weeks asking for an explanation and a refund of the full amount, then on calling I finally got a reply... that said that they'd need to refer to their head office in Italy again which takes up to 28 days. This is for a cruise that was two months ago now! I've lost patience with them now and am talking to my credit card company to try and get them to get some sense out of MSC as I've been out of pocket for £110 ever since.
I did have a great time on board and I'm trying to not let their appalling aftercare, or the fact that MSC seem intent on ripping us off for something that isn't our fault at all, spoil memories of what was a great holiday; but it really wants to make me avoid MSC going forward that their service is this shockingly poor.
I am still waiting a year later for my refund of €4500 when my cruise changed as a result of Russian invasion.
They have no managers or supervisors available to speak on phone. And customer service have been ignoring my emails. Operations team respond but have no answers nor do they want to get any.
I have to bring them to court now for my basic consumer rights. It’s completely unnecessary the amount of difficulty they are putting up.
I’ve had better luck getting refunds from Ryanair.
Try Costa Cruises instead.
Disappointed with the worlds biggest cruise liner at this time should do better!
Was really looking forward to this Cruise on the MSC World Europa as at this moment in time it's the biggest cruise ship in the world.
Lets start with the positives, the ship itself is quite impressive due to it's sheer size and has colourful lighting at the back with the biggest slide on view. Good promenade decks with plenty to look at and do, but remember and check out what's included in your package as quite a lot is not included.
The bars are great, and there is loads of them, and the quality of drinks included in the Premium package is really good. Our favourite place to go was the Gin and Masters bar with great service and really good quality drinks. The singer in the Masters bar was exceptional and really made for a great night out.
We had a balcony cabin which was a good size, modern decor and furniture and quite basic, nothing to much to shout out about but was always clean and tidy. The shower cubicle is small, however the shower is very powerful and hot.
The pool areas are good, however on sea days there is not enough beds to go round and my 70 year old mother had to lie on her towel on the actual deck for a seat!! After not being able to find any pool staff and the bar staff being unable to assist we complained to reception and they did upgrade us to Top 20 area for next 3 days, but not everyone was as successful. Sea days you need to be up early to get a bed, but please don't do what a lot of people do, put your towels down and then not use for hours!
I am a total foodie and my biggest let down was the food nothing was fine dining, including the complimentary restaurants. We were on a 5* ship with 3* food and had paid a lot of money for the pleasure! There just wasn't enough choice, nothing was ever hot, felt like a school dinner hall and quite often parts of the buffet restaurant were closed, so for a ship which was at full capacity this just didn't make sense. When you say the best thing on your plate was the potatoes what does that tell you!! I heard the same complaints time and time again. I had a friend with me and this was her first time cruising and I had to keep telling her honestly other cruise liners are not like this.
The staff were lovely but I honestly felt there wasn't enough of them around the pool and pool bars, especially on the sea days to cope with the amount of people especially when a large number of them were complaining.
The ports we called out were great other than Dammam which I still can't quite fathom why MSC would choose to stop here, unless it is to save themselves some money! If doing this trip please remember you cannot drink alcohol whilst in this port and have to be at least 2 hours away from the port before you will be served an alcoholic drink, which is a bit annoying when you paid for a drinks package and are not told this at the time!!
For me I would never cruise with MSC again, I think the food issue is too important and a large part of anyone's cruising experience so my advice is to stay well clear.
The employees are quick to respond, helpful, and friendly, which is why is my 3. booked cruise through them. but watch out for their prices... you think you've got the best, but their system doesn't always calculate the club membership discount, had to change the booking option up to several times, also because I was allocated the wrong cabin - if you look at the prices elsewhere , also through their website do not match the prices you get from them by e-mail. in my price I thought I got a good discount, but it differs by DKK 713 from the website, and they will not correct the price after you have paid the deposit, and they will not regulate, so be careful and check the price thoroughly, maybe you have to compare with others . companies that sell the same trips and have a price guarantee. I hope it ends up getting the price fixed, because then I will re-evaluate this notice (44108035)
MSC Cruises is a global cruise line offering a wide range of vacation experiences at sea. The company operates a modern fleet of cruise ships that cater to diverse customer needs, including family vacations, romantic getaways, and group travel. With itineraries that span the Mediterranean, Northern Europe, the Caribbean, and beyond, MSC Cruises provides travelers with various onboard activities, dining options, and entertainment designed to enhance their cruising experience.
Targeting a broad market, MSC Cruises appeals to both seasoned cruisers and first-time travelers looking for memorable journeys. The company emphasizes its commitment to sustainability and innovation, positioning itself as a responsible choice for travelers who value environmentally friendly practices. Through its user-friendly website, www.msccruises.com, customers can explore cruise options, plan their trips, and access customer support, making it easier to navigate their vacation planning process.
