Carrier route record
AAPDX→DFW
American Airlines · Portland to Dallas-Fort Worth
- Flights
- 1,919
- Period
- July 2025 to June 2026
- Share of route
- 80%
- Carriers
- 2
Historical statistics for July 2025 to June 2026, not live status. For today’s flights, check with American Airlines.
American on PDX to DFW lands a B−, 2 points better than the national rate of 77.6%. About one flight in five arrives 15 minutes late or worse, and those flights are late by close to two hours on average. That is a workable record, not a spotless one. That rests on 1,919 flights, with a median arrival 9 minutes early.
The US average over the same twelve months is 77.6%, so there is little to separate American on PDX to DFW from the country as a whole. The variation that matters here is internal: which carrier, and what time of day.
Key figures
On time
80.0%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 1,846 completed flights
Avg delay
105 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
3.18%
National rate is 1.81%
Whole route
80.7%
Every carrier on PDX to DFW, 2,412 flights
These figures cover 1,919 flights between July 2025 and June 2026. The median arrival is 9 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
American against every carrier on PDX to DFW
American flew 1,919 of the 2,412 flights on PDX to DFW, most of the route. Its 80.0% on time is about level with the route as a whole at 80.7%. Ranked by on-time rate it is last of two carriers on the route, where the range runs from Alaska at 83.5% to American at 80.0%.
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Alaska Airlines | 493 | 83.5% | 46 min | 0.81% | B+ |
| American Airlines (this page) | 1,919 | 80.0% | 105 min | 3.18% | B− |
Flight by flight
American flight numbers on PDX to DFW
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 18 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–8am728 flights88.2%
- 8am–11am86 flights83.5%
- 11am–2pm491 flights70.1%
- 2pm–5pm227 flights75.5%
- 5pm–8pm—
- 8pm–5am387 flights78.7%
Scale runs 60% to 95%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
The weak window here is the middle of the day, not the evening: 11am–2pm runs 70.1% on time against 88.2% for 5am–8am. That shape usually means a departure bank rather than an accumulating delay, so the recovery later in the afternoon is real rather than noise. The 5am–8am window is the busiest, with 728 flights scheduled in it.
Across the year
American on PDX to DFW through the year
June is the worst month at 70.2% on time, 18 points below December, the best at 88.1%. 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. August was the busiest month here, with 183 flights.
Across the week, Friday is the strongest day at 84.8% on time and Saturday the weakest at 76.9%. 8 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. Carrier accounts for 44% of the 39,000 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.
- 44%Carrier
- 44%Late-arriving aircraft
- 8%National Airspace System
- 4%Extreme weather
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 39,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 11 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 38,969 reported delay minutes.
The largest share of delay minutes, 44%, 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 17,000 of the 39,000 delay minutes reported here.
Cancellations run at 3.18%, 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
7.5% 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 close to two hours, which a normal layover absorbs.
At 1,616 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 is a different operation and performs like one: it runs 62.1% on time across 1,917 flights, 18 points below 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 18 points of difference.
The sample behind these figures is 1,919 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 PDX to DFW
Put together: the delay figures matter less here than the 3.18% cancellation rate. A late arrival costs you close to two hours; 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. 1,846 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Related
Where to go next
- PDX to DFW, every carrier
- American on DFW to PDX, the return leg
- Alaska Airlines on PDX to DFW83.5%
- American Airlines network-wide record
- Portland International (PDX) delay statistics
- Dallas/Fort Worth International (DFW) delay statistics
- The US routes with the most cancellations
- Why the first flight of the morning is statistically safest
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.