Carrier route record

WNMCO→PHX

Southwest Airlines · Orlando to Phoenix

Flights: 852
Period: July 2025 to June 2026
Share of route: 46%
Carriers: 3

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

Southwest on MCO to PHX lands a B+, level with the national rate of 77.6%. Roughly one flight in five arrives 15 minutes late or worse, and those flights are late by roughly 50 minutes on average. That is a workable record, not a spotless one. That rests on 852 flights, with a median arrival 3 minutes early.

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

On time

78.2%

Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 847 completed flights

Avg delay

51 min

Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights

Cancelled

0.23%

National rate is 1.81%

Whole route

77.6%

Every carrier on MCO to PHX, 1,842 flights

These figures cover 852 flights between July 2025 and June 2026. The median arrival is 3 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

Southwest against every carrier on MCO to PHX

Southwest flew 852 of the 1,842 flights on MCO to PHX, about 46% of it. Its 78.2% on time is about level with the route as a whole at 77.6%. Ranked by on-time rate it is number two of three carriers on the route, where the range runs from Frontier at 81.8% to American at 75.9%. 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.

On-time performance by carrier on MCO to PHX
Airline	Flights	On time	Avg delay	Cancelled	Grade
Frontier Airlinesthin sample	194	81.8%	51 min	1.03%	B
Southwest Airlines (this page)	852	78.2%	51 min	0.23%	B+
American Airlines	796	75.9%	104 min	0.63%	B+

Departure window

When Southwest runs best on this route

Departure time matters more here than the choice of carrier. The gap between the best and worst window is 30 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–8am279 flights92.4%
8am–11am98 flights85.7%
11am–2pm80 flights83.5%
2pm–5pm71 flights69.0%
5pm–8pm206 flights64.9%
8pm–5am118 flights62.9%

Scale runs 55% to 100%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.

The 8pm–5am window is where this operation falls apart: 62.9% on time, against 92.4% 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 5am–8am window is the busiest, with 279 flights scheduled in it.

Across the year

Southwest on MCO to PHX through the year

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

November is the best month on the calendar at 88.2% on time. Shoulder season thins the schedule and takes the summer weather with it, and the operation gets its margin back. December was the busiest month here, with 91 flights.

Across the week, Wednesday is the strongest day at 85.0% on time and Sunday the weakest at 70.8%. 14 points is a smaller lever than departure hour, but it is free.

Delay causes

Why Southwest runs late on this route

One category carries most of the weight here. Late-arriving aircraft accounts for 44% of the 9,490 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.

Late-arriving aircraft
44%
Carrier
31%
National Airspace System
16%
Extreme weather
8%
Security
1%

44% 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 9,490 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 6 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 9,490 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 92.4% on time here.

Cancellations are rare at 0.23%, below the national 1.81% 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 costs

5.5% 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 roughly 50 minutes, which a normal layover absorbs.

At 1,849 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 runs 76.8% on time across 856 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.

One caution: this is a thin sample. 852 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 Southwest on MCO to PHX

Put together: treat all of this as provisional. 852 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 78.2% headline is the most reliable number on the page; the hour and month splits below it are built on a few dozen flights each. 847 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