My family and I traveled to Honolulu for spring break and had the best experience on our flight with Hawaiian Airlines. The take-off and landing were smooth, the crew was engaging and tended to everyone with kindness and care. The food and snacks were good and provided options of either meatballs and rice or vegetarian jambalaya. We even sang happy birthday to a passenger and wished a couple well on the flight. They also stated that it was the longest domestic flight in the U.S. We will book with them again!

I've flown with Hawaiian Airlines many times over the years both internationally and domestically, their service is quite good being the only major local airline in Hawaii and I've never had a bad experience with customer service or inflight crew as some have been claiming in their reviews here.

In saying that, I gave this a rating of 4 due to my own personal reasons below.

Checking in:
Upside: Check in is easy and simple once you familiarize yourself with the procedures, especially for a traveler such as myself who carries a Carnet for import/export of commercial goods, once I've got customs verification signed off (which required a visit to a separate building on the ground floor of the International Terminal) on my document then it's smooth sailing from there onwards.

The staff are always helpful with seating arrangements, they will move you to a another seat upon request only if available and being respectable and friendly towards the check-in staff always gets you great results with the possibility of a great seat, or even an upgrade for free.

Downside: Sometimes there's very few check-in staff available which will often make for impatient and grumpy passengers on the flight. Staff are not aware of what a Carnet is or what it is used for, perhaps some updated information or educating the staff on the procedure may save a lot of confusion on their part.

The ground crew can be a little rough with your baggage, throwing bags or equipment around when loading/unloading gets you a little anxious witnessing it when looking out of the passengers window.

Cabin Crew:
Upside: I was greeted with a huge friendly smile and a warm welcoming "ALOHA" by crew members upon entry into the aircraft who were all very well presented. The flight crew exercised outstanding professionalism towards my comfort during my flight and catered as best they could to my requests.

The emergency demonstration procedure was very detailed and explanatory, easy to understand, the P.A system was set at the perfect volume and not blasting my ears off as I've been subject to on other airlines which is an annoying experience to suddenly wake up to.

Downside: None.

Seating:
Upside: As I mentioned earlier, if you're friendly and respectable towards the check-in staff then upon request and availability you will be rewarded to an extra comfort seat or even premium economy. My recent booking had me in an extra comfort seat with an empty seat beside me of which I was thankful since I'm a very heavy set guy so having the extra room made my flight so much more relaxing.

Downside: Although you might have an extra comfort seat doesn't mean that it is. The extra legroom that comes with extra comfort seating is fantastic however, it stops there. It would be so much better if you could fold the armrest closest to the window up and out of the way just to reclaim the few more inches of space. The firm bump in the seat cushion gets a little uncomfortable after a few hours as it starts digging into the back of your legs, I had to raise my feet up off of the floor a couple of times during my flight to avoid the sensation of pins and needles in my feet.

Catering/Entertainment:
Upside: Snacks and beverages were served quite early after reaching our cruising altitude then meals not long after. Entertainment was also made available almost effective immediately after take off.

Downside: Personally I always take my own snacks aboard my flight as it seems more convenient plus I can choose a variety of which Hawaiian Airlines lacks. Their snacks have become noticeably budget which is a shame as it seems they've cut back on what snacks they originally served over the passed years. Bring back the Honolulu cookie.

The meals really do need an upgrade as they've become that undesirable over the passed few years that I've flown with them that I would prefer to not eat until I have reached my destination.

Inflight Entertainment is personal preference, don't expect the latest blockbuster movies that are out in theaters. The selection is good enough besides, I would rather get some sleep.

Apart from my own personal nitpicks mentioned above, I'll continue to fly Hawaiian Airlines simply because they're the most friendliest airline I've ever flown, plus their miles do not expire.

1. Nickel & dime you for everything including paying for headphones to use their entertainment bit (e.g., watching movies) & for snacks that are usually free with every other airline
2. App that is clunky & doesnt download on some Androids. I could never check in online.
3. Not discounted fare for all the additional fees/cost you have to pay just to enjoy your flight
4. They used to give you leis back in the day. That was a nice touch. No more. Its ghetto airlines now.

Service at Hawaiian Airlines has deteriorated sharply and places minimal attention on customer service. On my recent flight, I checked in online as well at the airport kiosk for my flight to Los Angeles via Maui. I had boarding passes for my entire party. Prior to checking in I received two confirmations from their customer service representatives (located in the Philippines) that seat belt harnesses for children 4 years and under was provided by the airline and the request should be made at the gate. WRONG! After speaking to the gate agent, Premier Club attendant, supervisor, and flight attendant, no such service is available. In fact, two of these employees blamed it on the airline’s fault for having calls handled by a call center in the Philippines. Then, our flight to Maui was cancelled and was assigned to a later flight. I asked the gate agent if she was going to contact the Maui gate agent to hold our connecting flight to Los Angeles since there was only a 15 minutes leeway before the arrival of our new flight and the departure of the Maui flight to Los Angeles. She said it was company policy to hold flights only if there was a lot of passengers affected. Since there wasn’t a lot of passenger impacted, no advanced call was going to be made. When we arrived in Maui, the gate agent claimed that 4 of our family members had not checked in. I told him this was possible as I had their boarding passes with seat assignments for the flight. He couldn’t explain why but managed to accommodate my 4 family members. When we arrived in Los Angeles, our bags were not there, along with the bags of the other customers impacted by the cancelled flight. The customer service agents handling lost and missing baggage told customers that if they wanted their bags quickly, they needed to pick up their baggage at LAX airport the following day. When I asked how long it would take to have the bags delivered to my hotel in Anaheim, she told me by 11 PM the following day, but, no guarantee. Then the other clerk chimed in and said if really want your baggage sooner then just pick them up at LAX airport. NO empathy or concern. I asked if there was a system to track the baggage and provide an estimated time of arrival for the baggage. She said we deal with a 3rd party vendor and it’s out of their hands. I eventually received my baggage at approximately 6 PM the following day.

Obviously, there is a culture at this airlines that flows through this organization that could care less about providing great customer service. Such systemic problems probably lead to the airlines having to be taken over by Alaska Airlines. Another failed Hawaii born airlines that hasn’t been able to succeed on its own.

Lesson Learned: AVOID checking in your baggage. Travel lighter and carry on your baggage. Almost 80% of the time, the gate agents will gate check your carry on baggage for free. Why ruin your vacation having to deal with a broken airline.

Has gone from one of the best to one of the worst in s matter of years. Expect your flight to get canceled or to get bumped - especially if you use the loyalty points you have paid for through the years.

Call center is ALWAYS experiencing higher volume because they don’t have enough people. App fails. Chat bot doesn’t work.

No flexibility on changes. Terrible gate times. Uncomfortable seats, bad entertainment, horrible food. Expensive and inconvenient and uncomfortable.

Planes are falling apart. Not cleaned well.

Very nice employees in flights and at check in but powerless to help you because of awful management and policies.

Fly any other airline and if you own the stock you should probably consider selling before something major goes wrong.