Thrips hawaiiensis (Morgan) (Thysanoptera: Thripidae), which originates in Oriental and Pacific regions, is one of the economically critical thrips pest. As T. hawaiiensis has a marked thigmokinetic behavior, invasive capacity, high fecundity, and a short life-cycle, it is a potential worldwide pest of numerous plants, such as mango, banana, citrus, tea, coffee, and many horticultural plants. At present, T. hawaiiensis is known to cause serious damages to all species of banana crops cultivated in China. In particular, the thrips has been a key pest of the banana crops at the flowering stage, leading to large annual economic losses because of yield reductions and management costs. Understanding the population dynamics of a particular pest is important to monitor and predict the occurrence of the pest, and then proposing a cost-effective and eco-friendly integrated pest management (IPM) strategy. To date, however, the life history characteristics of the field T. hawaiiensis population remain largely unknown. In the present study, field-based experiments were conducted to investigate the population activity, rhythm, dynamics, spatial distribution pattern, and sex ratio of T. hawaiiensis. Moreover, 3 major banana planting areas, Chengmai of Hainan, Yulin of Guangxi, and Jinghong of Yunnan and 3 species of banana plants, Musa cavendish AAA, Musa acuminata Lour, and Musa paradisiaca AA were selected for the experiments. The blue-sticky cards and field survey were used for the experiments. All of these works were carried out from 2016 to 2018. Our results revealed that the adult T. hawaiiensis were active in the heights from 0.5 m to 15 m and most of the thrips were captured in the heights from 2 m to 6 m, indicating that the thrips population could be significantly correlated with the height. The field survey also revealed that T. hawaiiensis had a similar trend of daily activity rhythm in sunny-, cloudy-, and rainy-day, showing that the peak period was from 12:00 am to 16:00 pm. The thrips were not active at night and in the cloudy-, and rainy-day. The population dynamics of T. hawaiiensis was not influenced by the banana species and planting areas, with a similar pattern of population dynamics in the banana orchards tested. Importantly, it seemed that the banana growing season played a key role in the growth and declining rhythm of the thrips population, showing that T. hawaiiensis exhibited a single-peaked preference. A rapid population increase was observed during the flower-bud stage, and the peak time was in the flowering stage, while few of the thrips occurred in the other crop season. Aggregation index and Taylor regression analysis revealed that T. hawaiiensis had an aggregating distribution in the banana orchards. Finally, sex ratio analysis demonstrated that T. hawaiiensis was a female-dominant species, with approximately 70% female rate. Overall, the current study helps in understanding the population activity rhythm, dynamics, and spatial distribution pattern of adult T. hawaiiensis in banana orchards. These results would expand the basic knowledge of the ecological characteristics of T. hawaiiensis, providing useful information for implementing better forecast system and integrated pest management strategies for T. hawaiiensis control programs.