Disney Cruise Line announced Friday that three of its future ships in its expansion to a fleet of 13 in the next seven years will be smaller than all but its two original vessels.

DCL just welcomed its newest ship, Disney Treasure, sailing out of Port Canaveral as the sixth in the fleet with a sister ship in the Wish class, Disney Destiny, headed to Port Everglades at the end of 2025. It also has the Disney Adventure, which is its own class of ship, headed to Singapore before the end of the year, which will grow the fleet to eight.

Friday’s announcement revealed details for four more ships that have been ordered by DCL to be delivered between 2027-2031. The first would be a fourth sister ship in the Wish class while the last three will be a new class, which has yet to be named.

The new class of ships will be delivered in 2029, 2030 and 2031, and have a passenger capacity of around 3,000, which is about 1,000 fewer than the Wish class and older Dream class vessels, according to a press release.

Those ships are projected to come in around 100,000 gross tons compared to the 144,000 gross tons of the Wish class and 129,600 gross tons of 2011’s Disney Dream and 2012’s Disney Fantasy.

It will still be about 20% larger than the first two DCL ships — 1998’s Disney Magic and 1999’s Disney Wonder, which come in around 84,000 gross tons and 2,700-passenger capacities.

Of note, and included in the 13-ship fleet total was a previously announced Wish-class ship ordered by the Oriental Land Co. that will sail out of Japan after its arrival in 2029. That one would be the fifth Wish-class ship when it debuts.

All of the on-order ships are to be constructed at Meyer Werft shipyards in Papenburg, Germany as has the previous Wish and Dream-class vessels.

The smaller size for the future class of ships will allow them to access more ports than the newer vessels.

“As we expand our fleet, it is important that we continue to provide a variety of experiences for our guests,” said Thomas Mazloum, president of the New Experiences Portfolio & Disney Signature Experiences, which includes Disney Cruise Line. “Families enjoy the diversity of vacations we offer, from our classic vessels to our Wish-class ships. They also expect to explore a broad range of destinations, including those that prefer to host smaller ships.”

In a previous interview with the Sentinel, Mazloum said the Magic and Wonder, though smaller, still give great returns and rank high with guests. He said the deployment of Wonder, for instance, to Alaska each year is the right choice for the line in terms of guest satisfaction.

“We’re going to be very flexible on that, and I think you will see different sizes eventually emerging over the next decade plus, because we’re going to be very, very thoughtful — how we do this. Not every size fits everywhere,” he said.

Another feature of the new class will be its fuel capability, with the vessels steering away from liquefied natural gas (LNG), as is used on the Wish class. Instead, the new class will be able to support multiple green fuel options such as hydrotreated vegetable oil, known as HVO, and renewable methanol, which are among options that the cruise industry is looking to switch to in an effort to reduce carbon emissions.

“We’ve looked at LNG as a transition,” Mazloum told the Sentinel. “It’s another step in the right direction, and the future ships will have an immense amount of flexibility. So one of the things you will see is that on all of our ships, including, by the way, the Wish class, we’ve built in and spent money on a lot of flexibility so that different types of fuels as they are being developed are going to be used.”

The fourth Wish-class ship, though, will remain an LNG-powered ship, the Disney release stated.

The new class of ships, though, will be among the lightest for their size in the industry, featuring a streamlined hull, next-generation power and propulsion systems and other energy-efficient efforts such as a battery system, the release said. The ships will also have the ability to hook up to shore power at ports that support it, so that they don’t have to burn fuel while in port.

For now, only PortMiami out of Florida has limited shore power capacity, but a global effort is underway to expand that option for cruise lines.

“Our team of Disney Imagineers is dreaming up this new class of ships to be as fuel and energy efficient as possible, and our guests will see the difference — from a more hydrodynamic design to lighter materials and energy-efficient technology throughout the ships,” said Philip Gennotte, a project management executive with Walt Disney Imagineering “We’re very proud to continue to support Disney’s broader environmental goals, now and into the future.”

©2025 Orlando Sentinel. Visit at orlandosentinel.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.