My wife and I have been cruising for over 20 years, mostly with Royal Carribean (Diamond plus member), but also have cruised with Norwegian, Disney and Carnival. We've been on the Allure of the Seas twice now and can say without any doubt we will not book another cruise on this ship. I will say before I get into the reason for our dissatisfaction with the ship that like with any place there were some excellent staff experiences, but unfortunately there were many negative experiences as well. Service at Royal Carribean has steadily declined the past few years and it's my personnel opinion that's due to the fact crew members get their tip regardless of their job performance. I do understand the need to mandate tips, but i'll never understand why as the customer you can't give the tips to those that earn it (Royal justifies their practice by telling you you can give extra to those you'd like to) to me that's not the point. Below is a list of complaints: Getting on the ship was a total cluster. We arrived at the port at 10:20 and didn't get on board until 11:35. We were supposed to get priority boarding, but were told that that group was already on board and could't stop the lines. There's a "sun" deck on floor 14, but there are no chairs? Weather was great all week for the most part. This was cruise number 21 for us and cabin porter service was by far the worst we've ever had. Normally the porter finds out what your habits/schedule are (when you leave your room and when you usually come back) not on this ship. Our room never got done on several occasions (each time we were out of the room better than 4 hours). We also received other passengers paperwork and never got ours several times. From day one and throughout the week of the cruise we never received our typical Diamond perks or paperwork We called the desk a couple of times, but that was futile so I'm guessing someone else enjoyed our perks. One night we pulled out the extra blanket that was stored under our bed folded in a plastic bag and it was disgusting. Large stains all over it. TV channel offerings are horrible. Slamming doors is a norm on a cruise ships , but hearing carts slamming so hard that walls shake at 1, 2, 3, am in the morning is not. We did't get much sleep on this cruise. Food quality has gone way down hill at Royal the last couple of years, and this Ship kept up with that trend and then some. One of the big reasons you go on a cruise is to eat, right? There was plenty of food at the Windjammer, but quality was pretty bad. The food was overcooked (by a lot) and in many cases items like spaghetti was clumped together dried out and hard. There's more, but I'll stop here and just say, my wife and I are retiring this year and won't let these experiences with Royal Carribean change the fact we plan on cruising a lot during retirement just not with Royal Carribean. We plan to give Norwegian cruises a try again. Read Less

Royal Caribbean gave us a wonderful experience for pur firdt time crusing. Getting on the ship extremely fast. I highly recommend people download the app and do early check in because that allows you to skip the long lines and wait times. We arrived and explodered and checked out almost everything. We met amazing people and the crew went beyond expectations for customer service. I feel as though those who complain are a bit high maintenance. Royal Caribbean goes beyond expectations to meet everyones needs. We had ocean view witg balcony. And i highly recommend it. We did the specialty dining everything was good but Giovanni's table. Not the best for a 5 star cruise. Windjammer has awesome lunch and dinner. Skip breakfast not very good there. Overall experience is a 5 star. Shore excursion were fun. Had to cancel last one due to poor weather. They did give a refund which they had automatically applied to our balance. One this i would recommend to save money is to purchase the beverage package. Going to the bar without it can add up quickly. Beer is about 10 dollars. Plus any girly blended drinks are 12 to 14 dollars. Its made a lot more sense to us to get it. Cause it also covers soft drinks, tea, smoothies and etc. Starbucks not included. We did comedy night the 1st night and the guys were funny. And has us laughing the whole time. Only 2 real downsides 1. They allow smoking near skybar. And also in the casino. Even for a large space it got to be a bit much and we had to aviod going to the casino after the 4th night. And 2. I wish they allowed more hot tubs and pools to be open 24 hrs. Most people on this cruise are older and i feel like we wouldnt need supervision. I feel like it would add a lot more romance and fun to those who want to each star gazing in the pools and hot tubs. Read Less

First time on mega ship, and came away very happy. A lot of people, but somehow we hardly encountered any long lines. Lots to do on a ship this size, so we kept busy. Our only issues would be that a few (very few) employees did not put on a happy face. It's as if they do not want to be there, but you can encounter that anywhere you go. My biggest complaint is the they have 12 elevators on each floor, and with that many people, why are not all of them operating at the same time? It appeared that only 6 were working at all times. But if that is my only beef, seems trivial. Foul weather made up most of our 7 days at sea, but you cannot fault Allure for that. Also, kudos to the Captain and Crew for their parking job in Nassau. Quite a feat with the wind and all. Cabin was a bit small, but comfortable. Specialty dining was pretty good, with 150 Central Park being by far our favorite, as we tried 4 of the restaurants. All in all, I would suggest this ship, just be careful of doing so in September. Read Less