Flight number record

AA 171

American Airlines · New York to Los Angeles

Route: JFK → LAX
Departs: 06:00
Flights: 363
Period: July 2025 to June 2026

Historical statistics for July 2025 to June 2026, not live status. For today’s AA 171, check with American Airlines.

AA 171 earns an A. Close to nine flights in ten arrive inside the 15-minute window the DOT uses to define an on-time arrival, which puts it 11 points better than the national rate of 77.6%. When something does go wrong the average delay runs about an hour. That rests on 363 flights, with a median arrival 14 minutes early.

Set against the rest of the country, AA 171's record is 11 points better than the US average of 77.6%. That gap is worth roughly 109 fewer late arrivals for every thousand flights.

On time

88.5%

Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 355 completed flights

Avg delay

63 min

Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights

Cancelled

1.93%

National rate is 1.81%

1 hour+ late

2.5%

National rate is 8.1%

These figures cover 363 flights between July 2025 and June 2026. The median arrival is 14 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.

Schedule

When AA 171 flies

AA 171 is scheduled to leave New York (JFK) at 06:00 local time and reach Los Angeles (LAX) at 09:20. That slot held for 329 of the 363 scheduled departures in the data, so the figures below describe one steady operation rather than a number that moved around the clock.

Departs 06:00329 flights90.6%

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 06:00 departure sits in the 5am–8am window. Across every US flight scheduled in that window the on-time rate is 89.3%, and AA 171 runs level with that at 88.5%. Early departures usually start with an aircraft that has not flown yet that day, which is most of why the window does well.

Against the route

AA 171 next to JFK to LAX

Every carrier on JFK to LAX combined arrived on time 77.6% of the time across 10,284 flights, so AA 171 is 11 points ahead of it. American flew 3,237 flights on the same city pair under all its flight numbers, including this one, and those ran 80.3% on time. Across its whole network American Airlines managed 74.4%, which this flight beats by 14 points.

AA 171 against its route and carrier
Compared with	Flights	On time	Avg delay	Cancelled	Grade
AA 171thin sample	363	88.5%	63 min	1.93%	A
All American Airlines on JFK–LAX	3,237	80.3%	95 min	2.04%	B
All carriers on JFK–LAX	10,284	77.6%	77 min	1.94%	B
American Airlines, whole network	986,297	74.4%	85 min	2.29%	C

Across the year

AA 171 quarter by quarter

AA 171 did not run the same all year. Its best quarter was Jul–Sep 2025 at 93.5% on time and its weakest Jan–Mar 2026 at 79.8%, a swing of 14 points on roughly 91 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 flights93.5%
Oct–Dec 202591 flights87.8%
Jan–Mar 202689 flights79.8%
Apr–Jun 202691 flights92.1%

Scale runs 70% to 100%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.

By weekday, AA 171 ranged from 84.0% on Sunday to 92.3% on Wednesday. With about 52 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 171 runs late

One category carries most of the weight here. Carrier accounts for 60% of the 2,599 delay minutes carriers reported, and the remaining four split what is left. The split is by minutes rather than by flights, so a few very long delays count for as much as many short ones.

Carrier
60%
National Airspace System
34%
Late-arriving aircraft
5%

The largest share of delay minutes, 60%, falls under carrier control: crew scheduling, maintenance, fuelling, baggage. Unlike weather, that is a management outcome, and it is the category where the gap between two carriers on the same schedule is genuinely earned. It accounts for 1,566 of the 2,599 delay minutes reported here. The split is drawn from 2,599 delay minutes reported on AA 171.

Cancellations sit at 1.93% against a national 1.81%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.28%.

Connections and routes

What a delay on this flight costs

Badly late arrivals are rare here: only 2.5% land an hour or more behind schedule, against 8.1% nationally. Connections built on this flight are about as safe as US domestic connections get, though a cancelled flight still ignores every layover you give it.

At 2,475 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 363 flights under AA 171 in the data flew JFK to LAX. 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. 363 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 171

For a booking, read AA 171 as 88.5% on time with 1.93% cancelled over 363 flights. Those are rates from the past twelve months, not a forecast for any particular day.

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