Hawaii PE and architect license renewal: what firms need to track

Last checked Sep 28, 2026. Not yet confirmed with the Hawaii Board of Professional Engineers, Architects, Surveyors and Landscape Architects. Confirm anything you act on with the board. Not legal advice.

If your firm has engineers or architects licensed in Hawaii, you track three kinds of dates: each person’s license expiration, the end of each person’s CE period, and the firm’s own registration. One board, the Hawaii Board of Professional Engineers, Architects, Surveyors and Landscape Architects, licenses both engineers and architects in Hawaii. Worth knowing up front: Hawaii is one of the few places with no PDH hours for PE renewal, so the engineering side is mostly about dates; some structural work needs a structural engineer license.

PE license renewal in Hawaii

Every license expires April 30 of each even-numbered year and is renewed every two years. The next deadline in our data is April 30, 2028.

The board: Hawaii Board of Professional Engineers, Architects, Surveyors and Landscape Architects. Look up each engineer’s current expiration date on the board’s license lookup rather than trusting the date on an old spreadsheet.

License numbers: PVL shows "PE-" + digits; branch (civil, structural...) is a separate field. This is how SealBench reads the numbers on an imported roster; it isn’t a board rule.

PE continuing education (PDH)

• Hours: No PDH hours are required to renew a PE license.
• New licensees: Not applicable: Hawaii has no CE requirement for professional engineers, so there is nothing to exempt.
• Records: Not applicable: no CE requirement for PEs, so no CE record retention rule.
• Reporting: No CE reporting or CE audit for PEs. Only architects certify CE at renewal and face the random CE audit.

Architect license renewal and CE in Hawaii

The architect rules on this page come from our rule tables and haven’t been checked against the architecture board’s rules yet. Check with the board before you rely on them.

Biennial. All licenses expire April 30 of even years. Restoration allowed within 2 years; after that, reapply. The board: Hawaii Board of Professional Engineers, Architects, Surveyors and Landscape Architects (DCCA Professional and Vocational Licensing); each architect’s date is on the license lookup.

• Hours: 16 hours every two years, all in health, safety and welfare (HSW) topics. Two years before the April 30 even-year renewal.
• Also required: Service on state or county boards/commissions up to 50% of required hours.
• Limits on some activities: teaching (at most 8) hours.
• Carryover: Excess credits may not be carried forward (HAR 16-115-60(b)(4)).
• New licensees: Licensed in the first year of the biennium: 8 hours. Licensed in the second year: none (HAR 16-115-60(b)).
• Records: At least 4 years after the renewal period in which courses were taken (HAR 16-115-61(c)).
• Units: An AIA learning unit (LU) is one hour.

Firm registration (COA) and qualifier rules

Engineering firms

Our data shows no separate firm authorization from the Hawaii engineering board. Hawaii does not issue a firm certificate. A corporation, partnership or LLC may practice if the person directly in charge of the engineering work is licensed in Hawaii. That person must be a full-time employee (40+ hours a week), principal, officer, partner, member or manager with legal authority to bind the entity on the professional work. No replacement deadline was found.

Architecture firms

Our data shows no separate architecture firm registration in Hawaii. Hawaii has no firm license. A corporation, partnership or LLC may practice architecture if the person(s) directly in charge of the professional work are licensed (HRS 464-12; HAR 16-115-4). The person in charge must be a full-time employee, principal, officer, partner, member or manager with legal authority to bind the entity on the professional work. No ownership percentage. If the architect named for construction observation is removed or replaced, the licensee must notify the public official within 15 days (HAR 16-115-9(d)). Small private buildings under cost limits are exempt from ch. 464 (HRS 464-13).

Ownership: No firm registration and no ownership percentage. The person(s) directly in charge of the professional work must be licensed and be a full-time employee, principal, officer, partner, member or manager with authority to bind the entity (HAR 16-115-4).

Architect in charge: Person(s) directly in charge of architectural work must be Hawaii-licensed, full-time with the entity, and delegated legal authority to bind it on professional matters (HAR 16-115-4).

Firms that offer both

One joint board licenses engineers, architects, surveyors and landscape architects, and none of them has a firm license. A firm offering both just needs a licensed person in charge of each discipline.

Who can seal drawings in Hawaii

Hawaii ties sealing to the discipline on the license, so a sheet’s discipline has to match what the engineer is licensed in. Structural is its own licensing branch, and the civil branch definition leaves out structural load-bearing design, so structural work needs a structural license (not yet confirmed: scope).

Our data doesn’t record whether an engineer may seal architectural sheets in Hawaii, so ask the architecture board. Joint board; the rules read did not state whether a PE may design or seal architectural work for buildings. Statute exempts privately owned one-story buildings up to $40,000, two-story up to $35,000, one-story residences up to $180,000 and two-story residences up to $162,000 (not reinforced concrete or steel frame) from ch. 464 entirely (HRS 464-13, per search summary of statute text).

Before a set goes out, every sheet has to pass four checks: a Hawaii license, the right discipline, a license still active on the issue date, and the firm’s registration. Compare Hawaii with other states on who can seal drawings, by state.

Common mistakes

Where to file

SealBench never files anything with a board for you. Renewals, CE reports and firm registrations go to the board directly:

• Hawaii Board of Professional Engineers, Architects, Surveyors and Landscape Architects (engineers, architects and firms)
• Hawaii engineer license lookup

How SealBench helps

SealBench keeps every PE and architect license and every firm registration on your roster in one list, soonest expiration first. Reminders at 90, 60 and 30 days before each date are coming soon. It counts each person’s CE hours and required topics against Hawaii’s rules, and Set Check shows who can seal each sheet in a Hawaii permit set, and why anyone can’t. One license is free to track; see pricing.