CruiseLink
Does everyone need their own account for cruise line app chat?
On some lines, yes, and that is where children fall through. We read seven cruise lines’ own pages and UK App Store listings on 8 Nov 2026. Royal Caribbean and Celebrity need each person to have a Guest Account, and say you must be 13 or older to create one (14 in Austria, 16 in Germany, Hungary, the Netherlands and Lithuania); Celebrity adds that you need an active email address. Holland America signs you in with a hollandamerica.com account. Disney and Costa ask for things you already have on the ship instead: Disney your name, stateroom and birth date, Costa your Costa Card. Carnival asks parents to consent for anyone 15 and under. Sort out every phone in your group before you leave home.
Why we checked
We asked a search-grounded AI assistant on 8 Nov 2026 whether every family member, children included, needs their own account and email address to use the line’s app chat. It covered three lines. For Royal Caribbean and Carnival it said the line’s FAQ “doesn’t specify” — but Royal Caribbean’s own app FAQ does set a minimum age for a Guest Account, and the assistant did not find it.
The question gets asked, one line at a time. planDisney has questions on whether everyone needs their own Disney login to chat, and whether each person in a party needs their own Navigator password; DISboards has a thread on an email address for a child’s app; Cruise Critic has threads on whether children should have their own Royal Caribbean accounts and on teenagers and the Norwegian app. We found nobody who had put the lines side by side.
Line by line
The middle column is what the line itself says, from its own website or its UK App Store listing (read through Apple’s public lookup on 8 Nov 2026), unless another source and date is given. “Not stated” means we could not find the line saying either way.
| Line | What each person needs to use chat, in the line’s words | Children, and what it means |
|---|---|---|
| Royal Caribbean | App FAQ: “To create a Guest Account and use all the app features, guests must be at least 13 years of age (in most countries).” Austria 14; Germany, Hungary, the Netherlands and Lithuania 16. Chat FAQ: “Guests sailing in the same stateroom will automatically be connected to chat. You can also invite other people to chat.” Email address: not stated. | 13 or older for an account; no route described below that. The FAQ does not say whether a younger child can chat on a parent’s account or not at all. Check with Royal Caribbean before you rely on reaching an 11-year-old this way. |
| Celebrity | App FAQ: the same 13-and-over wording and country list as Royal Caribbean, and the same chat answer. Guest Account FAQ: “You will need to have an active email address to create a new Guest Account.” | 13 or older, with an email address. The FAQ also says you must be 21 to check in a child, by linking your reservation to theirs with the child’s name, reservation number and stateroom. It describes no chat route for a child. |
| Disney (Navigator) | App Store: “To use onboard chat, you are required to provide your full name, stateroom number and birth date.” No account or email address mentioned for chat. | A parent switches it on. App Store: “Control access for children with the permissions feature.” Who can start a conversation with your child once chat is on is a different question, and no line answers it. Disney’s US cruise contract (read 25 Oct 2026) says chat is off by default for under-13s until the primary guest turns it on. How that works. |
| Costa | App Store: on board, “Connect to the ship’s network, log in with your Costa Card or C|Club membership”. Before sailing, “Log in with your booking number or C|Club membership”. | Not stated. The ship card is a login everyone on board has, which is the simplest arrangement of any line here, but Costa says nothing about children and chat. |
| Carnival (HUB) | HUB page on carnival.com: “For a small additional fee, the Carnival HUB App offers chat.” How each person signs in on board: not stated on that page. Cruise Hive (12 Aug 2021, secondary): log in on the ship “using your folio number and date of birth”, the folio number being on your Sail and Sign card. | Parent consent for 15 and under. HUB page: “parents and guardians must give consent within the app for any guest 15 years and under to activate onboard chat.” Carnival’s help page said “limited to ages 13+” when we read it on 1 Nov 2026; it would not load on 8 Nov. Both are Carnival’s own words. |
| Holland America (Navigator) | FAQ: download the app and “sign in with your Holland America Line account credentials”, and “Download and log in before embarkation so you are already set when you arrive at the pier.” App Store: “Log in with your Hollandamerica.com account”. | Not stated. Neither the FAQ nor the listing mentions children or whether each traveller needs their own account. |
| MSC (MSC for Me) | App Store: “Manage all your bookings with a single MSC account” and “Link guests to your account.” The listing does not mention chat. | No chat under 16. MSC’s own pages (read 28 Oct 2026) say the chat is only for guests from 16. An account question does not arise for a younger child. |
Norwegian and Princess are left out. Norwegian’s current App Store listing and its FAQ on contacting other guests (read 5 Nov 2026) no longer describe in-app guest messaging, so there is no sign-in to compare; our Norwegian page has what we know. Princess’s listing describes locating shipmates and CrewCall chat with the crew, not guest-to-guest chat. Any line can change its app in an update, and every App Store listing quoted above was updated in the four weeks before we read it.
What this means before you sail
Accounts that need an email: do them at home
Every person without an account is a person missing from the family group chat, which only three lines say they offer in their own words.
Where the line uses an online account — Royal Caribbean, Celebrity, Holland America, MSC — set one up for every adult and teenager while you still have home broadband. Celebrity says outright that it needs an active email address, and an account that needs one usually needs it confirmed. That is easy on your sofa and awkward at sea, where reading a confirmation email may mean buying the internet you were trying to avoid. Holland America’s own advice is the same: log in before embarkation.
Children under 13 on Royal Caribbean and Celebrity
This is the gap the lines leave quietest. Both say a Guest Account needs you to be 13, and neither describes how a younger child joins the chat. Disney, Norwegian and Carnival all describe a parent switching chat on for a child; Royal Caribbean and Celebrity do not. If your plan for keeping track of a ten-year-old depends on the line’s chat, ask the line first. Royal Caribbean’s Find My Kid band is a different system on two ships; what each line offers for tracking children is compared here.
Lines that use what you already carry
Disney’s name, stateroom and birth date and Costa’s Costa Card are details nobody has to create, so a grandparent or a child can be set up on the ship. That is easier, but it is still a step per phone, and on Disney a child’s chat stays off until a parent switches it on. Do it on the first afternoon, not when someone is already lost.
The phone matters as much as the account
An account is no use on a phone the app will not install on. Several lines’ apps need a recent phone, and Royal Caribbean and Celebrity say their apps are not supported on tablets. Which phones and iPads each line’s app supports.
Where CruiseLink fits, and where it does not
CruiseLink has no accounts at all: no sign-up, no email address, no phone number. One person starts a group and sends the invite; everyone else taps it and joins. Messages travel between your group’s phones over Bluetooth and the ship’s local wifi, with no internet package, on any line. That makes it one answer for a child the line’s chat does not cover.
The limits are real and they come first. Everyone has to install it and join the group before you sail, because downloading an app at sea needs an internet package. It reaches your own group, not the whole ship. It is not instant across a large vessel: a message waits when nobody from your group is in between, and is passed on when someone is. It sends text, meet-up plans and check-ins only — no photos and no push-to-talk; it is not a walkie talkie. It needs an iPhone 11 or later, or Android 9 or later, and it is free on the App Store and Google Play. If your line’s chat covers everyone in your group, use it; which lines include chat and which charge is compared here, and setting up a CruiseLink group takes a few minutes at home.
Not affiliated with any cruise line. Read on 8 Nov 2026 unless another date is given: Royal Caribbean app FAQ (“What is the new Royal Caribbean app?”, royalcaribbean.com/aus/en) and chat FAQ; Celebrity “Celebrity app” and “Guest Account” FAQs (celebritycruises.com); Carnival HUB page (carnival.com/shipboard/funhub); Holland America Navigator FAQ (hollandamerica.com); UK App Store listings for Disney Cruise Line Navigator, Costa Cruises, Holland America Line Navigator and MSC for Me, via Apple’s public lookup. Earlier first-party readings: Disney US cruise contract (25 Oct 2026), MSC chat age (28 Oct 2026), Carnival help page (1 Nov 2026), Norwegian FAQ (5 Nov 2026). Secondary, dated: Cruise Hive, “20 Must-Know Things About The Carnival Hub App” (12 Aug 2021). Forum threads are cited as evidence that people ask, not for facts.
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