Port Everglades terminals: Fort Lauderdale's cruise port explained

Port Everglades has one enormous advantage over every other cruise port in the world, and it is worth stating plainly: Fort Lauderdale–Hollywood International airport is about two miles away. That is a ten-minute taxi costing fifteen or twenty dollars. Nowhere else comes close, and it is most of the reason people choose to sail from here.

The port itself sits south of downtown Fort Lauderdale, wrapped around Lake Mabel, with terminals numbered rather than lettered.

Which terminal is which

Terminal	Usually
2	Princess Cruises
4	Disney Cruise Line — opened 2023
18	Royal Caribbean
19	Holland America Line
21	Holland America and Princess
25	Celebrity Cruises
26	Holland America
29	Rotates — Holland America, Celebrity and Royal Caribbean have all used it

As at every port, assignments shift by ship and by sailing date, and Terminal 29 in particular is a swing berth. Confirm the terminal on your own cruise documents — it is printed there, and it is the version that counts.

Getting there

From FLL: two miles. Taxi or rideshare, ten minutes, roughly $15–20. Some hotels and the cruise lines run shuttles, but at this distance a taxi is usually cheaper and faster than waiting for one.

Driving: the port has entrances from I-595 east and from US-1. Follow signs for Port Everglades and then your terminal number — the terminals are spread around the harbour and the signage assumes you know which one you want.

From Fort Lauderdale beach or downtown: ten to fifteen minutes by car.

The short airport distance changes the calculation on a lot of things. If you are flying in, seriously consider not having a car at all: two taxis beat a week of parking at $20 a day, and you avoid the rental entirely.

Parking

Official parking is around $20 a day for a standard vehicle and $25 for oversized ones, in garages and lots close to the terminals. The port is compact enough that walking distances from garage to terminal are short.

Off-site lots in the area run roughly $5 to $10 a day with a shuttle. On a fourteen-night Southern Caribbean sailing — and Port Everglades runs a lot of those — that is a saving of well over $150, which is when it clearly becomes worth doing.

What Port Everglades is good at

The fleet here skews differently from Miami’s rather than smaller. Princess and Holland America both base multiple ships at Port Everglades, and they run the long itineraries: ten- and fourteen-night Southern Caribbean loops, and the Panama Canal transits that barely exist from other Florida ports. Celebrity and Royal Caribbean hold year-round berths, and Disney added its second Florida base here in 2023.

If you want a two-week Caribbean cruise or a canal transit leaving Florida, this is the port that runs them. If you want a three-night Bahamas hop, Miami and Port Canaveral have more choice.

Embarkation day

• Respect your arrival window. The port handles multiple ships a day and the windows exist for a reason.
• Drop bags with the porters outside the terminal before parking. Tip them.
• Boarding usually starts late morning; all aboard is typically 60 to 90 minutes before sailing.
• Take your passport even on a closed-loop Caribbean sailing where a birth certificate and photo ID technically suffice.

Fly in the day before — but you have more slack here

The standard advice still applies, and you should still fly in the night before if you can. That said, of all the Florida ports this is the one where a same-day arrival is least reckless: a two-mile transfer means a mid-morning landing genuinely can make a mid-afternoon sailing.

If you are flying in the day before, Fort Lauderdale beach hotels are ten minutes from the terminals and many offer park-and-cruise rates.

The Port Everglades schedule has every sailing we track, and the five-port comparison covers how Fort Lauderdale measures up against Miami and Port Canaveral.