Route reliability record
DCA→PHX
Washington to Phoenix
- Flights
- 1,086
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Distance
- 1,979 mi
- Carriers
- 1
This route lands a B, 5 points better than the national rate of 77.3%. About one flight in six arrives 15 minutes late or worse, and those flights are late by close to two hours on average. That rests on 1,086 DCA to PHX flights, with a median arrival 11 minutes early.
Best time to fly DCA to PHX: a 5am–8am departure, ideally on a Tuesday. Flights in that window arrived on time 90.0% of the time and Tuesday flights 89.5%, against 82.5% for the route overall.
Set against the rest of the country, this route's record is 5 points better than the US average of 77.3%. That gap is worth roughly 52 fewer late arrivals for every thousand flights.
Key figures
On time
82.5%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 1,060 completed flights
Avg delay
108 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
1.47%
National rate is 1.89%
Best carrier
American
82.5% on time across 1,086 flights
These figures cover 1,086 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. The median arrival is 11 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
Which airline is most reliable on DCA to PHX
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 | 1,086 | 82.5% | 108 min | 1.47% | B |
Flight by flight
Flights on DCA to PHX
The flight numbers below flew this route at least 250 times in the period, busiest first. Each has its own record, with its schedule and delay causes.
Timetable by Aviasales, a Travelpayouts partner. Booking through it may earn this site a commission at no cost to you; it changes no figure here.
Best ways to make this trip
The most reliable ways to fly Washington to Phoenix
Every airline on this route and on the routes between nearby airports, ranked by how often a scheduled flight actually operated and arrived on time. 2 of the top 3 use a different airport at one end.
| Option | Airline | Success | On time | Cancelled | Best departure | Most punctual flight |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. IAD → PHXWashington to Phoenix | United Airlines | 84.5% | 85.2% | 0.85% | 8am–11am, Tue | UA 1938 17:50 |
| 2. DCA → PHXWashington to Phoenix | American Airlines | 81.3% | 82.5% | 1.47% | 5am–8am, Tue | AA 1218 10:00 |
| 3. BWI → PHXBaltimore to Phoenix | Southwest Airlines | 75.6% | 76.4% | 1.07% | 5am–8am, Thu | — |
Success is the share of scheduled flights that operated and arrived less than 15 minutes late, so a cancelled flight counts against it. “(route)” means the best time comes from every carrier on the route rather than this airline alone.
Departure window
The best time of day to leave
Departure time matters more here than the choice of carrier. The gap between the best and worst window is 16 points, against half a point between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am365 flights90.0%
- 8am–11am364 flights82.9%
- 11am–2pm—
- 2pm–5pm—
- 5pm–8pm357 flights74.0%
- 8pm–5am—
Scale runs 65% to 95%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
Book the early departure. Flights leaving between 5am–8am arrive on time 90.0% of the time, against 74.0% for the evening window. That is 16 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 365 flights scheduled in it.
Explore
Filter DCA to PHX by airline, time, month and day
Pick a breakdown and a carrier. The dashed mark on each row is the same slice for every US flight.
On DCA to PHX, the best departure window is 5am–8am at 90.0% on time and the worst is 5pm–8pm at 74.0%, a wide gap of 16.0 points. All US flights leaving 5am–8am ran 89.3%.
- 5–8am90.0%
- 8–11am82.9%
- 11am–2pm—
- 2–5pm—
- 5–8pm74.0%
- 8pm–5am—
best all US flightsScale 60% to 95%. Cells under 30 flights show a dash.
Across the year
When delays peak on this route
This route's year swings by 14 points from best month to worst, which is wide. An annual average tells you very little about the week you are actually flying, so read the strip rather than the headline if your dates are fixed.
Delays peak in November, when the on-time rate falls to 75.0%. March is the strongest month at 89.0%. Moving a flexible trip across that boundary buys 14 points. January was the busiest month here, with 93 flights.
Across the week, Tuesday is the strongest day at 89.5% on time and Thursday the weakest at 74.7%, a spread of 15 points.
Delay causes
Why this route gets delayed
Late-arriving aircraft accounts for 47% of the 20,000 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 47%Late-arriving aircraft
- 30%Carrier
- 18%National Airspace System
- 5%Extreme weather
- 0%Security
47% of delay minutes trace back to a late-arriving aircraft, meaning the plane was already behind before it got here. Across 20,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 9 to one. The split is drawn from 20,024 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 90.0% on time here.
Cancellations sit at 1.47% against a national 1.89%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.92%.
Connections and stage length
What a delay here actually costs
7.0% 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 close to two hours, which a normal layover absorbs.
At 1,979 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 runs 82.0% on time across 1,086 flights, within half a point of this direction. The two legs are scored separately because they usually differ; on this city pair they happen not to.
One caution: this is a thin sample. 1,086 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.
Work out the risk of missing a connection in PHX after this flight
What to do with this
Booking this route
Put together: treat all of this as provisional. 1,086 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 82.5% headline is the most reliable number on the page; the hour and month splits below it are built on a few dozen flights each. 1,060 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
DCA to PHX questions
How often is DCA to PHX delayed?
About one flight in six arrives at least 15 minutes late, which is the Department of Transportation's definition of a delayed arrival. That works out to 17.5% of the 1,086 flights in this analysis, against 22.7% nationally. Delayed flights are late by close to two hours on average.
How reliable is DCA to PHX compared with the rest of the country?
82.5% of flights arrive on time here against a national 77.3%, a difference of 5 points in its favour. That is worth a B on this site's grading scale.
What time of day has the fewest delays on DCA to PHX?
The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 90.0% on time. The 5pm–8pm window is the weakest at 74.0%, 16 points behind. Later departures inherit delays from earlier flights the same aircraft has already flown, which is why the curve slopes the way it does.
How bad are November delays on DCA to PHX?
November is the weakest month at 75.0% on time, compared with 89.0% in March. Across the year that is 14 points between the best and worst months. Moving flexible dates out of that month is one of the few things that reliably helps.
Related
Where to go next
- PHX to DCA — the return legseparate record
- Ronald Reagan Washington National (DCA) delay statistics
- Phoenix Sky Harbor International (PHX) delay statistics
- DCA to BOS, a related route70.1%
- DEN to PHX, a related route75.6%
- DCA to ORD, a related route73.8%
- American Airlines on-time record82.5%
- Why the first flight of the morning is statistically safest
- The best time of day to fly, according to 7.05 million flight records
Direction matters. DCA to PHX and PHX to DCA are scored separately because they are separate operations, with different departure banks and different aircraft. Compare the return leg.
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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.