Route reliability record
PHL→PVD
Philadelphia to Providence
- Flights
- 769
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Distance
- 237 mi
- Carriers
- 3
This route carries a cancellation problem, not just a delay problem: 6.8% of scheduled flights never operate, against 1.9% nationally. Of the ones that do fly, close to three flights in four arrive on time, worth a B− overall. The punctuality figure counts only flights that actually departed, so it flatters an operation that cancels this often. That rests on 769 PHL to PVD flights, with a median arrival 5 minutes early.
Best time to fly PHL to PVD: a 8am–11am departure, ideally on a Thursday. Flights in that window arrived on time 83.0% of the time and Thursday flights 79.8%, against 75.7% 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
75.7%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 716 completed flights
Avg delay
76 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
6.76%
National rate is 1.89%
Best carrier
American
80.3% on time across 369 flights
These figures cover 769 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 10.9% 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 PVD
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| American Airlines | 369 | 80.3% | 58 min | 2.44% | B |
| Republic Airwaysthin sample | 36 | 77.8% | 83 min | 0.00% | B+ |
| PSA Airlinesthin sample | 364 | 70.3% | 89 min | 11.81% | C− |
Timetable by Aviasales, a Travelpayouts partner. Booking through it may earn this site a commission at no cost to you; it changes no figure here.
Best ways to make this trip
The most reliable ways to fly Philadelphia to Providence
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. 3 of the top 4 use a different airport at one end.
| Option | Airline | Success | On time | Cancelled | Best departure | Most punctual flight |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. PHL → PVDPhiladelphia to Providence | American Airlines | 78.3% | 80.3% | 2.44% | 8am–11am, Mon | — |
| 2. PHL → BOSPhiladelphia to Boston | Republic Airways | 77.1% | 80.3% | 4.01% | 5am–8am, Sat | YX 5740 06:00 |
| 3. PHL → BOSPhiladelphia to Boston | JetBlue Airways | 69.5% | 72.3% | 3.81% | 5am–8am, Sat | — |
| 4. PHL → BOSPhiladelphia to Boston | American Airlines | 68.6% | 70.6% | 2.84% | 5am–8am, Sat | AA 1874 22:20 |
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 20 points, against half a point between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am—
- 8am–11am169 flights83.0%
- 11am–2pm62 flights66.7%
- 2pm–5pm96 flights71.4%
- 5pm–8pm139 flights63.5%
- 8pm–5am303 flights80.2%
Scale runs 55% to 90%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
The 5pm–8pm window is where this operation falls apart: 63.5% on time, against 83.0% for the 8am–11am 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 8pm–5am window is the busiest, with 303 flights scheduled in it.
Explore
Filter PHL to PVD 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 PVD, the best departure window is 8am–11am at 83.0% on time and the worst is 5pm–8pm at 63.5%, a wide gap of 19.5 points. All US flights leaving 8am–11am ran 83.9%.
- 5–8am—
- 8–11am83.0%
- 11am–2pm66.7%
- 2–5pm71.4%
- 5–8pm63.5%
- 8pm–5am80.2%
best all US flightsScale 55% to 95%. Cells under 30 flights show a dash.
Across the year
When delays peak on this route
This route's year swings by 19 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 65.1% on time, 19 points below April, the best at 84.3%. 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 131 flights.
Across the week, Thursday is the strongest day at 79.8% on time and Wednesday the weakest at 70.9%, a spread of 9 points.
Delay causes
Why this route gets delayed
Late-arriving aircraft accounts for 46% of the 13,000 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 46%Late-arriving aircraft
- 33%Carrier
- 13%National Airspace System
- 7%Extreme weather
46% of delay minutes trace back to a late-arriving aircraft, meaning the plane was already behind before it got here. Across 13,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 6 to one. The split is drawn from 13,257 reported delay minutes.
The practical consequence: the 8am–11am departure is the one that starts clean. Its aircraft has no earlier leg to be late from, which is exactly why that window shows 83.0% on time here.
Cancellations run at 6.76%, against 1.89% nationally. That is about one flight in fifteen 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
10.9% of arrivals land a full hour or more behind schedule, against 8.3% nationally. Ninety minutes is the honest minimum for a connection here, and two hours if the onward flight is on a separate ticket.
At 237 miles this is a short hop, and stage length matters more than it looks. A flight this short spends under two hours in the air, which leaves almost nothing to claw back a late pushback with. Delay here is decided on the ground, in the turn, which is why the 8am–11am window matters as much as it does.
The return leg runs 78.4% on time across 770 flights, within 3 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. 769 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.
Work out the risk of missing a connection in PVD after this flight
What to do with this
Booking this route
Put together: the delay figures matter less here than the 6.76% cancellation rate. A late arrival costs you a little over an hour; a cancelled flight costs you the day. Book the 8am–11am departure so there is still a schedule behind you if it goes wrong, and treat a same-day connection as optimistic. 716 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
PHL to PVD questions
How often is PHL to PVD delayed?
About 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 24.3% of the 769 flights in this analysis, against 22.7% nationally. Delayed flights are late by a little over an hour on average.
How reliable is PHL to PVD compared with the rest of the country?
75.7% of flights arrive on time here against a national 77.3%, a difference of 2 points against it. That is worth a B− on this site's grading scale.
What time of day has the fewest delays on PHL to PVD?
The 8am–11am departure window is the strongest at 83.0% on time. The 5pm–8pm window is the weakest at 63.5%, 20 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 PVD?
August is the weakest month at 65.1% on time, compared with 84.3% in April. Across the year that is 19 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
- PVD to PHL — the return legseparate record
- Philadelphia International (PHL) delay statistics
- American Airlines on PHL to PVD80.3%
- PSA Airlines on PHL to PVD70.3%
- PHL to ATL, a related route78.0%
- DCA to PVD, a related route72.5%
- PHL to MCO, a related route72.4%
- American Airlines on-time record80.3%
- Republic Airways on-time record77.8%
- PSA Airlines on-time record70.3%
- The US routes with the most cancellations
- Why the first flight of the morning is statistically safest
Direction matters. PHL to PVD and PVD 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.