The Hawaiian Airlines app is about to be gone completely. What replaced it is already available today in the app stores. It’s the new combined Alaska-Hawaiian app, redesigned to handle both airlines, but built on Alaska’s platform, running on Alaska’s systems, and carrying Alaska’s name first. Eventually, you can select an Alaska or Hawaiian theme in the app to personalize it.
The old Hawaiian app will continue to function until April 21. If you have the old Alaska app on your phone, it will be updated to the new Alaska-Hawaiian app when you enable it.
Here’s what happened for us.
Our Hawaiian app shows the Alaska flight we booked for later this month to San Diego, but the new combined Alaska-Hawaiian app does not show that flight. We still have to go to the old Hawaiian app to see it and check in. When you enable the new Alaska-Hawaiian app, you may want to cross-check with the Hawaiian app to see if you also have flights missing. Honestly, it was hard to tell exactly what was happening under the hood. But since this was just announced today, it can only get better from here.
Hawaiian Airlines travelers have until April 21 to get this handled.
The cutoff is April 21, and after that, the Hawaiian Airlines app stops working entirely. The guidance from Alaska is straightforward: if you have Hawaiian Airlines flights booked through April 21, keep using the Hawaiian app for check-in and day-of travel. In our case, we’ll also need to use the Hawaiian app to check in for our Alaska flight.
But starting April 22, everything shifts to the Alaska side. That lines up with the broader April 22 integration milestone already tied to the combined airline operation, a single passenger service system, and the next phase.
What you’ll be able to do in the new app that you never could in the old one.
The Alaska-based app adds features Hawaiian users have never had, but none of them are quite ready today; they arrive on April 22. That is when Hawaiian users gain the ability to change or cancel flights directly in the app, share boarding passes, use Apple Pay, and book partner award travel. Those are standard features on many carriers that Hawaiian users did not have, and they unlock only after the shared passenger service system goes live.
What stays the same, and what is already gone.
Your reservations, flights, and login still carry over, and all bookings will be accessed in the new combined app. Travelers are not losing access to their trips or accounts.
What will be gone soon is the standalone Hawaiian app itself. Even if you choose the Hawaiian look inside the new app (which we did not have access to today), the identity underneath it is no longer Hawaiian.
This does feel bigger than any normal app update. It is one more part of Hawaiian that travelers knew well, good or bad, and now it belongs to Alaska. Since the Hawaiian app has not been fully functional for a long time, most travelers will soon find this a much-appreciated change.
How do you feel about the Hawaiian Airlines app disappearing?
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Just downloaded the app today (March 31) – my two flights in early April and late April were listed. Even got to log into the Atmos account with no issues. Crossing my fingers this continues to be a smoother experience than the transition period.
I think the only thing I will really miss was the “busy” animation of the guy in the hammock slung between the palms. I really enjoyed that.
This comes as no real surprise. A joint app makes perfect sense and reflects the reality of both airlines operating from one common database. Sentiment and nostalgia has no place in this discussion. The HA app was barely functional at best… when it worked at all. It won’t be missed.
With the change over to the Alaska based app and flight designator, remember to check previously selected seats. After we had received notification that are Hawaiian flight number had changed to an Alaska number, we found that we had lost our previous seat assignment. We had purchased our tickets for premium economy. When we checked on the Alaska side, we had been reassigned to main cabin economy, even though our original seats were unassigned. When we tried to get our seats back, we had to pay the upgrade charge again when we did it online. After which, we had to call Alaska customer service parentheses and wait two hours) in order to process a refund. I am sure that this was just another challenge in integrating the two systems but it was still frustrating to see and correct.
Back say, 15 years ago before apps were a thing the HA website was good, i used it all the time, easy to book mileage travel, etc. The app, when it came along always felt like it stopped evolving at some point and stayed pretty basic. The inability to do changes or cancel ranged from mildly annoying to exasperating when running through the airport trying to get a seat on a later flight after a missed connection. Basic stuff on Any other airline app. As with many other BofHawaii readers who are savvy travelers who do use other airline apps we will appreciate when this transition is done and we finally have a fully functional app on which we can do everything we never were able to do… ever. Then I also expect the usual flood of those lamenting the loss of what was and had always been a pretty bare bones app that more often required a call to reservations than resolving anything yourself. The newly updated Alaska app is quite good and that is what we have now so, period.