Airport month record

LAXDEC

Los Angeles International in December 2025

Departures: 16,050
Month: December 2025
National, same month: 73.2%
Carriers: 10

Historical statistics for December 2025, not live status or a forecast for this year’s December. For today’s conditions at LAX, see live FAA status.

LAX in December lands a B+, 5 points better than the national rate of 73.2%. Roughly one flight in four arrives 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 16,050 flights, of which Alaska Airlines flew 698 at 84.8% on time.

Alaska Airlines is the most reliable of the eight carriers covered here at 84.8% on time across 698 flights.

On time

77.7%

Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 15,869 completed departures

Avg delay

71 min

Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights

Cancelled

0.88%

Nationally in December: 1.55%

Whole year

80.4%

LAX across all twelve months

These figures cover 16,050 departures from Los Angeles International in December 2025. On time means an arrival less than 15 minutes after the scheduled gate time, the DOT's threshold, and the national comparison uses every US departure in the same month rather than the whole year.

Against the year

December next to LAX's other months

Against LAX's own year, December ran 3 points worse than the twelve-month rate of 80.4%, which makes it number nine of twelve months, best first. Either side of it, November ran 79.7% on time and January 81.2%, so a trip moved by a few weeks would have landed in a better stretch.

LAX month by month
Month	Flights	On time	Avg delay	Cancelled	Grade
July 2025	17,104	77.5%	78 min	1.20%	B
August 2025	16,493	82.5%	73 min	0.53%	B+
September 2025	15,262	85.8%	66 min	0.28%	A+
October 2025	16,122	83.5%	70 min	0.31%	B+
November 2025	15,422	79.7%	67 min	1.78%	B
December 2025 (this page)	16,050	77.7%	71 min	0.88%	B+
January 2026	14,815	81.2%	76 min	2.17%	B
February 2026	13,687	80.9%	69 min	1.42%	B
March 2026	16,088	77.7%	65 min	1.29%	B
April 2026	15,732	81.5%	62 min	0.44%	B+
May 2026	16,317	80.0%	64 min	0.54%	B+
June 2026	16,664	77.0%	69 min	0.61%	B+

Departure window

The best time of day to leave LAX in December

Departure time matters more here than the choice of carrier. The gap between the best and worst window is 16 points, against 16 points between the best and worst carrier. Each bar is the on-time rate for flights scheduled inside that window.

5am–8am1,967 flights89.7%
8am–11am4,034 flights79.6%
11am–2pm2,672 flights73.9%
2pm–5pm2,157 flights73.3%
5pm–8pm2,316 flights76.3%
8pm–5am2,904 flights74.4%

Scale runs 65% to 95%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.

Book the early departure. Flights leaving between 5am–8am arrive on time 89.7% of the time, against 73.3% for the afternoon window. That is 16 points of difference for no extra money, and it comes from the same aircraft having had no earlier flight to fall behind on. The 8am–11am window is the busiest, with 4,034 flights scheduled in it.

Across the week, Thursday is the strongest day at 81.8% on time and Friday the weakest at 71.7%. 10 points is a smaller lever than departure hour, but it is free.

Carrier by carrier

Which airlines ran best at LAX in December

The choice of carrier is not cosmetic here. Alaska Airlines arrives on time 84.8% of the time; Frontier Airlines manages 69.1%. Sample sizes sit next to every figure, because a two-point gap across 481 flights means less than a ten-point one.

Carriers at LAX in December 2025
Airline	Flights	On time	Avg delay	Cancelled	Grade
SkyWest Airlines	3,397	81.4%	78 min	0.62%	B+
Delta Air Lines	3,049	78.8%	72 min	1.57%	B
American Airlines	2,477	75.4%	85 min	0.44%	B+
United Airlines	2,465	79.8%	61 min	0.12%	B+
Southwest Airlines	2,158	74.8%	52 min	0.19%	C+
JetBlue Airways	756	70.3%	70 min	2.51%	C
Alaska Airlines	698	84.8%	55 min	0.57%	B+
Frontier Airlines	481	69.1%	73 min	2.49%	C
Spirit Airlinesthin sample	350	71.6%	83 min	4.29%	C−
Hawaiian Airlinesthin sample	200	62.6%	96 min	2.50%	D

The spread between Alaska and Frontier 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

Busiest routes out of LAX in December

Routes from LAX in December 2025
Route	Flights	On time	Avg delay	Cancelled	Grade
LAX to JFK · New York	894	78.1%	98 min	2.46%	B
LAX to SFO · San Francisco	842	65.4%	65 min	0.48%	C+
LAX to LAS · Las Vegas	682	76.2%	56 min	0.73%	B+
LAX to PHX · Phoenix	668	82.3%	61 min	0.45%	B+
LAX to DEN · Denver	651	80.3%	59 min	0.46%	B+
LAX to SEA · Seattle	629	82.0%	67 min	1.43%	B
LAX to ORD · Chicago	569	73.5%	107 min	1.23%	C
LAX to DFW · Dallas-Fort Worth	508	75.8%	70 min	0.00%	B+
LAX to HNL · Honolulu	490	69.6%	85 min	1.22%	C
LAX to EWR · Newark	475	74.7%	80 min	1.47%	C
LAX to IAH · Houston	448	79.2%	60 min	0.89%	B+
LAX to ATL · Atlanta	441	71.8%	65 min	1.13%	C
LAX to SMF · Sacramento	431	85.0%	64 min	0.70%	A+
LAX to PDX · Portland	382	85.3%	60 min	0.26%	A+
LAX to BOS · Boston	380	76.0%	82 min	1.32%	B
LAX to SJC · San Jose	379	81.4%	71 min	0.79%	B+
LAX to SLC · Salt Lake Citythin sample	356	86.5%	81 min	1.97%	A
LAX to AUS · Austinthin sample	345	75.1%	58 min	0.00%	B+
LAX to MCO · Orlandothin sample	308	76.0%	78 min	1.30%	B
LAX to MIA · Miamithin sample	287	74.6%	63 min	0.00%	C+
LAX to FLL · Fort Lauderdalethin sample	238	61.7%	63 min	1.26%	D
LAX to TUS · Tucsonthin sample	223	80.2%	89 min	0.45%	B+
LAX to IAD · Washingtonthin sample	215	86.4%	38 min	0.47%	A+
LAX to DTW · Detroitthin sample	215	74.2%	60 min	2.79%	C
LAX to CLT · Charlottethin sample	196	76.0%	62 min	0.00%	B+

Delay causes

What held LAX up in December

Carriers report a reason for every delay minute they cause, in five DOT categories. The split below is by minutes, not by number of flights, so a handful of very long weather delays weighs as much as many short ones. It covers 251,000 reported delay minutes.

Carrier
42%
Late-arriving aircraft
38%
National Airspace System
17%
Extreme weather
3%
Security
0%

38% 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 251,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 12 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. The split is drawn from 251,322 reported delay minutes.

Cancellations are rare at 0.88%, below the national 1.55% and low enough to earn the plus on the grade. Roughly one flight in 100 is called off; the risk here is arriving late, not not arriving.

7.9% of arrivals land an hour or more late, close to the national 10.0%. 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 last a little over an hour, which a normal layover absorbs.

What to do with this

Flying from LAX in December

For a December trip through LAX: expect 77.7% on time and 0.88% cancelled, going by December 2025. The 5am–8am window was the strongest part of the day.

Los Angeles International (LAX), the whole year
LAX in July77.5%
LAX in August82.5%
LAX in September85.8%
LAX in October83.5%
LAX in November79.7%
LAX in January81.2%
LAX in February80.9%
LAX in March77.7%
LAX in April81.5%
LAX in May80.0%
LAX in June77.0%

Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics, on-time performance data, July 2025 to June 2026. Last updated 15 September 2026; recomputed monthly. How this data is collected.

Key figures