Route reliability record
HNL→SJC
Honolulu to San Jose
- Flights
- 808
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Distance
- 2,417 mi
- Carriers
- 3
This route lands a B+, 4 points better than the national rate of 77.3%. About one flight in five arrives 15 minutes late or worse, and those flights are late by about 50 minutes on average. That rests on 808 HNL to SJC flights, with a median arrival 2 minutes early.
Best time to fly HNL to SJC: a 8am–11am departure, ideally on a Tuesday. Flights in that window arrived on time 89.2% of the time and Tuesday flights 85.1%, against 81.4% for the route overall.
Set against the rest of the country, this route's record is 4 points better than the US average of 77.3%. That gap is worth roughly 41 fewer late arrivals for every thousand flights.
Key figures
On time
81.4%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 805 completed flights
Avg delay
51 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
0.00%
National rate is 1.89%
Best carrier
Southwest
88.5% on time across 445 flights
These figures cover 808 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. The median arrival is 2 minutes early, which is the part an average hides: most flights here are fine, and the on-time rate is decided by a tail of badly late ones. On-time means under 15 minutes late, the DOT's own threshold.
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Carrier by carrier
Which airline is most reliable on HNL to SJC
Only one carrier clears this site's 365-flight floor here, so there is no comparison to draw. The table below is the full picture.
| Airline | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Southwest Airlines | 445 | 88.5% | 42 min | 0.00% | A+ |
| Hawaiian Airlinesthin sample | 120 | 73.1% | 55 min | 0.00% | C+ |
| Alaska Airlinesthin sample | 243 | 72.4% | 56 min | 0.00% | C+ |
Timetable by Aviasales, a Travelpayouts partner. Booking through it may earn this site a commission at no cost to you; it changes no figure here.
Best ways to make this trip
The most reliable ways to fly Honolulu to San Jose
Every airline on this route and on the routes between nearby airports, ranked by how often a scheduled flight actually operated and arrived on time. 3 of the top 4 use a different airport at one end.
| Option | Airline | Success | On time | Cancelled | Best departure | Most punctual flight |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. HNL → SJCHonolulu to San Jose | Southwest Airlines | 88.5% | 88.5% | 0.00% | 11am–2pm, Tue | — |
| 2. HNL → OAKHonolulu to Oakland | Southwest Airlines | 88.2% | 88.2% | 0.00% | 8pm–5am, Wed | — |
| 3. HNL → SFOHonolulu to San Francisco | United Airlines | 84.6% | 85.1% | 0.62% | 8am–11am, Tue | UA 373 07:00 |
| 4. HNL → SFOHonolulu to San Francisco | Alaska Airlines | 68.3% | 69.8% | 2.08% | 8pm–5am, Tue | — |
Success is the share of scheduled flights that operated and arrived less than 15 minutes late, so a cancelled flight counts against it. “(route)” means the best time comes from every carrier on the route rather than this airline alone.
Departure window
The best time of day to leave
Departure time matters more here than the choice of carrier. The gap between the best and worst window is 33 points, against half a point between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am—
- 8am–11am270 flights89.2%
- 11am–2pm486 flights79.8%
- 2pm–5pm52 flights55.8%
- 5pm–8pm—
- 8pm–5am—
Scale runs 45% to 95%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
Book the morning departure. Flights leaving between 8am–11am arrive on time 89.2% of the time, against 55.8% for the afternoon window. That is 33 points of difference for no extra money, and it comes from the same aircraft having had no earlier flight to fall behind on. The 11am–2pm window is the busiest, with 486 flights scheduled in it.
Explore
Filter HNL to SJC by airline, time, month and day
Pick a breakdown and a carrier. The dashed mark on each row is the same slice for every US flight.
On HNL to SJC, the best departure window is 8am–11am at 89.2% on time and the worst is 2pm–5pm at 55.8%, a wide gap of 33.4 points. All US flights leaving 8am–11am ran 83.9%.
- 5–8am—
- 8–11am89.2%
- 11am–2pm79.8%
- 2–5pm55.8%
- 5–8pm—
- 8pm–5am—
best all US flightsScale 45% to 95%. Cells under 30 flights show a dash.
Across the year
When delays peak on this route
This route's year swings by 32 points from best month to worst, which is wide. An annual average tells you very little about the week you are actually flying, so read the strip rather than the headline if your dates are fixed.
May is the best month on the calendar at 96.8% on time. Shoulder season thins the schedule and takes the summer weather with it, and the operation gets its margin back. July was the busiest month here, with 93 flights.
Across the week, Tuesday is the strongest day at 85.1% on time and Sunday the weakest at 78.3%, a spread of 7 points.
Delay causes
Why this route gets delayed
Carrier accounts for 50% of the 7,607 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 50%Carrier
- 36%Late-arriving aircraft
- 11%National Airspace System
- 3%Extreme weather
- 0%Security
36% of delay minutes trace back to a late-arriving aircraft, meaning the plane was already behind before it got here. Across 7,607 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 14 to one. The split is drawn from 7,607 reported delay minutes.
The largest share of delay minutes, 50%, falls under carrier control: crew scheduling, maintenance, fuelling, baggage. It accounts for 3,788 of the 7,607 delay minutes reported here.
Cancellations are rare at 0.00%, below the national 1.89% and low enough to earn the plus on the grade. Almost no flights are called off; the risk here is arriving late, not not arriving.
Connections and stage length
What a delay here actually costs
Badly late arrivals are rare here: only 4.8% land an hour or more behind schedule, against 8.3% nationally. Connections built on this flight are about as safe as US domestic connections get, though a cancelled flight still ignores every layover you give it.
At 2,417 miles this is transcontinental flying, and long routes get a quiet structural advantage. Scheduled block time on a flight this length carries more padding in absolute minutes, so a twenty-minute late departure often still becomes an on-time arrival. Read the on-time rate here as slightly flattering next to a short-haul route with the same operational quality.
The return leg runs 80.4% on time across 807 flights, within about a point of this direction. The two legs are scored separately because they usually differ; on this city pair they happen not to.
One caution: this is a thin sample. 808 flights over twelve months is enough to clear this site's floor but not enough to pin the rate down tightly, and a single bad week moves it by more than a point. Treat the grade as a rough reading.
Work out the risk of missing a connection in SJC after this flight
What to do with this
Booking this route
Put together: treat all of this as provisional. 808 flights over twelve months is enough to clear this site's floor and not enough to be confident to better than a couple of points. The 81.4% headline is the most reliable number on the page; the hour and month splits below it are built on a few dozen flights each. 805 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
HNL to SJC questions
How often is HNL to SJC delayed?
About one flight in five arrives at least 15 minutes late, which is the Department of Transportation's definition of a delayed arrival. That works out to 18.6% of the 808 flights in this analysis, against 22.7% nationally. Delayed flights are late by about 50 minutes on average.
How reliable is HNL to SJC compared with the rest of the country?
81.4% of flights arrive on time here against a national 77.3%, a difference of 4 points in its favour. That is worth a B+ on this site's grading scale.
What time of day has the fewest delays on HNL to SJC?
The 8am–11am departure window is the strongest at 89.2% on time. The 2pm–5pm window is the weakest at 55.8%, 33 points behind. Later departures inherit delays from earlier flights the same aircraft has already flown, which is why the curve slopes the way it does.
How bad are March delays on HNL to SJC?
March is the weakest month at 65.0% on time, compared with 96.8% in May. Across the year that is 32 points between the best and worst months. Moving flexible dates out of that month is one of the few things that reliably helps.
Related
Where to go next
- SJC to HNL — the return legseparate record
- Daniel K. Inouye International (HNL) delay statistics
- Norman Y. Mineta San Jose International (SJC) delay statistics
- Southwest Airlines on HNL to SJC88.5%
- Hawaiian Airlines on HNL to SJC73.1%
- Alaska Airlines on HNL to SJC72.4%
- HNL to OGG, a related route84.1%
- SAN to SJC, a related route74.5%
- HNL to LIH, a related route83.7%
- Southwest Airlines on-time record88.5%
- Hawaiian Airlines on-time record73.1%
- Alaska Airlines on-time record72.4%
- Why the first flight of the morning is statistically safest
- The best time of day to fly, according to 7.05 million flight records
Direction matters. HNL to SJC and SJC to HNL are scored separately because they are separate operations, with different departure banks and different aircraft. Compare the return leg.
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Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics, on-time performance data, September 2025 to August 2026. Last updated ; recomputed monthly. How this data is collected.