Route profile
LAX→SFO
Flight reliability, delays and best times to fly from Los Angeles to San Francisco, 337 miles.
Right now
Aviation weather is not currently a factor.
Aviation weather is not currently a factor.
Route reliability
July 2023 – July 2026
Better than 24% of comparable major US routes (4,598 compared)
Calculated from 34,819 flights. How this is calculated
LAX → SFO arrives on time 69.3% of the time; the return trip, SFO → LAX, arrives on time 77.1% of the time, a 7.8-point gap between the two directions of the same city pair.
LAX → SFO spends 30.5 minutes on the ground on a 337-mile trip: 23.5 minutes from pushback to wheels-up at LAX and 7.0 minutes from touchdown to gate at SFO.
Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics · Data covering July 2023 – July 2026
What stands out
Reliability on this route has fallen unusually sharply over the past year, a bigger swing than 97% of 5,368 comparable routes.
62.2% on time over the most recent 12 months (2025-08 to 2026-07), against 76.3% in the 12 months before (2024-08 to 2025-07), a change of 14.1 points.
Source: FlyerIntel analysis of US DOT BTS data · July 2023 – July 2026 · Ranked against every other route with the same kind of figure and at least 5,368 in the comparison.
Why LAX → SFO flights are cancelled
July 2023 – July 2026
LAX → SFO cancelled 232 of 34,819 scheduled flights — about 1 in every 150. The reason filed most often was the airline, 65.9% of the cancellations coded on this route — about 1 in every 228 scheduled flights.
Share of cancellations
Of 232 cancelled departures carrying a reason code.
What each reason means
Crew, maintenance, aircraft cleaning, baggage or fueling: what BTS counts as within the carrier’s own control.
153 cancellations, 65.9% of the total.
Conditions the carrier judged severe enough to stop the flight: a blizzard, a hurricane, a line of thunderstorms.
48 cancellations, 20.7% of the total.
Airport capacity, air traffic control flow programs, heavy traffic and ordinary bad weather. A system decision, not the airline’s.
31 cancellations, 13.4% of the total.
A terminal evacuation, a security breach, screening equipment failure, or screening queues over 29 minutes.
0 cancellations, 0.0% of the total.
Reason codes are the operating airline’s own filing with US DOT, not an independent finding of fault. Ordinary bad weather is filed under air traffic, so weather’s full share is larger than its bar.
232 coded cancellations were recorded on LAX → SFO; the section appears from 50.
When it goes wrong
July 2023 – July 2026
59 min late
against a median of 1 min early
LAX → SFO has an average that understates its risk: a typical arrival is 1 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 34,819 operations; cancelled and diverted flights are counted separately.
Will your connection be tight enough?
Layovers at SFO after arriving from LAX.
| Connection time | Chance of missing | Reads as |
|---|---|---|
| 30 min | 47% | Likely to miss |
| 45 min | 30% | High risk |
| 60 min | 20% | High risk |
| 90 min | 9.6% | Some risk |
| 120 min | 5.1% | Some risk |
This is one leg of a connection. Gate changes and the next flight's own schedule matter too. And a connection can fail before delay is even the question — this route cancels 0.67% of the time and diverts 0.13% of the time, which a late arrival never shows up in.
Chance of missing is the share of 34,543 arrivals on this route that landed later than the connection time less 30 minutes to reach the next gate.
The worst tenth of arrivals on this route land at least 59 minutes late (90th-percentile gate arrival delay), over 34,819 operations.
Any other layover length: connection checker.
Best time to fly
LAX → SFO flights departing 5–9 AM arrived on time 77.3% of the time, against 59.0% for 6–9 PM departures, a gap of 18.3 percentage points.
By day and hour
On-time arrival rate for each weekday and scheduled departure hour, in local time at the departure airport (LAX).
Hour of departure matters more than day of the week: hourly averages sit a typical 10.6 points from the route-wide rate, weekday averages 3.8 points.
| Hour | Monday | Tuesday | Wednesday | Thursday | Friday | Saturday | Sunday |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 6 AM–7 AM | |||||||
| 7 AM–8 AM | |||||||
| 8 AM–9 AM | |||||||
| 9 AM–10 AM | |||||||
| 10 AM–11 AM | |||||||
| 11 AM–12 PM | |||||||
| 12 PM–1 PM | |||||||
| 1 PM–2 PM | |||||||
| 2 PM–3 PM | |||||||
| 3 PM–4 PM | |||||||
| 4 PM–5 PM | |||||||
| 5 PM–6 PM | |||||||
| 6 PM–7 PM | |||||||
| 7 PM–8 PM | |||||||
| 8 PM–9 PM | |||||||
| 9 PM–10 PM | |||||||
| 10 PM–11 PM |
On-time rate, % · stronger color, fewer on time
- 40–49
- 50–59
- 60–69
- 70–79
- 80–89
- 90–99
- Fewer than 120 flights, not scored
Source: FlyerIntel analysis of US DOT BTS data · July 2023 – July 2026 · On time is arrival within 15 minutes of schedule. Cells round to whole percentages; the table shows one decimal.
No slot is named best or worst: too few reach 500 flights. Departures before 6 AM and after 11 PM (178 flights) are not drawn: no slot in those hours has enough flights to score.
View as tableHide table
| Hour | Monday | Tuesday | Wednesday | Thursday | Friday | Saturday | Sunday |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 6 AM–7 AM | 95.1% on time475 flights | 95.7% on time420 flights | 95.5% on time402 flights | 92.8% on time476 flights | 95.7% on time463 flights | 95.7% on time326 flights | 94.7% on time404 flights |
| 7 AM–8 AM | 78.5% on time222 flights | 78.4% on time236 flights | 77.5% on time237 flights | 80.0% on time226 flights | 78.0% on time238 flights | 83.7% on time262 flights | 85.0% on time210 flights |
| 8 AM–9 AM | 53.7% on time401 flights | 57.3% on time397 flights | 59.5% on time395 flights | 55.2% on time400 flights | 57.3% on time395 flights | 56.3% on time384 flights | 51.6% on time394 flights |
| 9 AM–10 AM | 63.0% on time258 flights | 73.1% on time209 flights | 69.7% on time212 flights | 61.3% on time259 flights | 57.3% on time254 flights | 65.0% on time218 flights | 62.5% on time233 flights |
| 10 AM–11 AM | 59.8% on time389 flights | 71.1% on time372 flights | 63.2% on time373 flights | 66.0% on time399 flights | 57.3% on time396 flights | 71.9% on time335 flights | 62.9% on time353 flights |
| 11 AM–12 PM | 65.3% on time240 flights | 74.8% on time234 flights | 67.3% on time227 flights | 69.8% on time229 flights | 58.0% on time233 flights | 77.0% on time219 flights | 69.7% on time239 flights |
| 12 PM–1 PM | 68.4% on time214 flights | 78.7% on time203 flights | 72.7% on time206 flights | 68.3% on time205 flights | 66.8% on time209 flights | 78.2% on time207 flights | 77.5% on time233 flights |
| 1 PM–2 PM | 75.8% on time362 flights | 82.9% on time363 flights | 75.7% on time367 flights | 73.8% on time365 flights | 69.0% on time367 flights | 76.6% on time338 flights | 66.8% on time372 flights |
| 2 PM–3 PM | 63.7% on time146 flights | 66.7% on time165 flights | 62.3% on time167 flights | 58.7% on time150 flights | 58.1% on time150 flights | 71.8% on time151 flights | 57.8% on time150 flights |
| 3 PM–4 PM | 68.2% on time155 flights | 107 flights, too few to score | 106 flights, too few to score | 69.0% on time158 flights | 66.9% on time158 flights | 80.3% on time138 flights | 76.7% on time135 flights |
| 4 PM–5 PM | 68.7% on time412 flights | 76.8% on time376 flights | 71.0% on time367 flights | 65.9% on time399 flights | 68.1% on time405 flights | 74.7% on time354 flights | 69.2% on time382 flights |
| 5 PM–6 PM | 74.7% on time353 flights | 78.8% on time288 flights | 76.2% on time284 flights | 72.0% on time356 flights | 68.2% on time353 flights | 84.9% on time262 flights | 70.8% on time328 flights |
| 6 PM–7 PM | 59.6% on time441 flights | 70.4% on time390 flights | 61.9% on time389 flights | 59.1% on time408 flights | 58.9% on time422 flights | 66.3% on time331 flights | 58.1% on time428 flights |
| 7 PM–8 PM | 51.4% on time330 flights | 70.4% on time332 flights | 64.6% on time337 flights | 55.9% on time333 flights | 59.3% on time328 flights | 67.2% on time354 flights | 52.9% on time329 flights |
| 8 PM–9 PM | 49.3% on time308 flights | 63.3% on time230 flights | 58.4% on time234 flights | 51.2% on time302 flights | 48.0% on time306 flights | 59.3% on time222 flights | 47.9% on time309 flights |
| 9 PM–10 PM | 65.7% on time310 flights | 80.5% on time216 flights | 72.8% on time240 flights | 63.5% on time301 flights | 59.5% on time299 flights | 75.6% on time176 flights | 54.1% on time322 flights |
| 10 PM–11 PM | 74.9% on time239 flights | 88.0% on time210 flights | 84.1% on time208 flights | 71.3% on time248 flights | 71.4% on time223 flights | 81.8% on time121 flights | 67.9% on time255 flights |
By departure window
By departure hour
- 12 AM to 5 AM: too few flights to score
- 6 AM: 95.0% on time from 2,966 flights
- 7 AM: 80.1% on time from 1,631 flights
- 8 AM: 55.8% on time from 2,766 flights
- 9 AM: 64.2% on time from 1,643 flights
- 10 AM: 64.4% on time from 2,617 flights
- 11 AM: 68.8% on time from 1,621 flights
- 12 PM: 73.0% on time from 1,477 flights
- 1 PM: 74.3% on time from 2,534 flights
- 2 PM: 62.8% on time from 1,079 flights
- 3 PM: 73.8% on time from 957 flights
- 4 PM: 70.5% on time from 2,695 flights
- 5 PM: 74.6% on time from 2,224 flights
- 6 PM: 61.8% on time from 2,809 flights
- 7 PM: 60.4% on time from 2,343 flights
- 8 PM: 53.1% on time from 1,911 flights
- 9 PM: 65.9% on time from 1,864 flights
- 10 PM: 76.3% on time from 1,504 flights
- 11 PM: too few flights to score
Why LAX → SFO runs late
July 2023 – July 2026
airspace and airport capacity, including weather-driven flow control
the inbound aircraft was late, so this flight started late
crew, maintenance, boarding and fueling, all within the carrier’s control
weather severe enough to stop this flight specifically
screening or terminal security incidents
Share of the delay minutes US DOT attributed to each cause for LAX → SFO. Only delays of 15 minutes or more are attributed.
How this route holds up in bad weather
July 2023 – July 2026
Bad weather raises cancellations by a similar amount at both ends of LAX to SFO: 1.3 times the normal rate at LAX and 1.7 times at SFO. Cancelled in bad weather against normal hours: LAX 1.0% against 0.8%, SFO 1.5% against 0.9%. Flights that did leave SFO in bad weather arrived on time 73.0% of the time, against 79.8% in normal hours.
Bad weather and normal hours at the airports
Scheduled departures, July 2023 – July 2026| Departures from | LAX | SFO |
|---|---|---|
| Cancelled in bad weather | 1.0% | 1.5% |
| Cancelled in normal hours | 0.8% | 0.9% |
| Arrived on time, bad weather | 78.9% | 73.0% |
| Arrived on time, normal hours | 81.4% | 79.8% |
| Departures in bad weather | 60,639 | 36,006 |
Of the carriers on this route, Southwest Airlines (0.6% cancelled against 1.1% for the other carriers at LAX) cancelled the fewest departures from LAX in bad weather and Frontier Airlines (3.1% cancelled against 1.0% for the other carriers at LAX) the most.
This route’s airlines in bad weather at LAX
All departures from LAX| Airline | Bad-weather departures | Cancelled | Other carriers |
|---|---|---|---|
| Southwest Airlines | 8,724 | 0.6%below the others | 1.1% |
| American Airlines | 9,554 | 0.8%below the others | 1.1% |
| Delta Air Lines | 11,619 | 0.9%about level | 1.0% |
| SkyWest Airlines | 11,169 | 1.0%about level | 1.0% |
| JetBlue | 2,801 | 1.0%about level | 1.0% |
| Alaska Airlines | 2,917 | 1.1%about level | 1.0% |
| United Airlines | 8,785 | 1.2%about level | 1.0% |
| Frontier Airlines | 1,064 | 3.1%above the others | 1.0% |
These are airport figures, not route figures: every scheduled departure from LAX and SFO, to any destination, in hours the weather report called bad. The airline rows count each carrier’s departures from LAX on every route.
Weather source and limits. In full: LAX (airlines), SFO, What Weather Costs Each Airport, Who Cancels More When the Weather Turns, Airports That Change Places When Weather Turns.
Airlines on this route
Carriers with at least 200 flights, by the airline that operated each one.
| Carrier | Flights | On time | Cancelled | Median delay | Severe |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| United Airlines | 9,784 | 72.5% | 0.84% | -4 min | 7.9% |
| SkyWest Airlines | 9,241 | 71.8% | 0.64% | -1 min | 9.0% |
| Delta Air Lines | 7,252 | 71.4% | 0.80% | -4 min | 9.1% |
| Southwest Airlines | 4,377 | 62.1% | 0.25% | 4 min | 12.7% |
| Alaska Airlines | 1,438 | 59.3% | 0.49% | 6 min | 12.1% |
| American Airlines | 1,173 | 67.5% | 0.09% | -2 min | 13.5% |
| Frontier Airlines | 1,023 | 54.3% | 1.27% | 11 min | 18.0% |
| JetBlue | 531 | 57.2% | 0.19% | 9 min | 16.0% |
United Airlines flew 28.1% of the 34,819 flights listed. Frontier Airlines cancelled 1.27% of its flights here against 0.09% for American Airlines.
United Airlines arrived on time 18.2 percentage points more often than Frontier Airlines on this route.
Other ways to fly Los Angeles to San Francisco
Airport pairs in the same two city markets, as the DOT defines them.
LAX → SJC is the most reliable pairing for this journey at 86.5% on time, against 71.6% for SNA → SFO.
Flying to SFO from the Los Angeles area? Compare LAX, SNA, BUR, ONT for SFO, with the same test for what counts as a real difference.
Flights on this route
Flight numbers with at least 600 operations here and still on the schedule.
UA2019 (4:10 PM) arrived on time 72.5% of the time, 3.8 points more often than DL2267 (1:30 PM) at 68.7%.
Weekly and seasonal patterns
By day of week
Tuesday is historically the most reliable day and Friday the least, a gap of 10.5 percentage points.
By month
- Jan: 77.8%
- Feb: 65.2%
- Mar: 69.2%
- Apr: 60.1%
- May: 59.7%
- Jun: 63.4%
- Jul: 67.7%
- Aug: 76.8%
- Sep: 74.6%
- Oct: 72.7%
- Nov: 73.6%
- Dec: 72.1%
May is historically the weakest month and January the strongest, a spread of 18.1 percentage points.
Reliability over time
July 2023 – July 2026
- July 2023: 77.7% from 940 flights
- August 2023: 77.8% from 993 flights
- September 2023: 76.6% from 999 flights
- October 2023: 77.0% from 1,009 flights
- November 2023: 84.6% from 976 flights
- December 2023: 77.4% from 882 flights
- January 2024: 67.0% from 858 flights
- February 2024: 54.5% from 821 flights
- March 2024: 48.1% from 938 flights
- April 2024: 52.1% from 1,001 flights
- May 2024: 56.6% from 1,004 flights
- June 2024: 67.3% from 860 flights
- July 2024: 82.1% from 942 flights
- August 2024: 77.2% from 1,005 flights
- September 2024: 76.7% from 1,016 flights
- October 2024: 76.0% from 1,062 flights
- November 2024: 71.5% from 1,045 flights
- December 2024: 73.0% from 974 flights
- January 2025: 84.5% from 852 flights
- February 2025: 71.2% from 819 flights
- March 2025: 74.8% from 915 flights
- April 2025: 81.1% from 918 flights
- May 2025: 79.6% from 961 flights
- June 2025: 79.5% from 898 flights
- July 2025: 71.4% from 896 flights
- August 2025: 75.5% from 930 flights
- September 2025: 70.0% from 916 flights
- October 2025: 64.9% from 990 flights
- November 2025: 63.8% from 903 flights
- December 2025: 65.4% from 842 flights
- January 2026: 81.9% from 772 flights
- February 2026: 70.2% from 742 flights
- March 2026: 85.2% from 927 flights
- April 2026: 48.6% from 988 flights
- May 2026: 44.1% from 1,028 flights
- June 2026: 46.8% from 1,079 flights
- July 2026: 44.5% from 1,118 flights
Over the most recent 12 months (2025-08 to 2026-07), on-time arrivals averaged 62.2% against 76.3% in the 12 months before — declining by 14.1 percentage points.
Data and methodology
Calculated by FlyerIntel from 34,819 LAX → SFO flight records from the US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics, covering July 2023 – July 2026. Late means 15 or more minutes past scheduled arrival; cancelled and diverted flights are left out of on-time rates.
Full methodology · Data sources · Report a problem
Related research: How Long a Layover Needs to Be · Two Airlines on One Route · Best Time of Day to Fly From Major US Airports
Analysis last recomputed