Carrier performance at one airport
AA→CLT
American Airlines at Charlotte Douglas International
- Departures
- 113,776
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Routes
- 25
- Rank here
- #6 of 10
American Airlines at Charlotte sits in the middle of the pack with a B. Close to three flights in four arrive on time by the DOT's definition, 2 points worse than the national rate of 77.3%. The late ones land a little over an hour behind schedule. That rests on 113,776 flights, of which Delta Air Lines flew 5,482 at 85.6% on time.
Measured against the airport rather than the country, American Airlines runs half a point behind the 76.1% weighted average across all carriers at CLT. That is the comparison worth making: every operator here works the same runways, the same airspace and the same weather.
Key figures
On time
75.5%
111,561 completed departures
Avg delay
70 min
Across delayed flights only
Cancelled
1.70%
At CLT, this carrier only
Rank here
#6
Of 10 carriers clearing the floor at CLT
These figures cover 114,000 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 9.0% of arrivals land a full hour or more behind schedule, against 8.3% nationally.
Against the competition
Every carrier at CLT, ranked
The choice of carrier is not cosmetic here. Delta Air Lines arrives on time 85.6% of the time; Frontier Airlines manages 68.3%. Sample sizes sit next to every figure, because a two-point gap across 3,341 flights means less than a ten-point one.
| Airline | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Delta Air Lines | 5,482 | 85.6% | 84 min | 1.37% | A |
| Envoy Air | 5,813 | 83.4% | 60 min | 1.72% | B |
| United Airlines | 2,265 | 81.8% | 84 min | 1.77% | B |
| Republic Airways | 3,975 | 81.5% | 88 min | 4.28% | B− |
| Southwest Airlines | 3,248 | 76.7% | 55 min | 1.63% | B |
| American Airlines (this page) | 113,776 | 75.5% | 70 min | 1.70% | B |
| PSA Airlines | 38,800 | 75.2% | 73 min | 2.64% | B |
| Spirit Airlines | 2,106 | 74.6% | 68 min | 5.27% | C− |
| SkyWest Airlines | 2,037 | 74.2% | 148 min | 2.95% | C |
| Frontier Airlines | 3,341 | 68.3% | 98 min | 4.49% | C− |
Spirit Airlines cancels 5.3% of what it schedules here, the highest in the table. A cancelled flight never appears in an on-time rate, so read that column alongside the punctuality one rather than after it.
Route by route
Where American Airlines flies from CLT
American Airlines operates 25 routes out of CLT with enough volume to report. Route records inside one carrier at one airport still spread widely, because a short shuttle and a transcontinental have very different exposure to a late inbound.
| Route | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| CLT to MCO · Orlando | 3,686 | 71.6% | 74 min | 1.71% | C |
| CLT to DFW · Dallas-Fort Worth | 3,621 | 78.3% | 69 min | 2.13% | B |
| CLT to MIA · Miami | 3,269 | 78.1% | 78 min | 1.38% | B |
| CLT to ORD · Chicago | 3,144 | 71.5% | 78 min | 2.70% | C |
| CLT to RDU · Raleigh | 3,010 | 77.3% | 69 min | 1.46% | B |
| CLT to TPA · Tampa | 2,884 | 76.6% | 63 min | 1.56% | B |
| CLT to PHX · Phoenix | 2,881 | 80.0% | 67 min | 1.01% | B |
| CLT to PHL · Philadelphia | 2,873 | 79.1% | 77 min | 2.47% | B |
| CLT to LGA · New York | 2,767 | 69.8% | 76 min | 3.79% | C− |
| CLT to BOS · Boston | 2,726 | 74.1% | 66 min | 2.13% | C |
| CLT to DCA · Washington | 2,444 | 66.9% | 69 min | 2.78% | C |
| CLT to LAX · Los Angeles | 2,276 | 78.8% | 59 min | 0.92% | B+ |
| CLT to BNA · Nashville | 2,229 | 74.6% | 74 min | 1.39% | C |
| CLT to FLL · Fort Lauderdale | 2,069 | 77.1% | 61 min | 1.79% | B |
| CLT to LAS · Las Vegas | 2,053 | 78.3% | 64 min | 0.97% | B+ |
| CLT to DTW · Detroit | 2,051 | 78.9% | 76 min | 1.80% | B |
| CLT to RIC · Richmond | 1,950 | 75.8% | 70 min | 1.59% | B |
| CLT to JAX · Jacksonville | 1,924 | 77.2% | 66 min | 1.09% | B |
| CLT to IND · Indianapolis | 1,909 | 76.8% | 72 min | 1.26% | B |
| CLT to JFK · New York | 1,863 | 70.5% | 77 min | 2.95% | C |
| CLT to EWR · Newark | 1,831 | 71.5% | 77 min | 3.50% | C− |
| CLT to BWI · Baltimore | 1,780 | 76.4% | 74 min | 1.52% | B |
| CLT to RSW · Fort Myers | 1,774 | 77.4% | 59 min | 1.41% | B |
| CLT to PIT · Pittsburgh | 1,760 | 77.5% | 67 min | 1.25% | B |
| CLT to CHS · Charleston | 1,733 | 75.2% | 74 min | 1.27% | B |
Flight by flight
American Airlines flight numbers from CLT
14 American Airlines flight numbers leaving CLT flew their main route often enough to have a record of their own. Grouped by destination.
- AA 1843to BOS 22:2970.8%
- AA 2794to EWR 20:3362.5%
- AA 1840to IAH 20:4573.6%
- AA 1727to JFK 20:2961.8%
- AA 1060to LGA 18:0459.1%
- AA 1879to MCO 20:1562.6%
- AA 1962to PIT 23:0172.0%
- AA 1882to RIC 23:0666.4%
- AA 1176to RSW 16:5067.5%
- AA 2604to SRQ 19:0074.5%
- AA 1550to TPA 18:1476.5%
- AA 1773to TPA 21:3563.4%
- AA 2022to TPA 20:1567.1%
- AA 2662to TUL 18:2572.9%
Departure window
Best time of day for this operation
Departure time matters more here than the choice of carrier. The gap between the best and worst window is 20 points, against 17 points between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am8,261 flights89.2%
- 8am–11am18,629 flights85.7%
- 11am–2pm20,536 flights79.4%
- 2pm–5pm19,455 flights71.5%
- 5pm–8pm20,229 flights68.9%
- 8pm–5am26,666 flights69.2%
Scale runs 60% to 95%.
Book the early departure. Flights leaving between 5am–8am arrive on time 89.2% of the time, against 68.9% for the evening window. That is 20 points of difference for no extra money, and it comes from the same aircraft having had no earlier flight to fall behind on. The 8pm–5am window is the busiest, with 26,666 flights scheduled in it.
Across the year
Seasonal pattern
July is the worst month at 63.5% on time, 19 points below September, the best at 82.3%. Summer afternoon convection and peak-season schedules land on the same weeks every year, so this is a pattern you can book around rather than a run of bad luck. October was the busiest month here, with 10,209 flights.
Delay causes
What holds this operation up
- 48%Late-arriving aircraft
- 30%Carrier
- 15%National Airspace System
- 7%Extreme weather
- 0%Security
48% of delay minutes trace back to a late-arriving aircraft, meaning the plane was already behind before it got here. Across 1.91 million reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 7 to one. The split is drawn from 1,913,058 reported delay minutes.
Cancellations sit at 1.70% against a national 1.89%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.24%.
9.0% of arrivals land a full hour or more behind schedule, against 8.3% nationally. Ninety minutes is the honest minimum for a connection here, and two hours if the onward flight is on a separate ticket.
113,776 flights sit behind these numbers, which is a large enough sample that the headline rate is not moving on noise. Where a sub-group falls below 30 flights the site shows a dash instead of a percentage.
Put together: the calendar is the biggest lever here, not the carrier or the hour. September runs 82.3% on time and July 63.5%, a swing of 19 points. If the dates move at all, move them out of July before you think about anything else. 111,561 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
American Airlines at CLT
How often is American Airlines at CLT delayed?
About one flight in four arrives at least 15 minutes late, which is the Department of Transportation's definition of a delayed arrival. That works out to 24.5% of the 113,776 flights in this analysis, against 22.7% nationally. Delayed flights are late by a little over an hour on average.
Which airline is most reliable on American Airlines at CLT?
Delta Air Lines leads at 85.6% on time across 5,482 flights. Frontier Airlines is at the other end on 68.3%, a gap of 17 points. Sample size matters as much as the percentage: a rate built from a few hundred flights moves around far more than one built from ten thousand.
What time of day has the fewest delays on American Airlines at CLT?
The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 89.2% on time. The 5pm–8pm window is the weakest at 68.9%, 20 points behind. Later departures inherit delays from earlier flights the same aircraft has already flown, which is why the curve slopes the way it does.
How bad are July delays on American Airlines at CLT?
July is the weakest month at 63.5% on time, compared with 82.3% in September. Across the year that is 19 points between the best and worst months. Moving flexible dates out of that month is one of the few things that reliably helps.
Related
Where to go next
Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics, on-time performance data, September 2025 to August 2026. Last updated ; recomputed monthly. How this data is collected.