Flight number record

AA 1953

American Airlines · New York to Dallas-Fort Worth

Route: JFK → DFW
Departs: 18:20
Flights: 362
Period: July 2025 to June 2026

Historical statistics for July 2025 to June 2026, not live status. For today’s AA 1953, check with American Airlines.

AA 1953 sits in the middle of the pack with a C. About seven flights in ten arrive on time by the DOT's definition, 8 points worse than the national rate of 77.6%. The late ones land close to two hours behind schedule. That rests on 362 flights, with a median arrival 3 minutes early.

The national on-time rate over the same period is 77.6%, so AA 1953 runs 8 points behind the country as a whole. Across a thousand flights that is about 83 extra late arrivals.

On time

69.3%

Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 348 completed flights

Avg delay

112 min

Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights

Cancelled

2.76%

National rate is 1.81%

1 hour+ late

14.4%

National rate is 8.1%

These figures cover 362 flights between July 2025 and June 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 14.4% 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 1953 flies

AA 1953 flies JFK to DFW without a single fixed slot. Its most common scheduled departure was 18:20, used on 69 of 362 flights, with 11:00 (44 flights) and 18:29 (43 flights) next. Carriers retime flights through the season, so the rates here blend slightly different positions in the aircraft's day.

Departs 18:2069 flights19.1%
Departs 11:0044 flights12.2%
Departs 18:2943 flights11.9%

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 18:20 departure sits in the 5pm–8pm window. Across every US flight scheduled in that window the on-time rate is 68.2%, and AA 1953 runs level with that at 69.3%. 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 1953 next to JFK to DFW

Every carrier on JFK to DFW combined arrived on time 76.3% of the time across 2,014 flights, so AA 1953 is 7 points behind it. American flew 1,409 flights on the same city pair under all its flight numbers, including this one, and those ran 77.6% on time. Across its whole network American Airlines managed 74.4%, which this flight trails by 5 points.

AA 1953 against its route and carrier
Compared with	Flights	On time	Avg delay	Cancelled	Grade
AA 1953thin sample	362	69.3%	112 min	2.76%	C
All American Airlines on JFK–DFW	1,409	77.6%	87 min	2.56%	B
All carriers on JFK–DFW	2,014	76.3%	88 min	2.93%	B
American Airlines, whole network	986,297	74.4%	85 min	2.29%	C

Across the year

AA 1953 quarter by quarter

AA 1953 did not run the same all year. Its best quarter was Jan–Mar 2026 at 79.5% on time and its weakest Jul–Sep 2025 at 60.7%, a swing of 19 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 flights60.7%
Oct–Dec 202589 flights68.2%
Jan–Mar 202690 flights79.5%
Apr–Jun 202691 flights69.3%

Scale runs 50% to 85%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.

By weekday, AA 1953 did best on Tuesday at 82.0% on time and worst on Sunday at 59.2%. Each day rests on about 52 flights, so a gap of 23 points is worth noticing but could still narrow in another year.

Delay causes

Why AA 1953 runs late

One category carries most of the weight here. Late-arriving aircraft accounts for 46% of the 12,000 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.

Late-arriving aircraft
46%
Carrier
34%
National Airspace System
18%
Extreme weather
1%

46% 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 12,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 32 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 12,008 delay minutes reported on AA 1953.

Cancellations run at 2.76%, against 1.81% nationally. That is roughly one flight in 40 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

For anyone connecting, the number to weigh is not the on-time rate but the tail behind it. 14.4% of arrivals land a full hour or more behind schedule, against 8.1% nationally. A 45-minute layover does not survive that, and no amount of walking quickly changes it. Ninety minutes is the honest minimum here, and two hours if the onward flight is on a separate ticket.

The 1,391 miles between these two airports put this in the middle of the US network, around two and a half to three hours of block time. That is enough cruise to absorb a ten-minute late pushback and not enough to absorb thirty. It is also long enough that the aircraft usually flies three or four legs a day rather than six, which slows how fast delay compounds.

Every one of the 362 flights under AA 1953 in the data flew JFK to DFW. 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. 362 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 1953

For a booking, the cancellation rate is the figure to plan around on AA 1953: 2.76% of its 362 scheduled flights did not operate. A late arrival costs close to two hours, 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