Carrier route record
AAPHL→RDU
American Airlines · Philadelphia to Raleigh
- Flights
- 1,105
- Period
- July 2025 to June 2026
- Share of route
- 43%
- 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 RDU sits in the middle of the pack with a C. About seven flights in ten arrive on time by the DOT's definition, 6 points worse than the national rate of 77.6%. The late ones land a little over an hour behind schedule. That rests on 1,105 flights. The strongest carrier on the route with a full sample, Frontier Airlines, flew 585 at 81.2% on time.
The national on-time rate over the same period is 77.6%, so American on PHL to RDU runs 6 points behind the country as a whole. Across a thousand flights that is about 63 extra late arrivals.
Key figures
On time
71.3%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 1,077 completed flights
Avg delay
81 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
2.35%
National rate is 1.81%
Whole route
75.0%
Every carrier on PHL to RDU, 2,560 flights
These figures cover 1,105 flights between July 2025 and June 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 13.0% 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 RDU
American flew 1,105 of the 2,560 flights on PHL to RDU, about 43% of it. Its 71.3% on time is 4 points worse than the route as a whole, which runs 75.0%. Ranked by on-time rate it is last of four carriers on the route, where the range runs from Republic at 83.2% to American at 71.3%. One of those carriers flew fewer than 365 flights here, so treat their positions as rough.
The choice of carrier is not cosmetic here. Frontier Airlines arrives on time 81.2% of the time; PSA Airlines manages 72.9%. Sample sizes sit next to every figure, because a two-point gap across 655 flights means less than a ten-point one.
| Airline | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Republic Airwaysthin sample | 215 | 83.2% | 75 min | 3.26% | B− |
| Frontier Airlines | 585 | 81.2% | 68 min | 2.56% | B |
| PSA Airlines | 655 | 72.9% | 80 min | 3.51% | C− |
| American Airlines (this page) | 1,105 | 71.3% | 81 min | 2.35% | C |
PSA Airlines cancels 3.5% of what it schedules here, the highest in the table. A cancelled flight never appears in an on-time rate, so read that column alongside the punctuality one rather than after it.
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 23 points, against 8 points between the best and worst carrier. Each bar is the on-time rate for flights scheduled inside that window.
- 5am–8am—
- 8am–11am196 flights80.6%
- 11am–2pm46 flights86.7%
- 2pm–5pm352 flights64.2%
- 5pm–8pm283 flights68.6%
- 8pm–5am228 flights74.2%
Scale runs 55% to 90%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
The best window here is not the first bank but the 11am–2pm slot at 86.7% on time, ahead of 2pm–5pm at 64.2%. Where the curve peaks mid-day rather than at dawn, the constraint is usually congestion at one end rather than the aircraft's own rotation. The 2pm–5pm window is the busiest, with 352 flights scheduled in it.
Across the year
American on PHL to RDU through the year
July is the worst month at 59.9% on time, 26 points below April, the best at 85.7%. 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. July was the busiest month here, with 172 flights.
Across the week, Tuesday is the strongest day at 77.4% on time and Thursday the weakest at 64.6%. 13 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 63% of the 25,000 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.
- 63%Late-arriving aircraft
- 26%Carrier
- 8%National Airspace System
- 1%Extreme weather
- 0%Security
63% 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 25,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 45 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 24,874 reported delay minutes.
Cancellations sit at 2.35% against a national 1.81%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.18%.
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. 13.0% 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.
At 337 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 11am–2pm window matters as much as it does.
The return leg runs 72.5% on time across 1,105 flights, within about a point 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 1,105 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 RDU
Put together: the calendar is the biggest lever here, not the carrier or the hour. April runs 85.7% on time and July 59.9%, a swing of 26 points. If the dates move at all, move them out of July before you think about anything else. 1,077 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Related
Where to go next
- PHL to RDU, every carrier
- American on RDU to PHL, the return leg
- Republic Airways on PHL to RDU83.2%
- Frontier Airlines on PHL to RDU81.2%
- PSA Airlines on PHL to RDU72.9%
- American Airlines network-wide record
- Philadelphia International (PHL) delay statistics
- Raleigh-Durham International (RDU) delay statistics
- Why the first flight of the morning is statistically safest
- How often a connection fails at the major US hubs
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.