How Much are Hawaiian Airlines Miles Worth?

Whether you’re island- or mainland-based, flying between the two can earn a lot of Hawaiian Airlines miles in a hurry. If you’re sitting on a pile of them, you’re probably wondering how much they’re worth.

Based on our research, HawaiianMiles have a value of 1 cent each. This is a baseline value, drawn from real-world data on hundreds of economy routes, not a maximized value. In other words, you should aim for award redemptions that offer 1 cent or more in value from your HawaiianMiles.

What does this value mean?

Our estimated value of 1 cent per Hawaiian mile provides a baseline value you can compare against your own redemptions.

This is the value you can expect to get from your HawaiianMiles by booking an arbitrary award flight. This means you can get more value by comparing options and using more advanced search techniques. It also means you can get less value than this if you’re not careful.

» Learn more: Guide to booking award flights with Hawaiian Airlines

How do HawaiianMiles compare to other airlines?

HawaiianMiles are worth an average amount as far as airline miles go. However, because Hawaiian is one of the few airlines that still awards miles based on the distance flown rather than the amount spent, it’s somewhat easier to rack up a bunch of miles. So the raw value matters less than the overall value of flying and earning with Hawaiian.

How to convert HawaiianMiles to dollars

Thinking about signing up for a Hawaiian credit card or other promotion and want to know how much it’s worth? Use this calculator to convert your stash of HawaiianMiles to dollars.

When’s the best time to use HawaiianMiles?

We compared several different time periods for using miles:

• 180 days (six months) before departure.

• 15 days before departure.

• Peak winter holiday season (Dec. 22-29).

Here's what the data shows.

HawaiianMiles offered above-average value for last-minute bookings and below-average value for holiday bookings. That doesn't mean these are always the best and worst times to book, but it does offer some guidance for which time frames to target.

How flexible are HawaiianMiles?

Although HawaiianMiles can be used to book flights on a few partner airlines like JetBlue and Japan Airlines, Hawaiian lacks the deep partner roster of other U.S. carriers.

On the plus side, Hawaiian maintains relatively simple award charts for its partners, so it should be easy to know how many miles it will cost to fly with them. On the other hand, Hawaiian only allows round-trip award bookings with partners, which limits the usefulness of using miles in this way.

How did we determine the value of HawaiianMiles?

We collected hundreds of data points comparing the cash value to award (mile) value for the same routes and dates. That is, we compared the cost of a given ticket in either cash or miles, across many tickets.

This method differs from others in that it looks at actual redemptions rather than hypothetical, maximized redemptions. The advantage of this approach is that it provides a real-world indication of how much these miles are worth, on average. That said, it doesn’t take into account the high-value redemptions that some points enthusiasts seek.

Wondering what you can do with these miles? Check out our guide to the Hawaiian Airlines award chart, Hawaiian Airlines partners and our how to redeem Hawaiian Airlines miles.