There are no longer any travel restrictions for going to Hawaii.
Keeping this post for archival purposes, but you can ignore it.
As you’re probably aware, all of Hawaii requires a pre-test, a negative COVID test, to be allowed on island without quarantining.
You need to get tested within 72 hours of your departure. You MUST do it with one of Hawaii’s trusted partners and you MUST have the results in hand before you board the aircraft. My recommendation is to get tested as soon as you can within the 72 hour window. Here are the Trusted Partners:
They are being strict about this. If you don’t have a negative test with one of the above partners they will not let you on the plane (or if you get on the plane, they may send you back). So please make sure you have test results.
It will speed things up for you on arrival if you register on Hawaii’s travel website and upload your results. This is highly recommended: https://travel.hawaii.gov/
This whole process has gotten a lot easier, as the COVID tests are coming back a lot faster these days. When I went over in November, it took about 65 hours for the test to come back. I didn’t get the test results until a few hours before I boarded the plane. That was pretty stressful. Last Month, May, I get my tests through Kaiser and they have it back to me in about 30 hours. So I had about a day and a half before my flight left. So it’s much easier to get a test quickly now.
But you do need a negative pre-test before you board the plane. Most of the time the airlines are checking that at the departure airport. So you want to give yourself an extra half an hour more than you usually do. So you can go through the pre-test check at the airport that you’re leaving from and get all that confirmed. They will give you a Bracelet or some other notification that you have all the required documentation and that they have checked it. And the awesome thing about that is that you can skip all of that in Maui. So you can just pop off the plane and go straight to baggage..
Now, as of this writing, they are requiring a post-test if you are not vaccinated. So if you are vaccinated, bring your vaccination card!
That will allow you to skip the post-test. If you don’t have a vaccination card or you’re not vaccinated, then they’re going to require you to take up test at the airport. It’s a rapid test. Usually the results take about 20 minutes to get back, but you will have to go do that and have to wait on that test. And if it is negative, you’re good to go. If it’s positive, they will refer you to another one of the more reliable tests that take a day or two to get the results back. And you will have to quarantine in the meantime. And if that test comes back positive, then you will have to quarantine for the entire duration of your stay. So 1) you should be getting vaccinated, and that’s really important anyways, but for travel to Maui it’s going to make getting on island much easier.
When you get off the plane, they will herd you off into another vaccine checking line, where you show them the vaccination card. And then you can head off the baggage claim.
So it’s a pretty easy process these days, like I said, the COVID tests are coming back pretty quickly. So you don’t really have to stress too much about that as long as you’re negative. Obviously if you’re positive, then that’s going to put a damper on your vacation and you’re going to probably want to reschedule it.
For myself, it was pretty seamless process. They got us out of the plane and out of the airport pretty fast. Again, they checked the pre-test at the airport (thanks United!) and the vaccine line was quick and easy.
Once on the island, you still need masks indoors, if you’re not eating. Outdoors, you no longer need a mask and, And so it’s great being on an island, you can walk around pretty much any outdoor area with no masks, but if you are shopping the supermarket, for example, you will need to don your mask. Indoors it’s still required and places will kick you out.
So hopefully this was helpful. Any questions, post a comment down in the comments section and I’ll try and answer it. They are no longer giving out signed certification that you need to rent a car with or check into a hotel (this used to be required). As long as you make it through the vaccine line with your vaccination card, then you’re good to go and you don’t need any special permissions or anything else to get out of the airport or get a rental car.