Carrier route record
AAMIA→LGA
American Airlines · Miami to New York
- Flights
- 3,549
- Period
- July 2025 to June 2026
- Share of route
- 59%
- Carriers
- 5
Historical statistics for July 2025 to June 2026, not live status. For today’s flights, check with American Airlines.
American on MIA to LGA carries a cancellation problem, not just a delay problem: 3.5% of scheduled flights never operate, against 1.8% nationally. Of the ones that do fly, about two flights in three arrive on time, worth a C− overall. The punctuality figure counts only flights that actually departed, so it flatters an operation that cancels this often. That rests on 3,549 flights. The strongest carrier on the route with a full sample, Delta Air Lines, flew 1,916 at 72.2% on time.
The national on-time rate over the same period is 77.6%, so American on MIA to LGA runs 11 points behind the country as a whole. Across a thousand flights that is about 106 extra late arrivals.
Key figures
On time
67.0%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 3,398 completed flights
Avg delay
82 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
3.47%
National rate is 1.81%
Whole route
68.0%
Every carrier on MIA to LGA, 6,010 flights
These figures cover 3,549 flights between July 2025 and June 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 14.2% 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 LGA
American flew 3,549 of the 6,010 flights on MIA to LGA, most of the route. Its 67.0% on time is about level with the route as a whole at 68.0%. Ranked by on-time rate it is number three of five carriers on the route, where the range runs from Republic at 75.0% to Spirit at 59.0%. Two of those carriers flew fewer than 365 flights here, so treat their positions as rough.
The choice of carrier is not cosmetic here. Delta Air Lines arrives on time 72.2% of the time; Spirit Airlines manages 59.0%. Sample sizes sit next to every figure, because a two-point gap across 422 flights means less than a ten-point one.
| Airline | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Republic Airwaysthin sample | 4 | 75.0% | 31 min | 0.00% | B+ |
| Delta Air Lines | 1,916 | 72.2% | 65 min | 3.97% | C− |
| American Airlines (this page) | 3,549 | 67.0% | 82 min | 3.47% | C− |
| Frontier Airlinesthin sample | 119 | 60.0% | 90 min | 11.76% | D− |
| Spirit Airlines | 422 | 59.0% | 73 min | 7.82% | D− |
Spirit Airlines cancels 7.8% of what it schedules here, the highest in the table. A cancelled flight never appears in an on-time rate, so read that column alongside the punctuality one rather than after it.
Flight by flight
American flight numbers on MIA to LGA
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 32 points, against 13 points between the best and worst carrier. Each bar is the on-time rate for flights scheduled inside that window.
- 5am–8am391 flights87.5%
- 8am–11am812 flights80.6%
- 11am–2pm371 flights61.7%
- 2pm–5pm656 flights56.4%
- 5pm–8pm842 flights55.4%
- 8pm–5am477 flights65.0%
Scale runs 45% to 95%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
The 5pm–8pm window is where this operation falls apart: 55.4% on time, against 87.5% 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 842 flights scheduled in it.
Across the year
American on MIA to LGA through the year
September is the best month on the calendar at 80.1% on time. Shoulder season thins the schedule and takes the summer weather with it, and the operation gets its margin back. March was the busiest month here, with 306 flights.
Across the week, Tuesday is the strongest day at 73.7% on time and Sunday the weakest at 53.0%. 21 points is a smaller lever than departure hour, but it is free.
Delay causes
Why American runs late on this route
One category carries most of the weight here. Late-arriving aircraft accounts for 43% of the 92,000 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.
- 43%Late-arriving aircraft
- 27%Carrier
- 26%National Airspace System
- 5%Extreme weather
- 0%Security
43% 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 92,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 9 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 91,651 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 87.5% on time here.
Cancellations run at 3.47%, against 1.81% nationally. That is about one flight in 30 cancelled outright. A cancelled flight is invisible in every on-time figure on this page, so the punctuality numbers above describe only the flights that actually operated.
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. 14.2% 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 1,096 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 is a different operation and performs like one: it runs 71.5% on time across 3,549 flights, 5 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 5 points of difference.
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 LGA
Put together: the delay figures matter less here than the 3.47% cancellation rate. A late arrival costs you a little over an hour; a cancelled flight costs you the day. Book the 5am–8am departure so there is still a schedule behind you if it goes wrong, and treat a same-day connection as optimistic. 3,398 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Related
Where to go next
- MIA to LGA, every carrier
- American on LGA to MIA, the return leg
- Delta Air Lines on MIA to LGA72.2%
- Frontier Airlines on MIA to LGA60.0%
- Spirit Airlines on MIA to LGA59.0%
- American Airlines network-wide record
- Miami International (MIA) delay statistics
- LaGuardia (LGA) delay statistics
- The US routes with the most cancellations
- Same route, different airline: where the carrier you pick matters most
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.