The terminal is operated by SATS-Creuers Cruise Services. This addition and the Singapore Cruise Centre at HarbourFront are expected to grow the leisure cruise sector in Singapore.
Second Minister for Trade and Industry S Iswaran said that cruise passenger numbers are expected to hit 1.5 million in three to five years.
Passenger numbers reached close to one million last year.
Costing about S$500 million, the 28,000 square metres Marina Bay Cruise Centre can handle about 6,800 passengers at any one time.
The arrival and departure halls will comprise 80 check-in counters and up to 40 immigration counters. Also about six shops are expected to be set up which include food and beverage and convenience stores.
Other facilities include 25 coach bays, 327 carpark lots and convenient road access with provisions made for future walkway linkages to MRT stations, the waterfront promenade and the park.
The cruise centre at Marina South will double Singapore's berthing capacity and will cater to the world's largest cruise ships.
Despite the drop in cruise passenger numbers in the last two years, the Singapore Tourism Board (STB) is confident of a more buoyant outlook.
Ms Aw Kah Peng, chief executive of the STB, said: "Our numbers in terms of throughput has fallen and it's partly because the industry here is restructuring. After the two IRs opened, many of the gaming ships didn't make sense anymore. So for them, it made sense for them not to continue.
"But I think the structural adjustment is almost at the tail end. Now we are seeing more interest from cruise ships that are not gaming ships."
She also added that more cruise liners are showing interest in Asia mainly because the market is doing well here. For example, Asia accounts for close to 20 per cent of the global outbound travel.
The terminal is also expected to have spillover benefits in the economy.
Second Minister for Trade and Industry and Home Affairs and Minister in the Prime Minister's Office, S Iswaran, said: "All the supporting services for the cruise ships and also the onshore tourism services will be big factors. The hotels also stand to benefit to the extent that we become a turnaround cruise spot. People come to Singapore in order to board their cruise ship or to disembark in Singapore before going home which means the fly cruise component is quite important and for that we're also quite well positioned because of our air connectivity."
The cruise-fly packages is aimed at making it more seamless for passengers to connect to the airport and will be made available from May 26, facilitated by the terminal's access to the airport. Currently it will only service Silkair, Singapore Airlines and Qantas passengers.
The Royal Caribbean's Voyager of the Seas will be the largest ship to make its way here on 26 May, paving the way for larger cruise liners to dock in Singapore and Asia.
The ship has a capacity of 3,840 passengers and 1,176 crew.
Currently, the terminal is only open to cruise liners, passengers and authorised personnel and will only open its doors to the public in the second half of this year.
SATS-Creuers Cruise Services which operates the terminal said that one of the challenges when constructing the facility was to tackle the low tides. As such, cages were built to aid the crew to load or unload baggage more effectively.
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