Carrier route record
AAAUS→ORD
American Airlines · Austin to Chicago
- Flights
- 1,190
- Period
- July 2025 to June 2026
- Share of route
- 38%
- Carriers
- 6
Historical statistics for July 2025 to June 2026, not live status. For today’s flights, check with American Airlines.
American on AUS to ORD 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 1,190 flights, with a median arrival 4 minutes early.
The national on-time rate over the same period is 77.6%, so American on AUS to ORD runs 8 points behind the country as a whole. Across a thousand flights that is about 78 extra late arrivals.
Key figures
On time
69.8%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 1,147 completed flights
Avg delay
105 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
3.11%
National rate is 1.81%
Whole route
72.1%
Every carrier on AUS to ORD, 3,166 flights
These figures cover 1,190 flights between July 2025 and June 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 13.5% 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.
Carrier by carrier
American against every carrier on AUS to ORD
American flew 1,190 of the 3,166 flights on AUS to ORD, about 38% of it. Its 69.8% on time is 2 points worse than the route as a whole, which runs 72.1%. Ranked by on-time rate it is number three of six carriers on the route, where the range runs from United at 74.9% to Frontier at 65.1%. Four of those carriers flew fewer than 365 flights here, so treat their positions as rough.
Only one carrier clears this site's 365-flight floor here, so there is no comparison to draw. The table below is the full picture.
| Airline | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| United Airlines | 1,470 | 74.9% | 80 min | 1.02% | C |
| Envoy Airthin sample | 86 | 72.6% | 62 min | 2.33% | C |
| American Airlines (this page) | 1,190 | 69.8% | 105 min | 3.11% | C− |
| Republic Airwaysthin sample | 95 | 69.7% | 71 min | 6.32% | C− |
| Southwest Airlinesthin sample | 207 | 68.8% | 56 min | 0.48% | C+ |
| Frontier Airlinesthin sample | 118 | 65.1% | 141 min | 5.93% | C− |
Flight by flight
American flight numbers on AUS to ORD
Departure window
When American runs best on this route
Departure time matters more here than the choice of carrier. The gap between the best and worst window is 32 points, against half a point between the best and worst carrier. Each bar is the on-time rate for flights scheduled inside that window.
- 5am–8am324 flights79.0%
- 8am–11am172 flights85.7%
- 11am–2pm255 flights74.9%
- 2pm–5pm163 flights54.0%
- 5pm–8pm274 flights53.8%
- 8pm–5am2 flights—
Scale runs 45% to 90%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
The 5pm–8pm window is where this operation falls apart: 53.8% on time, against 85.7% for the 8am–11am slot. By evening the aircraft flying these rotations have absorbed a full day of small delays and there is no slack left to recover in. The 5am–8am window is the busiest, with 324 flights scheduled in it.
Across the year
American on AUS to ORD through the year
May is the best month on the calendar at 78.4% on time. Shoulder season thins the schedule and takes the summer weather with it, and the operation gets its margin back. May was the busiest month here, with 125 flights.
Across the week, Wednesday is the strongest day at 77.6% on time and Friday the weakest at 62.5%. 15 points is a smaller lever than departure hour, but it is free.
Delay causes
Why American runs late on this route
One category carries most of the weight here. Late-arriving aircraft accounts for 56% of the 36,000 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.
- 56%Late-arriving aircraft
- 23%Carrier
- 18%National Airspace System
- 2%Extreme weather
- 0%Security
56% 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 36,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 23 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 36,273 reported delay minutes.
The practical consequence: the 8am–11am departure is the one that starts clean. Its aircraft has no earlier leg to be late from, which is exactly why that window shows 85.7% on time here.
Cancellations run at 3.11%, 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 stage length
What a delay here costs
For anyone connecting, the number to weigh is not the on-time rate but the tail behind it. 13.5% 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 977 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.
The return leg runs 67.0% on time across 1,190 flights, within 3 points of this direction. The two legs are scored separately because they usually differ; on this city pair they happen not to.
The sample behind these figures is 1,190 flights, enough that the headline rate is stable to within roughly a point. The hour-block and month splits divide that further, so read the thinner bars with more caution than the headline.
What to do with this
Booking American on AUS to ORD
Put together: the delay figures matter less here than the 3.11% cancellation rate. A late arrival costs you close to two hours; a cancelled flight costs you the day. Book the 8am–11am departure so there is still a schedule behind you if it goes wrong, and treat a same-day connection as optimistic. 1,147 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Related
Where to go next
- AUS to ORD, every carrier
- American on ORD to AUS, the return leg
- United Airlines on AUS to ORD74.9%
- Southwest Airlines on AUS to ORD68.8%
- Frontier Airlines on AUS to ORD65.1%
- American Airlines network-wide record
- Austin-Bergstrom International (AUS) delay statistics
- Chicago O'Hare International (ORD) delay statistics
- The US routes with the most cancellations
- Why the first flight of the morning is statistically safest
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.