Visitor arrivals in February recovered to 96.5% of 2019, continuing a six month trend of the recovery rate topping 90%, but just shy of last month when the recovery rate was the highest since the pandemic.

There were 753,750 visitors who came to Hawaii in February, down 3.5% from February 2019, the benchmark year prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, according to preliminary data released Thursday by the state Department of Business, Economic Development and Tourism (DBEDT). Arrivals were up 19.5% from February 2022.

The visitors who came to Hawaii in February spent more on a nominal basis than visitors who came in 2022 and in 2019. Visitor spending in February reached $1.64 billion, a nominal increase of 25% from February 2022 and 18% from February 2019.

In February, some 4,654 trans-Pacific flights with 1,029,278 seats serviced the the Hawaiian islands. This was a 3.8% increase in flights and a 9.7% rise in seats from February 2022. Compared to February 2019, there was an increase of 0.9% in flights and 1.8% in seats. 

During the first two months of 2023, more than 1.5 visitors arrived, which was a 28.3% increase from the more than 1.2 visitors that came during the same period in 2022. Total arrivals were down 3.3% when compared to the first two months of 2019.

Year-to-date through February, visitor spending hit $3.53 billion, up 30.5% the first two months of 2022, and up 17.6% from the same period in 2019.