Has Royal Caribbean finally reached its limit on giant ships? The cruise line’s CEO has sparked speculation

Is the age of bigger ships ever here? Caribbean Royal Is it coming to an end? Comments made by the company’s CEO, Michael Bayley, this week are fueling fresh speculation on the subject.

Speaking at the launch event of the new product line Utopia of the seaBayley suggests that Royal Caribbean’s next new class of ships (to be called the Discovery Class) will be smaller leviathan According to several media outlets involved, the route has been in the works for the past few years.

Bayley told a room full of cruise consultants and other attendees that the new class could include ships small enough to sail into ports like Baltimore and Tampa, where bridges block the arrival of the line’s larger ships. Travel Weekly reported.

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“It’s not as simple as it sounds. [the ship] “It’s wider and less tall, but we’re constantly looking at the possibility of taking ships to these places. So maybe the Discovery class will have a great solution to that problem,” Bayley said, according to Travel Weekly.

Bayley himself told a room full of journalists at a press conference during the event that the new class “is going to be really exciting,” but he did not provide details about the attractions and locations that will be on board, Travel Weekly reported.

Related: Royal Caribbean’s New Utopia of the Seas Named in Miami

Bayley also did not give a specific timeframe for when the new ships would be ordered and built.

Cruise Fever too reported on Bayley’s commentsas Travel Pulse and Australian Tourist Passengers; hereafter speculation that new ships could be small enough to pass under the Sydney Harbour Bridge.

Many large cruise ships cannot dock at Sydney’s White Bay Cruise Terminal because of the low bridge height. The Sydney Harbour Bridge is approximately 161 feet high. The bridges that cruise ships must cross when entering Baltimore and Tampa are approximately 180 feet high.

Royal Caribbean’s most recently built ships — including Symbol of the SeaUtopia of the Seas and its five sisters (collectively known as the Oasis Class) — are among the world’s largest cruise ship and have a “wind draft” of more than 200 feet. That means they can’t fit under bridges in Sydney, Baltimore or Tampa.

Bayley’s comments this week aren’t the first he’s hinted that the line is working on a new, smaller class of ship. He’s dropped hints about a new class of smaller ships at a number of other Royal Caribbean events over the past year, including at a January press conference aboard the line’s new Icon of the Seas ship.

At several of these events, Bayley noted that the carrier is looking to order new ships that could replace eight older Radiance-class and Vision-class ships — all of which are more than 20 years old.

At 90,090 gross tons or less, the eight Radiance-class and Vision-class ships are much smaller than the other 28 ships in Royal Caribbean’s fleet, and they’re often used for trips to places the larger ships can’t reach. Each ship has a capacity of about 2,100 passengers or less, assuming two passengers per cabin—a fraction of the 5,000 or more passengers that can fit on the line’s larger ships.

Royal Caribbean, the world’s largest cruise line, is known for operating some of the world’s largest and most well-equipped cruise ships. But like all major cruise lines, it likes to have a mix of ship sizes so it can offer a variety of itineraries.

Not all cruise itineraries are suited to giant ships—and not just because the port towns on some itineraries have bridges that block larger ships. Some port towns don’t have the berthing facilities that can accommodate giant ships. Additionally, some itineraries don’t have the consumer demand to justify deploying a giant ship.

If Royal Caribbean were to order smaller ships, however, it would be a significant shift from its recent strategy of building ever-larger ships. All of the ships it has ordered in the past decade have been megaships, weighing 200,000 gross tons or more.

Related: Each Royal Caribbean ship is ranked by size.

Royal Caribbean currently has just three new ships on order, all of which will be among the world’s largest cruise ships. Two are sister ships to Icon of the Seas and will be among the three largest ships in the world when they debut in 2025 and 2026. The third is an Oasis-class ship that will be among the 10 largest ships in the world when it debuts in 2028.

If Royal Caribbean’s next ship order is for a smaller ship, that doesn’t necessarily mean the company is done with larger ships. While Royal Caribbean hasn’t hinted at any larger ship classes being developed, it could still order more ships in its Icon Class or Oasis Class series.

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