The general rule: two years, for persons and property alike
Under Haw. Rev. Stat. § 657-7, actions for the recovery of compensation for damage or injury to persons or property must be instituted within two years after the cause of action accrued. Unlike many states that split personal injury and property damage into separate statutes with different deadlines, Hawaii covers both under this same two-year rule.
Medical malpractice: discovery-based, with a hard 6-year outer limit
Medical malpractice claims generally must be filed within two years of discovering, or reasonably having discovered, the injury. But a separate statute of repose sets a hard outer boundary: no malpractice suit can be filed more than six years after the malpractice actually occurred, regardless of when the injury was discovered. There's a narrow exception where fraud or collusion prevented timely discovery.
Wrongful death: the clock starts at death
Under Hawaii Revised Statutes § 663, a wrongful death claim's statute of limitations begins running at the time of death, rather than at the time of the underlying injury that eventually caused it.
Government claims: no special shortened deadline
Here's a genuinely distinctive fact about Hawaii. In most states, suing a government entity requires meeting a much shorter notice deadline than the general personal injury rule. Hawaii doesn't work that way — its state supreme court struck down a shorter county deadline as unconstitutional, so claims against Hawaii government entities generally follow the same two-year rule as everyone else. See our full guide to why Hawaii doesn't have the usual government notice trap.
Damage caps worth knowing
Separate from timing, Hawaii caps non-economic damages like pain and suffering at $375,000 in almost any personal injury case, including medical malpractice — a substantive limit worth understanding alongside the filing deadline itself.