Language
Keiki: What the Hawaiian Word for Child Means
Keiki means child in Hawaiian. You will see it on restaurant menus, activity programs, and signs across Hawaii. Here is what it means and how it is used.
Keiki (pronounced KAY-kee) is the Hawaiian word for child. It is one of the most frequently encountered Hawaiian words in everyday life in Hawaii, appearing on children's menus at restaurants, in activity programs, on park signs, and in ordinary conversation. Knowing it makes daily life in Hawaii a little more readable.
What keiki means
Keiki means child or children. The word likely derives from the Proto-Polynesian *keiki or *taiki, cognate with words in other Polynesian languages like Samoan tamaiti and Tahitian tamaiʻi. The Hawaiian language does not use separate singular and plural forms in the same way English does: keiki can refer to one child or many children depending on context. It can describe a baby, a toddler, an older child, or young people generally.
The word also has a botanical use: in orchid growing, a keiki is a small plantlet that grows from the stem of an existing orchid, a child plant. This horticultural usage reflects the Hawaiian cultural tendency to see relationships between humans and nature in familial terms - the same linguistic pattern that produces phrases like keiki o ka ʻāina (children of the land).
How it is used
In practical visitor contexts, you will most commonly see keiki on restaurant menus (the keiki menu is the children's menu, typically for ages 12 and under), at activity operators (keiki surf lessons for young beginners, keiki snorkel programs with shallow-water focus), and at parks and beaches (keiki swimming areas with calmer water and lifeguard supervision). It is also used at the Merrie Monarch Festival in keiki hula competitions, where children as young as five perform alongside adults, demonstrating the transmission of hula across generations.
In cultural and political contexts, the phrase keiki o ka ʻāina (children of the land) refers to Native Hawaiians as people whose genealogy connects them to the Hawaiian islands. This phrase appears in mele (songs), in speeches about Hawaiian identity, and in discussions of land rights and sovereignty. It expresses the deep genealogical connection between the Hawaiian people and their homeland that underlies concepts like mālama ʻāina (caring for the land) and kuleana (responsibility and privilege tied to place).
Related words
The Hawaiian family vocabulary is useful for visitors: makua means parent; kupuna means grandparent or elder; ʻohana means family in the extended sense; and wahine and kāne mean woman and man. See our guides to ohana and wahine and kāne for more detail. For a broader vocabulary list, see common Hawaiian words.
Frequently Asked Questions
What does keiki mean in Hawaiian?
What is a keiki menu?
What does keiki o ka aina mean?
We research each guide against primary sources: the Hawaii Tourism Authority and Mālama Hawaii, the National Park Service, the State of Hawaii and its Division of State Parks, the National Weather Service, and the U.S. Census. For culture, language, and history we lean on the Office of Hawaiian Affairs, the Bishop Museum, and the scholarship of Mary Kawena Pukui. We send readers to those sources rather than speaking over them. When rules, prices, or conditions change, we update the page.