Carrier route record

ASJFK→SAN

Alaska Airlines · New York to San Diego

Flights: 650
Period: July 2025 to June 2026
Share of route: 27%
Carriers: 3

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

Alaska on JFK to SAN sits in the middle of the pack with a B. Close to three flights in four arrive on time by the DOT's definition, 2 points worse than the national rate of 77.6%. The late ones land about an hour behind schedule. That rests on 650 flights. The strongest carrier on the route with a full sample, JetBlue Airways, flew 727 at 85.7% on time.

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

On time

75.7%

Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 638 completed flights

Avg delay

56 min

Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights

Cancelled

1.69%

National rate is 1.81%

Whole route

79.1%

Every carrier on JFK to SAN, 2,413 flights

These figures cover 650 flights between July 2025 and June 2026. The median arrival is 2 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.

Carrier by carrier

Alaska against every carrier on JFK to SAN

Alaska flew 650 of the 2,413 flights on JFK to SAN, about 27% of it. Its 75.7% on time is 3 points worse than the route as a whole, which runs 79.1%. Ranked by on-time rate it is last of three carriers on the route, where the range runs from JetBlue at 85.7% to Alaska at 75.7%.

The choice of carrier is not cosmetic here. JetBlue Airways arrives on time 85.7% of the time; Delta Air Lines manages 76.6%. Sample sizes sit next to every figure, because a two-point gap across 1,036 flights means less than a ten-point one.

On-time performance by carrier on JFK to SAN
Airline	Flights	On time	Avg delay	Cancelled	Grade
JetBlue Airways	727	85.7%	61 min	2.48%	A
Delta Air Lines	1,036	76.6%	57 min	2.80%	B
Alaska Airlines (this page)	650	75.7%	56 min	1.69%	B

JetBlue leads Delta by 9 points. Real, but small enough that a better departure time on the weaker carrier can outweigh it.

Flight by flight

Alaska flight numbers on JFK to SAN

Departure window

When Alaska runs best on this route

Departure time matters more here than the choice of carrier. The gap between the best and worst window is 14 points, against 9 points between the best and worst carrier. Each bar is the on-time rate for flights scheduled inside that window.

5am–8am—
8am–11am245 flights76.3%
11am–2pm56 flights87.5%
2pm–5pm328 flights73.1%
5pm–8pm21 flights—
8pm–5am—

Scale runs 65% to 95%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.

The best window here is not the first bank but the 11am–2pm slot at 87.5% on time, ahead of 2pm–5pm at 73.1%. Where the curve peaks mid-day rather than at dawn, the constraint is usually congestion at one end rather than the aircraft's own rotation. The 2pm–5pm window is the busiest, with 328 flights scheduled in it.

Across the year

Alaska on JFK to SAN through the year

Darker means more delays. Figures are on-time percentages.March best, October worst

Delays peak in October, when the on-time rate falls to 56.5%. March is the strongest month at 94.2%. Moving a flexible trip across that boundary buys 38 points. July was the busiest month here, with 62 flights.

Across the week, Tuesday is the strongest day at 84.3% on time and Sunday the weakest at 70.7%. 14 points is a smaller lever than departure hour, but it is free.

Delay causes

Why Alaska 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 8,713 reported delay minutes.

National Airspace System
42%
Carrier
32%
Late-arriving aircraft
22%
Extreme weather
3%
Security
1%

42% of delay minutes are charged to the National Airspace System: air traffic volume, runway configuration, ground stops. No carrier can price its way out of that, which is why airport choice moves the number here more than carrier choice does. That is 3,653 minutes out of 8,713, against a national NAS share of 21%. The split is drawn from 8,713 reported delay minutes.

Cancellations sit at 1.69% against a national 1.81%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.15%.

Connections and stage length

What a delay here costs

6.0% 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 about an hour, which a normal layover absorbs.

At 2,446 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 83.7% on time across 650 flights, 8 points above 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 8 points of difference.

One caution: this is a thin sample. 650 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 Alaska on JFK to SAN

Put together: treat all of this as provisional. 650 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 75.7% headline is the most reliable number on the page; the hour and month splits below it are built on a few dozen flights each. 638 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