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Hawaii Visitor Statistics Released for April 2020

For Immediate Release: May 28, 2020
HTA Release (20-71)

2020-05-28 April 2020 Visitor Statistics Press Release

HONOLULU – In April 2020, visitor arrivals to the Hawaiian Islands decreased 99.5 percent compared to a year ago due to the COVID-19 pandemic, according to preliminary statistics released today by the Hawaii Tourism Authority’s (HTA) Tourism Research Division.

All passengers arriving from out-of-state (since March 26) and traveling interisland (since April 1) are required to abide by a mandatory 14-day self-quarantine. Exemptions include travel for essential reasons like work or health care. The state’s four counties enforced strict stay-at-home orders and curfews in April. Nearly all trans-Pacific flights to Hawaii were cancelled. In addition, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) renewed its “No Sail Order” on all cruise ships until late July 2020. 

In April, a total of 4,564 visitors traveled to Hawaii by air service compared to 856,250 total visitors (by air and cruise ships) during the same period a year ago. Most of the visitors were from U.S. West (3,016, -99.2%) and U.S. East (1,229, -99.2%). A few visitors came from Japan (13, -100.0%), Canada (9, -100.0%) and All Other International Markets (298, -99.7%). Total visitor days dropped 98.2 percent compared to a year ago.

A total of 95,985 trans-Pacific air seats serviced the Hawaiian Islands in April, down 91.4 percent from a year ago. There were no scheduled seats from Oceania and Canada, and very few scheduled seats from Japan (-99.5%), Other Asia (-99.4%), U.S. East (-97.7%), U.S. West
(-88.7%) and Other countries (-62.1%).

Year-to-Date 2020

In the first four months of 2020, total visitor arrivals dropped 37.3 percent to 2,130,051 visitors, with considerably fewer arrivals by air service (-37.0% to 2,100,259) and by cruise ships (-53.8% to 29,792) versus a year ago. Total visitor days fell 34.5 percent.

Year-to-date, visitor arrivals by air service decreased from U.S. West (-35.8% to 911,899), U.S. East (-30.0% to 515,537), Japan (-40.5% to 294,241), Canada (-41.3% to 155,744) and All Other International Markets (-46.5% to 222,837).

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