Carrier route record

ASORD→PDX

Alaska Airlines · Chicago to Portland

Flights: 506
Period: July 2025 to June 2026
Share of route: 18%
Carriers: 3

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

Alaska on ORD to PDX sits in the middle of the pack with a C. About seven flights in ten arrive on time by the DOT's definition, 5 points worse than the national rate of 77.6%. The late ones land about 50 minutes behind schedule. That rests on 506 flights. The strongest carrier on the route with a full sample, United Airlines, flew 1,394 at 72.6% on time.

The national on-time rate over the same period is 77.6%, so Alaska on ORD to PDX runs 5 points behind the country as a whole. Across a thousand flights that is about 48 extra late arrivals.

On time

72.8%

Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 500 completed flights

Avg delay

50 min

Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights

Cancelled

1.19%

National rate is 1.81%

Whole route

69.5%

Every carrier on ORD to PDX, 2,761 flights

These figures cover 506 flights between July 2025 and June 2026. On-time means an arrival less than 15 minutes after the scheduled gate time, the same threshold the Department of Transportation uses in its own reports. Cancelled and diverted flights are excluded from the on-time rate and counted separately, which is why the cancellation column matters on its own.

Carrier by carrier

Alaska against every carrier on ORD to PDX

Alaska flew 506 of the 2,761 flights on ORD to PDX, about 18% of it. Its 72.8% on time is 3 points better than the route as a whole, which runs 69.5%. Ranked by on-time rate it is first of three carriers on the route, where the range runs from Alaska at 72.8% to American at 62.6%.

The choice of carrier is not cosmetic here. United Airlines arrives on time 72.6% of the time; American Airlines manages 62.6%. Sample sizes sit next to every figure, because a two-point gap across 861 flights means less than a ten-point one.

On-time performance by carrier on ORD to PDX
Airline	Flights	On time	Avg delay	Cancelled	Grade
Alaska Airlines (this page)	506	72.8%	50 min	1.19%	C
United Airlines	1,394	72.6%	61 min	0.43%	C+
American Airlines	861	62.6%	71 min	1.39%	D

United leads American by 10 points. Real, but small enough that a better departure time on the weaker carrier can outweigh it.

Flight by flight

Alaska flight numbers on ORD to PDX

AS 32514:0769.5% · 351 flights

Departure window

When Alaska runs best on this route

Departure time matters more here than the choice of carrier. The gap between the best and worst window is 11 points, against 10 points between the best and worst carrier. Each bar is the on-time rate for flights scheduled inside that window.

5am–8am154 flights80.3%
8am–11am—
11am–2pm—
2pm–5pm352 flights69.5%
5pm–8pm—
8pm–5am—

Scale runs 60% to 85%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.

Book the early departure. Flights leaving between 5am–8am arrive on time 80.3% of the time, against 69.5% for the afternoon window. That is 11 points of difference for no extra money, and it comes from the same aircraft having had no earlier flight to fall behind on. The 2pm–5pm window is the busiest, with 352 flights scheduled in it.

Across the year

Alaska on ORD to PDX through the year

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

September is the best month on the calendar at 85.1% on time. Shoulder season thins the schedule and takes the summer weather with it, and the operation gets its margin back. July was the busiest month here, with 61 flights.

Across the week, Saturday is the strongest day at 78.4% on time and Wednesday the weakest at 61.0%. 17 points is a smaller lever than departure hour, but it is free.

Delay causes

Why Alaska runs late on this route

One category carries most of the weight here. Late-arriving aircraft accounts for 55% of the 6,841 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
55%
National Airspace System
25%
Carrier
18%
Extreme weather
2%
Security
1%

55% 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 6,841 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 33 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 6,841 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 80.3% on time here.

Cancellations sit at 1.19% against a national 1.81%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.00%.

Connections and stage length

What a delay here costs

6.2% 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 about 50 minutes, which a normal layover absorbs.

At 1,739 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 74.5% on time across 510 flights, within 2 points 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. 506 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 Alaska on ORD to PDX

Put together: treat all of this as provisional. 506 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 72.8% headline is the most reliable number on the page; the hour and month splits below it are built on a few dozen flights each. 500 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