Carrier route record
AAPVD→DCA
American Airlines · Providence to Washington
- Flights
- 452
- Period
- July 2025 to June 2026
- Share of route
- 18%
- Carriers
- 5
Historical statistics for July 2025 to June 2026, not live status. For today’s flights, check with American Airlines.
American on PVD to DCA sits in the middle of the pack with a C. Close to three flights in four arrive on time by the DOT's definition, 4 points worse than the national rate of 77.6%. The late ones land about an hour behind schedule. That rests on 452 flights. The strongest carrier on the route with a full sample, Southwest Airlines, flew 672 at 78.9% on time.
The national on-time rate over the same period is 77.6%, so American on PVD to DCA runs 4 points behind the country as a whole. Across a thousand flights that is about 40 extra late arrivals.
Key figures
On time
73.6%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 443 completed flights
Avg delay
56 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
1.99%
National rate is 1.81%
Whole route
73.1%
Every carrier on PVD to DCA, 2,453 flights
These figures cover 452 flights between July 2025 and June 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.
Carrier by carrier
American against every carrier on PVD to DCA
American flew 452 of the 2,453 flights on PVD to DCA, about 18% of it. Its 73.6% on time is about level with the route as a whole at 73.1%. Ranked by on-time rate it is number four of five carriers on the route, where the range runs from Envoy at 84.1% to PSA at 68.0%. Two of those carriers flew fewer than 365 flights here, so treat their positions as rough.
The choice of carrier is not cosmetic here. Southwest Airlines arrives on time 78.9% of the time; PSA Airlines manages 68.0%. Sample sizes sit next to every figure, because a two-point gap across 1,063 flights means less than a ten-point one.
| Airline | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Envoy Airthin sample | 70 | 84.1% | 36 min | 10.00% | B− |
| Southwest Airlines | 672 | 78.9% | 65 min | 2.68% | B |
| Republic Airwaysthin sample | 196 | 75.1% | 63 min | 5.10% | B− |
| American Airlines (this page) | 452 | 73.6% | 56 min | 1.99% | C |
| PSA Airlines | 1,063 | 68.0% | 91 min | 7.24% | C− |
PSA Airlines cancels 7.2% 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 27 points, against 11 points between the best and worst carrier. Each bar is the on-time rate for flights scheduled inside that window.
- 5am–8am82 flights91.5%
- 8am–11am19 flights—
- 11am–2pm137 flights69.2%
- 2pm–5pm159 flights64.5%
- 5pm–8pm55 flights74.1%
- 8pm–5am—
Scale runs 55% to 95%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
Book the early departure. Flights leaving between 5am–8am arrive on time 91.5% of the time, against 64.5% for the afternoon window. That is 27 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 159 flights scheduled in it.
Across the year
American on PVD to DCA through the year
September is the best month on the calendar at 85.0% 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 63 flights.
Across the week, Saturday is the strongest day at 86.4% on time and Friday the weakest at 66.2%. 20 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 56% of the 6,590 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.
- 56%Late-arriving aircraft
- 35%National Airspace System
- 9%Carrier
- 0%Extreme weather
56% 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 6,590 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 56 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 6,590 reported delay minutes.
35% of delay minutes are charged to the National Airspace System: air traffic volume, runway configuration, ground stops. No carrier can price its way out of that, which is why airport choice moves the number here more than carrier choice does. That is 2,317 minutes out of 6,590, against a national NAS share of 21%.
Cancellations sit at 1.99% against a national 1.81%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.00%.
Connections and stage length
What a delay here costs
7.0% 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 about an hour, which a normal layover absorbs.
At 356 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 5am–8am window matters as much as it does.
The return leg is a different operation and performs like one: it runs 76.7% on time across 452 flights, 3 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 3 points of difference.
One caution: this is a thin sample. 452 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.
What to do with this
Booking American on PVD to DCA
Put together: treat all of this as provisional. 452 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 73.6% headline is the most reliable number on the page; the hour and month splits below it are built on a few dozen flights each. 443 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Related
Where to go next
- PVD to DCA, every carrier
- American on DCA to PVD, the return leg
- Southwest Airlines on PVD to DCA78.9%
- Republic Airways on PVD to DCA75.1%
- PSA Airlines on PVD to DCA68.0%
- American Airlines network-wide record
- Ronald Reagan Washington National (DCA) delay statistics
- Why the first flight of the morning is statistically safest
- Same route, different airline: where the carrier you pick matters most
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.