Carrier route record
AAPHL→ORD
American Airlines · Philadelphia to Chicago
- Flights
- 2,923
- Period
- July 2025 to June 2026
- Share of route
- 60%
- Carriers
- 4
Historical statistics for July 2025 to June 2026, not live status. For today’s flights, check with American Airlines.
American on PHL to ORD carries a cancellation problem, not just a delay problem: 3.9% of scheduled flights never operate, against 1.8% nationally. Of the ones that do fly, close to three flights in four 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 2,923 flights, with a median arrival 8 minutes early.
The national on-time rate over the same period is 77.6%, so American on PHL to ORD runs 4 points behind the country as a whole. Across a thousand flights that is about 44 extra late arrivals.
Key figures
On time
73.2%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 2,794 completed flights
Avg delay
98 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
3.90%
National rate is 1.81%
Whole route
73.0%
Every carrier on PHL to ORD, 4,911 flights
These figures cover 2,923 flights between July 2025 and June 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 12.3% 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 PHL to ORD
American flew 2,923 of the 4,911 flights on PHL to ORD, most of the route. Its 73.2% on time is about level with the route as a whole at 73.0%. Ranked by on-time rate it is number three of four carriers on the route, where the range runs from Republic at 92.3% to Frontier at 58.6%. Two 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.
| Airline | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Republic Airwaysthin sample | 26 | 92.3% | 44 min | 0.00% | A+ |
| United Airlines | 1,773 | 74.0% | 94 min | 1.75% | C |
| American Airlines (this page) | 2,923 | 73.2% | 98 min | 3.90% | C− |
| Frontier Airlinesthin sample | 189 | 58.6% | 137 min | 4.23% | D− |
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 26 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–8am516 flights86.1%
- 8am–11am610 flights78.0%
- 11am–2pm488 flights74.5%
- 2pm–5pm601 flights68.6%
- 5pm–8pm472 flights60.3%
- 8pm–5am236 flights65.6%
Scale runs 50% to 90%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
The 5pm–8pm window is where this operation falls apart: 60.3% on time, against 86.1% 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 8am–11am window is the busiest, with 610 flights scheduled in it.
Across the year
American on PHL to ORD through the year
July is the worst month at 58.6% on time, 24 points below February, the best at 82.7%. 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. May was the busiest month here, with 279 flights.
Across the week, Wednesday is the strongest day at 78.8% on time and Sunday the weakest at 64.6%. 14 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 45% of the 74,000 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.
- 45%Late-arriving aircraft
- 25%Carrier
- 24%National Airspace System
- 5%Extreme weather
- 0%Security
45% 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 74,000 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 73,799 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 86.1% on time here.
Cancellations run at 3.90%, against 1.81% nationally. That is about one flight in 25 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. 12.3% 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 678 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 runs 71.1% on time across 2,926 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 2,923 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 PHL to ORD
Put together: the delay figures matter less here than the 3.90% cancellation rate. A late arrival costs you an hour and a half; 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. 2,794 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Related
Where to go next
- PHL to ORD, every carrier
- American on ORD to PHL, the return leg
- United Airlines on PHL to ORD74.0%
- Frontier Airlines on PHL to ORD58.6%
- American Airlines network-wide record
- Philadelphia International (PHL) delay statistics
- Chicago O'Hare International (ORD) 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.