Makani Kai Helicopters

Free shuttle was early and the driver was great, all fm really friendly staff. Our pilot Morley was knowledgeable and experienced and we had an amazing flight over Oahu. Only downside was that half an hour was not long enough!

lots of fun!
started off by getting picked up by a courtesy shuttle at our hotel right on time.
when we got there had to wait prob 20 min for everyone to get settled and the people to do watever it is they do. i think its several helicopter tour companies so thats what was kinda confusing, they seemed kinda lost for some reason. couldve been cause theres sum guy called Mr. Obama who seems to be important visiting for the New years holiday so theres extra TSA security which took a while.
dont bring anything cause u can take it with you on the helicopter, just phone and sunglasses and wallet but no purse of any size. theres lockers there and they charge 1 $ in quarters and we had no cash (kinda annoying its not complementary for the price we paid) but a girl there was nice enough to give us the quarters.
anyways once in the helicopter i think our pilot was Jeff and he was GREAT. local ex military chinook pilot who really knew the island and def has flying skills. two kids in the back and my gf almost blew chunks but w. e its part of the experience lol.
we opted for the 45 min tour and it was more than enough as it does get a bit tiring, helicopters arent very comfortable.
best way to see the island by far!

WE LOVE YOU PILOT JIM! MAHALO!
We did the doors off tour and it was a beautiful day for a heli tour! Views of Waikiki, sacred falls, Waimea Bay and Valley, Haleiwa, the dole plantation. It actually covers most of the island. You just cannot beat the views. The whole experience was absolutely amazing! Our Pilot was Jim and he was awesome. Full of information, super friendly, and quite hilarious! Don’t forget to tip your pilot for exceptional service.
Although I’m not a ‘local’ I have numerous family members who live here and am familiar with all of the landmarks you see on this tour. It’s a completely different experience from this vantage point. It does cost a lot. But it’s something I would recommend for everyone.

I wish we could give them more than 5 stars. Our experience was FANTASTIC!!! From start to finish, everything was first class. Lori picked us up and drove us to the airport. Along the ride, she answered questions, gave us suggestions, and was a pleasure to interact with. Pilot Jim was a great pilot, an excellent tour guide, and a comedian. If you are looking for a helicopter tour… THIS IS THE ONE!!! I cannot say enough good things about our adventures. Great ride, great people, great fun!!!

One of the coolest things I’ve ever experienced. Aside from the complete professional from top to bottom, the 50 minute tour of Oahu was amazing. Our pilot Jim was perfect — knowledgeable, funny, hospital and he even tweaked the tour for us after hearing about our earlier trip. Couldn’t recommend Makani Kai enough. Well worth the money!

We’re about to go on a tour and I’m so impressed with the customer service that I felt I had to write a review on customer service alone. Spoke with a lovely woman named Ruby. In some what expected but always adored Island sweet speak she used «honey» «darling» «sweetie» type words while getting me booked. If the flight is half as good as Ruby we’ll have the total amazing experience! More to come…
It’s confirmed that Makani Kai heli company is awesome! If you get a chance fly with Jeff. He’s hilarious! Such a chill dude! He’s native and when he guides it seems as if it’s fits the crowd verses a broken record! The only intense part is the driver. She’s a bit high strung but she makes the experience what it is. Five stars! We hung loose!

First off, the courtesy shuttle that picked us up at our hotel was 20 minutes late. When we called the office to inquire, we were told to just hang tight. I would have appreciated response like «I’m sorry, I’ll see how far along they are and give you a call right back.» The driver does take calls during routes. Anyways… delay due to a no-​show couple. Driver didn’t apologize for being late either.
We booked a half hour tour which ended up being canceled during our shuttle ride to the facility due to maintenance issues. Big bummer. They upgraded us to a 1-​hour flight and gave us a nice picture book. They did their best to accommodate us which we appreciated.
The pilot… I think his name was «Morrie»? He was nice and chill. I felt pretty safe. I really enjoyed the ride until I got really motion sick halfway. The views are awesome from high up!
One thing I would suggest is for Makani staff is to clean the inside/​outside of the helicopter windows for each tour. The photos we took… you could see the «cloudiness.»
Anyways…it’s a good place to book. I wonder how the Magnum ride would have turned out since there would be no «cloudy windows»…

We booked a doors off tour, and it was canceled at the very last minute. We were standing there in their office and they canceled because two people did not show up and they would not fly the helicopter with just two tourists in it. Kind of ruined our anniversary.
Update: they rebooked us and gave us some free shirts. If the ride goes well I’ll give them more stars.

This was the most amazing thing we’ve ever done! Our pilot Margot was informative friendly and professional she made us feel very safe while we toured the island and provided us a detailed description about the surroundings! We had a wonderful experience with Makani Kai helicopters and I would recommend them in a heart beat!

A fun ride to visit Sacred Falls. Didn’t have cash for a tip (sorry) so I wanted to give a shout to Margot who was an awesome/​funny pilot for us. I got a bit motion sick but that’s just me being me :/

Makani Kai helicopters tours very awesome and highly recommend. Did the 30min tour of Oahu Our pilot Jeff a local from pearl city was the best! He flew us over his home town showed us all the schools he attended and even his house next time doing the longer tour can’t wait. Thanks Jeff!

Wow! Great ride! And i felt perfectly safe the whole time.
Took the open door «Magnum PI» ride! Very windy and noisy, but thats expected. The pilot was very good and gave a good commentary on what we were flying over. Only down side is he said we should not talk till we passed someones house (he has to talk to the tower and air traffic control in the beginning), but then he forgot to say when that was. Not a big deal, since we were mostly busy taking pictures and being thrilled to talk.
I was told afterwords there was a sign in the helicopter saying «Tips are appreciated» for the pilot. I didn’t see it, and now feel guilty for not tipping him. I have a cousin who is a professional pilot, and know how little they get paid. People should take an extra $ 20 with them.
On that note, some tips:
1. Empty your pockets.
2. Tie back your hair if it is long (it will go everywhere)
3. If you wear glasses, you are probably safe because the headphones hold them pretty tightly.
4. Don’t wear anything that will flap around. It will get really annoying.
5. Don’t put your hand out the door to point to something. Even though you cannot tell, the aircraft is moving quite fast and your hand will fly back.

We scheduled our flight a day in advance and they were absolutely accommodating to us. They picked us up at 815am and escorted us to the airport. Our pilot’s name was Jim and let me tell you, he was a hoot! Extremely informative and made us feel comfortable and safe. I would recommend this to anyone coming to visit Oahu. Thank you for an unforgettable experience.

We took a doors off tour and our pilot Jerry did a great job discussing history and specifics of the island so that I could keep my mind off falling out of the thing. Good times!

This is, by far, one of the most amazing things I have ever done on any vacation!!! We booked an hour long open-​door helicopter tour around the island of Oahu! The shuttle picked us up at our hotel in Waikiki Beach and a short ride later we were at the airfield near the Airport! The entire tour was amazing! Our pilot, Jim, was FANTASTIC! Great tour guide as well as pilot! This is a MUST DO if you come to Oahu! You will be soooo glad you did! Two thumbs WAY WAY WAY UP!

I had called before I booked to see how the seating was. I had spoken with other companies and they all had middle seats. I didn’t want a middle seat with limited views in my doors off ride. I was told by the lady on the phone there were not any middle seats. If you get first class you sit up front with the pilot, one on each side.
So I went online and booked first class for $ 265/​person. When we got there surprise surprise I am sitting in the middle. I have all the gauges in front on me, I had to lean over the pilot or my friend to see out the sides.
I explained to the manager after how disappointed I was. I was offered another ride if there were any open and of course they were booked for the week.
If booking the doors off tour I would not recommend first class. Just take the cheaper open seating and ask for the back so you actually get a doors off tour.
Very disappointed with this company, every other company I called was honest and said they had middle seats and were way cheaper.
** I did not decline going out on another tour, that is a lie. I was told by the manager that all yours were booked up till Saturday and I leave Wednesday afternoon. I did decline the merchandise as I do not want to remember a bad experience. I looked at pictures in your site. I couldn’t see the exact seating configuration, hence why I called and asked. **

RUINED OUT TRIP! I used to fly helicopters in Hawaii in the military. I was returning to Oahu to meet my son (now in the army) to spend some time with him before he deployed to Afghanistan. The highlight of our time together was to be the doors off helicopter tour. We scheduled for the saturday I was departing so we could come down from the north shore… take the tour and then he could drop me at the airport. I reserved our flight two weeks ahead of time. On thursday I got a call from flight ops asking if I could reschedule our flight from saturday to friday. No reason was given. I declined saying I wanted to stick with the reserved day and time. On friday morning I got a call that the aircraft was down for maintenance and we would need to reschedule. I asked what was wrong and got a suspicious answer… but asked about other flights. I reserved at 4:00 on saturday on a different aircraft. Later that afternoon I saw a Hughes 500 painted like Makani Kai’s flying a tour over Waimea Bay! I called the company to ask why there was a doors off flight overhead if the aircraft was grounded. They said the one I saw was another company (papillon helicopters) with a similar paint job. I apologized and stuck with our alternate saturday doors on flight. I should have looked up Papillion… now that I have I see they went out of business years ago and I have not been able to find another operator with a 500 painted like that on Oahu.
At no time during ANY of these phone communications did they mention that if there not enough seats sold on a flight the flight would be cancelled. On saturday morning around 10:00 I got a call asking if I would like to get «upgraded» to a one hour flight for same price by coming at 1:00. Since it was already 10:30 and we were on the north shore… to make the one oclock we would have to pack and check out immediately. 4:00 fit my departure flight better as well so I declined. Still no mention of the potential of cancellation. At 1:30 as we were departing the North Shore headed to the helipad I got another call… they just wanted to give me a «heads up». We were the only two people booked on the flight and unless they sold two more seats the flight would be cancelled! I’d like to say I couldn’t believe it but to be honest something seemed fishy from the very first call.
I understand wanting to send out the aircraft full of paying customers but if you have a policy that there is a minimum number of passengers for the flight to lift off that should be clear from the very beginning. Had someone told me that on thursday… that there is a risk of not flying at all due to minimum passenger requirements I could have at least re-​thought the friday flight and been able to take my son around the island by air before he deploys. It ended our time together on a real down note. I felt jacked around and mislead. I’m sure once you get off the ground they do a decent job showing the sights. We just didn’t get off the ground.

Wow! I’ve done helo tours before, but none like this. La Chica’s sister took me out to the military ITT office so we could get a discounted rate, and because they didn’t have the tour I wanted at the time I wanted, they threw in a free upgrade to come at a later time. I love professional compromise, especially when it isn’t necessary. This place does plenty of business, and who I am but one customer?
As for the staff, beyond friendly. I can’t say enough about how pleasant everyone was, from the lady who setup the safety video to the pilot.
The tour itself was great. The views from up there are priceless, so I will let the pictures do the talking once I upload them. Trust me, you wanna do this tour!

We booked online and PAID on their website not on a third party site. They email to tell us the day we paid foe is not available. If its not available why not block out the date online? Why do you take peoples money and let them pay for something thats not available!
To make things worse they are nor accommodating when you call them and they only offer to give you a refund in 7 days!!! We want our money back now if you cannot give us the service we are paying for!!! This is very upsetting ad this is our honeymoon and this is something we really wanted to do!!! I would never recommend this company! Watch out for people who just don’t care and only want to take your money!!!

«You’re from Aiea? We hardly ever get locals here»
I can understand why. The high price tag delayed us from booking a tour. Hell, it almost kept us from booking it completely! However, I highly recommend this tour to locals. The experience will be completely different for you than it is for tourists, but it is a one of a kind experience that will hold a special place in your memory for a long time.
Located off of lagoon dr, Makani Kai is very easy to locate if you don’t take transportation from Waikiki. They check you in as you arrive and show you the safety video right away. It seems as if that wouldn’t be very efficient since they showed the video 3 times for the 3 parties on our helicopter, but we didn’t even notice it was playing while we were watching TV on the other side of the room.
A note: don’t lie about your weight here. 5 pounds off? no problem, but please remember that there is a computer program that balances the plane based on your reported weight. If you grossly lie about it, the helo won’t be balanced, which is UNSAFE… so seriously… don’t lie.
We were very lucky to get the front row seats based on the computer program. We could see EVERYTHING! So this is why it’s great for locals. As our pilot was pointing everything out, we noticed how difficult it would be to spot some of these buildings if we didn’t know exactly what they looked like. For example, would you know what the kamehameha schools looked like from above if you’ve never even heard of them before? no, probably not. We enjoyed it so much more with the knowledge of the island and felt like we saw so much more.
We hovered close to the top of the ridges I could never dream of climbing. We saw the top of sacred falls, a portion of the island I never expected to see. We followed the same aerial shot seen at the beginning of the reveal of jurassic park. I will never forget these moments.
The employees are very nice, very safe, and very honest. They offered us our video, but then continued to say they wouldn’t personally buy it since the quality is poor. Instead, take this free canned video of what you saw on a much better quality camera… SCORE.
Put this on the list of must see’s when your friends come to visit.