Alaska Air Group has today made a slew of passenger experience announcements , which I’m covering across several posts. The theme is simple, and it includes focusing on the premium experience (as is the standard in the industry nowadays).

In this post, I’d like to focus on the new Hawaiian Airlines Lounge coming to Honolulu’s Daniel K. Inouye International Airport (HNL). This was first announced in early 2025, but more details have now been unveiled, including updated renderings, and a new timeline for the lounge’s opening. Separately, I’ve covered details about the new premium economy cabin , Alaska’s new premium 737 MAX 10s , Hawaiian’s A330 retrofits , and the new Alaska Aurora Lounge Seattle .

In early 2028, Hawaiian Airlines will be opening a new premium lounge at Honolulu Airport, located at the entrance to the Mauka Concourse in Terminal 1. The lounge will be roughly 13,000 square feet, and it’ll have the capacity to handle roughly 200 guests at a time. The lounge will of course cater to both Alaska and Hawaiian customers.

The expectation is that the new Hawaiian Lounge will boast locally inspired food and beverage options, a signature local coffee experience, a full service bar with specialty crafted cocktails, private workspaces, and artwork and installations by local artists.

The airline has released updated renderings of the new lounge, which you can find below.

Hawaiian Airlines’ new lounge in Honolulu really can’t open soon enough, as the carrier’s current lounge situation there is kind of a mess. The Plumeria Lounge has to be one of the most underwhelming “flagship” lounges out there. It’s small and consistently overcrowded.

A standard, larger, quality lounge, will massively improve the carrier’s ground experience. For all practical purposes, I would think of this as being along the lines of an Alaska Lounge. Keep in mind Alaska Air Group’s approach to branding going forward — down the road, anything that touches Hawaii will have Hawaiian branding, while everything else will have Alaska branding.

In terms of access, presumably this will be a standard part of the Alaska Lounge network . So I assume it will be open to Alaska Lounge members, long haul premium cabin passengers, etc.