American Airlines will resume its nonstop service between Chicago and Honolulu, marking the resumption of its longest domestic route and challenging United Airlines on a route it currently operates without competition.
American Airlines Resumes Chicago – Honolulu Service In October 2025
While American Airlines has operated nonstop service between its hub in Chicago O’Hare (ORD) to Daniel K. Inouye International Airport in Honolulu (HNL) in the past, it has been nearly four years. The service ran before the pandemic, was temporarily paused, resumed, but then suspended again in September 2021.
The service will launch on October 26, 2025 and operate daily utilizing a Boeing 787-8 aircraft with:
- 20 business class seats
- 28 premium economy seats
- 186 economy class seats
(this is AA’s leisure-focused aircraft with a much smaller number of business class seats than the 787-9, which has 30 seats in business class)
The flight is not yet for sale and the schedule has not yet been published, but the flight previously left Chicago in the morning and departed Honolulu in the evening.
United Airlines flies the same route daily using a Boeing 787-10 jet.
The resumption of the Honolulu route is one of many new routes from Chicago O’Hare in 2025, both domestic and international, including:
| City | Start date | Aircraft Type |
|---|---|---|
| Bismarck, North Dakota (BIS) | June 5, 2025 | Embraer 175 |
| Boise, Idaho (BOI) | June 5, 2025 | E175 |
| Colorado Springs, Colorado (COS) | June 5, 2025 | Bombardier CRJ700 |
| Halifax, Canada (YHZ) | June 21, 2025 | E175 |
| Honolulu, Hawaii (HNL) | Oct. 26, 2025 | Boeing 787-8 |
| Hyannis, Massachusetts (HYA) | June 21, 2025 | E175 |
| Madrid, Spain (MAD) | March 30, 2025 | 787-8 |
| Naples, Italy (NAP) | May 6, 2025 | 787-8 |
| Spokane, Washington (GEG) | June 5, 2025 | E175 |
Ben Humphrey, American’s Vice President of ORD Operations, said:
“O’Hare has always been a vital hub for American, connecting the Midwest to our global network and bringing travelers from across the world to Chicago for business and pleasure. Strengthening our network is a promise to our customers that we’ll continue to provide exceptional service to the places they want to go. And it reinforces to our partners and stakeholders that we’ll be an economic driver for the region well into the future — all powered by our Chicago team members who are the best at putting our customers first.”
While United has also grown at Chicago O’Hare, American Airlines will not have competition on its Madrid or Naples longhaul routes.
Again. Still shocking that AA does NOT serve YOW but chooses Halifax to operate to instead of resuming Ottawa.
I visit YHZ a few times a year and AA’s routes perform really well. A lot of Canada based travelers prefer to connect in PHL over YYZ for Europe flights. I agree YOW is an odd hole in the system, but AA feels pretty strong in Halifax.
This blog has been on a SEVERE decline because you do not cover the true premium airline!
Tim, what about my Delta One Lounge and 767-300 review last week…or my two Delta stories this morning?
Timmy, he covers United often. Don’t worry kid
Flew this route with May family in December 2020 to get some sun and escape from the Chicago weather. Business seats available for 5 both ways.
My seat wouldn’t recline on the day flight but because there was a spare seat 10 rows away American initially didn’t want to compensate me lollll. Finally got 15k points or something similar.
The red eye flight in business from hnl to Ord is awesome.
I’m still waiting for a Chicago Sydney or Chicago Brisbane flight.
I’m with MIck, I’d kill for that. But would greatly prefer it of one the ME3, Singapore or QANTAS offered it.
People have been saying that ORD-BNE on QR is basically a done deal. Should be announced any time.
I wonder if the timing is a coincidence or if this is growth in order to get back some of the gates UA hopes to gain later this year through their own recent growth.
While I don’t spend my time thinking about what routes American should fly, when I look at this one it’s frankly inspired. American has lots of widebodies doing pretty much nothing in the winter so switching a European seasonal route to Hawaii is a great move.
Are you still EXP?
UA needs to make the ORD route at least Polaris as AA will be selling it as Flagship
UA will have an uncompetitive product
Hasn’t the UA ORD-HNL been on the 78X for… ever? I know a lot of UA HNL flying is on the old IPTE 772, but I dont’ think ORD-HNL is except for a substitution here and there?
Oh… you mean the branding of polaris to allow certain club access and tier of service. Got it…
If they would add ORD to OGG as well, that would be great. Would rather connect there from NYC than DFW, SFO, LAX or HNL.