The Lanihuli Observatory will be used by students enrolled in the college's astronomy courses and Hawaii Space Grant program, as well as by the thousands of K-12 students who visit the Imaginarium and Aerospace Exploration Lab at Windward Community College. The observatory will also be made available to the community after public Imaginarium shows.

According to a WCC news release, visitors will be able to view the planets, moon and stars through a 16-inch optical telescope, listen to the sounds of Jupiter, the sun and Milky Way galaxy with the college's radio telescope operated in affiliation with NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, and watch real-time images of the weather conditions surrounding the Hawaiian Islands with the observatory's weather satellite tracking station. The facility also includes a 6-inch solar heliostat for extra large-scale views of the sun. While the optical telescope will be used primarily for evening viewing, the solar telescope will allow thousands of school children to observe the sun in a safe and unique way during the day.

In addition, a radio telescope for listening in on Jupiter and the sun will operate from the control room in affiliation with NASA's Radio Jove Project. Data collected from this radio telescope is already available to classrooms across the country via the Internet. A NOAA weather satellite tracking station will allow students to view live images of Hawai'i's cloud cover and weather.