Route reliability record
LAX→PDX
Los Angeles to Portland
- Flights
- 4,450
- Period
- June 2025 to May 2026
- Distance
- 833 mi
- Carriers
- 4
This route earns a A+. More than four flights in five arrive inside the 15-minute window the DOT uses to define an on-time arrival, which puts it 9 points better than the national rate of 77.4%. When something does go wrong the average delay runs a little over an hour. That rests on 4,450 flights, of which Alaska Airlines flew 1,942 at 89.6% on time.
Alaska Airlines is the most reliable of the three carriers covered here at 89.6% on time across 1,942 flights.
Key figures
On time
86.0%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 4,407 completed flights
Avg delay
70 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
0.94%
National rate is 1.80%
Best carrier
Alaska
89.6% on time across 1,942 flights
These figures cover 4,450 flights between June 2025 and May 2026. The median arrival is 13 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
Which airline is most reliable on LAX to PDX
The choice of carrier is not cosmetic here. Alaska Airlines arrives on time 89.6% of the time; SkyWest Airlines manages 74.7%. Sample sizes sit next to every figure, because a two-point gap across 598 flights means less than a ten-point one.
| Airline | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Alaska Airlines | 1,942 | 89.6% | 52 min | 1.08% | A |
| Delta Air Lines | 1,691 | 86.4% | 77 min | 0.89% | A+ |
| Frontier Airlinesthin sample | 219 | 81.9% | 63 min | 1.83% | B |
| SkyWest Airlines | 598 | 74.7% | 87 min | 0.33% | C+ |
The spread between Alaska and SkyWest is 15 points, wide enough that it should decide the booking. On a hundred trips that is 15 more arrivals inside the on-time window.
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 10 points, against 15 points between the best and worst carrier. Each bar is the on-time rate for flights scheduled inside that window.
- 5am–8am709 flights91.3%
- 8am–11am725 flights87.8%
- 11am–2pm656 flights87.6%
- 2pm–5pm978 flights86.5%
- 5pm–8pm746 flights81.3%
- 8pm–5am636 flights81.3%
Scale runs 75% to 95%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
Book the early departure. Flights leaving between 5am–8am arrive on time 91.3% of the time, against 81.3% for the overnight window. That is 10 points of difference for no extra money, and it comes from the same aircraft having had no earlier flight to fall behind on.
Across the year
When delays peak on this route
Twelve months, one bar each, drawn from the same 4,450 flights. The strip shows how much of this route's record is set by the calendar rather than by the operation.
June is the worst month at 79.6% on time, 12 points below May, the best at 91.3%. 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.
Across the week, Wednesday is the strongest day at 89.2% on time and Friday the weakest at 83.1%. 6 points is a smaller lever than departure hour, but it is free.
Delay causes
Why this route gets delayed
One category carries most of the weight here. Carrier accounts for 58% of the 43,000 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.
- 58%Carrier
- 35%Late-arriving aircraft
- 5%National Airspace System
- 1%Extreme weather
- 0%Security
35% 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 43,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 26 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 largest share of delay minutes, 58%, 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 25,000 of the 43,000 delay minutes reported here.
Cancellations sit at 0.94% against a national 1.80%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.02%.
Connections and stage length
What a delay here actually costs
5.6% of arrivals land an hour or more late, close to the national 8.2%. 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 are the a little over an hour kind, which a normal layover absorbs.
The 833 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 86.8% on time across 4,447 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 4,450 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 this route
Put together: avoid the 8pm–5am departure. It runs 81.3% on time against 91.3% for the 5am–8am slot, and that 10 points is the largest single thing you control here. Alaska Airlines is the strongest operator if the fares are close.
Common questions
LAX to PDX questions
How often is LAX to PDX delayed?
About one flight in seven arrive at least 15 minutes late, which is the Department of Transportation's definition of a delayed arrival. That works out to 14.0% of the 4,450 flights in this analysis, against 22.6% nationally. Delayed flights are late by a little over an hour on average.
Which airline is most reliable on LAX to PDX?
Alaska Airlines leads at 89.6% on time across 1,942 flights. SkyWest Airlines is at the other end on 74.7%, a gap of 15 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 PDX?
The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 91.3% on time. The 8pm–5am window is the weakest at 81.3%, 10 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 June delays on LAX to PDX?
June is the weakest month at 79.6% on time, compared with 91.3% in May. Across the year that is 12 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
- PDX to LAX — the return legseparate record
- Los Angeles International (LAX) delay statistics
- Portland International (PDX) delay statistics
- Alaska Airlines on-time record89.6%
- Delta Air Lines on-time record86.4%
- Frontier Airlines on-time record81.9%
- 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 PDX and PDX to LAX are scored separately because they are separate operations, with different departure banks and different aircraft. Compare the return leg.
Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics, on-time performance data, June 2025 to May 2026. Updated monthly. How this data is collected.