Norwegian Cruise Line Internet Experience

[benjaminf.haklmn]

Hello all!

This is always an interesting topic to speak about when traveling abroad is how to stay in touch with family members and friends while traveling outside the US cell coverage.
I just recently returned from a cruise to the Bahamas on Norwegian, and I had a promo for 250 minutes of Internet while on the ship, which I used sparingly since I didn’t want to end up paying for Internet.
This was the best Cruise Ship Internet I’ve used to date! I was able to make calls and send/receive texts! The audio quality was good in both directions with no breaks in it. This wasn’t the case last time I was on Carnival, where the audio was super choppy and distorted. Norwegian’s Internet was speedy enough to handle the phone calls.
One trick I did discover was once you were logged in through the web browser, turn on and off WiFi to cycle the Republic App to re-try the connection and so your phone connects to the strongest AP.

Let me know if anyone has any questions about my experience with this, and I’ll try to answer the question to the best of my ability.

[rolandh]

Not really a question but an observation.

You reference Norwegian’s Internet connection as being speedy enough to handle phone calls. Network speed is rarely an issue. For a typical Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) call only about 160 Kbps (80 in each direction) is required. If the G.729 codec were to be employed (Republic does not), one could get away with even less network speed. VoIP is the technology powering the WiFi portion of Republic’s blended WiFi/cell calling.

On the other hand, VoIP does require a stable Internet connection measured in terms of Packet Loss, Latency and Jitter. Shipboard Internet is satellite based and stable satellite based Internet connections are a challenge. I’m impressed and happy to hear Norwegian (unlike some of its competitors) has apparently invested the resources to achieve that.

Anyway, thanks for the review. If considering a cruise in the future, I would consider Norwegian based on your report.

[bocephous]

Hi @benjaminf.haklmn
I just wanted to thank you for sharing. I do know some people do have questions on this subject. Your personal experience should ease the nerves of future cruisers.

[benjaminf.haklmn]

Thank you @rolandh for the extra details with how VoIP works. I understood that it is more the quality of the internet instead of the speed, but speed is what we as the general public tend to think about. That being said I always enjoy learning something new!

[benjaminf.haklmn]

Hi @bocephous,
You are welcome! I’ll be going on a cruise with Royal Caribbean in a few months and if I use their Internet I’ll post my experience with that. Royal boasts that they have the best Satellite Internet of any cruise line, so we’ll see!