Rainbow Drive-In, Reviewed

Hours, holiday closures and prices from Rainbow’s own site and Kapahulu menu, checked Sep 27, 2026. Drive times from Google Maps the same day.

Best for

• CouplesGoodA cheap, quick dinner until 9 p.m., but a counter, not a date night.
• FamiliesGreatPlates from $12.75, a $5.75 hamburger, pancakes, and fries in place of rice.
• FriendsGreatOrder a spread of plates, or come for the weekday happy hour.
• SoloGreatOne plate is one meal, and the window is open 14 hours a day.
• GroupsGoodOnline pickup and 64-ounce buckets of chili, but only a covered counter area.

After the Mix Plate, the classics are the Loco Moco Plate ($15.50: two patties on rice with gravy and two eggs), the Chili Plate ($13.25, Rainbow’s own beef and bean chili over rice) and the BBQ Beef Plate ($15.95). For something smaller, the Rainbow Royal ($7.95) is a two-patty cheeseburger and saimin ($6.50) is the local noodle soup. Daily specials start at 9 a.m., such as BBQ ahi on Tuesday. Prices are as printed on the Kapahulu menu, checked September 27, 2026. More local food: our local Hawaiian snacks guide.

Seiju and Ayako Ifuku opened Rainbow Drive-In in Kapahulu in 1961. Seiju, born in Hawaii and raised in Okinawa, learned to cook in the Army while serving with the 100th Battalion in World War II, according to the restaurant’s own history. The family’s third generation runs it now. You order at the window under the rainbow-striped canopy and eat at the covered tables beside it or take it to go. There is no bar and no alcohol.

Open daily from 7 a.m. to 9 p.m., with breakfast until 10:30 a.m. The Monday to Thursday happy hour, 3 to 5 p.m., sells saimin and chili fries at $5, a chili plate at $10 and a loco moco plate at $12, in person or for online pickup. Plates run $12.75 to $16.95. For the holidays, Rainbow lists itself closed on Thanksgiving Day (Nov 26, 2026), Christmas Day and New Year’s Day, and closing at 6 p.m. on Christmas Eve and New Year’s Eve. Its site also lists an annual cleaning closure on 11/26.

Rainbow is at 3308 Kanaina Avenue, where it meets Kapahulu Avenue, inland from the Diamond Head end of Waikiki. From the Royal Hawaiian it is about 8 minutes and 1.5 miles by car, 17 minutes by transit, or a 30-minute walk along the Ala Wai, per Google Maps. Rainbow does not publish parking details, so a bus or ride-share is the simpler plan. It is one stop on the Kapahulu walk in our self-guided Oahu food tour, near the poke counters in our best poke guide. Staying at the quiet end of the beach? The Kaimana Beach Hotel is a short ride away.

• Ono Seafood is in Kapahulu too, the pick for a two-choice ahi poke bowl instead of a plate; it is takeout only, Tuesday to Saturday until 4 p.m.
• Yama’s Fish Market is the plate lunch for Hawaiian food rather than BBQ beef: lau lau, limu ahi poke and haupia six minutes from Waikiki, with 7 on-site parking stalls.
• Highway Inn is the sit-down Hawaiian plate with a free lot out front, in Waipahu about 31 minutes from Waikiki; order the Tasting Plate for lau lau, kalua pig and beef stew.

• Go Monday to Thursday, 3 to 5 p.m. Happy hour prices, at Kapahulu only.
• Order ahead online. Pickup orders go through Rainbow’s Toast page, happy hour included.
• Ask for gravy. The Mix Plate with Gravy is 20 cents more, or add a side for $2.50.
• Swap your sides. Fries for rice, or coleslaw for mac salad, on any plate.
• Check the day’s special. BBQ ahi is Tuesday only, curry stew Wednesday only.
• Check Instagram before a special trip. Rainbow posts weather and repair closures on @rainbowdrivein.
• Game day? See going to a UH football game; Rainbow closes at 9 p.m.