Route reliability record
SAN→PHX
San Diego to Phoenix
- Flights
- 5,920
- Period
- July 2025 to June 2026
- Distance
- 304 mi
- Carriers
- 5
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 77.6%. The late ones land about an hour behind schedule. That rests on 5,920 flights, of which American Airlines flew 1,669 at 81.3% on time.
American Airlines is the most reliable of the four carriers covered here at 81.3% on time across 1,669 flights.
Key figures
On time
75.8%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 5,820 completed flights
Avg delay
67 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
1.57%
National rate is 1.81%
Best carrier
American
81.3% on time across 1,669 flights
These figures cover 5,920 flights between July 2025 and June 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.
Carrier by carrier
Which airline is most reliable on SAN to PHX
The choice of carrier is not cosmetic here. American Airlines arrives on time 81.3% of the time; SkyWest Airlines manages 67.8%. Sample sizes sit next to every figure, because a two-point gap across 445 flights means less than a ten-point one.
| Airline | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| American Airlines | 1,669 | 81.3% | 118 min | 0.72% | B+ |
| Alaska Airlinesthin sample | 217 | 77.9% | 46 min | 1.84% | B |
| Southwest Airlines | 3,184 | 74.4% | 50 min | 1.54% | C |
| Frontier Airlines | 405 | 70.9% | 74 min | 1.23% | C |
| SkyWest Airlines | 445 | 67.8% | 54 min | 5.17% | C− |
SkyWest Airlines cancels 5.2% 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
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 25 points, against 14 points between the best and worst carrier. Each bar is the on-time rate for flights scheduled inside that window.
- 5am–8am795 flights89.9%
- 8am–11am1,167 flights86.5%
- 11am–2pm1,033 flights73.8%
- 2pm–5pm1,283 flights69.6%
- 5pm–8pm946 flights64.7%
- 8pm–5am696 flights71.0%
Scale runs 55% to 95%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
The 5pm–8pm window is where this operation falls apart: 64.7% on time, against 89.9% 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 2pm–5pm window is the busiest, with 1,283 flights scheduled in it.
Across the year
When delays peak on this route
This route's year swings by 18 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 November, when the on-time rate falls to 65.7%. February is the strongest month at 84.1%. Moving a flexible trip across that boundary buys 18 points. May was the busiest month here, with 554 flights.
Across the week, Saturday is the strongest day at 83.9% on time and Friday the weakest at 68.2%. 16 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. Late-arriving aircraft accounts for 59% of the 94,000 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.
- 59%Late-arriving aircraft
- 27%Carrier
- 11%National Airspace System
- 3%Extreme weather
- 0%Security
59% 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 94,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 23 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 94,396 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 89.9% on time here.
Cancellations sit at 1.57% against a national 1.81%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.12%.
Connections and stage length
What a delay here actually costs
7.3% 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 are the about an hour kind, which a normal layover absorbs.
At 304 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 runs 73.1% on time across 5,933 flights, within 3 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 5,920 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.
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 84.1% on time and November 65.7%, a swing of 18 points. If the dates move at all, move them out of November before you think about anything else. 5,820 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
SAN to PHX questions
How often is SAN to PHX delayed?
About one flight in four arrive at least 15 minutes late, which is the Department of Transportation's definition of a delayed arrival. That works out to 24.2% of the 5,920 flights in this analysis, against 22.4% nationally. Delayed flights are late by about an hour on average.
Which airline is most reliable on SAN to PHX?
American Airlines leads at 81.3% on time across 1,669 flights. SkyWest Airlines is at the other end on 67.8%, a gap of 14 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 SAN to PHX?
The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 89.9% on time. The 5pm–8pm window is the weakest at 64.7%, 25 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 November delays on SAN to PHX?
November is the weakest month at 65.7% on time, compared with 84.1% in February. Across the year that is 18 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 SAN — the return legseparate record
- San Diego International (SAN) delay statistics
- Phoenix Sky Harbor International (PHX) delay statistics
- American Airlines on-time record81.3%
- Alaska Airlines on-time record77.9%
- Southwest Airlines on-time record74.4%
- Why the first flight of the morning is statistically safest
- The best time of day to fly, according to 7.04 million flight records
Direction matters. SAN to PHX and PHX to SAN are scored separately because they are separate operations, with different departure banks and different aircraft. Compare the return leg.
Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics, on-time performance data, July 2025 to June 2026. Updated monthly. How this data is collected.