Route reliability record
PHX→DAL
Phoenix to Dallas
- Flights
- 2,906
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Distance
- 879 mi
- Carriers
- 1
This route sits in the middle of the pack with a B. Close to three flights in four arrive on time by the DOT's definition, 2 points worse than the national rate of 77.3%. The late ones land roughly 50 minutes behind schedule. That rests on 2,906 PHX to DAL flights, with a median arrival 2 minutes early.
Best time to fly PHX to DAL: a 5am–8am departure, ideally on a Wednesday. Flights in that window arrived on time 96.7% of the time and Wednesday flights 81.7%, against 75.4% 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
75.4%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 2,849 completed flights
Avg delay
51 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
1.48%
National rate is 1.89%
Best carrier
Southwest
75.4% on time across 2,906 flights
These figures cover 2,906 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. The median arrival is 2 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.
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Carrier by carrier
Which airline is most reliable on PHX to DAL
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Southwest Airlines | 2,906 | 75.4% | 51 min | 1.48% | B |
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Best ways to make this trip
The most reliable ways to fly Phoenix to Dallas
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. 2 of the top 3 use a different airport at one end.
| Option | Airline | Success | On time | Cancelled | Best departure | Most punctual flight |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. PHX → DFWPhoenix to Dallas-Fort Worth | American Airlines | 78.9% | 80.9% | 2.45% | 5am–8am, Wed | — |
| 2. PHX → DFWPhoenix to Dallas-Fort Worth | Frontier Airlines | 78.1% | 79.5% | 1.73% | 8am–11am, Tue | — |
| 3. PHX → DALPhoenix to Dallas | Southwest Airlines | 74.3% | 75.4% | 1.48% | 5am–8am, Wed | — |
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 41 points, against half a point between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am683 flights96.7%
- 8am–11am503 flights86.6%
- 11am–2pm455 flights77.8%
- 2pm–5pm624 flights59.7%
- 5pm–8pm591 flights56.2%
- 8pm–5am50 flights66.0%
Scale runs 50% to 100%.
The 5pm–8pm window is where this operation falls apart: 56.2% on time, against 96.7% 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 5am–8am window is the busiest, with 683 flights scheduled in it.
Explore
Filter PHX to DAL 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 PHX to DAL, the best departure window is 5am–8am at 96.7% on time and the worst is 5pm–8pm at 56.2%, a wide gap of 40.5 points. All US flights leaving 5am–8am ran 89.3%.
- 5–8am96.7%
- 8–11am86.6%
- 11am–2pm77.8%
- 2–5pm59.7%
- 5–8pm56.2%
- 8pm–5am66.0%
best all US flightsScale 50% to 100%.
Across the year
When delays peak on this route
This route's year swings by 21 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.
June is the worst month at 64.9% on time, 21 points below September, the best at 86.0%. 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. December was the busiest month here, with 278 flights.
Across the week, Wednesday is the strongest day at 81.7% on time and Sunday the weakest at 70.1%, a spread of 12 points.
Delay causes
Why this route gets delayed
Late-arriving aircraft accounts for 49% of the 36,000 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 49%Late-arriving aircraft
- 32%Carrier
- 16%National Airspace System
- 3%Extreme weather
49% of delay minutes trace back to a late-arriving aircraft, meaning the plane was already behind before it got here. Across 36,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 18 to one. The split is drawn from 35,858 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 96.7% on time here.
Cancellations sit at 1.48% against a national 1.89%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.48%.
Connections and stage length
What a delay here actually costs
6.5% 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 roughly 50 minutes, which a normal layover absorbs.
The 879 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 73.9% on time across 2,867 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 2,906 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 DAL after this flight
What to do with this
Booking this route
Put together: the calendar is the biggest lever here, not the carrier or the hour. September runs 86.0% on time and June 64.9%, a swing of 21 points. If the dates move at all, move them out of June before you think about anything else. 2,849 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
PHX to DAL questions
How often is PHX to DAL 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 24.6% of the 2,906 flights in this analysis, against 22.7% nationally. Delayed flights are late by roughly 50 minutes on average.
How reliable is PHX to DAL compared with the rest of the country?
75.4% 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 PHX to DAL?
The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 96.7% on time. The 5pm–8pm window is the weakest at 56.2%, 41 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 June delays on PHX to DAL?
June is the weakest month at 64.9% on time, compared with 86.0% in September. Across the year that is 21 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
- DAL to PHX — the return legseparate record
- Phoenix Sky Harbor International (PHX) delay statistics
- Dallas Love Field (DAL) delay statistics
- PHX to DEN, a related route76.7%
- HOU to DAL, a related route81.6%
- PHX to LAX, a related route82.1%
- Southwest Airlines on-time record75.4%
- Why the first flight of the morning is statistically safest
- The best time of day to fly, according to 7.05 million flight records
Direction matters. PHX to DAL and DAL to PHX 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.