Premium Economy Coming to Hawaiian Airlines’ Airbus A330s

Updated: July 31, 2025, 4:22pm CDT

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Hawaiian Airline’s Premium Economy
Final Thoughts

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Hawaiian Airlines is in the midst of a huge transformation after being acquired by and merging with Alaska Airlines.

As part of the transformation, we can now confirm Hawaiian Airlines’ Airbus A330s will be fitted with an all-new premium economy cabin.

“We have long stated our commitment to investing in the A330 fleet that will connect the Hawaiian Islands to destinations in the U.S. and abroad,” Tara Shimooka, senior brand PR manager at Hawaiian, confirmed to Upgraded Points. “These investments will include a new premium economy cabin and enhanced end to end onboard experience. We look forward to sharing more details about these exciting investments in the year ahead.”

Here’s what we know.

Hawaiian Airline’s Premium Economy

It’s all change at Alaska Airlines and Hawaiian Airlines HQ as the 2 airlines become 1.

After the merger was completed in September 2024, the Alaska Air Group now owns all assets, including aircraft in the Hawaiian Airlines livery.

It was confirmed during the newly founded group’s most recent 2025 quarterly earnings call that Hawaiian’s 24-strong fleet of Airbus A330-200 aircraft will be fitted with a new premium economy cabin.

The news comes in the same week that we learned that the HawaiianMiles loyalty program will be permanently closed on October 1, 2025.

Hawaiian started receiving its order of A330s in 2010, well before premium economy became the cabin class that every airline wants (and quite frankly needs in order to compete). Curiously, Hawaiian decided not to install premium economy seats on its 12 Boeing 787-9 Dreamliners, which it started taking delivery of less than 2 years ago in November 2023.

Hawaiian Airlines A330 200 at Kona KOA big island — These A330s will get a new premium economy cabin — hopefully soon. Image Credit: Ryan Smith

We’re already seeing the Alaska Group start placing its start placing its newly acquired Hawaiian Dreamliners on routes that don’t even touch Hawaii. With that, we’d expect Hawaiian’s workhorse Airbus A330s‘ new premium economy cabins to be found primarily on popular leisure routes between Hawaii and the West Coast.

This makes sense, given the current trend of leisure travelers spending more on premium economy to head off on vacation in more comfort than coach provides.

Details on the number and type of seats are yet to be revealed. However, we’d expect the cabin to consist of a 2-3-2 configuration, the standard set by airlines such as Delta and Virgin Atlantic on their Airbus A330 variants.

Hot Tip:

There’s far more to this merger than just the acquisition of planes. Along with reciprocal perks and benefits for elite status holders, it’s also possible to earn more miles than ever, thanks to the merger of Alaska and Hawaii.

Final Thoughts

It’s been confirmed that Hawaiian Airlines’ Airbus A330-200s will be retrofitted with a new premium economy cabin. We’ll be back as soon as we get more information about the details of the seats and the timeline for their rollout.