Route reliability record
PHX→HNL
Phoenix to Honolulu
- Flights
- 1,317
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Distance
- 2,917 mi
- Carriers
- 4
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 about an hour on average. That rests on 1,317 PHX to HNL flights, of which Southwest Airlines flew 365 at 81.0% on time.
Best time to fly PHX to HNL: a 5am–8am departure, ideally on a Wednesday. Flights in that window arrived on time 81.3% of the time and Wednesday flights 83.2%, against 79.4% 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
79.4%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 1,304 completed flights
Avg delay
65 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
0.30%
National rate is 1.89%
Best carrier
Southwest
81.0% on time across 365 flights
These figures cover 1,317 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. The median arrival is 5 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 HNL
The two carriers here are closely matched: 3 points separate the best from the worst. At that spread, schedule and price are better tie-breakers than reliability. Sample sizes are shown so you can see which rows are worth weighing.
| Airline | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hawaiian Airlinesthin sample | 122 | 83.6% | 85 min | 0.00% | B+ |
| Southwest Airlines | 365 | 81.0% | 36 min | 0.00% | B+ |
| Alaska Airlinesthin sample | 243 | 78.9% | 55 min | 0.41% | B+ |
| American Airlines | 587 | 77.6% | 80 min | 0.51% | B+ |
No carrier stands out. Southwest tops the table at 81.0%, 3 points clear of the bottom, which is inside the range this kind of sample moves year to year.
Flight by flight
Flights on PHX to HNL
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 Honolulu
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 → HNLPhoenix to Honolulu | Southwest Airlines | 81.0% | 81.0% | 0.00% | 8am–11am, Fri | — |
| 2. PHX → HNLPhoenix to Honolulu | American Airlines | 77.2% | 77.6% | 0.51% | 11am–2pm, Wed | AA 693 11:40 |
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 11 points, against 3 points between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am166 flights81.3%
- 8am–11am800 flights79.9%
- 11am–2pm234 flights80.8%
- 2pm–5pm117 flights69.9%
- 5pm–8pm—
- 8pm–5am—
Scale runs 60% to 85%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
Book the early departure. Flights leaving between 5am–8am arrive on time 81.3% of the time, against 69.9% for the afternoon window. That is 11 points of difference for no extra money, and it comes from the same aircraft having had no earlier flight to fall behind on. The 8am–11am window is the busiest, with 800 flights scheduled in it.
Explore
Filter PHX to HNL 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 HNL, the best departure window is 5am–8am at 81.3% on time and the worst is 2pm–5pm at 69.9%, a wide gap of 11.4 points. All US flights leaving 5am–8am ran 89.3%.
- 5–8am81.3%
- 8–11am79.9%
- 11am–2pm80.8%
- 2–5pm69.9%
- 5–8pm—
- 8pm–5am—
best all US flightsScale 60% to 95%. Cells under 30 flights show a dash.
Across the year
When delays peak on this route
This route's year swings by 32 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.
September is the best month on the calendar at 88.0% on time. Shoulder season thins the schedule and takes the summer weather with it, and the operation gets its margin back. March was the busiest month here, with 124 flights.
Across the week, Wednesday is the strongest day at 83.2% on time and Monday the weakest at 74.2%, a spread of 9 points.
Delay causes
Why this route gets delayed
Carrier accounts for 61% of the 17,000 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 61%Carrier
- 20%National Airspace System
- 18%Late-arriving aircraft
- 0%Extreme weather
- 0%Security
The largest share of delay minutes, 61%, falls under carrier control: crew scheduling, maintenance, fuelling, baggage. It accounts for 11,000 of the 17,000 delay minutes reported here. The split is drawn from 17,357 reported delay minutes.
Cancellations are rare at 0.30%, below the national 1.89% and low enough to earn the plus on the grade. Roughly one flight in 100 is called off; the risk here is arriving late, not not arriving.
Connections and stage length
What a delay here actually costs
5.1% 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 about an hour, which a normal layover absorbs.
At 2,917 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 83.3% on time across 1,317 flights, 4 points above 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 1,317 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 HNL 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 88.0% on time and April 56.3%, a swing of 32 points. If the dates move at all, move them out of April before you think about anything else. 1,304 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
PHX to HNL questions
How often is PHX to HNL 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 20.6% of the 1,317 flights in this analysis, against 22.7% nationally. Delayed flights are late by about an hour on average.
Which airline is most reliable on PHX to HNL?
Southwest Airlines leads at 81.0% on time across 365 flights. American Airlines is at the other end on 77.6%, a gap of 3 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 HNL?
The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 81.3% on time. The 2pm–5pm window is the weakest at 69.9%, 11 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 April delays on PHX to HNL?
April is the weakest month at 56.3% on time, compared with 88.0% in September. Across the year that is 32 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
- HNL to PHX — the return legseparate record
- Phoenix Sky Harbor International (PHX) delay statistics
- Daniel K. Inouye International (HNL) delay statistics
- Hawaiian Airlines on PHX to HNL83.6%
- Southwest Airlines on PHX to HNL81.0%
- Alaska Airlines on PHX to HNL78.9%
- American Airlines on PHX to HNL77.6%
- PHX to DEN, a related route76.7%
- OGG to HNL, a related route84.1%
- PHX to LAX, a related route82.1%
- Hawaiian Airlines on-time record83.6%
- Southwest Airlines on-time record81.0%
- Alaska Airlines on-time record78.9%
- The best time of day to fly, according to 7.05 million flight records
- Worst months to fly in the US, ranked by the data
Direction matters. PHX to HNL and HNL 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.