Carrier route record
AASTL→DFW
American Airlines · St. Louis to Dallas-Fort Worth
- Flights
- 1,852
- Period
- July 2025 to June 2026
- Share of route
- 78%
- Carriers
- 5
Historical statistics for July 2025 to June 2026, not live status. For today’s flights, check with American Airlines.
American on STL to DFW carries a cancellation problem, not just a delay problem: 3.5% of scheduled flights never operate, against 1.8% nationally. Of the ones that do fly, close to three flights in four arrive on time, worth a C− overall. The punctuality figure counts only flights that actually departed, so it flatters an operation that cancels this often. That rests on 1,852 flights, with a median arrival 7 minutes early.
The US average over the same twelve months is 77.6%, so there is little to separate American on STL to DFW from the country as a whole. The variation that matters here is internal: which carrier, and what time of day.
Key figures
On time
74.8%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 1,781 completed flights
Avg delay
114 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
3.46%
National rate is 1.81%
Whole route
74.5%
Every carrier on STL to DFW, 2,380 flights
These figures cover 1,852 flights between July 2025 and June 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 12.3% of arrivals land a full hour or more behind schedule. That is the number that wrecks a connection, and it is not visible in an on-time percentage alone.
Carrier by carrier
American against every carrier on STL to DFW
American flew 1,852 of the 2,380 flights on STL to DFW, most of the route. Its 74.8% on time is about level with the route as a whole at 74.5%. Ranked by on-time rate it is number two of five carriers on the route, where the range runs from Envoy at 82.8% to SkyWest at 54.7%. Four 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Envoy Airthin sample | 299 | 82.8% | 72 min | 3.01% | B− |
| American Airlines (this page) | 1,852 | 74.8% | 114 min | 3.46% | C− |
| Frontier Airlinesthin sample | 80 | 70.1% | 80 min | 2.50% | C |
| PSA Airlinesthin sample | 51 | 58.3% | 150 min | 5.88% | D− |
| SkyWest Airlinesthin sample | 98 | 54.7% | 127 min | 3.06% | F− |
Flight by flight
American flight numbers on STL to DFW
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 31 points, against half a point between the best and worst carrier. Each bar is the on-time rate for flights scheduled inside that window.
- 5am–8am687 flights85.6%
- 8am–11am485 flights78.3%
- 11am–2pm232 flights70.3%
- 2pm–5pm112 flights63.9%
- 5pm–8pm336 flights54.2%
- 8pm–5am—
Scale runs 45% to 90%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
The 5pm–8pm window is where this operation falls apart: 54.2% on time, against 85.6% 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 5am–8am window is the busiest, with 687 flights scheduled in it.
Across the year
American on STL to DFW through the year
June is the worst month at 65.2% on time, 19 points below February, the best at 84.6%. Summer afternoon convection and peak-season schedules land on the same weeks every year, so this is a pattern you can book around rather than a run of bad luck. March was the busiest month here, with 186 flights.
Across the week, Tuesday is the strongest day at 80.3% on time and Monday the weakest at 66.7%. 14 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 48% of the 51,000 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.
- 48%Late-arriving aircraft
- 34%Carrier
- 15%National Airspace System
- 3%Extreme weather
- 0%Security
48% 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 51,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 17 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 51,178 reported delay minutes.
The largest share of delay minutes, 34%, 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 18,000 of the 51,000 delay minutes reported here.
Cancellations run at 3.46%, against 1.81% nationally. That is about one flight in 30 cancelled outright. A cancelled flight is invisible in every on-time figure on this page, so the punctuality numbers above describe only the flights that actually operated.
Connections and stage length
What a delay here costs
For anyone connecting, the number to weigh is not the on-time rate but the tail behind it. 12.3% of arrivals land a full hour or more behind schedule, against 8.1% nationally. A 45-minute layover does not survive that, and no amount of walking quickly changes it. Ninety minutes is the honest minimum here, and two hours if the onward flight is on a separate ticket.
The 550 miles between these two airports put this in the middle of the US network, around two and a half to three hours of block time. That is enough cruise to absorb a ten-minute late pushback and not enough to absorb thirty. It is also long enough that the aircraft usually flies three or four legs a day rather than six, which slows how fast delay compounds.
The return leg is a different operation and performs like one: it runs 65.7% on time across 1,852 flights, 9 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 9 points of difference.
The sample behind these figures is 1,852 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 American on STL to DFW
Put together: the delay figures matter less here than the 3.46% cancellation rate. A late arrival costs you close to two hours; a cancelled flight costs you the day. Book the 5am–8am departure so there is still a schedule behind you if it goes wrong, and treat a same-day connection as optimistic. 1,781 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Related
Where to go next
- STL to DFW, every carrier
- American on DFW to STL, the return leg
- Envoy Air on STL to DFW82.8%
- American Airlines network-wide record
- St. Louis Lambert International (STL) delay statistics
- Dallas/Fort Worth International (DFW) delay statistics
- The US routes with the most cancellations
- Why the first flight of the morning is statistically safest
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.