Celebrity Cruises Wins Forbes’ First Travel Guide Award

Celebrity Cruises, the brand that revolutionised the cruising business with its fleet of Relaxed Luxury resorts at sea, is lifting the standard once more by becoming the first ocean cruise line ever to receive the coveted Forbes Travel Guide (“FTG”) Star Awards.

Celebrity ships join an exclusive and exclusive club of less than 20 land-based properties with more than 1,000 rooms in the world to ever obtain the coveted accreditation.

FTG is the world’s leading authority on luxury hospitality, with the sole worldwide rating system for luxury hotels, restaurants, spas, and, most recently, ocean cruises. Its professional inspectors travel the globe anonymously, evaluating the greatest hotels, restaurants, spas, and ocean cruise ships against hundreds of stringent requirements that produce their yearly Star Ratings.

Celebrity Apex, Celebrity Edge, Celebrity Flora, Celebrity Millenium, and Celebrity Summit are the five initial resorts at sea Star-Rated ships. Except for the line’s smaller Galapagos ships, most of the line’s 15-ship fleet will be evaluated in the next year.

“We constantly aim for the stars at Celebrity Cruises, whether in our extraordinary level of service, unique ship design, or the highest quality of relaxed luxury experiences we deliver aboard. Being Star-rated numerous times is a tremendous honour from the Forbes Travel Guide team. It’s proof that with our resorts at sea, our guests truly sail from the greatest places in the world to the best destinations around the world,” said Celebrity Cruises President and CEO Lisa Lutoff-Perlo.

“I’d like to congratulate the Celebrity family, both at sea and shoreside, for this special honour. I congratulate everyone and thank you for your dedication and commitment to providing the best holidays at sea.”

“Forbes Travel Guide is happy to introduce Celebrity ships as the world’s first Star-Rated resorts at sea in the new ocean cruise category,” said Forbes Travel Guide CEO Hermann Elger.

“Celebrity has delivered on Forbes Travel Guide’s standards time and time again via meticulous incognito inspections – delivering visitors experiences that equal those at the very finest land-based resorts. We congratulate Celebrity Cruises on this magnificent and historic accomplishment.”

Celebrity’s recently Star-rated ships represent three of the line’s ship classes, including:

The Edge Series- These ships have been hailed as architectural masterpieces, introducing a slew of industry firsts on a cruise ship, including an outward-facing resort deck, the world’s first cantilevered floating bar known as The Magic Carpet®, luxurious new staterooms such as the two-story Edge Villas with private plunge pools, and more.

Celebrity ApexSM (2021) and Celebrity Edge® (2018) continue to be among the most prestigious ships at sea, having been named to TIME Magazine’s list of the “World’s Greatest Places.”

Prestigious Millennium® and Celebrity Summit®, which provide a more intimate sailing experience with little over 1,000 cabins each, were part of the line’s most significant fleet-wide refurbishment in 2019, with more than $500 million in luxury upgrades made.

Celebrity Flora® is a unique 100-passenger luxury mega-yacht developed exclusively for Galapagos expeditions and engineered to blend in with its environment. She debuted a cutting-edge positioning technology that allows the ship to stay fixed without dropping anchors, further protecting the seabed, and solar panels, making it one of the most eco-friendly ships sailing anywhere.

Certified naturalists lead all visits from the Galapagos Natural Park, so visitors can get to know the area well.