Carrier route record
AADEN→PHL
American Airlines · Denver to Philadelphia
- Flights
- 877
- Period
- July 2025 to June 2026
- Share of route
- 29%
- Carriers
- 4
Historical statistics for July 2025 to June 2026, not live status. For today’s flights, check with American Airlines.
American on DEN to PHL lands a B, about a point better than the national rate of 77.6%. About one flight in five arrives 15 minutes late or worse, and those flights are late by close to two hours on average. That is a workable record, not a spotless one. That rests on 877 flights. The strongest carrier on the route with a full sample, United Airlines, flew 952 at 79.9% on time.
The US average over the same twelve months is 77.6%, so there is little to separate American on DEN to PHL from the country as a whole. The variation that matters here is internal: which carrier, and what time of day.
Key figures
On time
78.8%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 857 completed flights
Avg delay
103 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
1.82%
National rate is 1.81%
Whole route
73.1%
Every carrier on DEN to PHL, 3,003 flights
These figures cover 877 flights between July 2025 and June 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 8.6% 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 DEN to PHL
American flew 877 of the 3,003 flights on DEN to PHL, about 29% of it. Its 78.8% on time is 6 points better than the route as a whole, which runs 73.1%. Ranked by on-time rate it is number two of four carriers on the route, where the range runs from United at 79.9% to Frontier at 62.3%. One of those carriers flew fewer than 365 flights here, so treat their positions as rough.
The choice of carrier is not cosmetic here. United Airlines arrives on time 79.9% of the time; Southwest Airlines manages 63.7%. Sample sizes sit next to every figure, because a two-point gap across 879 flights means less than a ten-point one.
| Airline | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| United Airlines | 952 | 79.9% | 66 min | 0.53% | B+ |
| American Airlines (this page) | 877 | 78.8% | 103 min | 1.82% | B |
| Southwest Airlines | 879 | 63.7% | 58 min | 0.91% | D+ |
| Frontier Airlinesthin sample | 295 | 62.3% | 103 min | 2.03% | D |
The spread between United and Southwest is 16 points, wide enough that it should decide the booking. On a hundred trips that is 16 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 20 points, against 16 points between the best and worst carrier. Each bar is the on-time rate for flights scheduled inside that window.
- 5am–8am187 flights88.5%
- 8am–11am176 flights82.6%
- 11am–2pm281 flights76.4%
- 2pm–5pm187 flights68.9%
- 5pm–8pm—
- 8pm–5am46 flights79.5%
Scale runs 60% to 95%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
Book the early departure. Flights leaving between 5am–8am arrive on time 88.5% of the time, against 68.9% for the afternoon window. That is 20 points of difference for no extra money, and it comes from the same aircraft having had no earlier flight to fall behind on. The 11am–2pm window is the busiest, with 281 flights scheduled in it.
Across the year
American on DEN to PHL through the year
June is the worst month at 68.2% on time, 25 points below November, the best at 92.9%. 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 111 flights.
Across the week, Friday is the strongest day at 85.5% on time and Sunday the weakest at 69.8%. 16 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 43% of the 19,000 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.
- 43%Late-arriving aircraft
- 42%Carrier
- 12%National Airspace System
- 3%Extreme weather
- 0%Security
43% 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 19,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 14 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 18,742 reported delay minutes.
The largest share of delay minutes, 42%, falls under carrier control: crew scheduling, maintenance, fuelling, baggage. Unlike weather, that is a management outcome, and it is the category where the gap between two carriers on the same schedule is genuinely earned. It accounts for 7,872 of the 19,000 delay minutes reported here.
Cancellations sit at 1.82% against a national 1.81%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.46%.
Connections and stage length
What a delay here costs
8.6% of arrivals land an hour or more late, close to the national 8.1%. That is the figure that decides a connection, and it says 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 1,558 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 73.3% on time across 877 flights, 6 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 6 points of difference.
One caution: this is a thin sample. 877 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 DEN to PHL
Put together: treat all of this as provisional. 877 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 78.8% headline is the most reliable number on the page; the hour and month splits below it are built on a few dozen flights each. 857 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Related
Where to go next
- DEN to PHL, every carrier
- American on PHL to DEN, the return leg
- United Airlines on DEN to PHL79.9%
- Southwest Airlines on DEN to PHL63.7%
- Frontier Airlines on DEN to PHL62.3%
- American Airlines network-wide record
- Denver International (DEN) delay statistics
- Philadelphia International (PHL) delay statistics
- Same route, different airline: where the carrier you pick matters most
- 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.