Route reliability record
LAX→HNL
Los Angeles to Honolulu
- Flights
- 5,540
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Distance
- 2,556 mi
- Carriers
- 6
This route lands a B+, about a point worse than the national rate of 77.3%. About one flight in four arrives 15 minutes late or worse, and those flights are late by a little over an hour on average. That rests on 5,540 LAX to HNL flights, of which United Airlines flew 1,294 at 84.0% on time.
Best time to fly LAX to HNL: a 5am–8am departure, ideally on a Tuesday. Flights in that window arrived on time 86.8% of the time and Tuesday flights 79.1%, against 76.2% for the route overall.
United Airlines is the most reliable of the six carriers covered here at 84.0% on time across 1,294 flights.
Key figures
On time
76.2%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 5,506 completed flights
Avg delay
73 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
0.51%
National rate is 1.89%
Best carrier
United
84.0% on time across 1,294 flights
These figures cover 5,540 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. The median arrival is 4 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 LAX to HNL
The choice of carrier is not cosmetic here. United Airlines arrives on time 84.0% of the time; Alaska Airlines manages 65.9%. Sample sizes sit next to every figure, because a two-point gap across 1,054 flights means less than a ten-point one.
| Airline | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| United Airlines | 1,294 | 84.0% | 91 min | 0.31% | B+ |
| Delta Air Lines | 1,095 | 80.6% | 83 min | 0.27% | B+ |
| American Airlines | 1,182 | 76.2% | 61 min | 0.00% | B+ |
| Southwest Airlines | 516 | 75.5% | 47 min | 0.19% | B+ |
| Hawaiian Airlines | 399 | 66.6% | 99 min | 1.75% | C |
| Alaska Airlines | 1,054 | 65.9% | 67 min | 1.23% | C |
The spread between United and Alaska is 18 points, wide enough that it should decide the booking. On a hundred trips that is 18 more arrivals inside the on-time window.
Flight by flight
Flights on LAX to HNL
The flight numbers below flew this route at least 250 times in the period, busiest first. Each has its own record, with its schedule and delay causes.
- Delta 44317:2582.1% · 365 flights
- Delta 46513:5577.4% · 365 flights
- Delta 48008:3082.2% · 365 flights
- American 3108:0481.9% · 365 flights
- American 14315:4879.9% · 365 flights
- United 117017:1079.3% · 365 flights
- United 115809:0587.8% · 364 flights
- American 29717:1372.9% · 356 flights
- United 143113:1583.3% · 307 flights
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 Los Angeles to Honolulu
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. 1 of the top 5 use a different airport at one end.
| Option | Airline | Success | On time | Cancelled | Best departure | Most punctual flight |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. LGB → HNLLong Beach to Honolulu | Southwest Airlines | 92.1% | 92.1% | 0.00% | 5am–8am, Sun | — |
| 2. LAX → HNLLos Angeles to Honolulu | United Airlines | 83.7% | 84.0% | 0.31% | 5am–8am, Wed | UA 1158 09:05 |
| 3. LAX → HNLLos Angeles to Honolulu | Delta Air Lines | 80.4% | 80.6% | 0.27% | 8am–11am, Tue | DL 480 08:30 |
| 4. LAX → HNLLos Angeles to Honolulu | American Airlines | 76.2% | 76.2% | 0.00% | 8am–11am, Wed | AA 31 08:04 |
| 5. LAX → HNLLos Angeles to Honolulu | Southwest Airlines | 75.4% | 75.5% | 0.19% | 5am–8am, 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 39 points, against 18 points between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am633 flights86.8%
- 8am–11am1,862 flights75.4%
- 11am–2pm509 flights79.4%
- 2pm–5pm679 flights79.6%
- 5pm–8pm1,699 flights73.5%
- 8pm–5am158 flights47.5%
Scale runs 40% to 90%.
The 8pm–5am window is where this operation falls apart: 47.5% on time, against 86.8% for the 5am–8am slot. By evening the aircraft flying these rotations have absorbed a full day of small delays and there is no slack left to recover in. The 8am–11am window is the busiest, with 1,862 flights scheduled in it.
Explore
Filter LAX to HNL 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 LAX to HNL, the best departure window is 5am–8am at 86.8% on time and the worst is 8pm–5am at 47.5%, a wide gap of 39.3 points. All US flights leaving 5am–8am ran 89.3%.
- 5–8am86.8%
- 8–11am75.4%
- 11am–2pm79.4%
- 2–5pm79.6%
- 5–8pm73.5%
- 8pm–5am47.5%
best all US flightsScale 40% to 95%.
Across the year
When delays peak on this route
This route's year swings by 21 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.
November is the best month on the calendar at 86.6% 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 603 flights.
Across the week, Tuesday is the strongest day at 79.1% on time and Sunday the weakest at 70.7%, a spread of 8 points.
Delay causes
Why this route gets delayed
Carrier accounts for 55% of the 96,000 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 55%Carrier
- 32%Late-arriving aircraft
- 11%National Airspace System
- 2%Extreme weather
The largest share of delay minutes, 55%, falls under carrier control: crew scheduling, maintenance, fuelling, baggage. It accounts for 53,000 of the 96,000 delay minutes reported here. The split is drawn from 95,948 reported delay minutes.
The practical consequence: the 5am–8am departure is the one that starts clean. Its aircraft has no earlier leg to be late from, which is exactly why that window shows 86.8% on time here.
Cancellations are rare at 0.51%, below the national 1.89% and low enough to earn the plus on the grade. Roughly one flight in 100 is called off; the risk here is arriving late, not not arriving.
Connections and stage length
What a delay here actually costs
7.8% of arrivals land an hour or more late, close to the national 8.3%, so a 60 to 75 minute layover is reasonable here while anything under 45 minutes is a bet. Most delays on this route last a little over an hour, which a normal layover absorbs.
At 2,556 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 is a different operation and performs like one: it runs 80.3% on time across 5,540 flights, 4 points above this direction. Departure banks, aircraft rotations and the congestion at each end all differ, so scoring the two directions together would average away a real 4 points of difference.
The sample behind these figures is 5,540 flights, enough that the headline rate is stable to within roughly a point. The hour-block and month splits divide that further, so read the thinner bars with more caution than the headline.
Work out the risk of missing a connection in HNL after this flight
What to do with this
Booking this route
Put together: the calendar is the biggest lever here, not the carrier or the hour. November runs 86.6% on time and April 65.8%, a swing of 21 points. If the dates move at all, move them out of April before you think about anything else. 5,506 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
LAX to HNL questions
How often is LAX to HNL delayed?
About one flight in four arrives at least 15 minutes late, which is the Department of Transportation's definition of a delayed arrival. That works out to 23.8% of the 5,540 flights in this analysis, against 22.7% nationally. Delayed flights are late by a little over an hour on average.
Which airline is most reliable on LAX to HNL?
United Airlines leads at 84.0% on time across 1,294 flights. Alaska Airlines is at the other end on 65.9%, a gap of 18 points. Sample size matters as much as the percentage: a rate built from a few hundred flights moves around far more than one built from ten thousand.
What time of day has the fewest delays on LAX to HNL?
The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 86.8% on time. The 8pm–5am window is the weakest at 47.5%, 39 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 April delays on LAX to HNL?
April is the weakest month at 65.8% on time, compared with 86.6% in November. Across the year that is 21 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
- HNL to LAX — the return legseparate record
- Los Angeles International (LAX) delay statistics
- Daniel K. Inouye International (HNL) delay statistics
- United Airlines on LAX to HNL84.0%
- Delta Air Lines on LAX to HNL80.6%
- American Airlines on LAX to HNL76.2%
- Southwest Airlines on LAX to HNL75.5%
- Hawaiian Airlines on LAX to HNL66.6%
- Alaska Airlines on LAX to HNL65.9%
- LAX to SFO, a related route60.1%
- OGG to HNL, a related route84.1%
- LAX to JFK, a related route77.5%
- United Airlines on-time record84.0%
- Delta Air Lines on-time record80.6%
- American Airlines on-time record76.2%
- Why the first flight of the morning is statistically safest
- Same route, different airline: where the carrier you pick matters most
Direction matters. LAX to HNL and HNL to LAX 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.