Carrier route record

ASPDX→ATL

Alaska Airlines · Portland to Atlanta

Flights: 286
Period: September 2025 to August 2026
Share of route: 19%
Carriers: 3

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

Alaska on PDX to ATL lands a B+, 3 points better than the national rate of 77.3%. About one flight in five arrives 15 minutes late or worse, and those flights are late by about 35 minutes on average. That rests on 286 flights, with a median arrival 4 minutes early.

The US average over the same twelve months is 77.3%, so there is little to separate Alaska on PDX to ATL from the country as a whole. The variation that matters here is internal: which carrier, and what time of day.

On time

80.2%

Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 283 completed flights

Avg delay

36 min

Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights

Cancelled

0.70%

National rate is 1.89%

Whole route

88.4%

Every carrier on PDX to ATL, 1,544 flights

These figures cover 286 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. The median arrival is 4 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.

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Carrier by carrier

Alaska against every carrier on PDX to ATL

Alaska flew 286 of the 1,544 flights on PDX to ATL, about 19% of it. Its 80.2% on time is 8 points worse than the route as a whole, which runs 88.4%. Ranked by on-time rate it is last of three carriers on the route, where the range runs from American at 100.0% to Alaska at 80.2%. 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 PDX to ATL
Airline	Flights	On time	Avg delay	Cancelled	Grade
American Airlinesthin sample	1	100.0%	—	0.00%	A+
Delta Air Lines	1,257	90.2%	60 min	0.95%	A+
Alaska Airlines (this page)thin sample	286	80.2%	36 min	0.70%	B+

Flight by flight

Alaska flight numbers on PDX to ATL

AS 78407:3079.7% · 274 flights

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Departure window

When Alaska runs best on this route

Departure time is the single lever a traveller controls, and it moves the odds more than most people expect. Each bar below is the on-time rate for flights scheduled to leave inside that window, across 286 flights.

There are not enough flights in each departure window to split Alaska's PDX to ATL record by time of day without the percentages moving on noise. The headline rate of 80.2% is the reliable figure here.

Across the year

Alaska on PDX to ATL through the year

Jul–Sep 202530 flights63.3%
Oct–Dec 202591 flights82.4%
Jan–Mar 202618 flights—
Apr–Jun 202685 flights88.1%
Jul–Sep 202662 flights70.0%

Scale runs 55% to 95%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.

Monthly volumes are too low here to break the year into twelve reliable readings. What the twelve-month total says is 80.2% on time across 286 flights.

Alaska on PDX to ATL did not run the same all year. Its best quarter was Apr–Jun 2026 at 88.1% on time and its weakest Jul–Sep 2025 at 63.3%, a swing of 25 points on roughly 72 flights a quarter. The twelve-month rate averages over that, so if you are flying in a weak quarter the quarter's own figure is the better guide.

Across the week, Thursday is the strongest day at 87.8% on time and Sunday the weakest at 65.0%, a spread of 23 points.

Arrival by arrival

How late Alaska on PDX to ATL runs when it is late

Alaska on PDX to ATL often beats the schedule: 71 of 283 completed flights, 25%, arrived 15 minutes or more early. The 56 late arrivals split 24 under half an hour, 25 between 30 and 60 minutes, and 7 an hour or more. Not one arrived two hours late.

15+ min early71 flights25.1%
Within 15 min156 flights55.1%
15–29 min late24 flights8.5%
30–59 min late25 flights8.8%
1–2 hours late7 flights2.5%
2+ hours late0 flights0.0%

Scale runs 0% to 100%.

Share of 283 completed flights by arrival against schedule.

A late pushback is often recovered here: of 29 departures that left 15 minutes late or more, 13 still arrived on time. In the other direction, 40 flights left on time yet arrived 15 minutes late or more, so that delay built up after pushback: in the air, in a holding pattern or on the ground at ATL.

The worst days

Worst days for Alaska on PDX to ATL

The latest arrival of the period was on 6 October 2025, 1 hour 26 minutes behind schedule; most of its delay minutes were filed as carrier-caused (crew, maintenance, fuelling, baggage). Three of the five worst days fell in July 2026.

The latest arrivals of Alaska on PDX to ATL in the period
Date	Arrived late by	Largest filed cause
6 October 2025	1 hour 26 minutes	Carrier
3 July 2026	1 hour 23 minutes	National Airspace System
6 July 2026	1 hour 9 minutes	National Airspace System
7 October 2025	1 hour 4 minutes	Late-arriving aircraft
13 July 2026	1 hour 1 minute	National Airspace System

Delay causes

Why Alaska runs late on this route

National Airspace System accounts for 69% of the 2,003 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.

National Airspace System
69%
Carrier
24%
Late-arriving aircraft
7%

69% of delay minutes are charged to the National Airspace System: air traffic volume, runway configuration, ground stops. No carrier can price its way out of that, which is why airport choice moves the number here more than carrier choice does. That is 1,381 minutes out of 2,003, against a national NAS share of 21%. The split is drawn from 2,003 reported delay minutes.

Cancellations are rare at 0.70%, below the national 1.89% 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

Badly late arrivals are rare here: only 2.5% land an hour or more behind schedule, against 8.3% nationally. Connections built on this flight are about as safe as US domestic connections get, though a cancelled flight still ignores every layover you give it.

At 2,172 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 82.4% on time across 286 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. 286 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 PDX to ATL

Put together: treat all of this as provisional. 286 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 80.2% headline is the most reliable number on the page; the hour and month splits below it are built on a few dozen flights each. 283 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.

Where to go next

Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics, on-time performance data, September 2025 to August 2026. Last updated 22 October 2026; recomputed monthly. How this data is collected.

Key figures