Carrier route record
AASJU→ORD
American Airlines · San Juan to Chicago
- Flights
- 426
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Share of route
- 31%
- Carriers
- 4
Historical statistics for September 2025 to August 2026, not live status. For today’s flights, check with American Airlines.
American on SJU to ORD lands a B, level with the national rate of 77.3%. Roughly one flight in four arrives 15 minutes late or worse, and those flights are late by close to two hours on average. That rests on 426 flights, with a median arrival 10 minutes early.
The US average over the same twelve months is 77.3%, so there is little to separate American on SJU to ORD from the country as a whole. The variation that matters here is internal: which carrier, and what time of day.
Key figures
On time
77.3%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 409 completed flights
Avg delay
101 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
2.11%
National rate is 1.89%
Whole route
78.3%
Every carrier on SJU to ORD, 1,383 flights
These figures cover 426 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 8.3% of arrivals land a full hour or more behind schedule, against 8.3% nationally.
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Carrier by carrier
American against every carrier on SJU to ORD
American flew 426 of the 1,383 flights on SJU to ORD, about 31% of it. Its 77.3% on time is about level with the route as a whole at 78.3%. Ranked by on-time rate it is number three of four carriers on the route, where the range runs from United at 80.5% to Frontier at 65.2%. Two of those carriers flew fewer than 365 flights here, so treat their positions as rough.
Only one carrier clears this site's 365-flight floor here, so there is no comparison to draw. The table below is the full picture.
| Airline | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| United Airlines | 657 | 80.5% | 43 min | 0.61% | B+ |
| Spirit Airlinesthin sample | 227 | 77.8% | 82 min | 7.93% | B− |
| American Airlines (this page) | 426 | 77.3% | 101 min | 2.11% | B |
| Frontier Airlinesthin sample | 73 | 65.2% | 115 min | 2.74% | C |
Timetable by Aviasales, a Travelpayouts partner. Booking through it may earn this site a commission at no cost to you; it changes no figure here.
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 18 points, against half a point between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am101 flights83.0%
- 8am–11am—
- 11am–2pm—
- 2pm–5pm220 flights69.7%
- 5pm–8pm3 flights—
- 8pm–5am102 flights88.1%
Scale runs 60% to 95%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
The 8pm–5am window is the strongest at 88.1% on time. The full set of windows spans 18 points.
Across the year
American on SJU to ORD through the year
Delays peak in March, when the on-time rate falls to 67.2%. June is the strongest month at 93.3%. Moving a flexible trip across that boundary buys 26 points. January was the busiest month here, with 62 flights.
Across the week, Wednesday is the strongest day at 82.2% on time and Monday the weakest at 69.8%, a spread of 12 points.
Arrival by arrival
How late American on SJU to ORD runs when it is late
American on SJU to ORD often beats the schedule: 179 of 409 completed flights, 44%, arrived 15 minutes or more early. The 93 late arrivals split 31 under half an hour, 28 between 30 and 60 minutes, and 34 an hour or more.
- 15+ min early179 flights43.8%
- Within 15 min137 flights33.5%
- 15–29 min late31 flights7.6%
- 30–59 min late28 flights6.8%
- 1–2 hours late19 flights4.6%
- 2+ hours late15 flights3.7%
Scale runs 0% to 100%.
Share of 409 completed flights by arrival against schedule.
A late pushback is often recovered here: of 101 departures that left 15 minutes late or more, 32 still arrived on time. In the other direction, 24 flights left on time yet arrived 15 minutes late or more, so that delay built up after pushback: in the air, in a holding pattern or on the ground at ORD.
The worst days
Worst days for American on SJU to ORD
The latest arrival of the period was on 26 January 2026, 20 hours 5 minutes behind schedule; most of its delay minutes were filed as extreme weather. On four of the five worst days the largest share was filed as carrier-caused (crew, maintenance, fuelling, baggage).
| Date | Arrived late by | Largest filed cause |
|---|---|---|
| 26 January 2026 | 20 hours 5 minutes | Extreme weather |
| 28 April 2026 | 16 hours 30 minutes | Carrier |
| 5 February 2026 | 12 hours 46 minutes | Carrier |
| 20 July 2026 | 9 hours 54 minutes | Carrier |
| 15 August 2026 | 9 hours 39 minutes | Carrier |
Delay causes
Why American runs late on this route
Carrier accounts for 44% of the 9,419 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 44%Carrier
- 34%Late-arriving aircraft
- 14%Extreme weather
- 7%National Airspace System
- 0%Security
Extreme weather accounts for 14% of delay minutes, well above the single-digit share typical across the system. Weather delays are lumpy: they arrive as whole bad days rather than as a steady drag, so the monthly strip above is the more useful view of the risk. The national share is 6%, so this operation carries roughly 2.3 times the usual weather exposure. The split is drawn from 9,419 reported delay minutes.
34% of delay minutes trace back to a late-arriving aircraft, meaning the plane was already behind before it got here. Across 9,419 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 2 to one.
Cancellations sit at 2.11% against a national 1.89%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 1.88%.
Connections and stage length
What a delay here costs
8.3% 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 close to two hours, which a normal layover absorbs.
At 2,072 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 71.2% on time across 429 flights, 6 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 6 points of difference.
One caution: this is a thin sample. 426 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 SJU to ORD
Put together: treat all of this as provisional. 426 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 77.3% headline is the most reliable number on the page; the hour and month splits below it are built on a few dozen flights each. 409 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Related
Where to go next
- SJU to ORD, every carrier
- American on ORD to SJU, the return leg
- United Airlines on SJU to ORD80.5%
- Spirit Airlines on SJU to ORD77.8%
- American Airlines network-wide record
- Luis Munoz Marin International (SJU) delay statistics
- Chicago O'Hare International (ORD) delay statistics
- Why the first flight of the morning is statistically safest
- The best time of day to fly, according to 7.05 million flight records
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.