Carrier route record
AATPA→DCA
American Airlines · Tampa to Washington
- Flights
- 1,521
- Period
- July 2025 to June 2026
- Share of route
- 68%
- Carriers
- 3
Historical statistics for July 2025 to June 2026, not live status. For today’s flights, check with American Airlines.
American on TPA 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 an hour and a half behind schedule. That rests on 1,521 flights, with a median arrival 6 minutes early.
The national on-time rate over the same period is 77.6%, so American on TPA to DCA runs 4 points behind the country as a whole. Across a thousand flights that is about 44 extra late arrivals.
Key figures
On time
73.2%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 1,469 completed flights
Avg delay
85 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
2.76%
National rate is 1.81%
Whole route
74.3%
Every carrier on TPA to DCA, 2,248 flights
These figures cover 1,521 flights between July 2025 and June 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 10.4% 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 TPA to DCA
American flew 1,521 of the 2,248 flights on TPA to DCA, most of the route. Its 73.2% on time is about level with the route as a whole at 74.3%. Ranked by on-time rate it is last of three carriers on the route, where the range runs from Republic at 88.5% to American at 73.2%. One 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Republic Airwaysthin sample | 26 | 88.5% | 35 min | 0.00% | A+ |
| Southwest Airlines | 701 | 75.9% | 53 min | 1.43% | B |
| American Airlines (this page) | 1,521 | 73.2% | 85 min | 2.76% | C |
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 37 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–8am264 flights93.8%
- 8am–11am81 flights96.1%
- 11am–2pm629 flights73.2%
- 2pm–5pm42 flights68.3%
- 5pm–8pm505 flights59.1%
- 8pm–5am—
Scale runs 50% to 100%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
The 5pm–8pm window is where this operation falls apart: 59.1% on time, against 96.1% 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 11am–2pm window is the busiest, with 629 flights scheduled in it.
Across the year
American on TPA to DCA through the year
July is the worst month at 56.8% on time, 23 points below June, the best at 79.5%. 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 151 flights.
Across the week, Tuesday is the strongest day at 79.5% on time and Sunday the weakest at 61.5%. 18 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 60% of the 33,000 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%Late-arriving aircraft
- 20%Carrier
- 15%National Airspace System
- 6%Extreme weather
- 0%Security
60% 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 33,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 11 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 33,325 reported delay minutes.
The practical consequence: the 8am–11am departure is the one that starts clean. Its aircraft has no earlier leg to be late from, which is exactly why that window shows 96.1% on time here.
Cancellations run at 2.76%, against 1.81% nationally. That is roughly one flight in 40 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. 10.4% 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 814 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 runs 72.2% on time across 1,521 flights, within about a point 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 1,521 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 TPA to DCA
Put together: the calendar is the biggest lever here, not the carrier or the hour. June runs 79.5% on time and July 56.8%, a swing of 23 points. If the dates move at all, move them out of July before you think about anything else. 1,469 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Related
Where to go next
- TPA to DCA, every carrier
- American on DCA to TPA, the return leg
- Southwest Airlines on TPA to DCA75.9%
- American Airlines network-wide record
- Tampa International (TPA) delay statistics
- Ronald Reagan Washington National (DCA) 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.