Route reliability record
LAX→MIA
Los Angeles to Miami
- Flights
- 3,256
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Distance
- 2,342 mi
- Carriers
- 2
This route lands a B+, about a point better than the national rate of 77.3%. About one flight in five arrives 15 minutes late or worse, and those flights are late by about an hour on average. That rests on 3,256 LAX to MIA flights, of which American Airlines flew 2,761 at 79.2% on time.
Best time to fly LAX to MIA: a 5am–8am departure, ideally on a Tuesday. Flights in that window arrived on time 89.1% of the time and Tuesday flights 82.6%, against 78.4% for the route overall.
The US average over the same twelve months is 77.3%, so there is little to separate this route from the country as a whole. The variation that matters here is internal: which carrier, and what time of day.
Key figures
On time
78.4%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 3,223 completed flights
Avg delay
65 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
0.77%
National rate is 1.89%
Best carrier
American
79.2% on time across 2,761 flights
These figures cover 3,256 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. The median arrival is 6 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 LAX to MIA
The two carriers here are closely matched: 5 points separate the best from the worst. At that spread, schedule and price are better tie-breakers than reliability. Sample sizes are shown so you can see which rows are worth weighing.
| Airline | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| American Airlines | 2,761 | 79.2% | 67 min | 0.62% | B+ |
| Delta Air Lines | 495 | 73.8% | 52 min | 1.62% | C |
No carrier stands out. American tops the table at 79.2%, 5 points clear of the bottom, which is inside the range this kind of sample moves year to year.
Flight by flight
Flights on LAX to MIA
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.
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Best ways to make this trip
The most reliable ways to fly Los Angeles to Miami
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 4 use a different airport at one end.
| Option | Airline | Success | On time | Cancelled | Best departure | Most punctual flight |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. LAX → MIALos Angeles to Miami | American Airlines | 78.7% | 79.2% | 0.62% | 5am–8am, Tue | — |
| 2. LAX → FLLLos Angeles to Fort Lauderdale | JetBlue Airways | 74.4% | 75.3% | 1.22% | 8am–11am, Tue | B6 700 23:35 |
| 3. LAX → MIALos Angeles to Miami | Delta Air Lines | 72.6% | 73.8% | 1.62% | 8am–11am, Wed | DL 811 09:05 |
| 4. LAX → FLLLos Angeles to Fort Lauderdale | Delta Air Lines | 70.4% | 71.2% | 1.06% | 8pm–5am, Sat | DL 477 23:45 |
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 17 points, against 5 points between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am469 flights89.1%
- 8am–11am838 flights77.1%
- 11am–2pm476 flights72.6%
- 2pm–5pm275 flights77.3%
- 5pm–8pm—
- 8pm–5am1,198 flights77.7%
Scale runs 65% to 95%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
The weak window here is the middle of the day, not the evening: 11am–2pm runs 72.6% on time against 89.1% for 5am–8am. That shape usually means a departure bank rather than an accumulating delay, so the recovery later in the afternoon is real rather than noise. The 8pm–5am window is the busiest, with 1,198 flights scheduled in it.
Explore
Filter LAX to MIA 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 LAX to MIA, the best departure window is 5am–8am at 89.1% on time and the worst is 11am–2pm at 72.6%, a wide gap of 16.5 points. All US flights leaving 5am–8am ran 89.3%.
- 5–8am89.1%
- 8–11am77.1%
- 11am–2pm72.6%
- 2–5pm77.3%
- 5–8pm—
- 8pm–5am77.7%
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 25 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.
July is the worst month at 63.3% on time, 25 points below April, the best at 88.3%. 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. May was the busiest month here, with 302 flights.
Across the week, Tuesday is the strongest day at 82.6% on time and Saturday the weakest at 74.6%, a spread of 8 points.
Delay causes
Why this route gets delayed
Carrier accounts for 45% of the 45,000 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 45%Carrier
- 35%Late-arriving aircraft
- 19%National Airspace System
- 0%Security
35% of delay minutes trace back to a late-arriving aircraft, meaning the plane was already behind before it got here. Across 45,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 35 to one. The split is drawn from 44,937 reported delay minutes.
The largest share of delay minutes, 45%, falls under carrier control: crew scheduling, maintenance, fuelling, baggage. It accounts for 20,000 of the 45,000 delay minutes reported here.
Cancellations are rare at 0.77%, below the national 1.89% and low enough to earn the plus on the grade. Roughly one flight in 100 is called off; the risk here is arriving late, not not arriving.
Connections and stage length
What a delay here actually costs
5.6% 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 about an hour, which a normal layover absorbs.
At 2,342 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 75.2% on time across 3,251 flights, 3 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 3 points of difference.
The sample behind these figures is 3,256 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.
Work out the risk of missing a connection in MIA after this flight
What to do with this
Booking this route
Put together: the calendar is the biggest lever here, not the carrier or the hour. April runs 88.3% on time and July 63.3%, a swing of 25 points. If the dates move at all, move them out of July before you think about anything else. 3,223 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
LAX to MIA questions
How often is LAX to MIA delayed?
About one flight in five arrives at least 15 minutes late, which is the Department of Transportation's definition of a delayed arrival. That works out to 21.6% of the 3,256 flights in this analysis, against 22.7% nationally. Delayed flights are late by about an hour on average.
Which airline is most reliable on LAX to MIA?
American Airlines leads at 79.2% on time across 2,761 flights. Delta Air Lines is at the other end on 73.8%, a gap of 5 points. Sample size matters as much as the percentage: a rate built from a few hundred flights moves around far more than one built from ten thousand.
What time of day has the fewest delays on LAX to MIA?
The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 89.1% on time. The 11am–2pm window is the weakest at 72.6%, 17 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 July delays on LAX to MIA?
July is the weakest month at 63.3% on time, compared with 88.3% in April. Across the year that is 25 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
- MIA to LAX — the return legseparate record
- Los Angeles International (LAX) delay statistics
- Miami International (MIA) delay statistics
- American Airlines on LAX to MIA79.2%
- Delta Air Lines on LAX to MIA73.8%
- LAX to SFO, a related route60.1%
- ATL to MIA, a related route71.2%
- LAX to JFK, a related route77.5%
- American Airlines on-time record79.2%
- Delta Air Lines on-time record73.8%
- 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. LAX to MIA and MIA to LAX 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.