#visitor spending

Eighteen months after the Aug. 8, 2023, wildfires, there were 202,738 visitors to Maui in January 2025. The number of visitors to Maui in January 2025 was higher than January 2024 (175,005 visitors, +15.8%), but below January 2019 (233,422 visitors, -13.1%).

Here on Maui, 14 months after the Aug. 8, 2023, wildfires, there were 180,609 visitors to Maui in October 2024, which was higher than October 2023 (134,493 visitors, +34.3%), but below October 2019 (238,043 visitors, -24.1%). Visitor spending increased to $388.5 million in October 2024, compared to $332.9 million (+16.7%) in October 2023 and $379.8 million (+2.3%) in October 2019.

There were 206,049 visitors to Maui in March 2024, down significantly compared to 276,485 visitors (-25.5%) in March 2023 and 271,934 visitors (-24.2%) in March 2019, according to preliminary data from the state Department of Business Economic Development and Tourism.

There were 181,301 visitors on Maui in February 2024, and visitor spending was $443.1 million, according to new data released by the state Department of Business Economic Development and Tourism. That’s down from the 220,741 visitors in February 2023 when visitor spending was $540.1 million; and also down from February 2019, when there were 221,603 visitors and visitor spending was $413.2 million.

“Locally, the Maui wildfires continued to impact visitors to Maui six months after the tragedy,” said Department of Business Economic Development and Tourism (DBEDT) Director James Kunane Tokioka. “Maui’s visitor counts decreased by 23.5% compared to January 2023, although there has been progress from August 2023 when visitor arrivals were down by 57.8%. With the active recovery efforts and campaigns, we hope to see continuous improvements over the upcoming months,” he said.

Maui County hotels continued to be impacted by the Aug. 8 wildfires, but still led the counties in December 2023 Revenue Per Available Room due to comparatively higher Average Daily Rate. 

“The impact of the Maui wildfires continues to be felt in November’s figures, but with most of West Maui now reopened to tourism, there is a concerted effort to reinvigorate job opportunities and facilitate the economic recovery of Maui,” said DBEDT Director James Kunane Tokioka.

The impacts from the Maui wildfires were significant in September 2023 with both visitor arrivals and visitor expenditures down by more than 50% for Maui for the month compared to 2022.

Visitor spending on Maui was $619.4 million in June 2023, compared to $549.8 million in June 2022 (+12.7%) and $477.1 million (+29.8%) in June 2019.

Hawai‘i Tourism Authority President and CEO, John De Fries, announced he will not be accepting an extension of his three-year employment contract, which concludes on Sept. 15, 2023.

Visitor spending was $544.8 million in April 2023, compared to $496.7 million in April 2022 (+9.7%) and $398.6 million (+36.7%) in April 2019.

Maui had 276,485 visitors is March of 2023, up +15.4% from the same time last year, when 239,538 visitors came, and up +1.7% from March of 2019 when 271,934 arrived.

Tourism continued to recover across the state in February, with Maui County reporting double digit increases in visitors and spending over the same time last year.

Maui had a 95.1% recovery in visitors in 2022, compared to 2019, with 2.9 million people visiting Maui last year.  Total visitor spending was $5.69 billion in 2022, up 11% from 2019.  The year-end data was released by the state Department of Business Economic Development and Tourism.  

“While we may experience a slowdown in the US visitors coming into 2023, we hope that more international visitors will be coming in the new year and our tourism recovery continues in 2023. We expect full tourism recovery in 2025,” said DBEDT Director Chris J. Sadayasu.

Visitor arrivals on Maui have recovered to near pre-pandemic levels, with July 2022 arrivals coming in at -1% from 2019.

Visitors to Haleakalā National Park Created $76.7 Million in Economic Benefits and Supported 598 Jobs in the Local Economy

A total of 722,393 visitors arrived by air service to the Hawaiian Islands in August 2021, down 22% from the arrivals in August 2019. The loss of visitors primarily is from Japan (down 98.1% vs. August 2019), Canada (down 78.5% vs. August 2019) and other international markets (down 82.1% vs. August 2019).

For the first two months of 2021, visitors to Maui were down 58 percent to 29,060 visitors per day, compared to 69,281 visitors per day at the same time in 2020.

In August, total visitor days fell 96.8 percent in Maui County from a year ago. There were 2,341 visitors to Maui in August versus 273,638 visitors a year ago, according to a new report released by the Hawaiʻi Tourism Authority.