Celebrity sells a Classic and a Premium drink package. As of August 2026 the Classic covers alcoholic drinks valued up to $12 and the Premium up to $19, with anything above the cap charged as the difference rather than refused. A 20% gratuity is added at checkout on a standalone package. Every guest of legal drinking age sharing a stateroom on the same booking must buy the same package, and if one upgrades they all upgrade. Celebrity’s All Included is a fare pricing option rather than a universal standard: only Retreat suite guests get it automatically, and onboard staff gratuities are charged separately from the beverage gratuities it bundles.
The choice between Celebrity’s two drink packages comes down to a single number: the Classic covers drinks valued up to $12 and the Premium up to $19, as of August 2026. Almost everything else written about them is noise — including, on a lot of sites, the caps themselves, which are still being published at the figures Celebrity used before this.
Classic or Premium: the cap is the whole decision
The package does not refuse a drink above the cap. It covers the first $12 of value on the Classic as of August 2026, and you pay the difference. That single detail makes the Classic far more usable than the number suggests — a fifteen-dollar cocktail costs you the three-dollar difference, not the whole drink.
Which is why the upgrade is a narrower decision than it looks. As of August 2026, moving to Premium raises the cap to $19 and the wine discount from 15% to 20% off bottles. If your usual order is a beer, a glass of house wine or a standard cocktail, you are paying the upgrade to avoid a few dollars of top-up on the occasional drink.
Premium earns its money in one situation: you drink top-shelf spirits or wines by the glass regularly, where the gap between the two ceilings quoted above is being tested every day rather than twice a week.
The rule that decides it before the cap does
Everyone of legal drinking age in the stateroom must buy the same package. Celebrity applies this across guests sharing a cabin on the same booking number, and — the part people miss — if one guest upgrades, they all upgrade.
So the Premium question is never really about you. It is about whether the upgrade is worth it multiplied by everyone in the room. A package that pays for one enthusiastic drinker becomes poor value the moment it is doubled to cover someone who has a glass of wine with dinner.
Guests under 12 are exempt, and teenagers are placed on a non-alcoholic package rather than counted into the adult rule.
What “All Included” actually is
This is the most misreported thing about Celebrity, so it is worth being precise. All Included is a fare pricing option you select, not a standard applied to every booking. A cruise-only rate exists for every stateroom category.
The one exception: Retreat suite guests get it automatically, at the Premium tier rather than the Classic.
When you do take it, the bundle is the fare plus basic Wi-Fi plus the Classic drink package — and the beverage gratuity is included inside it. Buy the same package standalone and a 20% gratuity is added at checkout instead. Either way, onboard staff gratuities are charged separately, which is the line most “all-inclusive” write-ups skip.
Note also that the brand is All Included. If you are reading a page that calls it “Always Included”, it has not been updated in a while, which is worth knowing before you trust its figures.
Working out whether to buy one at all
The break-even arithmetic is the same across every line, so we keep it in one place — our drink packages guide works through it properly, including how sea days change the answer.
The Celebrity-specific note is that the fleet spans two very different products. A Galapagos expedition and an Edge-class ship in the Caribbean are not the same holiday and do not produce the same bar bill. If you are still choosing, Celebrity Ascent and Celebrity Beyond are the ships most people are deciding between.
Common questions
What is the difference between Celebrity's Classic and Premium drink packages?
The per-drink cap. As of August 2026 Classic covers drinks valued up to $12 and Premium up to $19. Premium also carries a larger wine discount, 20% off bottles against the Classic’s 15%. If your usual order sits under $12 the upgrade buys you very little.
What happens if a drink costs more than the cap?
You are charged the difference, not refused the drink. This makes the Classic package more usable than the cap suggests: a fifteen-dollar cocktail costs you the three-dollar difference rather than the whole drink.
Is Celebrity's All Included standard on every fare?
No, and this is widely misreported. All Included is a fare pricing option you select. Only Retreat suite staterooms include it automatically; a cruise-only rate exists for every other category.
Are gratuities included in Celebrity's drink package?
It depends which you buy. A standalone package has a 20% gratuity added at checkout. The All Included fare bundles the beverage gratuity, but onboard staff gratuities are still charged separately either way.
Does everyone in the cabin have to buy the same package?
Yes. All guests of legal drinking age sharing a stateroom on the same booking number must purchase the same alcoholic package, and an upgrade by one guest applies to all of them.
Celebrity’s packages are more generous than the caps suggest, because exceeding a cap costs you the difference rather than the whole drink. The Classic is the right answer for most people, and the everyone-upgrades-together rule is what should decide the Premium question rather than your own preference.
We book Celebrity regularly and will tell you honestly which tier fits your cabin rather than selling you the upgrade. The full fleet is on our Celebrity Cruises page, and our Royal Caribbean package guide covers the sister line if you are comparing the two.