We stayed at the Hilton Hawaiian Village Waikiki Beach for its ocean views, central location in Oahu, and variety of amenities. But we didn’t love it. Here’s why…

Our Resort Review of Hilton Hawaiian Village Waikiki

  • The Hilton Hawaiian Village in Waikiki (Oahu) is an all-suite hotel with timeshare opportunities. There are different towers that house the suites/timeshares.
  • Suites have 1, 2, or 3 bedrooms, a living area and dining area, a full kitchen, a washer/dryer (or at least access to one- ours was on the floor but not in the actual suite), a private balcony, and 1 or 2 bathrooms. There’s also a sleeper sofa in the living area.
  • There’s a 10,000 square foot Super Pool and 4 other pools on the 22 acre property
  • The Duke Kahanamoku Lagoon is a public property where anyone can hang out. There are a variety of rentable activities here, like water trikes and paddle boards.
  • The Hilton Hawaiian Village is right on a stretch of Waikiki Beach, a public beach.

Walk onto Waikiki Beach from the Hilton Hawaiian property:

the beach at Hilton Hawaiian Village

If you are staying in the hotel portion, you need to know that the check in line can be LONG. When we walked through the hotel lobby to get to one of the restaurants, I couldn’t believe how many people were waiting in line. We rented from someone who owns a timeshare in one of the towers, which had its own check in process outside of the hotel. If you are staying in one of the towers like the Lagoon Tower, where we stayed, you can go right to check in there at that building. You won’t wait in nearly as long as a line, if there is any line at all.

Check in area at the Lagoon Tower:

check in area at Hilton Hawaiian Village

We are not members of the Hilton Vacation Club, but rented through VRBO.

Check the prices for Hilton Hawaiian Village on TripAdvisor.

What we liked about the Hilton Hawaiian Village

  • BEACH ACCESS: The hotel complex is right on the beach! If you want to go between the pool and beach (or won’t have a car), it’s very easy, even with little kids.
  • LOTS OF DINING OPTIONS: Many food options within walking distance, including a Starbucks across the street from the towers and a market near the pools. At the market they sell bottled water, pastries, salads, sorbet, ice cream, and other items to go.
food at the Hilton Hawaiian Village
  • CHOOSE YOUR TYPE OF ROOM: A variety of towers and room types to choose from.
  • LAUNDRY: Laundry available, which is great if you’re traveling light and need to do a load of wash in the middle of your trip.
  • BALCONY: I liked that our balcony felt set apart from the other guest rooms, so we weren’t staring at each other on our respective balconies. This could have been because we were at the end of the hallway, so on the shorter side of the building.
  • WALK TO DOWNTOWN WAIKIKI: It’s very walkable to the downtown Waikiki area, where all of the shops are. It was about a 12 minute walk to go to CVS one night.

Here’s the view from the lagoon tower on the hallway end. That’s the lagoon and beach in front, and the lagoon pool in bottom right corner.

view from a room at the Hilton Hawaiian Village

The kids loved the lagoon activities, including this water trike:

people at the beach

What can the Hilton Hawaiian Village do better?

  • CHECK IN LINES: Check in for the hotel area is a mess. Long lines, luggage everywhere, people snaking through roped areas.
  • POOLS ARE CROWDED: The pool area feels cramped. We travel with a stroller that can fit down the aisle on an airplane (so it’s not wide at all), and I still could not push it between rows of pool chairs. The chairs are close together, and you still have to get out early to get a chair or risk not finding one at any of the pools.
  • TOWEL SYSTEM: You are given pool/beach towel cards at check in, one per person. You can exchange those at one of the towel huts for towels, and when you’re done turn in the towels in exchange for another set of cards. I get why they do this but found it to be an odd system.
  • CONCIERGE: I asked the concierge for help choosing a restaurant (after having to ask “excuse me?” twice while she was texting on her phone), and she seemed annoyed that I didn’t want to choose one on the property. We had already tried three different places on the property and they all were pretty much the same food, but she kept asking, “So you don’t want to eat on property?” And then honestly she seemed like I was bothering her. It made me think she was commissioned on reservations made or activities booked, and wasn’t really interested in helping otherwise. I didn’t love that.

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  • CHECK POOL HOURS: The pools didn’t open until 8:30am or 9am or 9:30am, with no signage posted. On our last morning we tried to go to the pool at 8:30am thinking that was the opening time. It turned out that was for one pool, but not the one we were at. A man walking by had to tell us when it opened. Turns out he stays nearby a lot and just happened to know their schedule.
  • Not the hotel’s fault, but I was surprised to see so many homeless sleeping on the beach not just early in the morning but mid morning as well.
  • BOTTLED WATER ACCESS IS LIMITED: We had to keep buying bottled water, which we did at the on-site market for $4 per bottle. It would be nice if they installed water purification refill machines around the resort, since Hawaii seems very focused on removing plastic materials from use. (For the record, I’m totally in favor of reducing plastic use!)

Overall, we probably would try somewhere else before going back here.

Our kids loved the pools, but we would try another place before staying here again.

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