Sources & Fact-Checking Policy
Where the facts on this site come from, and how we verify them before publishing.
Last updated: August 2026.
Fleet & company facts
Vessel specifications (passenger capacity, ice class, year built or refurbished), founding dates, and safety-body membership are sourced from operators' own public rate sheets and fact sheets, vessel registries, and IAATO/AECO published member lists. We do not rely on a single source for a material fact where a second source is available to cross-check it.
Pricing
Lead-in prices reflect publicly listed rate sheets and travel-agency published fares for the 2026/27 Antarctica and Arctic seasons, checked in July 2026. Prices change frequently and by cabin category — treat the ranges on our ranking page as a starting point, not a quote.
Traveler reviews
We read publicly available reviews on Google Reviews, TripAdvisor and Cruise Critic for each operator and summarize recurring themes in our own words. We do not quote individual reviews verbatim beyond a word or two, and we do not link to specific reviewer profiles. Where an operator's public review sentiment is genuinely mixed, we disclose that rather than presenting only the positive slice.
What we won't do
We will not fabricate a review, a rating figure, or a reviewer count to fill out an operator's profile. If public review volume for an operator is too thin to summarize responsibly, we say so rather than inventing detail.
Incident reporting
For safety or reputational incidents — such as the April–May 2026 hantavirus outbreak aboard Oceanwide Expeditions' m/v Hondius — we require independent corroboration (established news reporting, public health authority statements, or the operator's own public statement) before publishing, and we link to that source directly rather than relying on unsourced forum claims.
Corrections process
Anyone can flag a factual error via our contact page. We verify against current primary sources before making a correction, and we note the revision date on the affected page. See our editorial policy for our broader independence commitments.
Review cadence
Fleet and pricing data is reviewed at least twice a year; safety-membership status and any active incident disclosures are checked whenever we're notified of a change, and at minimum each time the methodology page is revised.