Flight number record

AA 1179

American Airlines · Chicago to Santa Ana

Route: ORD → SNA
Departs: 18:48
Flights: 319
Period: July 2025 to June 2026

Historical statistics for July 2025 to June 2026, not live status. For today’s AA 1179, check with American Airlines.

AA 1179 sits in the middle of the pack with a C−. Close to three flights in four arrive on time by the DOT's definition, 4 points worse than the national rate of 77.6%. The late ones land about an hour behind schedule. That rests on 319 flights, with a median arrival 3 minutes early.

The national on-time rate over the same period is 77.6%, so AA 1179 runs 4 points behind the country as a whole. Across a thousand flights that is about 40 extra late arrivals.

On time

73.6%

Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 307 completed flights

Avg delay

56 min

Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights

Cancelled

3.45%

National rate is 1.81%

1 hour+ late

8.1%

National rate is 8.1%

These figures cover 319 flights between July 2025 and June 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 8.1% of arrivals land a full hour or more behind schedule. That is the number that wrecks a connection, and it is not visible in an on-time percentage alone.

Schedule

When AA 1179 flies

AA 1179 flies ORD to SNA without a single fixed slot. Its most common scheduled departure was 18:48, used on 70 of 319 flights, with 18:54 (46 flights) and 19:30 (36 flights) next. Carriers retime flights through the season, so the rates here blend slightly different positions in the aircraft's day.

Departs 18:4870 flights21.9%
Departs 18:5446 flights14.4%
Departs 19:3036 flights11.3%

Scale runs 0% to 100%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.

Share of scheduled departures at each local time. Times used on fewer than one flight in ten are not listed.

A 18:48 departure sits in the 5pm–8pm window. Across every US flight scheduled in that window the on-time rate is 68.2%, and AA 1179 runs 5 points better at 73.6%. By that time of day most aircraft have flown several legs already, and whatever went wrong earlier is still in the schedule.

Against the route

AA 1179 next to ORD to SNA

Every carrier on ORD to SNA combined arrived on time 75.3% of the time across 2,212 flights, so AA 1179 is 2 points behind it. American flew 1,172 flights on the same city pair under all its flight numbers, including this one, and those ran 75.4% on time. Across its whole network American Airlines managed 74.4%, close to this flight's figure.

AA 1179 against its route and carrier
Compared with	Flights	On time	Avg delay	Cancelled	Grade
AA 1179thin sample	319	73.6%	56 min	3.45%	C−
All American Airlines on ORD–SNA	1,172	75.4%	62 min	1.79%	B
All carriers on ORD–SNA	2,212	75.3%	55 min	1.08%	B
American Airlines, whole network	986,297	74.4%	85 min	2.29%	C

Across the year

AA 1179 quarter by quarter

AA 1179 did not run the same all year. Its best quarter was Oct–Dec 2025 at 80.0% on time and its weakest Apr–Jun 2026 at 63.3%, a swing of 17 points on roughly 80 flights a quarter. The twelve-month rate averages over that, so if you are flying in a weak quarter the quarter's own figure is the better guide.

Jul–Sep 202592 flights75.3%
Oct–Dec 202588 flights80.0%
Jan–Mar 202689 flights71.4%
Apr–Jun 202650 flights63.3%

Scale runs 55% to 85%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.

By weekday, AA 1179 ranged from 69.8% on Sunday to 77.8% on Wednesday. With about 46 flights behind each day, a spread of 8 points is inside normal variation, so the day you fly is not worth changing for this flight.

Delay causes

Why AA 1179 runs late

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 4,533 reported delay minutes.

Late-arriving aircraft
41%
Carrier
39%
National Airspace System
14%
Extreme weather
6%

41% 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 4,533 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 7 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 4,533 delay minutes reported on AA 1179.

Cancellations run at 3.45%, against 1.81% nationally. That is about one flight in 30 cancelled outright. A cancelled flight is invisible in every on-time figure on this page, so the punctuality numbers above describe only the flights that actually operated.

Connections and routes

What a delay on this flight costs

8.1% of arrivals land an hour or more late, close to the national 8.1%. 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 about an hour, which a normal layover absorbs.

At 1,726 miles this is transcontinental flying, and long routes get a quiet structural advantage. Scheduled block time on a flight this length carries more padding in absolute minutes, so a twenty-minute late departure often still becomes an on-time arrival. Read the on-time rate here as slightly flattering next to a short-haul route with the same operational quality.

Every one of the 319 flights under AA 1179 in the data flew ORD to SNA. The number was not reused on any other city pair, which makes this a clean record of one route.

One caution: this is a thin sample. 319 flights over twelve months is enough to clear this site's floor but not enough to pin the rate down tightly, and a single bad week moves it by more than a point. Treat the grade as a rough reading.

What to do with this

Booking AA 1179

For a booking, the cancellation rate is the figure to plan around on AA 1179: 3.45% of its 319 scheduled flights did not operate. A late arrival costs about an hour, but a cancellation costs the day, so leave a later option open.

Where to go next

A flight number here means American Airlines’s own number as it reports to the DOT. How the figures are computed is on the methodology page.

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