Flight profile · American Airlines
AA2078
Dallas–Fort Worth (DFW) to Sacramento (SMF) · scheduled 11:46 AM – 1:19 PM
How AA2078 performs
608 operations, July 2023 – August 2026.
Between its first and last recorded date on DFW → SMF, AA2078 averaged about 4 operations a week (608 in 1,158 days, cancelled ones included).
AA2078 arrived on time 74.5% of the time, against 67.1% for all DFW → SMF flights, so this departure is 7.4 percentage points better than the route as a whole. Against American Airlines’ own flights on this route it is 7.2 points better.
Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics · 608 operations, July 2023 – August 2026 · If AA2078 is cancelled or significantly changed, DOT’s automatic refund rule may entitle you to your money back. The refund checker walks through eligibility.
Where AA2078 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| AA2078 | 74.5% | 1.15% | -6 min | 9.0% | 608 |
| American Airlines on DFW → SMF | 67.3% | 2.03% | 0 min | 12.5% | 5,375 |
| All DFW → SMF flights | 67.1% | 2.00% | 0 min | 12.6% | 5,444 |
AA2078 cancelled 7 of 608 operations (1.15%), below the 2.00% for DFW → SMF.
9.0% of AA2078’s arrivals were an hour or more late, against 12.6% across DFW → SMF, so the long delays are less common on this number than on the route.
Source: FlyerIntel analysis of US DOT BTS data · July 2023 – August 2026
Why AA2078 runs late
Where US DOT attributed the delay minutes on this flight.
the inbound aircraft was late, so this flight started late
crew, maintenance, boarding and fueling, all within the carrier’s control
airspace and airport capacity, including weather-driven flow control
weather severe enough to stop this flight specifically
Share of the delay minutes US DOT attributed to each cause for AA2078 on DFW → SMF. Only delays of 15 minutes or more are attributed. What the five causes mean
Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics · Data covering July 2023 – August 2026
Does a late aircraft delay this flight?
How often the plane that flies AA2078 comes in late, and what that does to the departure.
The aircraft flying AA2078 came in 15 or more minutes late on 10% 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.
Matched by tail number to the aircraft’s previous flight into DFW: 534 of 601 departures. Unknown, cancelled or diverted inbounds and gaps over 12 hours are left out.
Against the network at the same turn length
| Share of departures | Inbound landed 15+ late |
|---|---|
| AA2078 | 10% |
| Network, same turn | 17% |
61 scheduled minutes is enough to clean and board when the aircraft is on time, with little to spare when it is not.
The network row is every flight with a scheduled turn of 60 to 89 minutes. How often AA2078’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.
Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics · Data covering July 2023 – August 2026
From pushback to gate
When it leaves DFW late, does that still matter by the time it reaches SMF?
AA2078 pushes back an average of 16.7 minutes late and reaches the gate at SMF an average of 8.8 minutes late. The 7.9 minutes between those two figures are slack the published schedule already carries, so a late pushback is partly, not fully, made up before the gate. It spends 16.6 minutes on the taxiways at DFW, 1.9 minutes shorter than a typical DFW departure in the same hour.
On arrival at SMF, AA2078 spends 5.0 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 SMF spends on the ground before reaching the gate.
Taxi-out is gate to wheels up and sits inside the scheduled block; the hourly comparison is 42,171 DFW departures. Taxi-in is landing to gate, set against 177,301 arrivals at SMF. More on taxi time.
Source: FlyerIntel analysis of US DOT BTS data · July 2023 – August 2026
The hour it leaves DFW
AA2078 has one departure time, 11:46 AM, so this is what that hour at DFW is worth.
On-time arrival rate. 42,171 departures from DFW are scheduled in the 11 AM–12 PM hour over the period, against 989,065 across the whole day.
AA2078 is scheduled out of DFW at 11:46 AM, in the 11 AM–12 PM bank. Departures from DFW in that hour arrive on time 74.5% of the time against 73.1% across the airport’s whole day, so the hour AA2078 leaves in is an ordinary one for DFW and explains nothing about its record either way.
Both airport figures cover every destination from DFW, so they describe the slot, not this journey; the route comparison is above. Why the hour matters.
Source: FlyerIntel analysis of US DOT BTS data · July 2023 – August 2026 · Hours below 120 departures are not scored.
Other routes AA2078 has flown
Carriers reassign flight numbers. AA2078 also served these 12 other city pairs in the period.
| Route | Operated | Flights | On time |
|---|---|---|---|
| SMF→DFW Sacramento to Dallas–Fort Worth | July 1, 2023 – August 31, 2026 | 595 | 68.0% |
| DEN→DFW Denver to Dallas–Fort Worth | February 15, 2024 – August 4, 2026 | 379 | 84.7% |
| DFW→CHS Dallas–Fort Worth to Charleston | December 18, 2024 | 1 | — |
| MSN→PHX Madison to Phoenix | December 5–16, 2024 | 8 | — |
| LAX→DFW Los Angeles to Dallas–Fort Worth | November 5, 2024 – December 4, 2024 | 29 | — |
| MIA→LAS Miami to Las Vegas | November 28, 2024 | 1 | — |
| JFK→CLT New York to Charlotte | January 9, 2024 – February 14, 2024 | 22 | — |
| ABQ→PHX Albuquerque to Phoenix | January 14, 2024 | 1 | — |
| BUF→CLT Buffalo to Charlotte | January 8, 2024 | 1 | — |
| DFW→OKC Dallas–Fort Worth to Oklahoma City | December 5–19, 2023 | 15 | — |
| OKC→DFW Oklahoma City to Dallas–Fort Worth | December 5–19, 2023 | 15 | — |
| CLE→CLT Cleveland to Charlotte | November 25–26, 2023 | 2 | — |
The figures above describe only DFW → SMF, the route AA2078 flies now.
When it goes wrong
The average describes a usual day. This is the day that ruins a connection.
54 min late
against a median of 6 min early
AA2078 has an average that understates its risk: a typical arrival is 6 min early, but the worst tenth are 60 minutes worse than that. If the trip has something unmissable at the end of it, the median is the wrong number to plan against.
Percentiles over 608 operations; cancelled and diverted flights are counted separately.
Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics · Data covering July 2023 – August 2026
Other flights on this route
Same airports, same journey, different odds of arriving on time.
| Flight | Airline | On time | Median arrival | Operations |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| AA2081 | American Airlines | 83.3% | 9 min early | 635 |
| AA2078 this flight | American Airlines | 74.5% | 6 min early | 608 |
Among all 2 departures on this route with at least 600 operations, AA2078 has the lowest on-time rate, 8.8 points behind the best. Every departure here has at least 600 operations; the other rows are the most punctual on the route, not all of them.
Data and methodology
Calculated by FlyerIntel from 608 records of AA2078 operating DFW → SMF, 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 reported separately, not in the on-time rate.
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
Analysis last recomputed