Beginning in May 2024, United Airlines will, for the first time, have two daily services between Houston and Honolulu. Now bookable, it comes as United ends its daily Newark-Honolulu service in April; I previously showed that it was the US' third longest domestic route. The carrier will also return San Francisco-Honolulu to six daily next May.

United doubles Houston-Hononolu

The 3,904-mile (6,282 km) route has long been served. According to US DOT T-100 data, it was flown non-stop by Continental until 1991 (when the Boeing 747 and DC-10 were used), and then again from 1997 (DC-10, 767-400ER, 777-200ER). Following the merger with United, it entered that carrier's network and has been served ever since, always daily.

On May 23rd, United will serve the route twice daily, then halving on August 19th. All flights will deploy the non-ER Boeing 777-200, with an old livery example shown at the start of the article.

The 364-seat aircraft has 234 seats in economy, 102 in economy plus, and 28 in Polaris. The photo in San Francisco below shows the new livery on a non-ER aircraft, the excellently registered N777UA.

The new schedule is as follows, with all times local. I like the 7h 47m block time back to Texas. The additional service is UA393 out and UA394 back. In October 2023, the flight number UA393 is on Baltimore-Denver, although it switches to Fort Myers-Newark in February until it is used to Hawaii.

Where passengers go

US DOT T-100 data shows that United carried 21,454 roundtrip passengers on Houston-Honolulu-Houston in July 2023. With 22,568 seats for sale, it achieved a seat load factor of 95%.

Examining booking data indicates that nearly half of the passengers (45%) transited in Houston to/from Honolulu, with the top 10 markets shown below. Honolulu-Newark was the most popular and will carry many more passengers following the cut of the non-stop service between the two cities (see later).

More than a third of passengers (35%) were point-to-point; they only flew between the two airports. Some 13% 'bridged' both Houston and Honolulu (San Antonio-Houston-Honolulu-Guam was the largest market). The remaining 8% of passengers transferred in Honolulu after beginning or ending in Houston (Houston-Honolulu-Guam was first).

Newark-Honolulu is no more

Another ex-Continental route, the latest information shows that United's last Newark-Honolulu service (for now?) will leave New Jersey on April 13th. That day, a 767-400ER will operate UA363, departing Newark at 08:15 and arriving at 13:24 local, a huge 11h 9m block. Returning, UA362 will depart at 14:55 and return at 06:42+1 (9h 47m).