Alaska and Hawaiian Begin Route Optimization

As a condition of their merger approval, Alaska Airlines and Hawaiian Airlines are unable to reduce capacity on any of their existing routes. However, that doesn’t mean that they cannot the way in which they currently operate them. As such, Alaska and Hawaiian begin route optimization on two West Coast-Hawai’i routes. 

For any merger to be successful, the merging organizations need to create synergies. This means right sizing their operations in given markets, especially where overlaps exists. However, things are a little different for Alaska Air and Hawaiian Air, as the Department of Transportation forbade them from making any capacity reductions for at least six years from the date that their merger closed. Of course, that doesn’t complete deny them the ability to right-size their operations, as we can see as Alaska and Hawaiian begin route optimization work. 

Alaska and Hawaiian Begin Route Optimization

As Alaska and Hawaiian begin route optimization work, two routes are seeing changes thus far. Those two routes include: 

• Honolulu-Seattle 
• Kahului-San Diego

Honolulu-Seattle Changes

As of April 22, 2025, Hawaiian Airlines is adding a second daily flight between Honolulu and Seattle, while Alaska Air will be eliminating one of its frequencies. Today, Alaska Airlines operates five flights daily on this route utilizing Boeing 737-900 and Boeing 737 MAX9 aircraft, both of which can hold 178 passengers, while Hawaiian currently operates one daily flight utilizing its 278-passenger Airbus A330. 

While you might assume that Hawaiian would replace the discontinued Alaska Air frequency with one of their Airbus A321neos to keep the capacity similar, the additional Hawaiian flight is actually being up-gauged to another A330, effectively increasing daily capacity by 100 seats. 

This additional capacity will likely be a welcome change as, in my experience, flights on both Alaska and Hawaiian are quite full on this route, and is an example of a positive change as Alaska and Hawaiian begin route optimization. 

At any rate, this is what the schedule looks like today:

• HNL-SEA
  • AS888 departs at 8:00 am HST and arrives at 3:54 pm PT
  • AS816 departs at 12:38 pm HST and arrives at 8:35 pm PT
  • HA22 departs at 1:40 pm HST and arrives at 9:25 pm PT
  • AS896 departs at 3:31 pm HST and arrives at 11:30 pm PT
  • AS802 departs at 10:21 pm HST and arrives at 6:20 am PT
  • AS893 departs at 11:53 pm HST and arrives at 7:56 am PT
• SEA-HNL
  • HA21 departs at 7:00 am PT and arrives at 11:20 am HST
  • AS887 departs at 9:58 am PT and arrives at 2:31 pm HST
  • AS626 departs at 11:28 am PT and arrives at 3:56 pm HST
  • AS853 departs at 1:55 pm PT and arrives at 6:26 pm HST
  • AS811 departs at 4:05 pm PT and arrives at 8:32 pm HST
  • AS656 departs at 6:31 pm PT and arrives at 10:31 pm HST

Beginning April 22, 2025, the 11:53 pm departure from Honolulu and the 4:05 pm departure from Seattle on Alaska both go away. Some of the timings are also being tweaked a little, though it can be a little difficult to tell, as Alaska tends to adjust its schedule to compensate for Daylight Savings Time, too. At ay rate, on the Hawaiian side of things, the following flights are being added:

• HA634 HNL-SEA departing at 9:35 pm HST and arriving at 6:15 am PT
• HA633 SEA-HNL departing at 3:55 pm PT and arriving at 7:05 pm HST

As you can see, not only is capacity being adjusted as Alaska and Hawaiian begin route optimization, but aircraft types and flight times, too. After all, Hawaiian Airbus A330s have lie-flat seats in first class, so it makes sense to utilize these on at least some of the red eye flights, which is what’s happening here. 

Kahului-San Diego Changes

Today, this route operates as follows: 

• HNL-SAN
  • HA58 departing at 10:50 am HST and arriving at 7:15 pm PT
  • AS806 departing at 11:15 am HST and arriving at 7:30 pm PT
• SAN-HNL
  • AS829 departing at 9:20  am PT and arriving at 1:05 pm HST
  • HA57 departing at 10:10 am PT and arriving at 1:20 pm HST

As of June 12, 2025, the flights will look like this:

• HNL-SAN
  • AS806 departing at 12:00 pm HST and arriving at 8:21 pm PT
  • AS1029  departing at 11:00 pm HST and arriving at 7:20 am PT
• SAN-HNL
  • AS829 departing at 10:20  am PT and arriving at 1:18 pm HST
  • AS1028 departing at 5:40 pm PT and arriving at 8:43 pm HST

Hawaiian currently operates the route with a 189-seat Airbus A321neo, while Alaska uses its 178-passenger Boeing 737-900s and Boeing 737 MAX9s. So, these changes result in a slight reduction in capacity, but not one large enough to raise the ire of the DOT. However, the change does provide more flight time options, as they’ll be moving from two similarly timed turns, to one mid-day and one red eye/evening turn. 

Alaska and Hawaiian Begin Route Optimization, Final Thoughts

As Alaska and Hawaiian begin route optimization, these two changes are likely the first two in a LONG list of changes we’ll see in the future. Thankfully, as I mentioned earlier, these adjustments are largely positive ones. However, the we’ll have to see how things continue to evolve, especially after the six-year no-change period expires.