Flight profile · United Airlines

UA1481

Denver (DEN) to Phoenix (PHX) · scheduled 7:45 AM – 8:40 AM

This page describes how UA1481 has historically performed, which is a different and more useful question when you are deciding what to book. The live position below is a reading from receivers on the ground, not flight status. For today’s status, check with United Airlines.

How UA1481 performs

825 operations, March 2024 – July 2026.

On-time arrivals
83.8%
688 of 821 completed
Cancellation rate
0.48%
4 cancelled
Median arrival delay
-8 min
Average -1.5 min
Severe delays
3.3%
Arrived 60+ minutes late
Delay when late
45 min
Average, when 15+ min late
Departure punctuality
92.0%
Left the gate on time

UA1481 arrived on time 83.8% of the time, against 75.8% for all DEN → PHX flights, so this departure is 8.0 percentage points better than the route as a whole. Against United Airlines’ own flights on this route it is 3.1 points better.

Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics · 825 operations, March 2024 – July 2026 · If UA1481 is cancelled or significantly changed, DOT’s automatic refund rule may entitle you to your money back. The refund checker walks through eligibility.

Where UA1481 is right now

A live reading, only if you ask for it. It is not part of the reliability record above.

Ask for the position of UA1481 right now, if receivers on the ground are hearing it. Nothing is requested until you press the button.

Against the rest of the route

Against the rest of the route
Flight or routeOn timeCancelledMedian delaySevereFlights
UA148183.8%0.48%-8 min3.3%825
United Airlines on DEN → PHX80.7%0.66%-7 min6.9%7,154
All DEN → PHX flights75.8%0.90%-4 min7.9%28,387

Source: FlyerIntel analysis of US DOT BTS data · March 2024 – July 2026

Why UA1481 runs late

Where US DOT attributed the delay minutes on this flight.

Share of the delay minutes US DOT attributed to each cause for UA1481 on DEN → PHX. Only delays of 15 minutes or more are attributed.

Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics · Data covering March 2024 – July 2026

Does a late aircraft delay this flight?

How often the plane that flies UA1481 comes in late, and what that does to the departure.

Inbound aircraft late
16%
82 of 525 departures came in 15+ minutes late
Scheduled time on the ground
8 hours
Median at DEN between the inbound and this departure

UA1481 is usually the aircraft’s first flight of the day: the schedule gives it a median of 8 hours on the ground at DEN, so its “inbound” is mostly the aircraft’s arrival the evening before.

The aircraft flying UA1481 came in 15 or more minutes late on 16% 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 DEN just before it, using the tail number in the DOT file, 525 of 821 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

UA1481 against all flights with a scheduled turn of 6 hours or more, usually overnight
Share of departuresInbound landed 15+ late
UA148116%
Network, same turn29%

A night on the ground absorbs most of a late arrival, so a late inbound matters far less on a turn this long than on a same-day one.

The network row is every flight with a scheduled turn of 6 hours or more, usually overnight. How often UA1481’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 March 2024 – July 2026

From pushback to gate

When it leaves DEN late, does that still matter by the time it reaches PHX?

Leaves the gate
1.4 minutes late
Average over 821 pushbacks
Taxi out at DEN
23.5 min
18.8 min for the airport in this hour
Taxi in at PHX
4.5 min
7.5 min for a typical PHX arrival
Reaches the gate at PHX
1.5 minutes early
Average over 821 arrivals

UA1481 pushes back an average of 1.4 minutes late and reaches the gate at PHX an average of 1.5 minutes early. The 2.9 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 23.5 minutes on the taxiways at DEN, 4.6 minutes longer than a typical DEN departure in the same hour.

On arrival at PHX, UA1481 spends 4.5 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 2.9 minutes shorter than a typical PHX arrival (7.5 min).

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 PHX. Taxi-out is gate to wheels up and sits inside the scheduled block rather than on top of it; the comparison is 46,622 departures from DEN scheduled in the clock hour UA1481 most often leaves in. Taxi-in is landing to gate, compared against every arrival FlyerIntel has on file at PHX (598,496 flights), not just UA1481’s own. More on taxi time.

Source: FlyerIntel analysis of US DOT BTS data · March 2024 – July 2026

The hour it leaves DEN

Part of any flight’s record belongs to the clock rather than to the flight. UA1481 has one departure time, so this is what that time is worth.

UA148183.8%
All DEN departures, 7 AM–8 AM87.5%
All DEN departures, whole day76.0%

On-time arrival rate. 46,622 departures from DEN are scheduled in the 7 AM–8 AM hour over the period, against 963,099 across the whole day.

UA1481 is scheduled out of DEN at 7:45 AM, in the 7 AM–8 AM bank. Departures from DEN in that hour arrive on time 87.5% of the time against 76.0% across the airport’s whole day — the slot alone is worth 11.5 points better before anything about this particular flight is considered.

The two airport figures cover every departure from DEN 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 · March 2024 – July 2026 · Hours below 120 departures are not scored.

Other routes UA1481 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.

Other routes UA1481 has flown
RouteOperatedFlightsOn time
CHS→IAH Charleston to HoustonApril 30, 20261—
IAH→SDF Houston to LouisvilleApril 30, 20261—
SFO→TPA San Francisco to TampaNovember 28, 20251—
DFW→DEN Dallas–Fort Worth to DenverSeptember 25, 2025 – October 23, 20255—
DFW→IAH Dallas–Fort Worth to HoustonAugust 20, 2025 – September 24, 202536—
BUF→IAD Buffalo to WashingtonAugust 19, 20251—
AUS→DEN Austin to DenverJune 1–23, 202517—
PHX→SFO Phoenix to San FranciscoJune 1–23, 202517—
SAT→DEN San Antonio to DenverNovember 1, 2024 – December 2, 202431—
PHX→IAH Phoenix to HoustonMarch 7, 2024 – October 26, 202455—
ORD→DEN Chicago to DenverAugust 1–18, 202418—
BOI→DEN Boise to DenverMay 6–22, 202417—
ORD→PIT Chicago to PittsburghFebruary 15, 2024 – March 6, 202415—
MCO→LAX Orlando to Los AngelesJanuary 9, 2024 – February 14, 202437—
ORD→BOS Chicago to BostonDecember 21, 2023 – January 8, 202419—
LAS→LAX Las Vegas to Los AngelesNovember 28, 2023 – December 20, 202322—
RSW→ORD Fort Myers to ChicagoOctober 29, 2023 – November 27, 202322—
ORD→STL Chicago to St. LouisNovember 26, 20231—
EWR→SAN Newark to San DiegoJuly 1, 2023 – October 28, 202312071.1%

Because the same number has served different journeys, the statistics above describe only the route UA1481 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.

One arrival in ten is worse than

26 min late

against a median of 8 min early

Arrived an hour or more late3.3%
Typical delay when late45 min
Cancelled0.48%
Landed somewhere else0.00%

Percentiles over 825 operations; cancelled and diverted flights are counted separately.

Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics · Data covering March 2024 – July 2026

Other flights on this route

Same airports, same journey, different odds of arriving on time.

Other flights on this route
FlightAirlineOn timeMedian arrivalOperations
UA1481 this flightUnited Airlines83.8%8 min early825
F91375Frontier Airlines83.6%8 min early624
UA2249United Airlines78.3%6 min early815
AA1404American Airlines77.4%3 min early1,095
UA594United Airlines75.9%5 min early610
F94753Frontier Airlines62.1%4 min late705

Every departure listed carries at least 600 operations, so the comparison is between figures that mean something. UA1481 is placed in the same ordering rather than left out of it; the rows around it are the most punctual departures on the route, not all of them, so this is a comparison and not a rank. Schedules change; confirm the departure still operates before booking around this.

Data and methodology

Calculated by FlyerIntel from 825 records of UA1481 operating DEN → PHX, 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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