Hawaii on points: flights from the mainland and hotel taxes

Which bank points reach the airlines that fly to Hawaii

Most large US airlines sell mainland to Hawaii flights, and the useful question is which of their programs your bank currency reaches. Bilt's partner article, updated October 20, 2026, lists Atmos Rewards, described as covering Alaska Airlines and Hawaiian Airlines, at 1:1, along with Southwest and United MileagePlus at 1:1. Chase's transfer guide lists Southwest Airlines Rapid Rewards and United MileagePlus among its airline partners. Amex's transfer page prints Delta SkyMiles at 1,000 to 1,000, with Amex's excise tax offset fee because Delta is a US airline program.

Search your own departure city before choosing a program, because which airline flies nonstop from where you live decides more than any ratio. A program that requires a connection can still be the right one if its price is low enough, but the flight time and the risk of a missed connection belong in the decision too.

American AAdvantage is not on Bilt's current partner list. Its own using-miles page also notes that cash and miles bookings are not available for flights to, from or within Alaska or Hawaii, so an American award to Hawaii is an all-miles booking. The airline award chart table shows which programs publish prices before you search; most of the programs that fly to Hawaii from the mainland price by search.

The cash that survives on a Hawaii flight award

A flight between the mainland and Hawaii is domestic travel, so the cash on an award is a short list of US charges rather than the large international lines covered in the award taxes and carrier charges guide. The FAA's 2026 rate sheet lists a tax of $11.70 per passenger on transportation between the continental United States and Alaska or Hawaii. TSA's September 11 Security Fee is $5.60 per one-way trip originating at a US airport, capped at $11.20 per round trip. Delta's award terms put a floor under domestic awards of at least $11.20 in US government taxes and fees. The federal rate sheets name Hawaii but not Puerto Rico; San Juan on points prices San Juan by distance chart from six cities.

For planning, that means the cash on a round-trip Hawaii award is likely to be tens of dollars per person, not hundreds. The exact figure appears on the payment screen, and that is the number to use. For the illustrations on this page, the round trip carries $11.20 in TSA fees and the $11.70 Hawaii tax applied to each direction, $34.60 per person; that is an assumption about how the tax is applied per flight, stated so the arithmetic can be checked.

If the points come from Amex and go to Delta, add the excise tax offset fee of $0.0006 per point, up to $99. On 40,000 points it is $24, which on a domestic award can be nearly as much as the taxes.

Pricing the flights for two travelers

Hawaii fares and award prices both move with demand, school holidays and the departure city, so the only meaningful way to price the flights is for one trip with stated inputs. What follows is an arithmetic illustration, not a live fare or award price.

Two travelers fly round trip from a West Coast city to Honolulu in economy. The cash fare is $540 per person, $1,080 for both. Program A, reached at 1:1, prices the round trip at 32,000 points per person, 64,000 in total, with the $34.60 per person in charges above, $69.20 for both. The value is ($1,080 minus $69.20) divided by 64,000, which is 1.58 cents per point.

Program B prices the same dates at 50,000 points per person on a different airline with a $590 fare per person. The value is ($1,180 minus $69.20) divided by 100,000, or 1.11 cents per point. Program B asks for more points against a slightly higher fare, and the result falls well below A.

Two practical notes change these numbers more than any ratio. A nonstop at a higher price can be worth more than a connection at a lower one once the extra travel time is counted, which no cents per point formula captures. And a fare-linked program, where the points price follows the cash fare, gives roughly the same cents per point on every date; if your dates are fixed during a holiday, the cash fare and the points price rise together.

Hawaii's hotel taxes, from the Department of Taxation

Hawaii taxes hotel stays through two separate taxes, and both matter for an award because some programs include room tax in the points and some do not. The Department of Taxation's Announcement 2025-04 says Act 96 raised the state transient accommodations tax from 10.25 percent to 11 percent for the period beginning January 1, 2026 and running to December 31, 2030; the Department's 2025 tax outline also refers to a separate county transient accommodations tax.

The general excise tax is Hawaii's version of a sales tax and applies to most business activity. The Department of Taxation's GET page says the rate is 4 percent for most activities, and that all four counties have adopted a 0.5 percent county surcharge: the City and County of Honolulu and the County of Kauai through December 31, 2030, the County of Hawaii at 0.5 percent from January 1, 2020 to December 31, 2030, and the County of Maui from January 1, 2024 to December 31, 2030. When a business passes the GET on to customers, the page gives a maximum pass-on rate of 4.7120 percent where the county surcharge applies.

Add those together and a cash hotel bill in Hawaii carries a substantial tax line before any resort fee. The precise total for a given hotel depends on the county TAT and on how the hotel applies the GET pass-on, so read the hotel's own cash rate breakdown; the illustration below uses the state TAT and the maximum GET pass-on only, and says so.

What a hotel award covers in Hawaii, by program terms

Whether a hotel award covers those taxes depends on the program, and the terms are specific. Marriott's Bonvoy program rules say an Award Redemption Stay includes the cost of a guest room, room tax, service charge and extra-person charges, if any, and that all other charges, including incidentals and resort fees, are the member's responsibility. On a Marriott award in Hawaii, then, the room tax is inside the points and the resort fee is not.

Marriott's rules add a long-stay term that changes a Hawaii worksheet. Under its Stay for 5, Pay for 4 offer, a member redeeming points for five consecutive nights on a Standard Redemption or PointSavers award under one reservation pays points for only four, and the free night is the one with the lowest point rate in the stay. On a five-night Hawaii award, that is a fifth of the nights, though not a fifth of the points if the nightly prices differ.

IHG's card terms state that resort fees stay with the guest on the Reward Night benefits they describe. For other chains, read the program's own award terms for what the points include before assuming room tax is covered. The hotel points budget guide compares the large chains' long-stay and resort fee rules where their terms state them.

Pricing five nights at a resort, cash against points

Here is the hotel half of the trip as an arithmetic illustration with stated inputs. Five nights at a Marriott resort in Honolulu. Cash rates are $420, $420, $460, $460 and $420 a night, $2,180 before tax. The illustration applies the 11 percent state TAT and the 4.7120 percent maximum GET pass-on to the room rate, $342.52, ignoring the county TAT and any compounding, so the cash room total is $2,522.52. A resort fee of $50 a night, $250, is due on both the cash and the points stay.

The award prices at 60,000, 60,000, 70,000, 70,000 and 60,000 points, 320,000 before the fifth-night offer. Stay for 5, Pay for 4 removes the lowest-priced night, the first 60,000-point night, so the stay costs 260,000 points. Because Marriott's rules include room tax in an award stay, the award replaces $2,522.52 of room and tax, and the resort fee is a wash. Value on this booking: $2,522.52 divided by 260,000, or 0.97 cents per point.

If those points came from a bank at 1:1, compare 0.97 with what the same bank points would do on the flights. On the flight illustration, Program A gave 1.58 cents per point. On these inputs the points do more on the flight than on the hotel, and the natural split is points for the flights, cash for the room, unless a free night certificate or a chart program changes the hotel side. The flights versus hotels guide works that split in general.

A combined worksheet for the whole trip

Pricing the trip as one worksheet, rather than two separate decisions, shows where the points do the most. Using the illustrations above, two travelers and five nights:

Timing a Hawaii transfer

Hawaii trips often cluster around school holidays, and the transfer timing rules matter more when seats are scarce. Bilt says most transfers are immediate but to allow up to 48 hours, and up to 72 hours for Southwest. Chase allows up to 7 business days, though most land by the next business day. Amex says transfers typically take 48 to 72 hours, with some programs posting later.

Plan to the slowest window your bank states. If a holiday seat is the last one at a good price and your bank could take a week, the transfer is a gamble; a program balance already in place, or a program with a published hold, is the safer route. The phantom award space checklist covers how to confirm a seat is real before any points move.

For a family trip of four or more, the seat count matters as much as the timing. The family of four playbook covers splitting travelers across programs and flights when four award seats are not available together.

Edge cases on a Hawaii trip

A few situations break the simple worksheet, and each is worth checking before any transfer.

• Inter-island flights. A separate flight between islands is its own booking, and short flights often price poorly in points against a modest cash fare. Price it separately rather than folding it into the mainland award.
• American awards. American's own page says cash and miles bookings are not available for flights to, from or within Hawaii, so an American award there is all miles.
• Resort fees on award nights. Marriott's rules leave resort fees with the member; plan the cash for them even on an all-points stay.
• Five-night stays at Marriott. The Stay for 5, Pay for 4 offer applies to the lowest-priced night and only to one reservation; splitting the stay across two reservations can lose it.
• Vacation rentals and condos. Hawaii's 11 percent TAT applies to transient accommodations broadly; whether a points booking covers it depends on the program's terms for that product.
• Holiday dates. When the cash fare rises, fare-linked points prices rise with it, so a holiday award may not price better per point than an off-season one.

Building your own Hawaii trip

Start from your departure city: list the airlines that fly to the island you want, and the programs your bank reaches that sell their seats. Price the round trip in each, with the small domestic cash line, and compute cents per point on the bank points it would use. Then price the hotel both ways, reading the program's own terms on what an award includes, and add Hawaii's taxes to the cash side only when the award does not cover them.

Put both halves in one worksheet and let the points go where they do the most. The trip playbooks hub has the other trip shapes. For the hotel half, if the stay is at a Marriott or Hilton property and you are weighing a bank transfer to cover it, the per-night break-even for Marriott and Hilton transfers gives the exact cash rate a night has to show before the transfer beats paying cash.

If the beach trip leaves the country instead, the cash lines change. Cancun and the Caribbean on points adds the international air tax, US arrival inspection fees, Mexico's non-resident fee, an airport charge and the Quintana Roo VISITAX, and shows which of those lines stay the same whatever the hotel. If the trip is a drive-in national park instead of an island, national parks on points runs the same flight-and-fees arithmetic for ten parks.

Checklist

• List the airlines that fly your departure city to the island you want.
• Match them to programs your bank reaches, with ratios and posting times.
• Price the round trip award with the small domestic charges and compute cents per point.
• Price the hotel in cash with Hawaii's TAT and GET, and as an award.
• Check what the hotel award includes: room tax, resort fees, long-stay terms.
• Combine both halves in one worksheet and assign points where they do most.
• Transfer to the slowest posting window your bank states, then book.