Guide
Flying to Hawaii from the mainland: which routes run on time
San Francisco to Lihue ran 88.3% on time over September 2025 to August 2026; Portland to Honolulu 60.7%. The gateway and the airline matter more than the island.
San Francisco to Lihue and Portland to Honolulu are both flights of five to six hours over the same ocean to the same state. Over September 2025 to August 2026, the first ran 88.3% on time and cancelled 0.54% of its flights. The second ran 60.7%, rank 2,962 of the 2,978 routes on this site, close to the bottom of the country. Flying to Hawaii from the mainland is not one product.
It is two dozen routes in each direction with a route page here, and the spread between them is wider than the gap between the most and least punctual US airports.
All of them start or end on the West Coast or in the Mountain West. The long flights from the big eastern and central hubs, such as Dallas, Chicago, Atlanta and New York, run once or twice a day and fall below this site's threshold for a route page; they appear below through their flight pages.
The westbound flights, ranked
US average 77.3%
50.0%95.0%
The line under each bar is the route's cancellation rate. Dashed line: US average. Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics, September 2025 to August 2026.
The Bay Area's flights to the neighbour islands are the strongest group of Hawaii-bound routes. San Francisco to Maui ran 86.8%, San Francisco to Kona 86.9% and Oakland to Maui 84.7%. Two small gateways also did well: Long Beach to Honolulu at 89.3% and Portland to Maui at 89.4%.
The busiest route is the middle of the pack. Los Angeles to Honolulu, with 5,540 scheduled flights, ran 76.2%, and 7.8% of its flights arrived an hour or more late. San Francisco to Honolulu ran 80.0%.
The Pacific Northwest is where the westbound record breaks down. Seattle to Honolulu ran 66.2%, rank 2,871, and the Portland flight was worse still. Seattle to Lihue and Seattle to Kona were weak too, and San Diego to Honolulu ran 72.0% with 1.46% of its flights diverted, well above the national 0.29%. Over open water a diversion usually means turning back to the mainland, so it costs the whole day. Those flights are not in the on-time rate at all: my pipeline leaves diversions out, and a flight that returns to its departure airport counts as a diversion in the file. I read 72.0% as slightly flattering for that reason.
The cause codes on those weak routes are unusual. The airline's own causes account for 65% of Seattle to Honolulu's delay minutes and 70% of Portland's, against 33% nationally. The air traffic system, which dominates the worst routes into San Francisco or New York, accounts for only 13%. These delays happen at the gate: maintenance, crew, fuelling, catering. A twin-engine aircraft on a long overwater flight must meet extended-range (ETOPS) rules, and a fault that could be deferred on a two-hour hop can hold a Honolulu flight until it is fixed. That is a likely part of the explanation; the cause codes cannot isolate it.
The airline matters more than the route
Across all the mainland routes, United and Southwest ran the most punctual Hawaii flying in this period, Delta and American a little behind, and Alaska and Hawaiian, now one company, the least punctual. Alaska is the largest carrier on these routes by some distance.
The two names do not separate cleanly in this data. Hawaiian is reported under its own code only from August to December 2025; from January 2026 the same flights appear under Alaska's code. I noticed it when the Honolulu to Kahului route split into two carrier files. Hawaiian's pages here cover five months, and Alaska's carry Hawaiian's flying for the other seven.
The route-level comparisons are stark. On Los Angeles to Honolulu, United and Delta ran well ahead of Alaska and Hawaiian. On Seattle to Honolulu, Delta beat Alaska by a wide margin. On the Las Vegas flights, Southwest from Honolulu far outran Hawaiian on the same route.
That will surprise anyone who has looked at the national airline tables, where Hawaiian ranks near the top at 80.8%. Most of Hawaiian's flights are the short island hops covered in the inter-island guide, and those carry its national figure. On the long flights to the mainland it is a different airline. The same route, different airline guide shows how often the carrier is the bigger lever.
The return red-eyes
US average 77.3%
65.0%95.0%
The line under each bar is the route's cancellation rate. Dashed line: US average. Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics, September 2025 to August 2026.
Flying home runs better than flying out. The two directions of a route are separate records in the data, each with its own page, and on most route pairs the flight back to the mainland was the more punctual direction, and several return routes rank among the best in the country: Maui to Phoenix at 93.0%, rank 16, and Maui to San Francisco at 90.4%.
LAX → HNL76.2% overall
HNL → LAX80.3% overall
SEA → HNL66.2% overall
HNL → SEA74.9% overall
All panels share one scale. The last column is 8pm to 5am. Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics, September 2025 to August 2026.
The overnight departures carry that advantage. Honolulu to Los Angeles ran 84.9% on time after 8pm, and the late-evening flights off the neighbour islands were among the most punctual flight numbers in the country: United 1724 from Kona to San Francisco, Delta 394 from Maui to Seattle, American 664 from Kona to Phoenix. The aircraft has usually sat on the island for hours, the airspace at both ends is empty, and the eastbound jet stream tends to deliver the flight early into a dawn arrival slot. The red-eye guide explains why overnight flying beats its reputation generally; Hawaii's returns are its clearest case.
The returns cancel slightly more often than the outbound flights, largely on the Seattle routes: Kona to Seattle cancelled 2.27% and Lihue to Seattle 2.10%. A cancelled red-eye usually means a full extra day on the island.
US average 1.89%
0.00%3.00%
Share of scheduled flights cancelled, either direction. Dashed line: US average. Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics, September 2025 to August 2026.
Most mainland-Hawaii routes cancelled less than the average US flight. Hawaii's risk is the late departure, not the missing one; the Salt Lake City to Honolulu flight, at 2.10%, is one of the few where a cancellation is a real planning concern.
From the hubs further east
The once-daily flights from the big hubs have no route pages, but their flight pages tell the same story. American 5 and American 123, from Dallas-Fort Worth to Honolulu and Maui, were among the least punctual Hawaii-bound flights on the site; their return, American 6, ran far better. United 219 from Chicago and Delta 636 from JFK sit in the middle, and their returns, United 218 and Delta 650, beat them clearly. An eight-to-eleven-hour flight out of a congested hub inherits that hub's morning.
What I would book to Hawaii
Pick the airline first. On the routes where it is an option, United, Southwest and Delta ran well ahead of Alaska and Hawaiian in this period. Check the carrier table on the specific route page before booking.
Leave from California if you can. For Honolulu, every California gateway beat Seattle and Portland on the way out. For a neighbour island, a nonstop from San Francisco or Oakland was among the most reliable ways in. At 60.7%, Portland to Honolulu is the flight I would avoid whenever a California gateway is an option.
Book the red-eye home, or the early flight. On almost every return route the overnight departure beat the midday and afternoon flights; only the morning departures, mostly from Honolulu, did as well. Budget for the lost night's sleep, not for the delay.
Do not stack a same-day connection on the outbound. If a Hawaii flight feeds an inter-island hop or a cruise, arrive the day before. The connection risk tool will show how thin a two-hour buffer is at the mainland end.
Compare the gateways: Honolulu (HNL) · Kahului, Maui (OGG) · San Francisco (SFO) · Los Angeles (LAX) · Seattle (SEA) · Compare any US route