Hawaiian miles are being talked about a lot, but mostly as a conduit to alchemize American Express Membership Rewards points into Alaska miles.

Updated October 1, 2025. This program no longer exists and has been absorbed into the Alaska Airlines Atmos program.

What is the Hawaiian Miles program?

Hawaiian Miles is the program for Hawaiian Airlines, which is centered all around getting customers to and from the state of Hawaii. The Hawaiian Miles program is a transfer partner of American Express Membership Rewards. Amex MR points can transfer to Hawaiian Miles at a 1:1 ratio.

Hawaiian Airlines is in the process of being acquired by Alaska Airlines, and points can now transfer 1:1 between the programs. That adds some intrigue with a temporary opportunity where Amex Membership Rewards points become Alaska miles at a 1:1 ratio. This normally isn’t an option.

Current “Promotion”

While not truly in the realm of a “promotion”, the window to sign up for Hawaiian airline credit cards is quickly going to expire. Some are thinking the date could come as quickly as January 1, 2025. Aside from just collecting more miles, the real opportunity is free transfer of Hawaiian miles between accounts. This also means free transfer of Alaska miles by extension, which is awesome.

Additionally, there will come a time in the near-ish future when Amex MR points no longer transfer to Hawaiian miles.

Update May 13, 2025. Given that practically every Hawaiian Airlines partnership is discontinuing as of June 30, 2025, it seems reasonable that Amex transfers will also end on this date. If you have been intending to alchemize your Amex points into Alaska miles, your time is drawing near. And while not in this announcement, I imagine this is also the end date for signing up for Hawaiian credit cards.

Hawaiian Miles Award Chart (on Hawaiian)

Hawaiian does maintain an award chart, which they display on their website. However, note that you’re not going to always find the best pricing when awards are available, as they bucket awards into four fare buckets. That means you’ll want to compare award prices against cash fares to make sure you’re getting a good deal.

Some highlights, priced as one-ways at the best pricing:

• Neighbor Island flights from 7,500 Hawaiian miles in economy (6,375 miles with the credit card).
  • I would completely ignore first class intra-Hawaii awards. The flights are so short, you’re not going to get much incremental service.
• Continental USA to/from Hawaii from 40,000 Hawaiian miles in first class
• Japan/Korea/Australia/New Zealand to/from Hawaii from 65,000 Hawaiian miles in business class
• Papeete to/from Hawaii from 47,500 Hawaiian miles in business class

For first class on flights between the continental USA and Hawaii, ideally you’ll want cabins that have lie-flat seats on their A330-200 or 787-9 aircraft. Not all flights on each route have that cabin, so pay attention to the flight if that matters to you. Thankfully, it is easily identifiable on the Hawaiian website.

Upgrades with Hawaiian Miles (Hawaiian Flights)

There are also upgrades available whereby you purchase an economy flight and then use Hawaiian miles to upgrade to business class.

There are two levels of upgrades.

• “Upgrade 1” requires A class to be available
• “Upgrade 2” requires P class to be available.

For the most reliable information, you’re going to need to subscribe to a service like Expert Flyer. That will allow you to figure out how many A and P seats are available on a given flight. And it will save yourself from sticking on the phone with an agent for a very long time. Otherwise, you can generally get a sense of upgrade space if there are also award flights available.

You’ll need to avoid purchasing a flight in Main Cabin Basic if you’re looking to upgrade your flight.

Is there any value here? Potentially, yes. The upgrade costs for flights to the continental USA is a flat 25,000/50,000 for the two fare classes. On lengthy flights to the East Coast USA, the upgrade cost might be the substantially cheaper option compared to purchasing the flight outright with points. Just make sure you confirm availability in the upgrade fare buckets before purchasing your ticket if you’re intending to take this approach.

I’ve also heard of success upgrading with miles when using the BOGO 50% off coupon for getting the Hawaiian credit card, which would be an excellent deal for comfortable travel to Hawaii.

I don’t think upgrades are worth the cost for Hawaiian’s international destinations.

Partner Award Chart

Hawaiian maintains a separate page for award flights on partner airlines. As of now, Hawaiian partners with Japan Airlines, JetBlue, Korean Air, Virgin Atlantic, and Virgin Australia. Personally, I think flights on Japan Airlines carries the best value, but that’s not saying too much.

Update May 13, 2025. Booking partner flights with Hawaiian miles will end June 30, 2025. Your flights booked prior to this date will be honored with dates extending until February 28, 2026.

All pricing below is for one-way travel on Japan Airlines booked via Hawaiian Airlines:

The distinction between Asia 1 and Asia 2 is defined as follows (emphasis mine):

• Asia 1: Seoul, Busan, Beijing, Dalian, Guangzhou, Hong Kong, Kaohsiung, Manila, Shanghai, Taipei, Tianjin, Guam
• Asia 2: Bangkok, Delhi, Hanoi, Ho Chi Minh City, Jakarta, Kuala Lumpur, Singapore, Sydney, Melbourne

On its face, this doesn’t necessarily look like a competitive chart, though it is nice that Asia 1 extends as far south as Hong Kong and that Asia 2 includes Australia.

However, if you review the footnotes on the Hawaiian website, stopovers are allowed on some one-way itineraries. That means you can fly from Sydney to Tokyo, have a week-long stay there, and then continue on to Hawaii for 120,000 miles all in business class. It’s easy to get to Hawaii from the continental USA, so I would most likely pay cash for it. Then you just need a flight down to Sydney and you have yourself a trip that touches three destinations (Sydney, Tokyo, Hawaii) but you can be more efficient with your miles with the stopover pricing.

BUT…

How does it compare to Alaska Airlines award pricing given you can easily transfer points between the programs? Alaska would charge 85,000 miles for the itinerary given the distance involved. Alaska also has the same Japan Airlines partner award space available as Hawaiian has.

One of the only scenarios I can come up with where you can save miles booking with Hawaiian is something like Okinawa-Tokyo-Sydney. That trip would run 75,000 miles with Alaska in business class but only cost 60,000 miles with Hawaiian. The routing is so specific that I don’t think anyone would be going out of their way to book it.

Now that you can easily transfer between the programs, leave all the partner award flights to Alaska.

How to Best Search for Availability?

If you’re intending to purchase Hawaiian-operated flights with Hawaiian miles, you’re going to want to search their website directly to find your awards. You will need to log in to see search results, which is a little bit of a pain, but it’s simple to search once you’re in and you can see results for a week at a time.

Additionally, you can use the free point.me tool to research availability if you have an eligible Amex card.

Do Miles Expire?

No, there is no expiry of miles.

Anything Else?

This doesn’t necessarily concern the Hawaiian mileage program directly, but I do want to point out that I’ve typically been successful in finding award space between Asia and Hawaii (and more specifically between Japan and Hawaii). I think it’s generally overlooked, as most Americans who want to go to Japan only look for flight awards between their home or nearby airports. But there is sometimes an abundance of award space at decent to not-terrible rates.

Living in Los Angeles, I’ve used Hawaii as a generally reliable gateway to Asia if I need to find award flights. I feel I can easily purchase a cheap cash ticket between Los Angeles and Hawaii–and who doesn’t like tacking on a few nights in Hawaii? Yes, it’s less efficient than a nonstop routing, but it’s worth taking a look at dates especially if you’re locked into specific times to travel.

Happy hunting while the program lasts!

Suggested reading:

• Why You Need to Collect Alaska Airlines Miles
• Icy Strait Point: A Simple Alaskan Port Town
• Destination Spotlight: Oahu, Hawaii