Diamond Princess
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Diamond Princess
Diamond Princess is a Princess Cruises ship offering itineraries in Asia and Oceania, including Japan, Singapore, Vietnam, Taiwan, and Australia. It provides an all-inclusive cruise experience focused on luxury, gastronomy, wellness, and entertainment. The ship features the MedallionClass system, Princess Theater, Skywalkers Nightclub, and outdoor cinema. It caters to both family and adult travelers on international cruise routes.
Itineraries of the Diamond Princess
Price and Availability Notice
Prices displayed are provided for informational purposes only. They reflect the rates in effect at the time of their most recent update and are shown in Canadian dollars, per person, based on double occupancy, unless otherwise specified.
Supplier rates, exchange rates, taxes and fees, room or cabin categories, and promotions are subject to change at any time. The applicable price is the one confirmed by a travel advisor at the time of booking, subject to availability. Only the confirmed price shall be considered valid.
It is the traveler's responsibility to confirm the price, inclusions, and applicable terms and conditions before making a reservation. While every effort is made to keep our content up to date, transmission, display, or pricing errors may occur. In such cases, the correct price will be communicated to the traveler before any booking is confirmed. Certain terms, restrictions, and exclusions may apply.
decks plans
Deck - 19
Star
Deck - 18
Sky
Deck - 17
Sky
Deck - 16
Sports
Deck - 15
Sun
Deck - 14
Lido
Deck - 12
Aloha
Deck - 11
Baja
Deck - 10
Caribe
Deck - 9
Dolphin
Deck - 8
Emerald
Deck - 7
Promenade
Deck - 6
Fiesta
Deck - 5
Plaza
Deck - 4
Gala
Deck - 3
Crew
Deck - 2
Crew
Deck - 1
Crew
Ship's attributes
Services And Amenities
- Elevators
- Self-service laundry room
- Casino
- Jacuzzi
- Pool
- Beauty salon
- Spa & body care
Specific needs
- Wheelchair accessible staterooms
Technical specifications
- Classe: Gem Class
- Tonnage: 115875
- Speed: 22.0 knots
- Passengers: 2670
- Decks: 18
- Length: 290 m
- Width: 48 m
History
- 2004: Année de construction
- 13 mars 2004: Croisière inaugurale
- 2019: Modernisation
- 2019: Année de rénovation
Frequently Asked Questions
Diamond Princess measures 115,875 gross tons and 290.2 m long by 37.49 m wide, drawing 8.53 m. It carries 2,670 guests at double occupancy and 1,100 crew in 1,353 staterooms across 16 decks, 13 of them open to you. That is a middle format in the Princess fleet: larger than Coral Princess at 91,627 gross tons, considerably smaller than Sun Princess and its 4,000-plus guests. Twenty-seven staterooms are wheelchair accessible.
Because they measure different things. Double occupancy, two people per stateroom, is quoted between 2,670 and 2,706 depending on the source, and that is the figure that tells you how busy the ship feels. Maximum capacity climbs toward 3,247 when third and fourth berths are filled, which mainly happens during the Japanese school holidays in August. The same applies to beam: 37.49 m at the hull, roughly 48 m measured bridge wing to bridge wing.
A fire did break out at Mitsubishi Heavy Industries in Nagasaki in October 2002, but the short version of the story gets it backwards. The hull that burned was the one due to be named Diamond Princess, the further along of the pair; damage was severe enough that Princess transferred the Diamond Princess name to the untouched sister hull that was to have been Sapphire Princess. So this ship, never touched by the fire, was delivered first on 26 February 2004, while the burned hull was rebuilt and sails today as Sapphire Princess. Diamond and Sapphire remain the only two Princess ships ever built in Japan.
In Japan, almost exclusively. It runs 8- to 29-day round trips from Yokohama, the port for Tokyo, through 25 November: Hokkaido and the Sea of Japan in summer, autumn colours plus Korean and Taiwanese ports in the fall. On 11 and 25 November it leaves Yokohama for Singapore on 15-, 25- and 29-day crossings. From 9 December it operates out of Singapore on 11- to 25-day Southeast Asia voyages.
It stays on Singapore until early March, works its way back to Yokohama between 13 February and 1 March, then spends the whole warm season in Japan from 16 March to 13 November on Yokohama round trips. It heads back toward Singapore on 13 and 27 November. This ship never comes to North America, so plan the flight accordingly: there is no year-round nonstop from Montréal to Tokyo, expect a connection in Toronto or Vancouver, 15 to 18 hours door to door, a 13-hour time difference and a lost day outbound. Arrive at least a day early; Yokohama sits about 30 km from Haneda airport and roughly 30 minutes by train from central Tokyo.
A midship balcony on Dolphin (9), Caribe (10) or Baja (11), the steadiest decks and the best served by the central lifts. The Club Class Mini-Suite category is worth a look if you hate waiting, since it comes with a reserved dining room section. Staterooms on Lido deck (14) are convenient for the buffet but exposed to trolley noise early in the morning. On Japanese autumn sailings, balconies go early because local guests book far ahead.
The layout is unusual: several mid-sized main dining rooms rather than one or two large ones, namely International, Vivaldi, Pacific Moon and Santa Fe, plus the Horizon Court buffet, Trident Grill and Prego pizzeria. Extra-charge dining covers Sabatini's, Sterling Steakhouse, the Crown Grill installed on deck 5 in place of the former Savoy dining room, and the Japanese venue Kai Sushi and Makoto Ocean, whose Edomae-style sushi was developed with chef Makoto Okuwa. Lounges include the three-level Piazza, Crooners, Explorers Lounge, Churchill, the Wheelhouse Bar, Club Fusion and Skywalkers nightclub. The Sanctuary, the Lotus Spa, a wedding chapel and Movies Under the Stars round it out.
The gap between this ship and the new ones. Delivered in 2004, it has no cantilevered SeaWalk like the Royal class and no glass dome like Sphere-class Sun Princess, and its last major dry dock was in January 2019. The guest mix surprises people too: on Japanese seasons the majority of passengers are Japanese, and when that is the case main course portions are deliberately smaller. Stateroom bathrooms are small, and for a Québec traveller the ship is a long way from home, which makes every planning mistake expensive in time.
Yes, and it is the first thing to understand before booking. Since 2014 it has been based in Japan for most of the year and sails with a heavily Japanese guest list on those seasons, with service and food adjusted to match: smaller main course portions when the majority of guests are Japanese, Edomae-style sushi at Kai Sushi and Makoto Ocean, and Japanese-style toilets fitted in public washrooms and suite bathrooms during the 2019 dry dock. For a traveller who came for Japan, that is a real advantage. For someone expecting the feel of a Caribbean Princess sailing, it is a surprise, so talk it through with your advisor first at 1-866-628-6241.
The ship was the site of the first large-scale quarantine of the pandemic. An 80-year-old passenger who boarded in Yokohama on 20 January 2020 and left the ship in Hong Kong on 25 January tested positive on 1 February; the ship was placed under quarantine at Yokohama on 4 February with 3,711 people aboard, passengers and crew combined. By 16 March at least 712 of those 3,711 had tested positive, and fourteen deaths had been recorded as of 14 April. Everyone had disembarked by 1 March, the ship was cleared to sail again on 30 March and left Yokohama on 16 May 2020, after a level-3 deep clean carried out by Belfor and a complete replacement of mattresses, pillows, linens, draperies and curtains.
The base fare covers your stateroom, the International, Vivaldi, Pacific Moon and Santa Fe dining rooms, the Horizon Court buffet, Princess Theater shows, the pools and the fitness centre. Drinks, Wi-Fi, service charges, shore excursions, Sabatini's, Crown Grill, Sterling Steakhouse and Makoto Ocean are extra. Princess sells two bundles, Princess Plus and Princess Premier, that fold several of these together. On a Japanese itinerary, budget for shore excursions as well, since the distances between ports and sights often justify organised transport.
Service charges, called Crew Appreciation, are added daily to your onboard account and vary by stateroom category; they sit outside the base fare but are covered by Princess Plus and Princess Premier. On drinks, Princess Plus covers fifteen a day under a capped per-drink value including specialty coffees and bottled water, while Princess Premier removes the daily limit and raises the ceiling. Your usual stops on board will be Crooners, the Piazza bar, the Wheelhouse Bar and Club Fusion. On a 29-day Yokohama to Singapore voyage, length changes the equation completely, so do the maths with your advisor.
The ship is MedallionClass with OceanNow active, so the disc you wear unlocks your stateroom, pays for your drinks, speeds up embarkation and has orders brought to you anywhere on board. MedallionNet covers the ship and handles video calls on most itineraries. Two caveats specific to this ship: the signal fluctuates in the Japanese inland waters and along the Korean coast, and you should check your mobile roaming charges before you leave, because Canadian plans rarely cover Japan the way they cover the United States.
Camp Discovery is on board, split into The Treehouse for ages 3 to 7, The Lodge for 8 to 12 and The Beach House for teens, complimentary during the day, but this is still an adults' ship; on August departures from Japan there will be local families, and very few the rest of the year. On loyalty, Captain's Circle gives you Gold after your first cruise, Ruby after three cruises or thirty days, Platinum after five cruises or fifty days, Elite after fifteen cruises or 150 days. The Wi-Fi discount lands at Ruby, complimentary laundry and priority disembarkation at Platinum. One 25- or 29-day Japanese voyage moves your day count dramatically.
At 115,875 gross tons with stabilizers, the ship absorbs swell well, and the Japanese itineraries hug the coast with closely spaced ports, so there are few long sea days. The real variable is the season: from late August to mid-October Japan is in typhoon season, and Princess will occasionally reroute to stay clear of a system. If you are sensitive, take a midship cabin on Emerald (8) or Dolphin (9) rather than high and forward. The November crossings toward Singapore involve more open water than the Japanese loops.
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