Delta is back on top in March on-time performance rankings, according to data from aviation analytics company Cirium. However that’s less about material improvement on their part and more a function of Southwest’s (and Spirit’s) slippage during the month.
Maybe the biggest story is United’s more than 200 basis point improvement, and leapfrog from 4th to 2nd place in on-time performance.
Although JetBlue is at the bottom of the pack of full service carriers, its on-time performance wasn’t horrible in March. Frontier’s performance was, of course, worse. And Air Canada is a perennial operational laggard among airlines in North America. JetBlue’s on-time performance was up from 73% the month prior – and Air Canada’s up from an abysmal 60% (59.97%).
Overall, American Airlines was in sixth place – edging out JetBlue – with on-time performance that lagged the industry. Among U.S. carriers, American also cancelled the greatest percentage of flights during the month.
Here’s the data:
Good stuff. And it is interesting that UA was actually #1 in on-time departures but #2 in on-time arrivals/overall. Perhaps DL is overly “generous” with its block time to create the facade of arriving on time more frequently. It certainly wouldn’t be beyond Tim Dunn… I mean Ed Bastian… and his team at DL to cook the books that way!
FWIW, I’m platinum medallion with DL and 1K with UA, and in the last couple of years, while the improvement on UA has been incredible (and who would have thought that a bean-counter like Kirby would have helmed such a great operation), DL’s race to the bottom is equally notable.
Gary’s Kirbybux are cashing again it seems.
DL maintains its on-time lead because it pads its schedules as much as it does; it is common in good weather to arrive 10-15 minutes early on a DL flight – far more often than on any other airline.
It costs money to pad schedules and DL generates the profits to pad its schedules. UA is closing the on-time gap w/ DL because it is running a better operation but it is also having to cut schedules in delay prone airports like EWR and also pad DEN schedules more than in the past.
The SE has been disproportionately hit by storms over the past couple of months; UA has very little presence there so has not seen the operational problems that AA and DL have seen.
The Crowdstrike issue proved that the airline industry is a marathon and not a sprint. UA cancelled half of the flights that DL did and, even excluding the MAX 9 groundings in the beginning of 2024, DL still ended up with better operational performance than UA.
DL’s big 4 hubs are better operationally suited for the volume of traffic that DL pushes through them.
Hey Tim,
Look at OMAAT’s latest block came to comment.
Maybe take a couple day break when most aviation blogs block you?
Even per Lucky you kept trying to comment under fake names after you were blocked, just like you did on airliners.net until your IP address was blocked.
I don’t ever say “I told you so” but to whoever doubted that Tim Dunn uses fake usernames, being blocked by many websites should say it all.
You have zero credibility.
No mention anywhere in your writing (just the chart) that AA flew nearly 50,000 more flights than UA (which by the math, AA had more on time flights than UA and DL had *flights*). No mention of the severe weather systems that impacted DFW this month.
Again by the math, AA needed about 8k more on time flights to match DLs On Time Performance. DFW has nearly 7k flights a day on AA. So a day and change worth of operational issues.
You are biased, and it shows. Be honest with your readers. Don’t ever talk about “desperately wanting AA to succeed” when all you do is trash them, and to a degree DAL as well.
If you seek a premium, on-time flight with a global thought leader in travel, please consider Delta.
The problem is that most flights are delayed because of weather and since airlines aren’t God, well they’ve got to deal with what’s given. Many passengers don’t understand but that’s the way life goes. Ignorance is often praised and valued. Also, planes break.
The center of attention should be operational recovery, communications and ease and availability of customer service for rebooking. Sending someone to stand in a long line or to a useless chat bot is an issue. Moreover, with packed planes and few empty seats naturally airlines are going to get their best customers into those seats. And their best customers (like me) have lounge access and a special number to call (albeit almost always with a call back) to get reaccommodated. Plus we know the airline’s system.
AA tends to suck in a three. The place goes to fecal matter, gate agents have no interest in keeping passengers up to date, and it’s the long line or the bot.
LMAO statistically AA is still number one since it operates 50,000 more flights!
No mention anywhere in your writing (just the chart) that AA flew nearly 50,000 more flights than UA (which by the math, AA had more on time flights than UA and DL had *flights*). No mention of the severe weather systems that impacted DFW this month.
Again by the math, AA needed about 8k more on time flights to match DLs On Time Performance. DFW has nearly 7k flights a day on AA. So a day and change worth of operational issues.
jane,
Gary’s data proves that focusing my time on a winning site is worth more of my time than wasting time dealing w/ his biased and vindictive commentary and infested by people like you that can’t stand for anyone to speak truths you can’t stand to hear.
you and he prove that you are fixated on me by talking about me when I am not even there. The truth doesn’t change whether I am on any site or not whether others say it or not.
George,
you are right but the difference in AA, DL and B6’s performance at LGA, JFK and BOS for years is an indication that how a company manages delays matters alot. DL clearly outperforms in NYC and BOS AA but esp. B6. DL invests in the resources to run a reliable operation and to recover when things fall apart.
No airline can know when weather is going to fall apart when schedules are set months in advance. AA like B6 simply does not have the resources to provide the operational backup and so it alienates customers.
Gary’s data doesn’t show it but the gap in operational performance in SEA between AS and DL is growing – and to the negative for AS. All of the people that are convinced that DL can’t compete with AS in SEA don’t realize that DL is doing exactly what it has done in NYC, BOS and LAX and that is to keep growing and force other carriers to add capacity that they cannot operationally support and DL’s competitors lose high fare paying customers. AS simply cannot flood SEA with capacity and maintain a high quality operation.
No mention anywhere in your writing (just the chart) that AA flew nearly 50,000 more flights than UA (which by the math, AA had more on time flights than UA and DL had *flights*). No mention of the severe weather systems that impacted DFW this month.
Again by the math, AA needed about 8k more on time flights to match DLs On Time Performance. DFW has nearly 7k flights a day on AA. So a day and change worth of operational issues.
kb,
no, AA doesn’t operate 7000 flights/day at DFW. They don’t even operate that many throughout their entire system in a day.
And, yes, I did note that the Southeast has been heavily hit by bad weather – and, you are correct that many of those weather systems originated in Texas. The flooding in Kentucky and TN and the high number of tornadoes in Arkansas and MO is a result of weather systems from the South and Midwest colliding.
AA hasn’t run as good of an operation as DL for years. They briefly paid tribute to being more on-time and then not only pulled back the block time expansions but also pushed more connections through DFW and CLT, both of which have significant operating challenges – baggage transfers at DFW between terminals is costly and time-consuming and AA simply runs too much traffic through CLT in order to run a decent operation.
Running a poor operation hurts in multiple ways – not only does it cost more to handle customers but passengers just want to get where they are going and the highest value passengers choose more reliable options when they have a choice.
Honestly, on-time performance is the least of the airline industry’s concern right now. Airline stocks and the larger economy are falling sharply today. Consumer confidence is falling and companies will spend less on travel.
@Tim
Sorry, I meant nearly 7k a day system wide. Not sure why I put at DFW; too many thoughts colliding. And you’re right, it’s not 7k, it’s about 6200 a day, just taking 194k flights divided by 31 days in March, did quick math to arrive at 7k.
Also, I wasnt replying to your posts, I’m replying to Gary about not mentioning anything about weather, total flights, etc. He deliberately omits that info in his writing.
I assume AA’s problem — to the extent they have one, as this difference between being #1 and #6 is barely material — is DFW weather? I do recall a lot of bad weather at DFW recently, and that airport is prone to poor flight operations in bad weather. Like I see today, with sunny skies in Dallas, AA has not cancelled a single flight in their vast network. So I’m not sure what AA can realistically do about this.
weather happens. Year round in every city.
that is why the DOT measures on-time and other operational metrics on a full-year basis. They haven’t released data for March but private sites do track it and that is what Gary cites.
for its entire system in 2024 including its regional carriers, AA was #7
HA consistently in 1st place – that is what you get in paradise – but they will be merged into AS’ data when the two merge their operating certificates. AS was #5 behind DL, UA and WN. AA is behind those 3 plus Allegiant.
so, no, DFW thunderstorms don’t change the outcome over an extended period of time.
AA simply does not have a goal of running a first rate operation on any metric the DOT measures.
AA was #4 in cancellations for 2024 but at the bottom of the list for baggage handling, almost as bad in wheelchair handling, and has more involuntary denied boardings than any other airline. Only F9 is even remotely in F9’s league in invol DBs.
AA just runs a crAAppy operation and doesn’t seem to have a plan or desire to improve it.
Tim Dunn
Holy cow dude, that guy is not arguing with you. No wonder you get banned every where you go. Shut your trap. Seems like you’re fuming AA has more on time flights than Delta has flights.
Tim Dunn in shambles. Bro’s mad because Delduh can’t put up numbers like American can. Sure they make more money. But AA moves significantly more people. Can’t handle the facts dude. AA is just as reliable with a bigger operation. And DAL has a smaller operation yet still loses more money moving pax than american. Keep spending on your amex Timmy, Ed’s paycheck is dependent on you
And G’s blog post was about the month of March, not whatever rant you went on. Enjoy spending months of your life defending a company that won’t be at your funeral, let alone know you’re dead.
Get banned.
AA flies 6800 flights a day. Today, since there are no thunderstorms at DFW, they have a grand total of ZERO cancellations in their system. That means they’ll fly 6800 flights — the most of any airline in the world — without cancelling a single one anywhere. That’s a crAAppy operation? Really? Or are you just, um, a bit biased?
How many of UA’s flights are premium?
chopsticks
any airline can operate well for a day.
Gary accurately noted month long statistics.
I cited year long statistics.
In comparison to other carriers, yes, AA operates less reliably than other carriers.
Interesting updates, Gary. Thank you for sharing and analyzing for us.
It’s anecdotal, but I literally was booked in jetBlue Mint yesterday, but my flight was 3.5 hours delayed, so I cancelled, got my points back, and rebooked with American, and they got the job done. Now, if I could have made it work with Delta, they’d have been my preference, but you know, it’s still nice to visit that Chelsea lounge at JFK, which arguably does compete with Delta One and Polaris for ‘best’ in the USA.
@Tim Dunn — Thank you as well for your comments. Sorry, I’m late to the party here, but I think you’re still right on this. It’s a shame a few others take such offense—don’t mind them at all. Keep doing what you do, sir!
thank you, 1990.
The big 4 serve well over 150 million customers per year EACH.
Anecdotes don’t matter – which is why statistics do.
All this data is totally irrelevant as is. It is ABSOLUTELY needs to be broken down by cause: mechanical, crew related, weather.- or just controllable or non-controllable. Gary— quit posting irrelevant information, it just wastes all our time.