Route profile
IAH→HNL
Flight reliability, delays and best times to fly from Houston to Honolulu, 3,904 miles.
Right now
Aviation weather is not currently a factor.
Aviation weather is not currently a factor.
Route reliability
July 2023 – July 2026
Better than 38% of comparable major US routes (4,598 compared)
Calculated from 1,213 flights. How this is calculated · What counts as on time
IAH → HNL arrives on time 69.6% of the time; the return trip, HNL → IAH, arrives on time 87.2% of the time, a 17.6-point gap between the two directions of the same city pair.
IAH → HNL spends 31.4 minutes on the ground on a 3,904-mile trip: 25.4 minutes from pushback to wheels-up at IAH and 6.0 minutes from touchdown to gate at HNL.
Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics · Data covering July 2023 – July 2026
What sets this route apart
Where IAH to HNL differs most from similar routes by hour, weekday, month and airline, July 2023 – July 2026.
IAH to HNL struggles most at 9 AM: 67.6% of its flights scheduled then arrive on time, 11.6 points behind the 79.2% on routes of similar length at the same hour. Against all other routes the gap is 16.7 points.
Thursday is the day IAH to HNL slips furthest against routes of similar length, 65.9% on time where they average 81.6%, 15.7 points lower. Against all other routes the gap is 10.9 points.
In June, IAH to HNL runs 13.9 points below routes of similar length, 64.8% on time to 78.7%.
United Airlines’ flights on IAH to HNL arrive on time 69.6% of the time, 13 points below the 82.6% it manages on its routes of similar length. Against all other routes the gap is 10.3 points.
IAH to HNL against comparable routes
July 2023 – July 2026| Measure | This route | Compared with | Them | Gap | Flights behind it |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hour: 9 AM departures | 67.6% | routes of similar length | 79.2% | −11.6 pts | 673 here, 2,217 there |
| Weekday: Thursday | 65.9% | routes of similar length | 81.6% | −15.7 pts | 170 here, 2,573 there |
| Month: June | 64.8% | routes of similar length | 78.7% | −13.9 pts | 122 here, 1,958 there |
| Airline: United Airlines | 69.6% | routes of similar length | 82.6% | −13.0 pts | 1,203 here, 8,473 there |
Each comparison pools the flights of other routes, with this route’s own left out. Similar length means within 15% of this route’s 3,904 miles, with at least 5 such routes. A bucket is set against the most comparable group that has enough flights: similar length, then the same origin (at least 3 routes), then all other routes. Hours, weekdays and months appear only where both sides have 120 completed flights, and airlines where both have 600. The gap must be at least 2 points and 2 standard errors, and only the largest gap each way is kept per measure. These are differences in the flights counted, not causes.
When it goes wrong
July 2023 – July 2026
40 min late
against a median of 2 min late
Percentiles over 1,213 operations; cancelled and diverted flights are counted separately.
Will your connection be tight enough?
Layovers at HNL after arriving from IAH.
| Connection time | Chance of missing | Reads as |
|---|---|---|
| 30 min | 52% | Likely to miss |
| 45 min | 29% | High risk |
| 60 min | 16% | High risk |
| 90 min | 5.7% | Some risk |
| 120 min | 3.5% | Low risk |
This is one leg of a connection. Gate changes and the next flight's own schedule matter too. And a connection can fail before delay is even the question — this route cancels 0.66% of the time and diverts 0.16% of the time, which a late arrival never shows up in.
Chance of missing is the share of 1,203 arrivals on this route that landed later than the connection time less 30 minutes to reach the next gate.
The worst tenth of arrivals on this route land at least 40 minutes late (90th-percentile gate arrival delay), over 1,213 operations.
Any other layover length: connection checker.
Why IAH → HNL runs late
July 2023 – July 2026
crew, maintenance, boarding and fueling, all within the carrier’s control
airspace and airport capacity, including weather-driven flow control
the inbound aircraft was late, so this flight started late
weather severe enough to stop this flight specifically
Share of the delay minutes US DOT attributed to each cause for IAH → HNL. Only delays of 15 minutes or more are attributed. What the five causes mean
Airlines on this route
Carriers with at least 200 flights, by the airline that operated each one.
| Carrier | Flights | On time | Cancelled | Median delay | Severe |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| United Airlines | 1,213 | 69.6% | 0.66% | 2 min | 5.7% |
Flights on this route
Flight numbers with at least 600 operations here and still on the schedule.
| Flight | Scheduled | Operations | On time |
|---|---|---|---|
| UA253 United Airlines | 10:10 AM | 1,127 | 69.9% |
Weekly and seasonal patterns
By day of week
Saturday is historically the most reliable day and Thursday the least, a gap of 8.2 percentage points.
Reliability over time
July 2023 – July 2026
Over the most recent 12 months (2025-08 to 2026-07), on-time arrivals averaged 78.4% against 70.6% in the 12 months before — improving by 7.8 percentage points.
Data and methodology
Calculated by FlyerIntel from 1,213 IAH → HNL flight records from the US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics, covering July 2023 – July 2026. Late means 15 or more minutes past scheduled arrival; cancelled and diverted flights are left out of on-time rates.
Full methodology · Data sources · Report a problem
Related research: How Long a Layover Needs to Be · Two Airlines on One Route · Best Time of Day to Fly From Major US Airports
Analysis last recomputed