Carrier route record
AABOS→PHX
American Airlines · Boston to Phoenix
- Flights
- 1,310
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Share of route
- 65%
- Carriers
- 3
Historical statistics for September 2025 to August 2026, not live status. For today’s flights, check with American Airlines.
American on BOS to PHX lands a B, 3 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 a little over an hour on average. That rests on 1,310 flights, with a median arrival 8 minutes early.
The US average over the same twelve months is 77.3%, so there is little to separate American on BOS to PHX from the country as a whole. The variation that matters here is internal: which carrier, and what time of day.
Key figures
On time
80.0%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 1,283 completed flights
Avg delay
80 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
1.60%
National rate is 1.89%
Whole route
77.3%
Every carrier on BOS to PHX, 2,012 flights
These figures cover 1,310 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. The median arrival is 8 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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Carrier by carrier
American against every carrier on BOS to PHX
American flew 1,310 of the 2,012 flights on BOS to PHX, most of the route. Its 80.0% on time is 3 points better than the route as a whole, which runs 77.3%. Ranked by on-time rate it is first of three carriers on the route, where the range runs from American at 80.0% to Delta at 71.5%. One 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| American Airlines (this page) | 1,310 | 80.0% | 80 min | 1.60% | B |
| JetBlue Airwaysthin sample | 273 | 73.5% | 69 min | 1.83% | C |
| Delta Air Lines | 429 | 71.5% | 53 min | 1.86% | C |
Flight by flight
American flight numbers on BOS to PHX
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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 25 points, against half a point between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am359 flights88.3%
- 8am–11am351 flights80.9%
- 11am–2pm361 flights78.1%
- 2pm–5pm99 flights76.5%
- 5pm–8pm140 flights63.2%
- 8pm–5am—
Scale runs 55% to 95%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
The 5pm–8pm window is where this operation falls apart: 63.2% on time, against 88.3% for the 5am–8am 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 11am–2pm window is the busiest, with 361 flights scheduled in it.
Across the year
American on BOS to PHX through the year
January is the weak month at 74.7% on time, against 86.9% in November. Winter delays cluster: a single storm system can account for most of a month's shortfall, so an average December hides both very good weeks and genuinely unflyable days. July was the busiest month here, with 122 flights.
Across the week, Saturday is the strongest day at 85.0% on time and Friday the weakest at 77.0%, a spread of 8 points.
Arrival by arrival
How late American on BOS to PHX runs when it is late
American on BOS to PHX often beats the schedule: 486 of 1,283 completed flights, 38%, arrived 15 minutes or more early. The 257 late arrivals split 92 under half an hour, 84 between 30 and 60 minutes, and 81 an hour or more.
- 15+ min early486 flights37.9%
- Within 15 min540 flights42.1%
- 15–29 min late92 flights7.2%
- 30–59 min late84 flights6.5%
- 1–2 hours late48 flights3.7%
- 2+ hours late33 flights2.6%
Scale runs 0% to 100%.
Share of 1,283 completed flights by arrival against schedule.
64 of 245 late departures made up the time and arrived on time, 26% of them. In the other direction, 76 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 PHX.
The worst days
Worst days for American on BOS to PHX
The latest arrival of the period was on 27 October 2025, 21 hours 12 minutes behind schedule; most of its delay minutes were filed as carrier-caused (crew, maintenance, fuelling, baggage). The same cause led on four of the five worst days.
| Date | Arrived late by | Largest filed cause |
|---|---|---|
| 27 October 2025 | 21 hours 12 minutes | Carrier |
| 22 July 2026 | 13 hours 53 minutes | Carrier |
| 11 March 2026 | 13 hours 29 minutes | Carrier |
| 5 March 2026 | 11 hours 39 minutes | Late-arriving aircraft |
| 17 February 2026 | 9 hours 5 minutes | Carrier |
Delay causes
Why American runs late on this route
Carrier accounts for 47% of the 21,000 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 47%Carrier
- 35%Late-arriving aircraft
- 15%National Airspace System
- 2%Extreme weather
35% of delay minutes trace back to a late-arriving aircraft, meaning the plane was already behind before it got here. Across 21,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 15 to one. The split is drawn from 20,642 reported delay minutes.
The largest share of delay minutes, 47%, falls under carrier control: crew scheduling, maintenance, fuelling, baggage. It accounts for 9,731 of the 21,000 delay minutes reported here.
Cancellations sit at 1.60% against a national 1.89%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.46%.
Connections and stage length
What a delay here costs
6.3% of arrivals land an hour or more late, close to the national 8.3%, so a 60 to 75 minute layover is reasonable here while anything under 45 minutes is a bet. Most delays on this route last a little over an hour, which a normal layover absorbs.
At 2,300 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 76.1% on time across 1,308 flights, 4 points below 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.
The sample behind these figures is 1,310 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 BOS to PHX
Put together: the calendar is the biggest lever here, not the carrier or the hour. November runs 86.9% on time and January 74.7%, a swing of 12 points. If the dates move at all, move them out of January before you think about anything else. 1,283 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Related
Where to go next
- BOS to PHX, every carrier
- American on PHX to BOS, the return leg
- JetBlue Airways on BOS to PHX73.5%
- Delta Air Lines on BOS to PHX71.5%
- American Airlines network-wide record
- Boston Logan International (BOS) delay statistics
- Phoenix Sky Harbor International (PHX) delay statistics
- Why the first flight of the morning is statistically safest
- The best time of day to fly, according to 7.05 million flight records
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.