Route reliability record
PHL→MIA
Philadelphia to Miami
- Flights
- 3,286
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Distance
- 1,013 mi
- Carriers
- 3
This route lands a B, level with the national rate of 77.3%. Roughly one flight in four arrives 15 minutes late or worse, and those flights are late by a little over an hour on average. That rests on 3,286 PHL to MIA flights, of which American Airlines flew 2,724 at 78.7% on time.
Best time to fly PHL to MIA: a 5am–8am departure, ideally on a Tuesday. Flights in that window arrived on time 88.0% of the time and Tuesday flights 85.2%, against 77.0% for the route overall.
The US average over the same twelve months is 77.3%, so there is little to separate this route from the country as a whole. The variation that matters here is internal: which carrier, and what time of day.
Key figures
On time
77.0%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 3,185 completed flights
Avg delay
78 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
2.86%
National rate is 1.89%
Best carrier
American
78.7% on time across 2,724 flights
These figures cover 3,286 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 8.6% of arrivals land a full hour or more behind schedule, against 8.3% nationally.
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Carrier by carrier
Which airline is most reliable on PHL to MIA
The choice of carrier is not cosmetic here. American Airlines arrives on time 78.7% of the time; Frontier Airlines manages 63.3%. Sample sizes sit next to every figure, because a two-point gap across 369 flights means less than a ten-point one.
| Airline | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Spirit Airlinesthin sample | 193 | 78.9% | 55 min | 3.63% | B− |
| American Airlines | 2,724 | 78.7% | 79 min | 2.79% | B |
| Frontier Airlines | 369 | 63.3% | 81 min | 2.98% | D |
The spread between American and Frontier is 15 points, wide enough that it should decide the booking. On a hundred trips that is 15 more arrivals inside the on-time window.
Flight by flight
Flights on PHL to MIA
The flight numbers below flew this route at least 250 times in the period, busiest first. Each has its own record, with its schedule and delay causes.
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Best ways to make this trip
The most reliable ways to fly Philadelphia to Miami
Every airline on this route and on the routes between nearby airports, ranked by how often a scheduled flight actually operated and arrived on time. 4 of the top 5 use a different airport at one end.
| Option | Airline | Success | On time | Cancelled | Best departure | Most punctual flight |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. PHL → MIAPhiladelphia to Miami | American Airlines | 76.5% | 78.7% | 2.79% | 5am–8am, Tue | — |
| 2. PHL → FLLPhiladelphia to Fort Lauderdale | American Airlines | 73.4% | 75.4% | 2.70% | 8am–11am, Wed | AA 1864 19:00 |
| 3. PHL → FLLPhiladelphia to Fort Lauderdale | Frontier Airlines | 70.7% | 72.4% | 2.28% | 5am–8am, Wed | F9 2609 06:00 |
| 4. PHL → FLLPhiladelphia to Fort Lauderdale | JetBlue Airways | 68.6% | 70.9% | 3.29% | 8am–11am, Wed | B6 375 07:00 |
| 5. PHL → FLLPhiladelphia to Fort Lauderdale | Spirit Airlines | 65.7% | 69.9% | 5.95% | 5am–8am, Tue | — |
Success is the share of scheduled flights that operated and arrived less than 15 minutes late, so a cancelled flight counts against it. “(route)” means the best time comes from every carrier on the route rather than this airline alone.
Departure window
The best time of day to leave
Departure time matters more here than the choice of carrier. The gap between the best and worst window is 18 points, against 15 points between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am571 flights88.0%
- 8am–11am838 flights79.7%
- 11am–2pm387 flights73.6%
- 2pm–5pm497 flights74.0%
- 5pm–8pm707 flights71.4%
- 8pm–5am286 flights70.5%
Scale runs 60% to 95%.
Book the early departure. Flights leaving between 5am–8am arrive on time 88.0% of the time, against 70.5% for the overnight window. That is 18 points of difference for no extra money, and it comes from the same aircraft having had no earlier flight to fall behind on. The 8am–11am window is the busiest, with 838 flights scheduled in it.
Explore
Filter PHL to MIA by airline, time, month and day
Pick a breakdown and a carrier. The dashed mark on each row is the same slice for every US flight.
On PHL to MIA, the best departure window is 5am–8am at 88.0% on time and the worst is 8pm–5am at 70.5%, a wide gap of 17.5 points. All US flights leaving 5am–8am ran 89.3%.
- 5–8am88.0%
- 8–11am79.7%
- 11am–2pm73.6%
- 2–5pm74.0%
- 5–8pm71.4%
- 8pm–5am70.5%
best all US flightsScale 60% to 95%.
Across the year
When delays peak on this route
This route's year swings by 20 points from best month to worst, which is wide. An annual average tells you very little about the week you are actually flying, so read the strip rather than the headline if your dates are fixed.
August is the worst month at 64.8% on time, 20 points below May, the best at 84.8%. 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. July was the busiest month here, with 309 flights.
Across the week, Tuesday is the strongest day at 85.2% on time and Sunday the weakest at 71.8%, a spread of 13 points.
Delay causes
Why this route gets delayed
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 57,000 reported delay minutes.
- 40%Late-arriving aircraft
- 33%Carrier
- 20%National Airspace System
- 6%Extreme weather
- 1%Security
40% of delay minutes trace back to a late-arriving aircraft, meaning the plane was already behind before it got here. Across 57,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 7 to one. The split is drawn from 57,267 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 88.0% on time here.
Cancellations run at 2.86%, against 1.89% nationally. That is roughly 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 actually costs
8.6% of arrivals land an hour or more late, close to the national 8.3%, so a 60 to 75 minute layover is reasonable here while anything under 45 minutes is a bet. Most delays on this route last a little over an hour, which a normal layover absorbs.
The 1,013 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.
The return leg runs 75.1% on time across 3,289 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.
The sample behind these figures is 3,286 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.
Work out the risk of missing a connection in MIA after this flight
What to do with this
Booking this route
Put together: the delay figures matter less here than the 2.86% 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. 3,185 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
PHL to MIA questions
How often is PHL to MIA delayed?
Roughly one flight in four arrives at least 15 minutes late, which is the Department of Transportation's definition of a delayed arrival. That works out to 23.0% of the 3,286 flights in this analysis, against 22.7% nationally. Delayed flights are late by a little over an hour on average.
Which airline is most reliable on PHL to MIA?
American Airlines leads at 78.7% on time across 2,724 flights. Frontier Airlines is at the other end on 63.3%, a gap of 15 points. Sample size matters as much as the percentage: a rate built from a few hundred flights moves around far more than one built from ten thousand.
What time of day has the fewest delays on PHL to MIA?
The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 88.0% on time. The 8pm–5am window is the weakest at 70.5%, 18 points behind. Later departures inherit delays from earlier flights the same aircraft has already flown, which is why the curve slopes the way it does.
How bad are August delays on PHL to MIA?
August is the weakest month at 64.8% on time, compared with 84.8% in May. Across the year that is 20 points between the best and worst months. Moving flexible dates out of that month is one of the few things that reliably helps.
Related
Where to go next
- MIA to PHL — the return legseparate record
- Philadelphia International (PHL) delay statistics
- Miami International (MIA) delay statistics
- Spirit Airlines on PHL to MIA78.9%
- American Airlines on PHL to MIA78.7%
- Frontier Airlines on PHL to MIA63.3%
- PHL to ATL, a related route78.0%
- ATL to MIA, a related route71.2%
- PHL to MCO, a related route72.4%
- Spirit Airlines on-time record78.9%
- American Airlines on-time record78.7%
- Frontier Airlines on-time record63.3%
- The US routes with the most cancellations
- Why the first flight of the morning is statistically safest
Direction matters. PHL to MIA and MIA to PHL are scored separately because they are separate operations, with different departure banks and different aircraft. Compare the return leg.
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Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics, on-time performance data, September 2025 to August 2026. Last updated ; recomputed monthly. How this data is collected.