A Pixie’s Speculation on Disney Cruise Line’s Growth

 A Pixie’s Speculation on Disney Cruise Line’s Growth

Disney Cruise Line’s Fleet is Growing! As of today, January 17, 2025, DCL has 6 ships in the fleet. We know by 2031 DCL will have 13 ships in the fleet!

 

It all started in 1998 with the Disney Magic that was quickly followed by the Disney Wonder in 1999. The two ships are near identical twins and are the Magic/Classic Class of Disney Ships. They can hold 2,400 guests and are approximately 84 tons. Magic and Wonder are roving Disney ships. Magic moves between Fort Lauderdale/Port Everglades, Fl, Galveston, Tx, occasionally Port Canaveral, Fl, and San Diego, Ca. Wonder does Galveston, Tx, Fort Lauderdale/Port Everglades, San Diego, Ca, Vancover, Canada to Alaska, South Pacific Cruises, Hawaii, and sometimes spends time in Australia in the US winter and Australian Summer.

 

In 2011 and 2012 Disney Dream and Disney Fantasy joined the fleet. These ships comprise the Dream Class of Disney Ships. These ships are bigger than the Classic ships. They can hold 4,000  guests and are approximately 130 gross tons. Up until recently they went out of Port Canaveral. Now Dream is home ported at Fort Lauderdale. Disney Fantasy has been sailing out of Port Canaveral until recently. Both Dream and Fantasy have been taking turns going to Europe during the summer months.

 

In 2022 the Disney Wish joined the fleet. Wish is the first of a new class of ships, the Triton/Wish Class. December 2024 the Disney Treasure joined the fleet. Treasure is the second Triton/Wish Class ship. Treasure is doing 7-Night Caribbean Cruises. November 2025 DCL will add Disney Destiny. Destiny will sail 3-5-Niht Bahaman Cruises from Fort Lauderdale/Port Everglades. This will bring the Triton/Wish Class to three ships. In 2028 or 2029 (depending on the official DCL press release from DCL you read) an unnamed fourth Triton/Wish ship will join the fleet. The fourth ship was requested by the Oriental Land Company, that owns and operates the Tokyo Disney Parks. She will sail out of Tokyo on 3-5-Night Magic at Sea cruises with no port stops, all days are sea days. She will provide wonderful Land/Sea packages with the Tokyo Disney Parks when completed! A fifth Triton/Wish ship has been ordered, it will be delivered, along with all other ordered ships sometime between 2027 and 2031. DCL has released no other information about this fifth Triton ship. We have no expected date for her to join the fleet, no name and we do not know where she will call home port as of yet. This class of ships are currently the largest of the Disney Fleet. They are 140 gross tons and can hold a little over 4,000 guests.

 

Disney Adventure will join the fleet in December 2025. She is a one of a kind unique mega ship. Not only is she big for the DCL fleet, she is going to be one of the biggest passenger ships built! There will be no other Globel Class ship for DCL. She will be able to carry 6,700 passengers and is 208 gross tons. Her size is not the only unique thing about the Adventure. She will sail out of Singapore until at least 2030, on 3-5-Night Magic at Sea cruises. They will start and end in Singapore and have no ports to stop at. The prices for the Adventure are some of the lowest on the fleet! You just have to get to Singapore to board her. There are a lot of special and firsts of a kind things on this ship!

 

Adventure started as the Global Dream for a Chinese Cruise Line. Due to the financial losses of the Covid Pandemic the Chinese cruise line and the shipyard building her were forced out of business. DCL purchased the ¾ built ship and asked Meyer-Werft to take over the shipyard and redesigned the ship, making it uniquely Disney. All the reports make her look extremely special! But that is for a different post!

 

The above-mentioned ships will bring the total number of ships to ten. By 2031 Disney has announced they will have thirteen ships. The last three ships have my greatest attention. I’m very excited to hear more about them as they are being built!! This is the little bit we know these 3 ships. They will be a new class of Disney Ships. We do not know the name of the class or each individual ship. What we do know is they will be between the Classic and Dream size of ship. They will be about 20% larger than the Classic ships and about 20% smaller than the Dream Class. The last three ships will be about 100 gross tons. They have not stated the passenger capacity yet as she is yet to be designed. I’m assuming passenger capacity will be somewhere between 2,500 and 3,000 passengers. This is in direct opposition of all the other cruise lines out there that are building bigger and bigger ships. DCL decided to go smaller.

 

The last ships are being built so they can go to smaller ports and places the larger ships cannot. Dream Class and Trition/Wish Class are too big for the Panama Canal! This means easy movement between the East and West Coasts of the US is not possible for the bigger ships! These smaller ships may be able to do the Panama Canal! They will be more environmentally friendly. They will be able to plug into shore power were available in ports so they can shut off their engines in port. Their design will be sleeker allowing them to use less fuel and emit less emissions. Many ships use Disel Fuel, some use LNG that burns much cleaner. This new class will be able to use multiple types of fuel, LNG, Bio Disel and even using converted cooking oil! It will adapt to what is available and what is best for the environment.

 

The last three ships are going to be of a size that may be able to go through the Panama Canal! If they do that then the West Coast of the US has a good chance of having more Disney Cruises. Currently only the Magic and Wonder can come to the West Coast. These ships will open more locations for Disney Cruising!

 

With all of these ships I’m hoping that DCL will leave a ship on the West Coast of the US. Maybe have Wonder out of San Diego, Ca Spring and Fall with her spending the summer in Alaska as she has been. Maybe Magic or one of the new ships can stay in San Diego while Wonder is in Alaska and maybe Australia. They could have a ship sail out of Washington or Oregon and go into Canada instead of Mexico, as they have for quite a few years. Either way I hope they have a ship on the West Coast to make it easier for those who live there to sail with Disney.

 

Other options for DCL is to leave a new ship in Australia or dedicate a ship to going there. They could leave a ship in the Mediterranean and do more cruises in Europe. There are lots of places they could take a ship!