Carrier performance at one airport
AA→PHX
American Airlines at Phoenix Sky Harbor International
- Departures
- 56,179
- Period
- June 2025 to May 2026
- Routes
- 25
- Rank here
- #6 of 9
American Airlines at Phoenix lands a B, 2 points better than the national rate of 77.4%. About one flight in five arrive 15 minutes late or worse, and those flights are late by a little over an hour on average. That is a workable record, not a spotless one. That rests on 56,179 flights, of which Delta Air Lines flew 10,708 at 86.6% on time.
Measured against the airport rather than the country, American Airlines runs half a point ahead of the 79.1% weighted average across all carriers at PHX. That is the comparison worth making: every operator here works the same runways, the same airspace and the same weather.
Key figures
On time
79.4%
55,381 completed departures
Avg delay
70 min
Across delayed flights only
Cancelled
1.13%
At PHX, this carrier only
Rank here
#6
Of 9 carriers clearing the floor at PHX
These figures cover 56,000 flights between June 2025 and May 2026. The median arrival is 7 minutes early, which is the part an average hides: most flights here are fine, and the on-time rate is decided by a tail of badly late ones. On-time means under 15 minutes late, the DOT's own threshold.
Against the competition
Every carrier at PHX, ranked
The choice of carrier is not cosmetic here. Delta Air Lines arrives on time 86.6% of the time; JetBlue Airways manages 70.6%. Sample sizes sit next to every figure, because a two-point gap across 1,139 flights means less than a ten-point one.
| Airline | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Delta Air Lines | 10,708 | 86.6% | 84 min | 1.06% | A |
| Envoy Air | 9,964 | 85.3% | 49 min | 0.70% | A+ |
| Alaska Airlines | 5,615 | 85.1% | 56 min | 0.68% | A+ |
| United Airlines | 10,185 | 81.5% | 77 min | 0.79% | B+ |
| SkyWest Airlines | 27,166 | 81.3% | 78 min | 0.80% | B+ |
| American Airlines (this page) | 56,179 | 79.4% | 70 min | 1.13% | B |
| Frontier Airlines | 7,555 | 79.0% | 84 min | 1.28% | B |
| Southwest Airlines | 67,877 | 75.1% | 49 min | 0.65% | B+ |
| JetBlue Airways | 1,139 | 70.6% | 68 min | 2.37% | C |
The spread between Delta and JetBlue is 16 points, wide enough that it should decide the booking. On a hundred trips that is 16 more arrivals inside the on-time window.
Route by route
Where American Airlines flies from PHX
American Airlines operates 25 routes out of PHX 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| PHX to DFW · Dallas-Fort Worth | 4,576 | 80.1% | 77 min | 2.53% | B |
| PHX to ORD · Chicago | 2,994 | 79.5% | 75 min | 2.14% | B |
| PHX to CLT · Charlotte | 2,888 | 87.2% | 75 min | 1.21% | A |
| PHX to PHL · Philadelphia | 2,317 | 85.8% | 73 min | 1.68% | A |
| PHX to LAX · Los Angeles | 2,019 | 82.0% | 61 min | 0.54% | B+ |
| PHX to SNA · Santa Ana | 1,864 | 79.0% | 63 min | 0.38% | B+ |
| PHX to MIA · Miami | 1,832 | 81.8% | 63 min | 0.82% | B+ |
| PHX to LAS · Las Vegas | 1,692 | 78.6% | 69 min | 0.89% | B+ |
| PHX to SAN · San Diego | 1,672 | 75.0% | 63 min | 0.66% | B+ |
| PHX to JFK · New York | 1,466 | 77.2% | 70 min | 2.25% | B |
| PHX to ONT · Ontario | 1,321 | 79.6% | 68 min | 0.76% | B+ |
| PHX to SFO · San Francisco | 1,319 | 70.1% | 73 min | 0.91% | C+ |
| PHX to BOS · Boston | 1,316 | 78.6% | 65 min | 1.75% | B |
| PHX to RNO · Reno | 1,245 | 83.7% | 70 min | 0.72% | B+ |
| PHX to AUS · Austin | 1,203 | 74.7% | 64 min | 0.91% | C+ |
| PHX to SMF · Sacramento | 1,139 | 82.6% | 66 min | 0.44% | B+ |
| PHX to DCA · Washington | 1,088 | 84.0% | 60 min | 1.56% | B |
| PHX to SAT · San Antonio | 1,039 | 79.5% | 73 min | 0.77% | B+ |
| PHX to EWR · Newark | 1,001 | 78.0% | 68 min | 2.30% | B |
| PHX to DEN · Denver | 961 | 74.3% | 65 min | 0.62% | C+ |
| PHX to PDX · Portland | 878 | 75.7% | 67 min | 0.46% | B+ |
| PHX to FAT · Fresno | 802 | 81.0% | 80 min | 0.87% | B+ |
| PHX to MCO · Orlando | 792 | 74.2% | 56 min | 0.63% | C+ |
| PHX to TPA · Tampa | 733 | 76.7% | 62 min | 0.68% | B+ |
| PHX to SBA · Santa Barbara | 705 | 77.3% | 95 min | 1.13% | B |
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 16 points between the best and worst carrier. Each bar is the on-time rate for flights scheduled inside that window.
- 5am–8am4,701 flights92.1%
- 8am–11am15,432 flights83.0%
- 11am–2pm9,764 flights79.0%
- 2pm–5pm10,668 flights73.5%
- 5pm–8pm6,951 flights72.4%
- 8pm–5am8,663 flights79.2%
Scale runs 65% to 100%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
Book the early departure. Flights leaving between 5am–8am arrive on time 92.1% of the time, against 72.4% 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.
Across the year
Seasonal pattern
July is the worst month at 72.1% on time, 13 points below February, the best at 84.9%. 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.
Delay causes
What holds this operation up
- 48%Late-arriving aircraft
- 35%Carrier
- 15%National Airspace System
- 2%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. That is a cascade, and cascades start small and grow through the day. Across 801,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 24 to one. It is the strongest argument for booking the first departure of the morning, when the aircraft has been sitting at the gate overnight with nothing to inherit.
Cancellations sit at 1.13% against a national 1.80%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.29%.
7.3% of arrivals land an hour or more late, close to the national 8.2%. That is the figure that decides a connection, and it says a 60 to 75 minute layover is reasonable here while anything under 45 minutes is a bet. Most delays on this route are the a little over an hour kind, which a normal layover absorbs.
56,179 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. February runs 84.9% on time and July 72.1%, a swing of 13 points. If the dates move at all, move them out of July before you think about anything else.
Common questions
American Airlines at PHX
How often is American Airlines at PHX delayed?
About one flight in five arrive at least 15 minutes late, which is the Department of Transportation's definition of a delayed arrival. That works out to 20.6% of the 56,179 flights in this analysis, against 22.6% nationally. Delayed flights are late by a little over an hour on average.
Which airline is most reliable on American Airlines at PHX?
Delta Air Lines leads at 86.6% on time across 10,708 flights. JetBlue Airways is at the other end on 70.6%, a gap of 16 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 PHX?
The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 92.1% on time. The 5pm–8pm window is the weakest at 72.4%, 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 PHX?
July is the weakest month at 72.1% on time, compared with 84.9% in February. Across the year that is 13 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, June 2025 to May 2026. Updated monthly. How this data is collected.