How much of the tax can a seller show on a receipt?

The Department sets maximum pass-on rates by county: 4.7120 percent for Honolulu, Kauai and Maui, and for the County of Hawaii from 2020 to 2030. Passing the tax on is optional. This is not tax advice; confirm with the Hawaii Department of Taxation.

Do I owe the general excise tax if my store is on the mainland?

The Department says a remote business that engages with Hawaii customers is subject to the economic nexus threshold, which is 100,000 dollars or more of gross income or receipts or 200 or more transactions in the current or preceding calendar year. Once the threshold is met the business registers for a GET license.

Why does the page say the rate changes by activity?

The Department lists 4 percent for most activities, 0.5 percent for wholesaling, manufacturing, producing and wholesale services, and 0.15 percent for an insurance commission, and the county surcharge applies only to the 4 percent activities. A store that sells to shoppers is in the 4 percent group.

How long do the county surcharges last?

The Department's GET page lists each county's 0.5 percent surcharge as effective to December 31, 2030. Whether a county extends it is a decision for later, so check the page again before you plan prices past that date.

Hawaii's general excise tax: a tax on the seller, a capped pass-on and a free-sample plan

Hawaii does not have a sales tax. The Department of Taxation says so on its own page: the state has the general excise tax instead, which "is on the business and not on the customer" and is assessed on all business activities. For a Shopify store that sells into Hawaii, that changes the question you ask before you design an offer. A store with a Hawaii license decides whether to fold the tax into its prices or to show it as a line and, if it shows it, the Department sets a ceiling on what may be passed on: 4.7120 percent in Honolulu, Kauai and Maui counties, which is the 4.5 percent combined rate grossed up by our arithmetic because the tax passed on is itself part of gross receipts. A store outside the state faces a different test, an economic nexus threshold of 100,000 dollars of gross income or 200 transactions in the current or preceding calendar year. All four counties add a 0.5 percent surcharge that the Department dates to the end of 2030. This page works through those rules from the Department's own pages and ends with a free-sample plan, because a small free item is the lightest offer to ship to an island. This is not tax advice; confirm with the Hawaii Department of Taxation.

Updated October 10, 2026 · 10 sourced facts

Photo: National Park Service, Public domain via Wikimedia Commons

A free-sample plan for a store that sells into Hawaii

Before you set prices
Decide whether your Hawaii prices include the tax or show it apart. The Department says passing the GET on is a choice and that the tax passed on is part of gross receipts, so pick one method, write it down and apply it to every order from the same county.
Source: Hawaii Department of Taxation: Hawaii General Excise Tax (GET)
If you show the tax as a line
Keep the percentage at or under the Department's maximum for the county: 4.7120 percent for Honolulu, Kauai and Maui, and 4.7120 percent for the County of Hawaii since 2020. Our check: 4.5 divided by 0.955 is 4.712, the 4.5 percent combined rate grossed up for the tax being part of receipts.
Source: Hawaii Department of Taxation: General Excise Tax (GET) Information
If your store is outside Hawaii
Count your Hawaii orders and gross receipts for the current and the preceding calendar year against 100,000 dollars and 200 transactions. A store that sells low-priced items can pass the transaction count first, so count orders as well as revenue before you plan a Hawaii campaign.
Source: Hawaii Department of Taxation: Hawaii General Excise Tax (GET)
When you choose the free item
Pick a sample that is small and light, set the offer to give one with any order, and state the condition in the same place as the word free. Keep the threshold on the pre-tax cart value, so the rule does not move when the county surcharge applies.
Source: Hawaii Department of Taxation: General Excise Tax (GET) Information
Before launch
Place a test order to an address in each county you ship to and check the total against the method you chose in the first step. The Department dates all four county surcharges to the end of 2030, so note that date in your calendar for a review.
Source: Hawaii Department of Taxation: General Excise Tax (GET) Information

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Questions merchants ask

Does Hawaii have a sales tax?: No. The Department of Taxation says Hawaii has the general excise tax instead, which is on the business and not on the customer and is assessed on all business activities. A seller may choose to pass it on to the customer, and if it does, the amount passed on is included in gross receipts.
How much of the tax can a seller show on a receipt?: The Department sets maximum pass-on rates by county: 4.7120 percent for Honolulu, Kauai and Maui, and for the County of Hawaii from 2020 to 2030. Passing the tax on is optional. This is not tax advice; confirm with the Hawaii Department of Taxation.
Do I owe the general excise tax if my store is on the mainland?: The Department says a remote business that engages with Hawaii customers is subject to the economic nexus threshold, which is 100,000 dollars or more of gross income or receipts or 200 or more transactions in the current or preceding calendar year. Once the threshold is met the business registers for a GET license.
Why does the page say the rate changes by activity?: The Department lists 4 percent for most activities, 0.5 percent for wholesaling, manufacturing, producing and wholesale services, and 0.15 percent for an insurance commission, and the county surcharge applies only to the 4 percent activities. A store that sells to shoppers is in the 4 percent group.
How long do the county surcharges last?: The Department's GET page lists each county's 0.5 percent surcharge as effective to December 31, 2030. Whether a county extends it is a decision for later, so check the page again before you plan prices past that date.

Shipping into the state

Hawaii has 6,423 square miles of land and 1,432,820 residents, and for an out-of-state store the shipping question comes second to a registration question: the Department's test is 100,000 dollars of gross income or 200 transactions in the current or preceding calendar year, so a small store with many low-priced orders can reach the transaction count first. The FAA's 2025 all-cargo list names four airports outside Honolulu, on Maui, Hawaii Island and Kauai. At an average order of under 500 dollars, 200 orders stay below the 100,000 dollar line, so the count is the one to watch.

Source: U.S. Census Bureau: State Area Measurements (2010)

Source: U.S. Census Bureau: Vintage 2025 state population estimates

Source: Hawaii Department of Taxation: Hawaii General Excise Tax (GET)

Source: Federal Aviation Administration: CY 2025 All-Cargo Airports by Landed Weight (ARP-CY2025-all-cargo-airports.xlsx, added 9/22/2026)

Facts and sources

The Department of Taxation's GET page says "The tax is on the business and not on the customer" and that Hawaii does not have a sales tax; instead it has the general excise tax, which is assessed on all business activities.
Hawaii Department of Taxation: General Excise Tax (GET) Information (accessed October 10, 2026)
The Department lists the state rate as 4 percent for all activities not named at a lower rate, 0.5 percent for wholesaling, manufacturing, producing, wholesale services and the use tax on imports for resale, and 0.15 percent for an insurance commission.
Hawaii Department of Taxation: General Excise Tax (GET) Information (accessed October 10, 2026)
The Department says counties may adopt a surcharge on the 4 percent GET, and lists 0.5 percent for the City and County of Honolulu from January 1, 2007, for Kauai from January 1, 2019 and for Maui from January 1, 2024, each to December 31, 2030, and for the County of Hawaii 0.25 percent in 2019 and 0.5 percent from January 1, 2020 to December 31, 2030; the surcharge does not apply to the 0.5 percent and 0.15 percent activities.
Hawaii Department of Taxation: General Excise Tax (GET) Information (accessed October 10, 2026)
The Department says a seller may choose to visibly pass on the GET and any county surcharge but is not required to, and lists the maximum pass-on rate as 4.7120 percent for Honolulu (2007 to 2030), Kauai (2019 to 2030) and Maui (2024 to 2030), and 4.4386 percent for the County of Hawaii in 2019 and 4.7120 percent for 2020 to 2030.
Hawaii Department of Taxation: General Excise Tax (GET) Information (accessed October 10, 2026)
The Department's GET page says businesses may choose to pass the GET on to customers but are not required to, and that if the GET is passed on to customers it must be included in gross receipts.
Hawaii Department of Taxation: Hawaii General Excise Tax (GET) (accessed October 10, 2026)
The Department's GET page says out-of-state or remote businesses that engage with Hawaii customers are subject to the economic nexus threshold, and that economic nexus is established if the business has gross income or receipts of 100,000 dollars or more, or 200 or more transactions, in the current or preceding calendar year, in which case it must register for a GET license.
Hawaii Department of Taxation: Hawaii General Excise Tax (GET) (accessed October 10, 2026)
A Department of Taxation economist's January 2022 post says taxpayers claimed 33.3 billion dollars of exemptions in tax year 2020, 26.1 percent of gross receipts, that Hawaii has close to 60 different exemptions from the GET, and that out of state sales were among the five largest at 2.7 billion dollars, or 8.1 percent of the total.
Hawaii Department of Taxation: A quarter of all gross receipts in Hawaii are exempted from the GET (January 2022, tax year 2020 data) (accessed October 10, 2026)
The FAA's calendar year 2025 list of all-cargo airports by landed weight puts Kahului on Maui 59th at 405,862,500 pounds, Kailua-Kona 60th at 390,236,800, Lihue on Kauai 73rd at 320,040,000 and Hilo 89th at 206,435,000, each below its 2024 figure; outside Honolulu, then, landed cargo is spread over four airports on Maui, Hawaii Island and Kauai.
Federal Aviation Administration: CY 2025 All-Cargo Airports by Landed Weight (ARP-CY2025-all-cargo-airports.xlsx, added 9/22/2026) (accessed October 10, 2026)
The Census Bureau's Vintage 2025 estimate puts Hawaii at 1,432,820 residents on July 1, 2025, down from 1,434,952 a year earlier.
U.S. Census Bureau: Vintage 2025 state population estimates (accessed October 10, 2026)
Hawaii has 6,423 square miles of land area and 10,932 square miles of total area.
U.S. Census Bureau: State Area Measurements (2010) (accessed October 10, 2026)

Cities in Hawaii

HonoluluHawaii's commercial harbors move nearly everything the state imports, and Honolulu is the hub. What that means for a cart threshold, with a progress bar plan.

Not tax advice. Confirm current rules with the state revenue department before you rely on a date or an exemption.

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