Lofoten Islands cruise: all 13 boat trips compared

Svolvær is a working harbour on Austvågøya, the first big island of the Lofoten chain, and it is the point every boat on this page pushes off from. The trips are short by design. Nothing here is an overnight passage and nothing here asks you to pack a bag: you walk down to the main square, you board, and you are back in town the same morning or the same afternoon. That is what a cruise means in this archipelago — a few hours on the water between the islands, not a voyage.

Most of those hours have one destination. Trollfjord is a narrow arm off the Raftsundet strait, so tight between its walls that the boats go in, slow down, and turn around inside it. Six of the thirteen listings here name it outright, and the route to it takes in the mountain scenery of Raftsundet and, on some trips, the strait of Øyhellsundet and the island of Skrova on the way. Turning in that gap is the moment people book for, and every fjord trip on this site does it — the difference is entirely in what you are standing on while it happens.

Which is the first real decision: the boat. On one side is the quiet option. $157 runs a purpose-built hybrid-electric vessel for three and a half hours, with a live guide, access to warm indoor areas and tap water on board, and the listing sells the silence itself — the fjord without the engine underneath it. $109 is the three-hour cruise with snacks and drinks available on board. On the other side is the RIB: an inflatable boat that covers the same water in two hours, where the operator issues a flotation suit, a life vest, gloves and protective goggles, and on one listing a hat and balaclava as well. Three of these thirteen are RIBs. They are the fast, wet, exposed version of the same fjord.

The second thread is the white-tailed sea eagle. Six listings state that the guide looks for it, in the operators’ own words — scout for the king of the sky, watch for eagles, keep an eye out. No boat can promise you the bird, and none of these listings does. What they promise is a guide whose job on the trip is to find it, and the sea eagle safari page sets out which boats build the whole trip around that search. Beyond the fjord trips sit two fishing boats, a kayak launched from Eggum on the outer coast, and four land days down the island chain to Reine and Å — different days entirely, and listed here so you can tell them apart at a glance.

Six numbers decide most bookings — fare, length, what the fare covers, rating, review count and what an hour on the water costs — and all six are in the table below. What a table cannot show is what each kind of trip feels like, so here it is first.

The quiet boats into Trollfjord: two trips, three to three and a half hours. $157 is our top pick and the most reviewed listing on this site by a long way: three and a half hours on a purpose-built hybrid-electric boat, an in-person live guide, warm indoor areas, tap water, and a route the operator describes as the majestic Trollfjord and its white-tailed eagles experienced in silence and comfort. 3,480 reviews at 4.8. $109 is the three-hour version run by a local family business, taking in the fjord, the history of the area and local stories from the Viking age onward, with snacks and drinks available on board and a live guide; its listing is the one that describes the sea eagle as Europe’s largest, with a wingspan it puts at 2.65 metres. 169 reviews at 4.6, and the lowest fare here that still turns into the fjord.

The open boat: one trip, two hours. $143 is a sea eagle safari to Trollfjorden on an open-top boat — not a RIB, but not a cabin either. The operator provides a lifejacket, goggles, a cap and gloves, and the listing sets the trip up around the Raftsundet strait and the fjord itself. It holds 4.9 across 649 reviews, the joint-highest rating on this site.

The RIBs: three trips, two hours each. $125 runs from the centrally located main square in Svolvær to Trollfjord with a guide, a safety briefing, a flotation suit, a life vest, gloves and protective goggles, and the listing puts the history of the area alongside the scenery; 1,100 reviews at 4.8. $125 is the most thoroughly kitted of the three — a warm wetsuit, gloves, hat, balaclava, helmet or wind goggles and a life jacket, with a bilingual guide — and its route runs from Lofoten through Raftsundet, with Viking locations and the stories attached to them; 884 reviews at 4.9. $125 is the wildlife-watching version: out of Svolvær through the strait of Øyhellsundet to Trollfjord, past beaches and the island of Skrova, with a local guide, flotation suits and eyes open for eagles and seals; 365 reviews at 4.8.

The fishing boats: two trips, three and four hours. $114 is four hours in the Lofoten sea with a local family business, fishing gear, rain gear and a life vest provided, the crew teaching the gear and the technique, and help cleaning and packing a catch to carry away; 746 reviews at 4.7. $115 is the three-hour trip on a traditional vessel using a line wheel, with a fishing kit, safety equipment and an experienced crew; 177 reviews at 4.5. Neither is a fjord cruise, and both are on the fishing page in full.

The days that are not boat trips: five. $85 is the lowest fare on the site — three hours in double kayaks from Eggum on the outer coast with all equipment, snacks, hot drinks and a multilingual guide, at 4.9 across 181 reviews — and it is the one trip here that does not start in Svolvær. $152 is six hours by road across the islands with a local guide and pickup at Gravdal or the Svolvær waterfront. $209 is nine hours by minivan to Å, Reine, Hamnøy and Sakrisøy in a group of no more than eight, with personal headsets, hot drinks and a light Norwegian snack, at 4.8 across 146 reviews. $272 is the nine-hour guided day from Svolvær taking in Henningsvær, Reine, Å, Hamnøy and Sakrisøy with a photography service included, and $290 is the seven-hour run across the west islands with Skagsanden beach, the Hamnøy viewpoint and Reine, the highest fare on the site.

If you want the fjord and you want to hear it, book $157. It is our top pick and the most tested listing here: three and a half hours on a purpose-built hybrid-electric boat, a live guide on board, warm indoor areas to come back into, tap water, and Trollfjord reached without engine noise. 3,480 reviews at 4.8 — nothing else on this site has been through anything like that many hands. It is also the longest of the fjord trips, which is the point: the extra ninety minutes over a RIB are spent on the water rather than getting to it.

If you want speed and spray, book $125 or $125. Both are two hours, both cost the same, and both hand you the gear at the quay. $125 has the deeper record at 1,100 reviews and leaves from the main square in the middle of Svolvær; $125 holds the higher rating at 4.9 across 884 and issues the fullest kit on this site — warm wetsuit, gloves, hat, balaclava, helmet or wind goggles. If wildlife is the reason you are going out, $125 is the RIB that builds the trip around looking for eagles and seals on the way through Øyhellsundet.

If the fare matters most, book $109. Three hours, the fjord and the eagle safari in one trip, a live guide, the history and the local stories, snacks and drinks available on board, run by a local family business. It is the least you can pay here and still turn inside Trollfjord, and 169 reviews at 4.6 say it does the job. $85 is lower still, but it is a kayak from Eggum, not a cruise from Svolvær — a different day with a different view.

If the eagles are the reason, book $143. Two hours on an open-top boat through Raftsundet into Trollfjorden with a guide, a lifejacket, goggles, a cap and gloves, rated 4.9 across 649 reviews. The open deck is what makes it: there is no window between you and the sky. What the guide can promise is the search and the knowledge of where to look, which is exactly how the listing words it.

If you would rather fish than sightsee, book $114. Four hours with a local family business on the Lofoten sea, gear and rain gear provided, the crew showing you how to handle the line and helping clean what you bring up; 746 reviews at 4.7. And if the weather has closed the water in, the land days — $209 at nine hours and $290 at seven — cover Reine, Hamnøy, Sakrisøy and Å instead.