How to get to downtown Honolulu from Waikiki

ALOHA!

A trip to downtown Honolulu is absolutely worth it if you are a Hawaii Five-0 fan!

Oh hi! 👋 I was sad when the show was canceled too.

You will recognize the King Kamehameha Statue as the one that showed up in front of the building that was used as the Hawaii Five-0 headquarters. This is located in downtown Honolulu!

But even if you’re not a fan (or didn’t know that Hawaii Five-0 was a somewhat recent TV show on CBS 😅), downtown Honolulu is also worth it if you want to take in some Hawaiian culture and history.

Downtown Honolulu isn’t as touristy as Waikiki, but it’s where you’ll find some important Hawaiian historical sites.

In addition to the King Kamehameha Statue, you’ll find iconic landmarks like ʻIolani Palace and Kawaiahaʻo Church, which offer a deeper look into Native Hawaiian history and royalty.

Both the ʻIolani Palace and Kawaiahaʻo Church are on the National Register of Historic Places, with the ʻIolani Palace also designated as a National Historic Landmark.

If you want to walk around downtown Honolulu on your own, your must-see sights are the King Kamehameha Statue (Hawaii Five-0 statue), ʻIolani Palace (royal palace), and Kawaiahaʻo Church (Hawaiian church of the former royal family). You’ll probably want to see the Aloha Tower while you’re there too, since it’s an iconic landmark of modern Honolulu.

Waikiki to downtown Honolulu is around 3 miles. You can walk if you want to, although it’s not that exceptional of a walk. Instead, it’s easy to take the bus or even bike there!

Now, I’ll show you below some tours to consider and different ways you can get to downtown Honolulu from Waikiki!

 

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OAHU IDEAS > HAWAII FIVE-0 TOUR | GHOSTS OF HONOLULU | HISTORIC HONOLULU BIKE TOUR

 

👆 You can see the Iolani Palace from the outside for free. Be sure to take a look at the ways you can explore the inside of the palace. There are different types of palace tours.

 

👆 While you’re in downtown Honolulu you’ll want to walk to the iconic Aloha Tower too. There is a cruise ship pier right next to this, which is pier 11. NCL Pride of America is usually pier 2. To find out where your cruise ship will dock, check the Honolulu cruise port schedule.

 

👆 If you regularly watched Hawaii Five-0, the King Kamehameha Statue in downtown Honolulu is a must-visit!

 

 

Downtown Honolulu tour of Hawaiian sights

To get some context to the Hawaiian sights you’re seeing, your must-do tour is the Honolulu downtown walking tour on a Tuesday or Thursday. (Meeting spot downtown Honolulu.)

This will take you by Iolani Palace and the King Kamehameha Statue, along with other Hawaiian historical things to see.

You can book this as a Hawaii free tour, although tips are appreciated. Read the reviews.

If you are going to Pearl Harbor, there are also Pearl Harbor tours that do a drive-through of downtown Honolulu. The Pearl Harbor and city tour passes through downtown Honolulu, and you will also get to pass by the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific (aka the Punchbowl Cemetery).

 

More Hawaii Five-0 sights

For more as-seen-on-TV, you will want to consider doing the Hawaii Five-0 tour that takes you to McGarrett’s house!

 

How to get to downtown Honolulu

Now, here is more about getting to downtown Honolulu from Waikiki, by bike, bus, walking, or uber!

 

Biking to downtown Honolulu

Since it’s not that far away, you can bike from Waikiki to downtown Honolulu!

The cheaper way is to do a one way bike ride by using the bike sharing bikes. This allows you to go from point A to point B. This isn’t the same as a bike rental. You’ll find a bike station in Waikiki, ride to downtown, find a bike station there, and then drop off your bike, and that’s that! You don’t need to ride the same bike back to Waikiki. You’ll pay to use the bike based on 30 minute increments. There are lots of bike sharing stations in both Waikiki and downtown Honolulu. See the biki bike station map. You can pay ahead of time or just show up to a bike station and pay by credit card.

Follow the rules of the road, and always bike with traffic, not against.

 

The learning way to bike to downtown is to do the Historic Honolulu bike tour! This meets in Waikiki at Kuhio Beach.

See the official info and read the reviews.

This will take you to the Hawaiian sights of King Kamehameha Statue, Iolani Palace, and other noteworthy sights including filming locations of Hawaii-based shows like Hawaii Five-0 and Magnum PI.

 

Bus to downtown Honolulu from Waikiki

There’s a direct bus so it’s easy to get from Waikiki to downtown Honolulu! Google maps makes it easy to navigate by bus to downtown! Just look for the public transit icon.

As an example, you can type in the Duke Kahamamoku statue in Waikiki as your starting point, and the King Kamehameha statue as your downtown destination. See the map. When you’re actually in Waikiki, you’ll just use your current location as the starting point. It will tell you where your nearest bus stop is. You can play around with the routes. Doing this on the google maps app on your phone gives you more details. You can click on “scheduled” to see more upcoming departures, and you can click on “stops” when you’re actually on the bus to see exactly how many stops you have left (and follow along on the map with GPS). It will tell you where your nearest bus stop is.

 

👆 Google maps is the easy way to figure out how to get from Waikiki to downtown Honolulu by bus!

 

👆 You can expand out any bus route for details.

 

👆 It will also tell you about future bus timings!

 

If you’ll be taking the bus more than a few times, it will be worth getting a HOLO card, which you can get at any ABC Store in Waikiki. This acts as a public transportation cash card, and you can load it up online. You can also order your card online if you still have time.

Otherwise, you’ll need cash in exact change for every bus ride you take. See current bus fare.

 

Walking to downtown Honolulu

Just to get from Waikiki to downtown Honolulu will take you an hour to walk, maybe more depending on where exactly in Waikiki you’re coming from (map). And then that doesn’t include the time you’ll be walking around downtown.

It’s mostly just walking city streets, so it’s not that exciting of a walk, but you can do it if you just want to walk!

If you don’t mind a detour or an hour, then your scenic stop along the way can be Magic Island (map). This offers one of the best viewpoints of Waikiki and Diamond Head!

 

Uber

Finally, there is Uber in Waikiki and Honolulu. Since it’s a 15 minute drive, you might find it reasonable to take uber to downtown Honolulu. You can check the uber app even if you’re not currently in Hawaii just to get an idea of how much it will cost. For the best estimate, try to do a search during the day Hawaii time since it will be based on real-time data of available drivers!

 

OAHU ITINERARY IDEAS > Hawaii Five-0 tour | Ghosts of Honolulu | Downtown Honolulu walking tour | Historic Honolulu bike tour