Carrier route record
AAMIA→DCA
American Airlines · Miami to Washington
- Flights
- 3,549
- Period
- July 2025 to June 2026
- Share of route
- 90%
- Carriers
- 4
Historical statistics for July 2025 to June 2026, not live status. For today’s flights, check with American Airlines.
American on MIA to DCA sits in the middle of the pack with a C. Close to three flights in four arrive on time by the DOT's definition, 3 points worse than the national rate of 77.6%. The late ones land a little over an hour behind schedule. That rests on 3,549 flights, with a median arrival 5 minutes early.
The US average over the same twelve months is 77.6%, so there is little to separate American on MIA to DCA from the country as a whole. The variation that matters here is internal: which carrier, and what time of day.
Key figures
On time
74.8%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 3,451 completed flights
Avg delay
70 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
2.28%
National rate is 1.81%
Whole route
74.7%
Every carrier on MIA to DCA, 3,962 flights
These figures cover 3,549 flights between July 2025 and June 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 9.0% 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 MIA to DCA
American flew 3,549 of the 3,962 flights on MIA to DCA, most of the route. Its 74.8% on time is about level with the route as a whole at 74.7%. Ranked by on-time rate it is number three of four carriers on the route, where the range runs from Envoy at 100.0% to Republic at 66.7%. Three 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.
| Airline | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Envoy Airthin sample | 1 | 100.0% | — | 0.00% | A+ |
| Delta Air Linesthin sample | 364 | 75.2% | 75 min | 1.10% | B |
| American Airlines (this page) | 3,549 | 74.8% | 70 min | 2.28% | C |
| Republic Airwaysthin sample | 48 | 66.7% | 76 min | 0.00% | C+ |
Flight by flight
American flight numbers on MIA to DCA
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 27 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–8am361 flights88.8%
- 8am–11am708 flights87.9%
- 11am–2pm378 flights78.2%
- 2pm–5pm679 flights65.2%
- 5pm–8pm715 flights62.2%
- 8pm–5am708 flights74.0%
Scale runs 55% to 95%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
The 5pm–8pm window is where this operation falls apart: 62.2% on time, against 88.8% 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 5pm–8pm window is the busiest, with 715 flights scheduled in it.
Across the year
American on MIA to DCA through the year
July is the worst month at 58.4% on time, 23 points below April, the best at 81.3%. 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 308 flights.
Across the week, Tuesday is the strongest day at 79.7% on time and Sunday the weakest at 70.6%. 9 points is a smaller lever than departure hour, but it is free.
Delay causes
Why American 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 61,000 reported delay minutes.
- 41%Late-arriving aircraft
- 34%Carrier
- 19%National Airspace System
- 6%Extreme weather
- 1%Security
41% 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 61,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 7 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 60,541 reported delay minutes.
The largest share of delay minutes, 34%, 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 21,000 of the 61,000 delay minutes reported here.
Cancellations sit at 2.28% against a national 1.81%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.48%.
Connections and stage length
What a delay here costs
For anyone connecting, the number to weigh is not the on-time rate but the tail behind it. 9.0% of arrivals land a full hour or more behind schedule, against 8.1% nationally. A 45-minute layover does not survive that, and no amount of walking quickly changes it. Ninety minutes is the honest minimum here, and two hours if the onward flight is on a separate ticket.
The 919 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 77.4% on time across 3,546 flights, within 3 points 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 3,549 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 American on MIA to DCA
Put together: the calendar is the biggest lever here, not the carrier or the hour. April runs 81.3% on time and July 58.4%, a swing of 23 points. If the dates move at all, move them out of July before you think about anything else. 3,451 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Related
Where to go next
- MIA to DCA, every carrier
- American on DCA to MIA, the return leg
- Delta Air Lines on MIA to DCA75.2%
- American Airlines network-wide record
- Miami International (MIA) delay statistics
- Ronald Reagan Washington National (DCA) delay statistics
- Why the first flight of the morning is statistically safest
- How often a connection fails at the major US hubs
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.