Route reliability record
PHX→DTW
Phoenix to Detroit
- Flights
- 2,377
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Distance
- 1,671 mi
- Carriers
- 5
This route lands a B+, 2 points better than the national rate of 77.3%. About one flight in five arrives 15 minutes late or worse, and those flights are late by an hour and a half on average. That rests on 2,377 PHX to DTW flights, of which Delta Air Lines flew 1,332 at 83.3% on time.
Best time to fly PHX to DTW: a 5am–8am departure, ideally on a Thursday. Flights in that window arrived on time 90.4% of the time and Thursday flights 85.5%, against 79.5% 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
79.5%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 2,349 completed flights
Avg delay
82 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
0.97%
National rate is 1.89%
Best carrier
Delta
83.3% on time across 1,332 flights
These figures cover 2,377 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. The median arrival is 6 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 DTW
The choice of carrier is not cosmetic here. Delta Air Lines arrives on time 83.3% of the time; American Airlines manages 75.5%. Sample sizes sit next to every figure, because a two-point gap across 622 flights means less than a ten-point one.
| Airline | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Delta Air Lines | 1,332 | 83.3% | 81 min | 0.98% | B+ |
| Spirit Airlinesthin sample | 72 | 80.0% | 160 min | 2.78% | B |
| American Airlines | 622 | 75.5% | 76 min | 0.48% | B+ |
| Frontier Airlinesthin sample | 321 | 73.7% | 92 min | 1.56% | C |
| Southwest Airlinesthin sample | 30 | 56.7% | 38 min | 0.00% | D+ |
Delta leads American by 8 points. Real, but small enough that a better departure time on the weaker carrier can outweigh it.
Flight by flight
Flights on PHX to DTW
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 Phoenix to Detroit
Every airline on this route, ranked by how often a scheduled flight actually operated and arrived on time, with its best departure time and most punctual flight number. No nearby airport pair beat these.
| Option | Airline | Success | On time | Cancelled | Best departure | Most punctual flight |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. PHX → DTWPhoenix to Detroit | Delta Air Lines | 82.5% | 83.3% | 0.98% | 5am–8am, Thu | DL 947 06:00 |
| 2. PHX → DTWPhoenix to Detroit | American Airlines | 75.1% | 75.5% | 0.48% | 8am–11am, 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 22 points, against 8 points between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am409 flights90.4%
- 8am–11am389 flights82.4%
- 11am–2pm463 flights81.8%
- 2pm–5pm502 flights73.9%
- 5pm–8pm148 flights68.3%
- 8pm–5am466 flights74.9%
Scale runs 60% to 95%.
Book the early departure. Flights leaving between 5am–8am arrive on time 90.4% of the time, against 68.3% for the evening window. That is 22 points of difference for no extra money, and it comes from the same aircraft having had no earlier flight to fall behind on. The 2pm–5pm window is the busiest, with 502 flights scheduled in it.
Explore
Filter PHX to DTW 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 DTW, the best departure window is 5am–8am at 90.4% on time and the worst is 5pm–8pm at 68.3%, a wide gap of 22.1 points. All US flights leaving 5am–8am ran 89.3%.
- 5–8am90.4%
- 8–11am82.4%
- 11am–2pm81.8%
- 2–5pm73.9%
- 5–8pm68.3%
- 8pm–5am74.9%
best all US flightsScale 60% to 95%.
Across the year
When delays peak on this route
This route's year swings by 14 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.
Delays peak in March, when the on-time rate falls to 72.0%. February is the strongest month at 86.2%. Moving a flexible trip across that boundary buys 14 points. December was the busiest month here, with 222 flights.
Across the week, Thursday is the strongest day at 85.5% on time and Saturday the weakest at 75.5%, a spread of 10 points.
Delay causes
Why this route gets delayed
Late-arriving aircraft accounts for 44% of the 40,000 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 44%Late-arriving aircraft
- 39%Carrier
- 10%National Airspace System
- 6%Extreme weather
44% of delay minutes trace back to a late-arriving aircraft, meaning the plane was already behind before it got here. Across 40,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 7 to one. The split is drawn from 39,511 reported delay minutes.
The largest share of delay minutes, 39%, falls under carrier control: crew scheduling, maintenance, fuelling, baggage. It accounts for 16,000 of the 40,000 delay minutes reported here.
Cancellations sit at 0.97% against a national 1.89%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.21%.
Connections and stage length
What a delay here actually costs
7.4% 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 an hour and a half, which a normal layover absorbs.
At 1,671 miles this is transcontinental flying, and long routes get a quiet structural advantage. Scheduled block time on a flight this length carries more padding in absolute minutes, so a twenty-minute late departure often still becomes an on-time arrival. Read the on-time rate here as slightly flattering next to a short-haul route with the same operational quality.
The return leg is a different operation and performs like one: it runs 75.9% on time across 2,374 flights, 4 points below this direction. Departure banks, aircraft rotations and the congestion at each end all differ, so scoring the two directions together would average away a real 4 points of difference.
The sample behind these figures is 2,377 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 DTW 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. February runs 86.2% on time and March 72.0%, a swing of 14 points. If the dates move at all, move them out of March before you think about anything else. 2,349 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
PHX to DTW questions
How often is PHX to DTW delayed?
About one flight in five arrives at least 15 minutes late, which is the Department of Transportation's definition of a delayed arrival. That works out to 20.5% of the 2,377 flights in this analysis, against 22.7% nationally. Delayed flights are late by an hour and a half on average.
Which airline is most reliable on PHX to DTW?
Delta Air Lines leads at 83.3% on time across 1,332 flights. American Airlines is at the other end on 75.5%, a gap of 8 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 PHX to DTW?
The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 90.4% on time. The 5pm–8pm window is the weakest at 68.3%, 22 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 March delays on PHX to DTW?
March is the weakest month at 72.0% on time, compared with 86.2% in February. Across the year that is 14 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
- DTW to PHX — the return legseparate record
- Phoenix Sky Harbor International (PHX) delay statistics
- Detroit Metropolitan Wayne County (DTW) delay statistics
- Delta Air Lines on PHX to DTW83.3%
- American Airlines on PHX to DTW75.5%
- Frontier Airlines on PHX to DTW73.7%
- PHX to DEN, a related route76.7%
- ORD to DTW, a related route71.1%
- PHX to LAX, a related route82.1%
- Delta Air Lines on-time record83.3%
- Spirit Airlines on-time record80.0%
- American Airlines on-time record75.5%
- 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 DTW and DTW 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.