Carrier route record

HASFO→HNL

Hawaiian Airlines · San Francisco to Honolulu

Flights: 216
Period: September 2025 to August 2026
Share of route: 9%
Carriers: 3

Historical statistics for September 2025 to August 2026, not live status. For today’s flights, check with Hawaiian Airlines.

Hawaiian on SFO to HNL sits in the middle of the pack with a C−. About seven flights in ten arrive on time by the DOT's definition, 6 points worse than the national rate of 77.3%. The late ones land about an hour behind schedule. That rests on 216 flights. The strongest carrier on the route with a full sample, United Airlines, flew 1,779 at 84.5% on time.

The national on-time rate over the same period is 77.3%, so Hawaiian on SFO to HNL runs 6 points behind the country as a whole. Across a thousand flights that is about 63 extra late arrivals.

On time

71.0%

Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 207 completed flights

Avg delay

68 min

Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights

Cancelled

3.70%

National rate is 1.89%

Whole route

80.0%

Every carrier on SFO to HNL, 2,477 flights

These figures cover 216 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. On-time means an arrival less than 15 minutes after the scheduled gate time, the same threshold the Department of Transportation uses in its own reports. Cancelled and diverted flights are excluded from the on-time rate and counted separately, which is why the cancellation column matters on its own.

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Carrier by carrier

Hawaiian against every carrier on SFO to HNL

Hawaiian flew 216 of the 2,477 flights on SFO to HNL, about 9% of it. Its 71.0% on time is 9 points worse than the route as a whole, which runs 80.0%. Ranked by on-time rate it is number two of three carriers on the route, where the range runs from United at 84.5% to Alaska at 67.1%.

The choice of carrier is not cosmetic here. United Airlines arrives on time 84.5% of the time; Alaska Airlines manages 67.1%. Sample sizes sit next to every figure, because a two-point gap across 482 flights means less than a ten-point one.

On-time performance by carrier on SFO to HNL
Airline	Flights	On time	Avg delay	Cancelled	Grade
United Airlines	1,779	84.5%	63 min	0.11%	B+
Hawaiian Airlines (this page)thin sample	216	71.0%	68 min	3.70%	C−
Alaska Airlines	482	67.1%	57 min	2.90%	C

The spread between United and Alaska is 17 points, wide enough that it should decide the booking. On a hundred trips that is 17 more arrivals inside the on-time window.

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Departure window

When Hawaiian runs best on this route

Departure time matters more here than the choice of carrier. The gap between the best and worst window is 14 points, against 17 points between the best and worst carrier.

5am–8am66 flights78.0%
8am–11am63 flights64.5%
11am–2pm—
2pm–5pm—
5pm–8pm22 flights—
8pm–5am65 flights78.1%

Scale runs 55% to 85%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.

The 8pm–5am window is the strongest at 78.1% on time. The full set of windows spans 14 points.

Across the year

Hawaiian on SFO to HNL through the year

Jul–Sep 202551 flights90.2%
Oct–Dec 2025165 flights64.7%

Scale runs 55% to 95%.

Monthly volumes are too low here to break the year into twelve reliable readings. What the twelve-month total says is 71.0% on time across 216 flights.

Split by quarter, Hawaiian on SFO to HNL logged 51 flights in Jul–Sep 2025 and 165 flights in Oct–Dec 2025. Fewer than three of those quarters carried the 30 completed flights this site needs before printing a rate, so the 71.0% annual figure is the one to use.

Across the week, Sunday is the strongest day at 73.5% on time and Friday the weakest at 68.8%, a spread of 5 points.

Arrival by arrival

How late Hawaiian on SFO to HNL runs when it is late

Most of the lateness is short. 30 of the 60 late arrivals were under half an hour behind, and 16 reached an hour or more.

15+ min early50 flights24.2%
Within 15 min97 flights46.9%
15–29 min late30 flights14.5%
30–59 min late14 flights6.8%
1–2 hours late6 flights2.9%
2+ hours late10 flights4.8%

Scale runs 0% to 100%.

Share of 207 completed flights by arrival against schedule.

A late pushback is often recovered here: of 60 departures that left 15 minutes late or more, 23 still arrived on time. In the other direction, 23 flights left on time yet arrived 15 minutes late or more, so that delay built up after pushback: in the air, in a holding pattern or on the ground at HNL.

The worst days

Worst days for Hawaiian on SFO to HNL

The latest arrival of the period was on 20 November 2025, 14 hours 25 minutes behind schedule; most of its delay minutes were filed as carrier-caused (crew, maintenance, fuelling, baggage). Three of the five worst days fell in October 2025.

The latest arrivals of Hawaiian on SFO to HNL in the period
Date	Arrived late by	Largest filed cause
20 November 2025	14 hours 25 minutes	Carrier
6 October 2025	4 hours 44 minutes	Carrier
3 December 2025	4 hours 14 minutes	Carrier
25 October 2025	3 hours 19 minutes	Carrier
18 October 2025	2 hours 21 minutes	Carrier

Delay causes

Why Hawaiian runs late on this route

Carrier accounts for 93% of the 4,060 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.

Carrier
93%
Late-arriving aircraft
5%
Extreme weather
1%
Security
1%
National Airspace System
0%

The largest share of delay minutes, 93%, falls under carrier control: crew scheduling, maintenance, fuelling, baggage. It accounts for 3,787 of the 4,060 delay minutes reported here. The split is drawn from 4,060 reported delay minutes.

Cancellations run at 3.70%, against 1.89% nationally. That is roughly one flight in 25 cancelled outright. A cancelled flight is invisible in every on-time figure on this page, so the punctuality numbers above describe only the flights that actually operated.

Connections and stage length

What a delay here costs

7.7% 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 about an hour, which a normal layover absorbs.

At 2,398 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 69.4% on time across 217 flights, within 2 points 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. 216 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.

What to do with this

Booking Hawaiian on SFO to HNL

Put together: the delay figures matter less here than the 3.70% cancellation rate. A late arrival costs you about an hour; a cancelled flight costs you the day. Book the 8pm–5am departure so there is still a schedule behind you if it goes wrong, and treat a same-day connection as optimistic. 207 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.

Where to go next

Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics, on-time performance data, September 2025 to August 2026. Last updated 22 October 2026; recomputed monthly. How this data is collected.

Key figures