Flight number record
UA 1996
United Airlines · Chicago to San Juan
- Route
- ORD → SJU
- Departs
- 08:55
- Flights
- 365
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
Historical statistics for September 2025 to August 2026, not live status. For today’s UA 1996, check with United Airlines.
UA 1996 lands a B+, 2 points better than the national rate of 77.3%. About one flight in five arrives 15 minutes late or worse, and those flights are late by roughly 55 minutes on average. That rests on 365 flights, with a median arrival 5 minutes early.
Key figures
On time
79.1%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 364 completed flights
Avg delay
53 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
0.27%
National rate is 1.89%
1 hour+ late
4.4%
National rate is 8.3%
These figures cover 365 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. The median arrival is 5 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.
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Schedule
When UA 1996 flies
UA 1996 flies ORD to SJU without a single fixed slot. Its most common scheduled departure was 08:55, used on 175 of 365 flights, with 08:49 (135 flights) and 08:52 (55 flights) next.
- Departs 08:55175 flights47.9%
- Departs 08:49135 flights37.0%
- Departs 08:5255 flights15.1%
Scale runs 0% to 100%.
Share of scheduled departures at each local time. Times used on fewer than one flight in ten are not listed.
A 08:55 departure sits in the 8am–11am window. Across every US flight scheduled in that window the on-time rate is 83.9%, and UA 1996 runs 5 points worse at 79.1%. Early departures usually start with an aircraft that has not flown yet that day, which is most of why the window does well.
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Against the route
UA 1996 next to ORD to SJU
Every carrier on ORD to SJU combined arrived on time 73.2% of the time across 1,390 flights, so UA 1996 is 6 points ahead of it. United flew 657 flights on the same city pair under all its flight numbers, including this one, and those ran 79.2% on time. Across its whole network United Airlines managed 78.8%, close to this flight's figure.
| Compared with | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| UA 1996 | 365 | 79.1% | 53 min | 0.27% | B+ |
| All United Airlines on ORD–SJU | 657 | 79.2% | 52 min | 0.30% | B+ |
| All carriers on ORD–SJU | 1,390 | 73.2% | 70 min | 2.23% | C |
| United Airlines, whole network | 830,825 | 78.8% | 73 min | 1.02% | B |
Across the year
UA 1996 quarter by quarter
UA 1996 did not run the same all year. Its best quarter was Apr–Jun 2026 at 87.9% on time and its weakest Jul–Sep 2026 at 74.2%, a swing of 14 points on roughly 73 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 202530 flights80.0%
- Oct–Dec 202592 flights78.3%
- Jan–Mar 202690 flights74.2%
- Apr–Jun 202691 flights87.9%
- Jul–Sep 202662 flights74.2%
Scale runs 65% to 95%.
By weekday, UA 1996 did best on Wednesday at 84.6% on time and worst on Saturday at 68.6%. Each day rests on about 52 flights, so a gap of 16 points is worth noticing but could still narrow in another year.
Arrival by arrival
How late UA 1996 runs when it is late
UA 1996 often beats the schedule: 94 of 364 completed flights, 26%, arrived 15 minutes or more early. The 76 late arrivals split 29 under half an hour, 31 between 30 and 60 minutes, and 16 an hour or more.
- 15+ min early94 flights25.8%
- Within 15 min194 flights53.3%
- 15–29 min late29 flights8.0%
- 30–59 min late31 flights8.5%
- 1–2 hours late8 flights2.2%
- 2+ hours late8 flights2.2%
Scale runs 0% to 100%.
Share of 364 completed flights by arrival against schedule.
Time lost at the gate mostly stays lost. Of 48 departures that left 15 minutes late or more, only 4 made it up before arrival. In the other direction, 32 flights left on time yet arrived 15 minutes late or more, so that delay built up after pushback: in the air, in a holding pattern or on the ground at SJU.
The worst days
Worst days for UA 1996
The latest arrival of the period was on 12 August 2026, 6 hours 15 minutes behind schedule; most of its delay minutes were filed as carrier-caused (crew, maintenance, fuelling, baggage). The five worst days are spread across August, March, November and September, with no single month standing out.
| Date | Arrived late by | Largest filed cause |
|---|---|---|
| 12 August 2026 | 6 hours 15 minutes | Carrier |
| 15 August 2026 | 3 hours 28 minutes | Carrier |
| 16 March 2026 | 2 hours 49 minutes | Extreme weather |
| 8 November 2025 | 2 hours 37 minutes | Late-arriving aircraft |
| 7 September 2025 | 2 hours 33 minutes | Late-arriving aircraft |
Delay causes
Why UA 1996 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 4,010 reported delay minutes.
- 39%Carrier
- 35%National Airspace System
- 17%Late-arriving aircraft
- 9%Extreme weather
The largest share of delay minutes, 39%, falls under carrier control: crew scheduling, maintenance, fuelling, baggage. It accounts for 1,578 of the 4,010 delay minutes reported here. The split is drawn from 4,010 delay minutes reported on UA 1996.
Cancellations are rare at 0.27%, below the national 1.89% 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.
Connections and routes
What a delay on this flight costs
Badly late arrivals are rare here: only 4.4% land an hour or more behind schedule, against 8.3% 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 2,072 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 365 flights under UA 1996 in the data flew ORD to SJU. 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. 365 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 UA 1996
For a booking, read UA 1996 as 79.1% on time with 0.27% cancelled over 365 flights. Those are rates from the past twelve months, not a forecast for any particular day.
Related
Where to go next
- ORD to SJU, every carrier and departure
- SJU to ORD, the return direction
- United Airlines 695 on the same route79.4%
- Chicago O'Hare International (ORD) delay statistics
- Luis Munoz Marin International (SJU) delay statistics
- United Airlines on-time record
- Every United Airlines flight number with a record
- The most and least reliable flight numbers in the US
- Worst months to fly in the US, ranked by the data
A flight number here means United 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, September 2025 to August 2026. Last updated ; recomputed monthly. How this data is collected.