The statewide average daily room rate also increased, climbing 7.8 percent to $131.23 last month from $121.75 in February 1995.Occupancy was up 5.1 percentage points from the February 1995 level of 83.23 percent and was the highest since February 1990's rate of 88.8 percent, according to a report by the accounting and consulting firm PKF-Hawaii.
The statewide average daily room rate also increased, climbing 7.8 percent to $131.23 last month from $121.75 in February 1995.
With both occupancy and room rates up, statewide room revenue per available room was up 14.4 percent at $115.92.
Oahu showed the highest occupancy rate at 92.81 percent, up 6.1 percentage points from February 1995. Maui's February occupancy of 87.4 percent was up 3 percentage points from the year-ago period.
Occupancy on the Big Island averaged 79.57 percent, up 6.9 percentage points. Kauai's occupancy was 75.64 percent, up 5.1 percentage points from a year earlier.
Molokai's occupancy of 54.01 percent was down three-quarters of a percentage point.
Waikiki hotels reported a number of sold-out nights in February and neighbor island hotels said they also did well. Ernie Watari, the reporting firm's chairman and chief executive officer, said February was an outstanding month for tourism.
"With Waikiki running at such a high occupancy, you have to wonder what will happen once the convention center opens in 1998 and whether we will be turning away visitors because the hotels are full," he said.
Beachfront hotels in Waikiki averaged 91.95 percent full in February.
PKF-Hawaii, which has been monitoring the hotel industry since the 1970s, surveyed about 54 percent of the hotels and resort condominiums in the state for the February poll. That is less than the two-thirds level it has surveyed in the past because Outrigger Hotels & Resorts recently stopped reporting its occupancy figures to PKF.