Route reliability record
PIT→PHX
Pittsburgh to Phoenix
- Flights
- 811
- Period
- July 2025 to June 2026
- Distance
- 1,814 mi
- Carriers
- 3
This route lands a B+, about a point better than the national rate of 77.6%. About one flight in five arrives 15 minutes late or worse, and those flights are late by a little over an hour on average. That is a workable record, not a spotless one. That rests on 811 PIT to PHX flights, of which American Airlines flew 372 at 84.8% on time.
Best time to fly PIT to PHX: a 8am–11am departure, ideally on a Sunday. Flights in that window arrived on time 86.4% of the time and Sunday flights 88.7%, against 78.4% for the route overall.
The US average over the same twelve months is 77.6%, 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
78.4%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 802 completed flights
Avg delay
72 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
0.62%
National rate is 1.81%
Best carrier
American
84.8% on time across 372 flights
These figures cover 811 flights between July 2025 and June 2026. The median arrival is 4 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.
Carrier by carrier
Which airline is most reliable on PIT to PHX
The choice of carrier is not cosmetic here. American Airlines arrives on time 84.8% of the time; Southwest Airlines manages 72.8%. Sample sizes sit next to every figure, because a two-point gap across 373 flights means less than a ten-point one.
| Airline | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| American Airlines | 372 | 84.8% | 108 min | 0.54% | B+ |
| Allegiant Airthin sample | 66 | 73.8% | 53 min | 1.52% | C |
| Southwest Airlines | 373 | 72.8% | 55 min | 0.54% | C+ |
The spread between American and Southwest is 12 points, wide enough that it should decide the booking. On a hundred trips that is 12 more arrivals inside the on-time window.
Best ways to make this trip
The most reliable ways to fly Pittsburgh to Phoenix
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. PIT → PHXPittsburgh to Phoenix | American Airlines | 84.3% | 84.8% | 0.54% | 8am–11am, Sun | — |
| 2. PIT → PHXPittsburgh to Phoenix | Southwest Airlines | 72.4% | 72.8% | 0.54% | 8am–11am, Sun | — |
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 35 points, against 12 points between the best and worst carrier. Each bar is the on-time rate for flights scheduled inside that window.
- 5am–8am300 flights84.9%
- 8am–11am149 flights86.4%
- 11am–2pm111 flights79.1%
- 2pm–5pm213 flights67.9%
- 5pm–8pm37 flights51.4%
- 8pm–5am1 flights—
Scale runs 45% to 90%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
The 5pm–8pm window is where this operation falls apart: 51.4% on time, against 86.4% 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 5am–8am window is the busiest, with 300 flights scheduled in it.
Across the year
When delays peak on this route
This route's year swings by 23 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.
December is the weak month at 65.7% on time, against 88.7% in October. Winter delays cluster: a single storm system can account for most of a month's shortfall, so an average December hides both very good weeks and genuinely unflyable days. March was the busiest month here, with 74 flights.
Across the week, Sunday is the strongest day at 88.7% on time and Monday the weakest at 73.5%. 15 points is a smaller lever than departure hour, but it is free.
Delay causes
Why this route gets delayed
One category carries most of the weight here. Carrier accounts for 60% of the 12,000 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.
- 60%Carrier
- 25%Late-arriving aircraft
- 13%National Airspace System
- 2%Extreme weather
- 0%Security
The largest share of delay minutes, 60%, falls under carrier control: crew scheduling, maintenance, fuelling, baggage. Unlike weather, that is a management outcome, and it is the category where the gap between two carriers on the same schedule is genuinely earned. It accounts for 7,425 of the 12,000 delay minutes reported here. The split is drawn from 12,445 reported delay minutes.
Cancellations are rare at 0.62%, below the national 1.81% 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
6.0% of arrivals land an hour or more late, close to the national 8.1%. That is the figure that decides a connection, and it says a 60 to 75 minute layover is reasonable here while anything under 45 minutes is a bet. Most delays on this route last a little over an hour, which a normal layover absorbs.
At 1,814 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 runs 76.3% on time across 812 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.
One caution: this is a thin sample. 811 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 PHX after this flight
What to do with this
Booking this route
Put together: treat all of this as provisional. 811 flights over twelve months is enough to clear this site's floor and not enough to be confident to better than a couple of points. The 78.4% headline is the most reliable number on the page; the hour and month splits below it are built on a few dozen flights each. 802 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
PIT to PHX questions
How often is PIT to PHX 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 21.6% of the 811 flights in this analysis, against 22.4% nationally. Delayed flights are late by a little over an hour on average.
Which airline is most reliable on PIT to PHX?
American Airlines leads at 84.8% on time across 372 flights. Southwest Airlines is at the other end on 72.8%, a gap of 12 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 PIT to PHX?
The 8am–11am departure window is the strongest at 86.4% on time. The 5pm–8pm window is the weakest at 51.4%, 35 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 December delays on PIT to PHX?
December is the weakest month at 65.7% on time, compared with 88.7% in October. Across the year that is 23 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
- PHX to PIT — the return legseparate record
- Pittsburgh International (PIT) delay statistics
- Phoenix Sky Harbor International (PHX) delay statistics
- American Airlines on PIT to PHX84.8%
- Southwest Airlines on PIT to PHX72.8%
- PIT to ORD, a related route78.6%
- DEN to PHX, a related route75.7%
- PIT to LGA, a related route80.9%
- American Airlines on-time record84.8%
- Allegiant Air on-time record73.8%
- Southwest Airlines on-time record72.8%
- Same route, different airline: where the carrier you pick matters most
- The best time of day to fly, according to 7.04 million flight records
Direction matters. PIT to PHX and PHX to PIT 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, July 2025 to June 2026. Last updated 15 September 2026; recomputed monthly. How this data is collected.