Royal Caribbean opened its Hideaway Beach adults-only area at its Perfect Day at CocoCay private island earlier this year. At first, it was a modestly priced upgrade that guests could purchase, but it seems to have become far more expensive.
Of course, this isn’t official information, and Royal Caribbean hasn’t officially declared a price hike. We reached out to Royal Caribbean’s PR team but hadn’t heard back from them before publication. However, by all accounts (including my own), the price of a Hideaway Beach day pass has become several times more expensive since it opened earlier in 2024.
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It's important to know that Royal Caribbean does not have set prices for most things. When it comes to drink packages, dining packages, the internet, and most of the extras at Perfect Day at CocoCay, it used dynamic pricing.
The cruise line, however, does not share the formula it uses to set prices, and it's likely that its system manages prices to create the highest revenue. That means that fewer people paying a higher price might be more valuable to the cruise line than selling out at a lower price.
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Image source: Daniel Kline/ComeCruiseWithMe
Hideaway Beach prices keep going up
Hideaway Beach welcomed its first passengers on Jan. 29, 2024, specifically to coincide with the launch of Royal Caribbean’s mega-ship Icon of the Seas.
About two months later, I made my first visit to the newly opened area while sailing on Allure of the Seas. My wife and I booked our passes a couple of months in advance – right around the time Hideaway Beach, an 18-and-over experience, first opened – and paid $19.99. Other cruisers on social media report paying as little as $18 during the first few months of opening.
Of course, these were “sale” prices, but it wasn’t uncommon to see regular, non-discounted Hideaway Beach prices in the $30-$35 range at that time.
Just recently, a post in a Royal Caribbean-related (but not official) Facebook group claimed the standard price for Hideaway Beach for their April 2025 sailing jumped to $99. A separate post in a CocoCay-specific group reported the same price for a sailing in March 2025. Since I’m booked on three future Royal Caribbean cruises, I decided to look at how much the Hideaway Beach asking price is on them:
On a 7-night sailing on Wonder of the Seas in December of this year, a Hideaway Beach day pass is priced at $69, and is currently marked down 5% to $64.99. This is the lowest price of the three, which seems a bit odd since the colder months are when the perks of Hideaway Beach (especially the heated pool) are most valuable.
On a March 2025 sailing on Voyager of the Seas, I’m seeing the same $99 base price that has been circulating on social media. It also has a current 5% discount, making the price $93.99. And finally, on a Utopia of the Seas April 2025 sailing, the same $99 base price is listed, with the same 5% discount. So, it does indeed appear that the price has increased substantially, especially for 2025 sailings.
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It’s also worth noting that the prices seem to have increased significantly just in the past few months. I’m sailing on Celebrity Reflection this weekend and paid about $47 for my Hideaway Beach day pass when I reserved it about three months ago. Come Cruise With Me Executive Editor Dan Kline, who is also on the same cruise, booked it just a few weeks ago and paid about $70.
Why has Hideaway Beach become so much more expensive?
As mentioned, we don’t have any official explanation from Royal Caribbean, but there are a few possibilities. For one thing, it’s possible that Royal Caribbean was keeping the price artificially low in the first few months of Hideaway Beach operating to build awareness and demand for the newest Perfect Day add-on. And it’s also possible that Royal Caribbean’s dynamic pricing system is simply raising the price because demand warrants doing so.
There is also the more nefarious idea that the cruise line can make more money selling to fewer people at much higher prices. That would also, in theory, deliver a less crowded and "better" experience for those customers.
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After all, there is a maximum number of Hideaway Beach passes that the cruise line will sell for any given cruise, in order to maintain the desired crowd level. If the adults-only area is still selling at a higher price, raising the price is simply a natural business decision. Or, as noted above, the higher price itself could serve to both naturally limit crowd size while still maximizing revenue.
Whatever the reason, it has rapidly become more expensive to spend the day at Hideaway Beach. Whether the higher price is worthwhile to you or not is another question altogether.
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