Flight profile · American Airlines
AA1621
Philadelphia (PHL) to San Diego (SAN) · scheduled 8:50 AM – 11:41 AM
How AA1621 performs
624 operations, November 2023 – July 2026.
AA1621 arrived on time 87.6% of the time, against 75.6% for all PHL → SAN flights, so this departure is 12.0 percentage points better than the route as a whole. Against American Airlines’ own flights on this route it is 12.0 points better.
Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics · 624 operations, November 2023 – July 2026 · If AA1621 is cancelled or significantly changed, DOT’s automatic refund rule may entitle you to your money back. The refund checker walks through eligibility.
What stands out
How AA1621 compares to other flight numbers, not just to itself.
This flight runs unusually far ahead of the carrier's own average on this route, better than 95% of 11,589 comparable flight numbers.
87.6% on time for this specific departure, against 75.6% for the same carrier's other flights on this route.
Source: FlyerIntel analysis of US DOT BTS data · November 2023 – July 2026 · The one thing about this specific departure that ranks most extreme against every other published flight number, out of everything FlyerIntel checks — shown only when something clears a real statistical bar, not for every flight.
Where AA1621 is right now
A live reading, only if you ask for it. It is not part of the reliability record above.
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Against the rest of the route
| Flight or route | On time | Cancelled | Median delay | Severe | Flights |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| AA1621 | 87.6% | 0.16% | -12 min | 2.3% | 624 |
| American Airlines on PHL → SAN | 75.6% | 1.39% | -5 min | 8.3% | 3,098 |
| All PHL → SAN flights | 75.6% | 1.39% | -5 min | 8.3% | 3,098 |
Source: FlyerIntel analysis of US DOT BTS data · November 2023 – July 2026
Why AA1621 runs late
Where US DOT attributed the delay minutes on this flight.
airspace and airport capacity, including weather-driven flow control
crew, maintenance, boarding and fueling, all within the carrier’s control
weather severe enough to stop this flight specifically
the inbound aircraft was late, so this flight started late
Share of the delay minutes US DOT attributed to each cause for AA1621 on PHL → SAN. Only delays of 15 minutes or more are attributed.
Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics · Data covering November 2023 – July 2026
Does a late aircraft delay this flight?
How often the plane that flies AA1621 comes in late, and what that does to the departure.
The aircraft flying AA1621 came in 15 or more minutes late on 12% of the departures where its previous flight is known. There are not enough departures in both groups to say how the flight left after a late one and after an on-time one.
Each departure is matched to the flight the same aircraft flew into PHL just before it, using the tail number in the DOT file, 523 of 623 departures in all. A departure is left out when that flight is unknown, was cancelled or diverted, or the aircraft had sat for more than 12 hours. A flight the airline cancelled never left and is not in the count, and one flown by a substitute aircraft is matched to the aircraft that flew it, not to the one first planned.
Against the network at the same turn length
| Share of departures | Inbound landed 15+ late |
|---|---|
| AA1621 | 12% |
| Network, same turn | 23% |
The schedule leaves a long gap on the ground, which gives a late aircraft room to catch up before this flight pushes back.
The network row is every flight with a scheduled turn of 90 minutes to 3 hours. How often AA1621’s aircraft landed 15 or more minutes late is lower than the network’s. There are not enough departures in both groups to compare how it left.
More: Which Flight Numbers Pay for a Late Aircraft lists the flight numbers that pass a late aircraft on.
Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics · Data covering November 2023 – July 2026
From pushback to gate
When it leaves PHL late, does that still matter by the time it reaches SAN?
AA1621 pushes back an average of 0.0 minutes early and reaches the gate at SAN an average of 7.2 minutes early. The 7.1 minutes between those two figures are slack the published schedule already carries, which is why a late pushback on this flight does not reliably become a late arrival. It spends 24.5 minutes on the taxiways at PHL, 1.3 minutes longer than a typical PHL departure in the same hour.
On arrival at SAN, AA1621 spends 6.5 min taxiing from touchdown to the gate — ground time a connecting passenger sits through before they can even leave the aircraft, on top of however late the flight itself ran. That is about what any arrival at SAN spends on the ground before reaching the gate.
Departure delay is averaged over every pushback and arrival delay over every completed arrival, so the two counts differ by the flights that never reached SAN. Taxi-out is gate to wheels up and sits inside the scheduled block rather than on top of it; the comparison is 32,304 departures from PHL scheduled in the clock hour AA1621 most often leaves in. Taxi-in is landing to gate, compared against every arrival FlyerIntel has on file at SAN (297,664 flights), not just AA1621’s own. More on taxi time.
Source: FlyerIntel analysis of US DOT BTS data · November 2023 – July 2026
The hour it leaves PHL
Part of any flight’s record belongs to the clock rather than to the flight. AA1621 has one departure time, so this is what that time is worth.
On-time arrival rate. 32,304 departures from PHL are scheduled in the 8 AM–9 AM hour over the period, against 305,181 across the whole day.
AA1621 is scheduled out of PHL at 8:50 AM, in the 8 AM–9 AM bank. Departures from PHL in that hour arrive on time 84.3% of the time against 76.2% across the airport’s whole day — the slot alone is worth 8.0 points better before anything about this particular flight is considered.
The two airport figures cover every departure from PHL to every destination, so they describe the slot rather than this journey — the like-for-like comparison against the route is above. Hours are scheduled local, and a number whose schedule moved between banks inside the period has no single hour and is not described here at all. Why the hour matters.
Source: FlyerIntel analysis of US DOT BTS data · November 2023 – July 2026 · Hours below 120 departures are not scored.
Other routes AA1621 has flown
A flight number is a slot in a schedule, and carriers reassign it. These are the other city pairs this number served in the analysis period.
| Route | Operated | Flights | On time |
|---|---|---|---|
| BUF→CLT Buffalo to Charlotte | March 10, 2026 – April 4, 2026 | 8 | — |
| CLT→BUF Charlotte to Buffalo | March 10, 2026 – April 4, 2026 | 8 | — |
| ORD→SAN Chicago to San Diego | March 12, 2026 – April 2, 2026 | 4 | — |
| PIT→MIA Pittsburgh to Miami | March 11, 2026 – April 1, 2026 | 4 | — |
| ORD→LGA Chicago to New York | February 12, 2026 – March 7, 2026 | 24 | — |
| ORD→EGE Chicago to Eagle | December 31, 2025 – February 9, 2026 | 26 | — |
| PHX→DFW Phoenix to Dallas–Fort Worth | December 3–17, 2025 | 15 | — |
| XNA→DFW Fayetteville/Springdale/Rogers to Dallas–Fort Worth | November 2, 2025 – December 2, 2025 | 31 | — |
| LAX→CLT Los Angeles to Charlotte | April 4, 2024 – November 3, 2024 | 210 | 82.8% |
| CLT→LAX Charlotte to Los Angeles | May 6, 2024 – June 4, 2024 | 30 | — |
| CLT→SFO Charlotte to San Francisco | October 5, 2023 – November 4, 2023 | 29 | — |
| SAN→CLT San Diego to Charlotte | September 6, 2023 – October 4, 2023 | 25 | — |
| SNA→CLT Santa Ana to Charlotte | August 15, 2023 – September 4, 2023 | 21 | — |
| CHS→CLT Charleston to Charlotte | July 2, 2023 – August 14, 2023 | 38 | — |
Because the same number has served different journeys, the statistics above describe only the route AA1621 currently operates. Blending them would produce an average of two different flights.
When it goes wrong
The average describes a usual day. This is the day that ruins a connection.
18 min late
against a median of 12 min early
Percentiles over 624 operations; cancelled and diverted flights are counted separately.
Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics · Data covering November 2023 – July 2026
Data and methodology
Calculated by FlyerIntel from 624 records of AA1621 operating PHL → SAN, published by the US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics. A flight counts as delayed when it arrives 15 or more minutes after schedule. Cancelled and diverted flights are excluded from the on-time rate and reported separately. Flight numbers are resolved as carrier plus number plus route, because the same number serves different routes over time.
Full methodology · Data sources · Report a problem
Related research: Most and Least Reliable Flight Numbers · The Delay You Inherit · Making Up Time in the Air
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