How many people in Hawaii speak a language other than English at home?
Refreshed annually
In 2024, about 344,500 people age 5 and older in Hawaii spoke a language other than English at home. That's about one in 4 Hawaiians. Excluding English, Ilocano, Samoan, Hawaiian, or other Austronesian languages is the most common language spoken in Hawaii homes. About 34% of people speaking a non-English language spoke Ilocano, Samoan, Hawaiian, or other Austronesian languages.
344K
people speak a language other than English at home (2024)
34.0%
Ilocano, Samoan, Hawaiian, or other Austronesian languages's share of non-English language speakers (2020–2024)
More than half of all people in Hawaii speaking a non-English language at home spoke one of three languages: Ilocano, Samoan, Hawaiian, or other Austronesian languages, Tagalog (incl. Filipino), or Japanese.
Ilocano, Samoan, Hawaiian, or other Austronesian languages is the most-spoken non-English language in Hawaii homes, followed by Tagalog (incl. Filipino) and Japanese.
People aged 5 or older who speak a language other than English at home, by language group (2020-2024)
The ACS asks people if they speak a language other than English at home, what that language is, and how well they speak English. This data determines bilingual election requirements under the Voting Rights Act and has also been used to allocate funds for students with lower English proficiency.
Based on data from 2024, Hawaii's residents were more likely to speak a non-English language at home than the population nationwide. While about 0.43% of the US's 5+ population lived in Hawaii, the state was home to 0.47% of the nation's non-English speakers — a sign that Hawaii had a disproportionately larger share of non-English households.
The non-English languages most concentrated in Hawaii were Ilocano, Samoan, Hawaiian, or other Austronesian languages (24.2% of all US speakers), Japanese (8.0%), and Tagalog (incl. Filipino) (3.4%).
In Hawaii, the state had the biggest population of Ilocano, Samoan, Hawaiian, or other Austronesian languages speakers in the US. About 117,184 Ilocano, Samoan, Hawaiian, or other Austronesian languages speakers lived in Hawaii, or 24.2% of the language's 483,389 US speakers.
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Ilocano, Samoan, Hawaiian, or other Austronesian languages is the language for which Hawaii makes up the largest share of US speakers
State share of national speakers by language, ages 5 and older (2024)
Population change
The US population gained 1.78 million people between 2024 and 2025.
Between 2018 and 2024, the number of people in Hawaii whose primary language at home is not English decreased 6.2%. The number of people speaking Asian and Pacific Island languages — the largest of the Census Bureau's four broad language categories in Hawaii — shrunk 7.8% during this period.
In Hawaii, the number of people speaking Asian and Pacific Island languages at home shrunk 7.8% since 2018
Non-English language speakers ages 5 and older at home, by broad language group
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Methodology
USAFacts standardizes data, in areas such as time and demographics, to make it easier to understand and compare.
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USAFacts endeavors to share the most up-to-date information available. We sourced the data on this page directly from government agencies; however, the intervals at which agencies publish updated data vary.
