Hawaii County, HI Sign Regulations: Digital Billboards (2026)

Section 3-7(a) of the county sign code lists what no one may erect or maintain anywhere in the county, regardless of zoning district. Item (6) bans "any automated sign including signs with repeated or changeable commercial advertising," which is the provision that reaches digital and electronic message boards: a screen that cycles ads or changes copy on its own is an automated sign under this clause. Item (10) separately bans flashing signs outright. Item (13) bans "any sign that is a billboard or outdoor advertising device prohibited by chapter 445, Hawai'i Revised Statutes," folding the state's outdoor-advertising statute into the county code.

Item (7) closes the loophole of pretending a billboard is exempt: any sign that is not expressly permitted or exempted by this chapter is itself prohibited, and Sections 3-9 through 3-12 (the district-by-district permitted-sign lists for residential, commercial, industrial and agricultural zones) contain no allowance for automated, changeable-message or billboard signage. The Planning Department's Rule 23 STVR standard and other special permits do not carve out an exception for advertising signage; a landowner who has a special or use permit for some other activity still must confine signage to what that permit's own district allows under Section 3-6(c).

Because the ban sits in the "prohibited in all districts" article rather than a district-specific rule, it applies uniformly across Hilo, Kailua-Kona and every unincorporated community on the island; there is no municipal layer beneath the county code to create a local exception.