State of AI Adoption in Hawai'i Small and Medium Businesses, 2026
An original-survey study of Hawai'i SMBs on AI tool adoption, deployment categories, investment levels, reported barriers, and reported outcomes. Conducted by the 808 AI Group, headquartered on Maui. Data collection is in progress through Q2 2026 with a Q3 2026 publication target. The full anonymized dataset will be published on this page under a CC-BY-4.0 license so journalists, researchers, and other AI consultancies can cite it or rework it however they need.
AI in Hawaiʻi: what the published data shows
Below is a sourced briefing on the data that does exist as of mid-2026: Hawaiʻi economic and labor figures alongside national AI-adoption benchmarks. Every figure links to its original publisher. Items marked [HI] are Hawaiʻi-specific; [US] are national context. None of these are our survey's findings. They explain why the gap described below matters.
The Hawaiʻi small-business economy
144,375 small businesses in Hawaiʻi. That is 99.3% of all businesses in the state, employing 251,556 people, or 49.6% of the private-sector workforce.
[HI] SBA Office of Advocacy, 2025 Hawaiʻi Small Business Profile. Source
−189 net small-business locations between March 2023 and March 2024 (4,265 opened, 4,454 closed). The base is contracting under cost pressure.
[HI] SBA Office of Advocacy, 2025 Hawaiʻi Small Business Profile. Source
64,335 average quarterly jobs in food services and drinking places, Hawaiʻi's largest private-sector employer. Front-desk and booking work in this category is heavily phone-driven.
[HI] Hawaiʻi DBEDT, QSER labor data. Source
Why automation is economically urgent in Hawaiʻi
40-43¢/kWh Hawaiʻi commercial electricity, the highest in the U.S. and roughly 3 times the ~14.4¢ national average. Keeping equipment running longer than needed costs more here than anywhere else in the country.
[HI] Electric Choice, Hawaiʻi electricity prices (2025-26). Source
$16.00 Hawaiʻi minimum wage as of Jan 1, 2026, up 14.3% from $14.00 and rising to $18.00 by 2028 by statute. The cost of manual labor keeps climbing.
[HI] Hawaiʻi Dept. of Labor & Industrial Relations. Source
26,000 unfilled job openings (Oct 2024), only about 72 workers available per 100 jobs. There are not enough workers to fill the open roles; automation covers part of that shortfall.
[HI] U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Hawaiʻi JOLTS. Source
+25.75% interisland shipping rate increase (effective Jan 1, 2026) from the sole ocean carrier, compounding the cost pressure on neighbor-island operators.
[HI] Hawaiʻi PUC, via Maui Now (Apr 2026). Source
Tourism and hospitality: the dominant industry
$21.68B Hawaiʻi visitor spending in 2025 (+5.8% year-over-year), with statewide hotel occupancy averaging 73.9%. This is a high-volume, call-heavy service economy.
[HI] Hawaiʻi DBEDT, Visitor Statistics. Source
~8% AI adoption in the accommodation and food-services sector nationally, far below the 19.8% cross-industry average. Hawaiʻi's biggest industry uses AI less than almost any other, which leaves the most room for whoever adopts early.
[US] Federal Reserve FEDS Notes, Apr 2026. Source
How fast AI adoption is moving (national context)
58% of U.S. small businesses report using generative AI as of mid-2025, up from 40% in 2024 and 23% in 2023, with 96% planning to adopt emerging tech.
[US] U.S. Chamber of Commerce, Aug 2025 (n=3,870). Source
19.8% of all U.S. businesses currently use AI (firm-count), with ~32% of workers at AI-adopting firms, and firm adoption grew ~68% year-over-year.
[US] U.S. Census Bureau BTOS, May 2026. Source
83% vs 55% of growing SMBs have adopted AI versus declining SMBs, and 91% of AI-using SMBs report it boosts revenue (vendor-sponsored survey; directional).
[US] Salesforce SMB Trends, 2025. Source
The shift to AI-powered discovery (why GEO matters here)
45% of consumers now use AI tools to find local business recommendations, up from just 6% a year earlier. ChatGPT is used by 31% and Google AI Mode by 23%. AI is now the third most-used local-discovery tool.
[US] BrightLocal Local Consumer Review Survey, 2026. Source
1.2% of local business locations are recommended by ChatGPT (vs 11% by Gemini), and recommended businesses average 4.3★. AI local visibility is 3 to 30 times harder to earn than a Google local-pack spot, so structure and reviews decide it.
[US] SOCi Local Visibility Index, 2026 (~350k locations). Source
60.3% of U.S. searches now show a Google AI Overview (2B monthly users). For most queries, the AI answer is the first thing a customer reads.
[US] BrightLocal / Xponent21, Nov 2025. Source
Why this survey exists
For all the figures above, one number is missing: there is no published, statistically rigorous rate of AI adoption among Hawai'i small and medium businesses. We confirmed this gap directly. The SBA, DBEDT, UHERO, the Hawai'i Tourism Authority, and Hawai'i Business Magazine have each published adjacent data, but none reports an AI-adoption percentage for Hawai'i SMBs, let alone broken out by industry or island. UHERO's 2025 survey of 1,024 Honolulu businesses measured technology needs (49% cited marketing support; 93%+ valued innovation support) but not AI adoption itself. Mainland-focused surveys sample Hawai'i too thinly for island-level resolution.
That gap has real costs. A Hawai'i business owner weighing an AI investment is deciding against mainland benchmarks that may not apply here. Journalists, economic-development staff, and other consultancies have no local numbers to work from either. This survey is meant to be those numbers: open license, methodology fully disclosed, free to cite and re-analyze.
Methodology
- Sample frame
- Hawai'i-based small and medium businesses (under 200 employees) across hospitality, professional services, contractors, retail, agriculture, and other sectors.
- Sample size target
- 50 to 100 verified respondents (verification via business email domain plus LinkedIn match against Hawai'i location).
- Distribution channels
- Chamber of Commerce Hawai'i networks, Maui Chamber, Hawai'i Business Magazine reader survey, direct outreach to DBEDT HTDC cohorts, and Hawai'i-focused B2B social media.
- Instrument
- Typeform structured questionnaire, 12 to 18 questions, about 7 minutes to complete. Multiple choice plus a small set of free-response questions for adoption-barrier and outcome detail.
- Field period
- Q2 2026 (data collection in progress). Publication target Q3 2026.
- Publication format
- Findings on this page in plain-language summary with comparative tables. Raw anonymized data downloadable as CSV under a CC-BY-4.0 license so other researchers and journalists can cite or re-analyze it.
Variables measured
The questionnaire measures the following variables. Each will be reported in aggregate and broken out by industry, island, and business size where sample sizes allow it.
- AI tool adoption rate (any AI tool in use, by category)
- AI receptionist / voice agent deployment rate
- GEO / AI search optimization awareness rate
- AI automation deployment rate (workflow, follow-up, scheduling)
- Annual AI investment as percentage of revenue
- Reported barriers to AI adoption (cost, complexity, trust, skills)
- Reported outcomes among adopters (hours saved, revenue impact, customer experience)
- Industry breakdown (hospitality, professional services, contractors, retail, agriculture, other)
- Island breakdown (Oahu, Maui, Big Island, Kauai, Molokai, Lanai)
- Business size (sole proprietor, 2-10 employees, 11-50, 51-200, 200+)
Findings (placeholder: Q3 2026)
Findings will be published in this section when the field period closes. This page will include: a one-paragraph headline finding, a results table per primary variable, industry-level breakdowns, island-level breakdowns where sample sizes allow, comparison against the most relevant mainland benchmark for each variable, and a short methodological note on response rate and any sample limitations.
We are not asserting any findings before the data is collected. This page deliberately has no placeholder numbers, modelled estimates, or projections from mainland data. Those would mislead readers now and make the finished dataset harder to trust and cite later.
Participate
If you own or operate a Hawai'i small or medium business, your responses make the dataset stronger. The survey takes about seven minutes. Respondents who provide a business email receive the published findings ahead of public release.
License and citation
The published dataset will be released under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 (CC-BY-4.0) license. Anyone, from journalists to competing consultancies, is welcome to cite the findings or reuse the data with attribution. A suggested citation format will be added at publication.