Carrier route record

AACLE→PHL

American Airlines · Cleveland to Philadelphia

Flights: 272
Period: July 2025 to June 2026
Share of route: 26%
Carriers: 4

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

American on CLE to PHL lands a B−, level with the national rate of 77.6%. Roughly one flight in four arrives 15 minutes late or worse, and those flights are late by an hour and a half on average. That is a workable record, not a spotless one. That rests on 272 flights, with a median arrival 11 minutes early.

The US average over the same twelve months is 77.6%, so there is little to separate American on CLE to PHL from the country as a whole. The variation that matters here is internal: which carrier, and what time of day.

On time

77.0%

Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 261 completed flights

Avg delay

93 min

Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights

Cancelled

4.04%

National rate is 1.81%

Whole route

76.9%

Every carrier on CLE to PHL, 1,060 flights

These figures cover 272 flights between July 2025 and June 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 11.5% 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 CLE to PHL

American flew 272 of the 1,060 flights on CLE to PHL, about 26% of it. Its 77.0% on time is about level with the route as a whole at 76.9%. Ranked by on-time rate it is number three of four carriers on the route, where the range runs from Frontier at 85.4% to Republic at 71.1%. Two 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.

On-time performance by carrier on CLE to PHL
Airline	Flights	On time	Avg delay	Cancelled	Grade
Frontier Airlinesthin sample	41	85.4%	39 min	0.00%	A+
PSA Airlines	590	77.8%	121 min	7.63%	B−
American Airlines (this page)thin sample	272	77.0%	93 min	4.04%	B−
Republic Airwaysthin sample	157	71.1%	68 min	3.18%	C−

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 51 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–8am172 flights92.8%
8am–11am10 flights—
11am–2pm1 flights—
2pm–5pm63 flights41.9%
5pm–8pm26 flights—
8pm–5am—

Scale runs 35% to 100%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.

Book the early departure. Flights leaving between 5am–8am arrive on time 92.8% of the time, against 41.9% for the afternoon window. That is 51 points of difference for no extra money, and it comes from the same aircraft having had no earlier flight to fall behind on. The 5am–8am window is the busiest, with 172 flights scheduled in it.

Across the year

American on CLE to PHL through the year

Jul–Sep 2025141 flights63.2%
Oct–Dec 202538 flights81.6%
Jan–Mar 202611 flights—
Apr–Jun 202682 flights95.0%

Scale runs 55% to 100%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.

Monthly volumes are too low here to break the year into twelve reliable readings. What the twelve-month total says is 77.0% on time across 272 flights.

American on CLE to PHL did not run the same all year. Its best quarter was Apr–Jun 2026 at 95.0% on time and its weakest Jul–Sep 2025 at 63.2%, a swing of 32 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.

Across the week, Saturday is the strongest day at 86.5% on time and Monday the weakest at 65.7%. 21 points is a smaller lever than departure hour, but it is free.

Delay causes

Why American runs late on this route

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 5,577 reported delay minutes.

Late-arriving aircraft
40%
Carrier
34%
National Airspace System
25%
Extreme weather
2%
Security
0%

40% 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 5,577 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 5,577 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 92.8% on time here.

Cancellations run at 4.04%, against 1.81% nationally. That is about one flight in 25 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. 11.5% 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.

At 363 miles this is a short hop, and stage length matters more than it looks. A flight this short spends under two hours in the air, which leaves almost nothing to claw back a late pushback with. Delay here is decided on the ground, in the turn, which is why the 5am–8am window matters as much as it does.

The return leg is a different operation and performs like one: it runs 71.6% on time across 272 flights, 5 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 5 points of difference.

One caution: this is a thin sample. 272 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 CLE to PHL

Put together: the delay figures matter less here than the 4.04% cancellation rate. A late arrival costs you an hour and a half; a cancelled flight costs you the day. Book the 5am–8am departure so there is still a schedule behind you if it goes wrong, and treat a same-day connection as optimistic. 261 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.

Where to go next

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