Carrier route record
AABNA→LAX
American Airlines · Nashville to Los Angeles
- Flights
- 413
- Period
- July 2025 to June 2026
- Share of route
- 18%
- Carriers
- 4
Historical statistics for July 2025 to June 2026, not live status. For today’s flights, check with American Airlines.
American on BNA to LAX sits in the middle of the pack with a C+. About seven flights in ten arrive on time by the DOT's definition, 6 points worse than the national rate of 77.6%. The late ones land an hour and a half behind schedule. That rests on 413 flights. The strongest carrier on the route with a full sample, Delta Air Lines, flew 909 at 85.5% on time.
The national on-time rate over the same period is 77.6%, so American on BNA to LAX runs 6 points behind the country as a whole. Across a thousand flights that is about 56 extra late arrivals.
Key figures
On time
72.0%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 410 completed flights
Avg delay
95 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
0.73%
National rate is 1.81%
Whole route
77.0%
Every carrier on BNA to LAX, 2,317 flights
These figures cover 413 flights between July 2025 and June 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 12.7% 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 BNA to LAX
American flew 413 of the 2,317 flights on BNA to LAX, about 18% of it. Its 72.0% on time is 5 points worse than the route as a whole, which runs 77.0%. Ranked by on-time rate it is number three of four carriers on the route, where the range runs from Delta at 85.5% to Southwest at 70.7%. One of those carriers flew fewer than 365 flights here, so treat their positions as rough.
The choice of carrier is not cosmetic here. Delta Air Lines arrives on time 85.5% of the time; Southwest Airlines manages 70.7%. Sample sizes sit next to every figure, because a two-point gap across 927 flights means less than a ten-point one.
| Airline | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Delta Air Lines | 909 | 85.5% | 61 min | 1.32% | A |
| Spirit Airlinesthin sample | 68 | 80.6% | 124 min | 1.47% | B |
| American Airlines (this page) | 413 | 72.0% | 95 min | 0.73% | C+ |
| Southwest Airlines | 927 | 70.7% | 43 min | 0.65% | C+ |
The spread between Delta and Southwest is 15 points, wide enough that it should decide the booking. On a hundred trips that is 15 more arrivals inside the on-time window.
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 14 points, against 15 points between the best and worst carrier. Each bar is the on-time rate for flights scheduled inside that window.
- 5am–8am43 flights83.7%
- 8am–11am—
- 11am–2pm—
- 2pm–5pm61 flights77.0%
- 5pm–8pm300 flights70.0%
- 8pm–5am9 flights—
Scale runs 60% to 90%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
Book the early departure. Flights leaving between 5am–8am arrive on time 83.7% of the time, against 70.0% for the evening window. That is 14 points of difference for no extra money, and it comes from the same aircraft having had no earlier flight to fall behind on. The 5pm–8pm window is the busiest, with 300 flights scheduled in it.
Across the year
American on BNA to LAX through the year
July is the worst month at 50.0% on time, 31 points below March, the best at 80.6%. Summer afternoon convection and peak-season schedules land on the same weeks every year, so this is a pattern you can book around rather than a run of bad luck. June was the busiest month here, with 59 flights.
Across the week, Thursday is the strongest day at 76.8% on time and Sunday the weakest at 57.1%. 20 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 62% of the 11,000 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.
- 62%Late-arriving aircraft
- 29%Carrier
- 7%National Airspace System
- 2%Extreme weather
- 0%Security
62% 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 11,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 35 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 10,914 reported delay minutes.
The practical consequence: the 5am–8am departure is the one that starts clean. Its aircraft has no earlier leg to be late from, which is exactly why that window shows 83.7% on time here.
Cancellations are rare at 0.73%, below the national 1.81% 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 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. 12.7% 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.
At 1,798 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.
The return leg is a different operation and performs like one: it runs 75.6% on time across 414 flights, 4 points above this direction. Departure banks, aircraft rotations and the congestion at each end all differ, so scoring the two directions together would average away a real 4 points of difference.
One caution: this is a thin sample. 413 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 American on BNA to LAX
Put together: treat all of this as provisional. 413 flights over twelve months is enough to clear this site's floor and not enough to be confident to better than a couple of points. The 72.0% headline is the most reliable number on the page; the hour and month splits below it are built on a few dozen flights each. 410 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Related
Where to go next
- BNA to LAX, every carrier
- American on LAX to BNA, the return leg
- Delta Air Lines on BNA to LAX85.5%
- Southwest Airlines on BNA to LAX70.7%
- American Airlines network-wide record
- Nashville International (BNA) delay statistics
- Los Angeles International (LAX) delay statistics
- Why the first flight of the morning is statistically safest
- Same route, different airline: where the carrier you pick matters most
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.