Carrier route record
AADCA→TPA
American Airlines · Washington to Tampa
- Flights
- 1,521
- Period
- July 2025 to June 2026
- Share of route
- 68%
- Carriers
- 3
Historical statistics for July 2025 to June 2026, not live status. For today’s flights, check with American Airlines.
American on DCA to TPA sits in the middle of the pack with a C. About seven flights in ten arrive on time by the DOT's definition, 5 points worse than the national rate of 77.6%. The late ones land a little over an hour behind schedule. That rests on 1,521 flights, with a median arrival 6 minutes early.
The national on-time rate over the same period is 77.6%, so American on DCA to TPA runs 5 points behind the country as a whole. Across a thousand flights that is about 54 extra late arrivals.
Key figures
On time
72.2%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 1,477 completed flights
Avg delay
82 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
2.70%
National rate is 1.81%
Whole route
74.5%
Every carrier on DCA to TPA, 2,248 flights
These figures cover 1,521 flights between July 2025 and June 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 12.1% 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 DCA to TPA
American flew 1,521 of the 2,248 flights on DCA to TPA, most of the route. Its 72.2% on time is 2 points worse than the route as a whole, which runs 74.5%. Ranked by on-time rate it is last of three carriers on the route, where the range runs from Republic at 92.3% to American at 72.2%. 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Republic Airwaysthin sample | 26 | 92.3% | 27 min | 0.00% | A+ |
| Southwest Airlines | 701 | 78.7% | 66 min | 1.85% | B |
| American Airlines (this page) | 1,521 | 72.2% | 82 min | 2.70% | 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 41 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–8am44 flights97.7%
- 8am–11am670 flights83.3%
- 11am–2pm81 flights79.7%
- 2pm–5pm248 flights58.9%
- 5pm–8pm360 flights56.8%
- 8pm–5am118 flights67.9%
Scale runs 50% to 100%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
The 5pm–8pm window is where this operation falls apart: 56.8% on time, against 97.7% 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 8am–11am window is the busiest, with 670 flights scheduled in it.
Across the year
American on DCA to TPA through the year
Delays peak in March, when the on-time rate falls to 68.5%. January is the strongest month at 78.3%. Moving a flexible trip across that boundary buys 10 points. March was the busiest month here, with 151 flights.
Across the week, Saturday is the strongest day at 77.3% on time and Sunday the weakest at 63.6%. 14 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 60% of the 34,000 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.
- 60%Late-arriving aircraft
- 20%Carrier
- 16%National Airspace System
- 4%Extreme weather
- 0%Security
60% 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 34,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 16 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 33,666 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 97.7% on time here.
Cancellations run at 2.70%, against 1.81% nationally. That is about one flight in 40 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. 12.1% 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 814 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 73.2% on time across 1,521 flights, within about a point 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 1,521 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 DCA to TPA
Put together: avoid the 5pm–8pm departure. It runs 56.8% on time against 97.7% for the 5am–8am slot, and that 41 points is the largest single thing you control here. Southwest Airlines is the strongest operator if the fares are close. 1,477 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Related
Where to go next
- DCA to TPA, every carrier
- American on TPA to DCA, the return leg
- Southwest Airlines on DCA to TPA78.7%
- American Airlines network-wide record
- Ronald Reagan Washington National (DCA) delay statistics
- Tampa International (TPA) 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.