According to relevant data, as of November 2021, the volume of cruise ships holding orders totaled 93 ships with 8.742 million gross tonnage; global ro-ro passenger ships holding orders totaled 95 ships with 1.713 million revised gross tonnage. Although the Covid-19 pandemic has had a serious impact on the cruise market and the global economy, the world's largest cruise shipbuilding group Fincantieri holds orders for 33 cruise ships from different brands of 13 cruise lines, and still remains confident in the future market; Meyer Werft have received this year's second cruise ship order in 2021 and holds orders for 9 cruise ships, the deliveries will extend to 2025.

In recent years, cruise shipbuilding in China has gradually drawn more attention, the Ministries of the State Council have successively issued documents to support the independent design and construction of cruise ships and the development of supporting industrial chains. From the Chinese cruise shipbuilding market, the projects of first batch of 2+4 Vista-class large-scale luxury cruise ships built by SWS in cooperation with CSSC, Carnival and Fincantieri are steadily advancing as planned, and the hull structure of the first ship has been completed on 18th October 2021 and it is scheduled to be completed and delivered within 2023.And the classification agreement has been signed for a second ship with RINA and the second ship is expected to be delivered in December 2025.

China Merchants Industry Holding (CMHI) and SunStone Ships signed an agreement to build "4+6" small polar expedition cruise ship, and a number of expedition cruise ships have been delivered. China Merchants Industry Holdings (CMHI) is following the development path of "from small to large, from easy to difficult", to build cruise ship in stages and at different levels including high-end river cruises, expedition cruises, small and medium-sized cruises etc., and CMHI has built China’s first luxury cruise manufacturing supporting industrial park in Haimen, to simultaneously cultivate and develop a supporting industrial chain for cruise manufacturing and steadily promote the localized manufacturing of cruise ships.

In addition, other Chinese shipyards have increased their R&D investment in high-tech and high-value-added ships such as luxury ro-ro passenger ships etc., and are accumulating strength for entering the small and medium-sized luxury cruise market. At present, China Merchants Jinling Shipyards (Weihai and Nanjing) holds a total of 11 ro-ro passenger orders, Guangzhou Shipyard International (GSI) currently holds 8 ro-ro passenger ships orders, and Xiamen Shipbuilding Industry (XSI) and Viking Cruises have signed “1+1” 2800-passenger cruise-type ro-ro passenger ship contract, Tianjin Xingang Heavy Industry have just delivered the world's largest civilian and multifunctional hospital ship.

Hosted by China's Society of Naval Architecture & Marine Engineering, Shanghai Service Federation Cruise Economy Services Committee and China Cruise Ship Design Alliance, the 5th China International Cruise Shipbuilding Forum & Exhibition will be held in Shanghai from October 17 to October 19, 2023. The theme of this year's event is "Under the dual-cycle pattern in China and abroad, promoting high-quality development of entire industrial chain of China's cruise industry " and co-located with Shanghai International Cruise Ship Supply Exhibition.

This event will bring together industry associations, shipbuilders and repairers, cruise lines and shipowners, cruise ship interiors and supporting enterprises, cruise ship suppliers, classification societies, cruise ship design and institutes, financial institutions, cruise & ship industrial parks, and other related enterprises etc., to build an exchange and cooperation platform for the cruise (passenger ships) shipbuilding industry and supporting supply chain, to accelerate the realization of breakthroughs in independent design, independent construction, and independent manufacturing supplying of cruise ships, and to promote the high-quality development of the entire cruise industry chain in China. The China International Cruise Shipbuilding Forum & Exhibition has been successfully held for four sessions. It is the only professional cruise (passenger ships) shipbuilding exhibition in Asia. It is the best way to understand the latest products and technologies of global cruise shipbuilding and to build a face-to-face, a multi-directional and multi-level exchange and cooperation platform for industry players. It has practical significance for the transformation of China's shipbuilding industry to high-end development.