The Economic Contribution of Waikīkī (2026 Update)
By Nori Tarui, Marcus Peng, and Dolan Eversole, UHERO, October 14, 2026
Waikīkī, through tourism-related activity, accounted for an estimated $6.9 billion, or 6% of Hawai‘i’s Gross State Product in 2024.
In addition, Waikīkī’s attraction of visitors can be credited with 62,000 civilian jobs statewide (7% of the total) and $799 million in state tax revenues (7% of the total).
A sign of Waikīkī’s outsized contribution to the state economy, the area’s population is 20,470 as of April 1, 2020, representing just 2.0% of O‘ahu’s resident population.
The trend of visitors diversifying their allocation of visitor days from O‘ahu to the Neighbor Islands continues, but Waikīkī remains the flagship with 38% of all visitor units (inventory and occupancy). Some $8.7 billion, or 36% of all visitor expenditures in the state were generated by Waikīkī-based visitor activity during 2024.
Using the same metrics as the State of Hawaii Department of Business Economic Development and Tourism (DBEDT) (2003) brief, the contribution to the state economy by tourism is $18.9 billion of the $115 billion total Gross State Product (GSP) for 2024. That is, about 16% of Hawai‘i’s GSP for the year was generated by visitor activity and is the largest single contributor to Hawai‘i’s annual GSP.
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The findings and recommendations are those of the author(s) and do not reflect the views or official positions of UHERO, the University of Hawai’i, or any funding or supporting organization.
This paper is funded by the Waikīkī Beach Special Improvement District Association and coordinated by the University of Hawai‘i Sea Grant College Program, SOEST, under Institutional Grant No. NA24OARX417C0024 from NOAA Office of Sea Grant, Department of Commerce. The views expressed herein are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of NOAA or any of its subagencies. Hawai‘i Sea Grant Report Number: UNIHI-SEAGRANT-5034.