Wifi on the ship in Alaska?

I know this is probably a matter of opinion, but is it worth the expense to buy a wifi package on a ship in Alaska? I thought I had read somewhere that the reception may not be too good because of the mountains. Any thoughts are appreciated.

I was considering purchasing the WiFi package for our upcoming Alaska cruise until I realized that we will have our cell phones with us and we will be able to use data on the phones. Our regular plan at home should suffice in Alaska, I don't expect to be having any more internet usage there than I do at home. Granted, we may not have service when we're away from port but any internet access I will need can be done while we are in port.

I know this is probably a matter of opinion, but is it worth the expense to buy a wifi package on a ship in Alaska? I thought I had read somewhere that the reception may not be too good because of the mountains. Any thoughts are appreciated.

Ship wifi results from a satellite signal. Mountains are irrelevant.

Few if any ship has wifi that is even close to what you are used to at home.

My experience - ship wifi is slow and often down because you are too far north to pick up the satellites and because the satellites are to the south, if you are in a narrow channel or there are high mountains to the south, the signal is diminished or blocked. Ship wifi is good in the ports and they may offer a discount on your minutes on port days. Ketchikan and Juneau also have wifi at various places around the ports. Almost every bar has wifi so for the price of a coke/beer you can get online. In Juneau you can go to the library. Skagway has terrible wifi. Don't go to the library! It's the only place in town (or was in 2015) with free wifi and it's overwhelmed with crew and passengers with the end result being 20 minutes to load a page.....

Alaska cell service was pioneered by AT&T. If you have Sprint, Verizon, or some carrier other than AT&T you may not get optimal service. Ketchikan and Juneau have good service, but it is spotty in Skagway. You may have to go up to the top decks to get service. Generally, if you can see the cell tower on the hill behind town you can get service. If you have AT&T you can pick up cell phone service for about 10-15 minutes around the entrance to Glacier Bay off the Gustavus tower and if you are travelling down Icy Strait or near Hoonah you can pick up their cell tower. Don't know if it works for other carriers.

Be careful in the Seattle/Vancouver area. You can pick up a US tower and then in the middle of a call/data transmittal switch to a Canadian tower. Unless you have a Canadian plan that allows you to call OUT from Canada (some plans include calling to but not from), you will be charged out the wazoo, especially for data. Texts are around $0.50 each so that's a good way to go.

If you are on the ship's service, it will say "Cellular at Sea" on Princess.

Thank you all so much.....this is very helpful!

As an internet addict.... I need my daily (and hourly) fix. I can't be away from these forums for too long. Oh the agony!

Thoughts....

• @jst4fun715: Which ship are you on? Some ships are time based and others are quantity based.
  
• When I was on the Disney Wonder (they are quantity based), I got 24Mbps download speeds. Updating my device was very expensive as it was done in minutes..... bad iPad!
  
• for time based internet.... I found it very slow and unresponsive during the day and especially in the evening. However, from midnight until 7am... the wifi speed is not bad on my Princess and HAL sailings.
  
• yes, cellular data is available at certain locations, but along the Canadian coast.... it will be roaming.
  
• In Alaska, cellular data was limited to around the ports
  
• be careful that you are connecting to land towers and not the ships cellular service.... that can get expensive.
  

In summary... think about how much you plan to use the internet and try to concentrate usage late evening and/or early morning when it's fastest and least used.

This is actually for my sister and her husband. They will be on the Explorer beginning Aug 18 out of Seattle.

I was on NCL Pearl last year on a 10-day Alaska cruise. I bought the unlimited WiFi package months ahead. I had no problem whatsoever with reception/usage. It took me a couple days to figure out that unless I actually logged off the WiFi from my computer (not just powering the computer down...) I wasn't able to then logon with my phone. Once connected their system considers your device connected regardless if it is powered off or on. After I figured that out I had no problem switching between devices. While roaming around the ship (we had three at sea days) I could have the WiFi logged on with my phone and receive messages (WhatsApp). I didn't use the ship's cell service because I didn't want a surprise on my cellphone bill. The ship's internet speed wasn't the fastest I've ever seen but it was good enough that I was able to upload my pictures from that day to Flickr each night.

Verizon coverage maps for our upcoming Alaska cruise.

Skagway, Juneau, and Ketchikan, respectively:

Ketchikan is interesting. It almost looks like the dead zone within reach of the ship is deliberate.