ORD → PHX Flight Reliability

Right now

Origin · ORDNo disruption reported

Aviation weather is not currently a factor.

Updated 07:51 UTC

Chicago airport profile →

Destination · PHXNo disruption reported

Aviation weather is not currently a factor.

Updated 07:51 UTC

Phoenix airport profile →

Route reliability

July 2023 – July 2026

Route Reliability Score

63/ 100Good

Better than 42% of comparable major US routes (4,598 compared)

Calculated from 17,873 flights. How this is calculated

On-time arrivals

77.8%

13,721 of 17,638

Cancellation rate

1.07%

191 cancelled

Median arrival delay

-6 min

Average 8.1 min

Severe delays

8.1%

60+ minutes late

Delay when late

78 min

Average, when 15+ min late

Flights analyzed

17,873

4 carriers

ORD → PHX arrives on time 77.8% of the time; the return trip, PHX → ORD, arrives on time 79.9% of the time, a 2.1-point gap between the two directions of the same city pair.

ORD → PHX spends 29.0 minutes on the ground on a 1,440-mile trip: 22.6 minutes from pushback to wheels-up at ORD and 6.4 minutes from touchdown to gate at PHX.

Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics · Data covering July 2023 – July 2026

Why ORD → PHX flights are cancelled

July 2023 – July 2026

ORD → PHX cancelled 191 of 17,873 scheduled flights — about 1 in every 94. The reason filed most often was extreme weather, 66.5% of the cancellations coded on this route — about 1 in every 141 scheduled flights.

Share of cancellations

Weather66.5%

Airline26.2%

Air traffic7.3%

Security0.0%

Of 191 cancelled departures carrying a reason code.

What each reason means

Extreme weather1 in 141

Conditions the carrier judged severe enough to stop the flight: a blizzard, a hurricane, a line of thunderstorms.

127 cancellations, 66.5% of the total.

The airline1 in 357

Crew, maintenance, aircraft cleaning, baggage or fueling: what BTS counts as within the carrier’s own control.

50 cancellations, 26.2% of the total.

The air traffic system1 in 1,277

Airport capacity, air traffic control flow programs, heavy traffic and ordinary bad weather. A system decision, not the airline’s.

14 cancellations, 7.3% of the total.

Security—

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.

191 coded cancellations were recorded on ORD → PHX; the section appears from 50.

When it goes wrong

July 2023 – July 2026

One arrival in ten is worse than

48 min late

against a median of 6 min early

Arrived an hour or more late8.1%

Typical delay when late78 min

Cancelled1.07%

Landed somewhere else0.25%

Percentiles over 17,873 operations; cancelled and diverted flights are counted separately.

Will your connection be tight enough?

Layovers at PHX after arriving from ORD.

Connection buffer and chance of missing by layover length, ORD → PHX arrivals
Connection time	Chance of missing	Reads as
30 min	37%	Likely to miss
45 min	21%	High risk
60 min	14%	Some risk
90 min	8.0%	Some risk
120 min	5.0%	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 1.07% of the time and diverts 0.25% of the time, which a late arrival never shows up in.

Chance of missing is the share of 17,638 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 48 minutes late (90th-percentile gate arrival delay), over 17,873 operations.

Any other layover length: connection checker.

Best time to fly

ORD → PHX flights departing 5–9 AM arrived on time 86.8% of the time, against 64.1% for 9 PM–5 AM departures, a gap of 22.7 percentage points.

By day and hour

On-time arrival rate for each weekday and scheduled departure hour, in local time at the departure airport (ORD).

Hour of departure matters more than day of the week: hourly averages sit a typical 8.2 points from the route-wide rate, weekday averages 2.1 points.

On-time arrival rate for ORD to PHX by weekday and scheduled departure hour, local time. Each button reads out one slot.
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

On-time rate, % · stronger color, fewer on time

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 9 PM (1,339 flights) are not drawn: no slot in those hours has enough flights to score.

View as tableHide table

On-time arrival rate (%) with flights beneath, by scheduled departure hour and weekday for ORD to PHX. A dash means fewer than 120 flights, which are not scored.
Hour	Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday	Saturday	Sunday
6 AM–7 AM	90.8% on time131 flights	118 flights, too few to score	90.1% on time121 flights	89.8% on time131 flights	93.6% on time125 flights	93.2% on time135 flights	81.9% on time138 flights
7 AM–8 AM	86.2% on time274 flights	83.4% on time253 flights	88.7% on time239 flights	87.5% on time266 flights	83.1% on time271 flights	87.2% on time283 flights	85.4% on time275 flights
8 AM–9 AM	89.7% on time146 flights	84.3% on time136 flights	83.3% on time145 flights	89.7% on time145 flights	76.2% on time148 flights	85.5% on time147 flights	82.0% on time141 flights
9 AM–10 AM	84.5% on time206 flights	85.9% on time199 flights	87.6% on time194 flights	86.0% on time208 flights	82.5% on time203 flights	82.5% on time186 flights	84.5% on time209 flights
10 AM–11 AM	110 flights, too few to score	111 flights, too few to score	108 flights, too few to score	107 flights, too few to score	107 flights, too few to score	82.9% on time130 flights	107 flights, too few to score
11 AM–12 PM	82.8% on time171 flights	82.6% on time167 flights	83.8% on time167 flights	74.7% on time162 flights	80.6% on time163 flights	81.5% on time189 flights	76.1% on time163 flights
12 PM–1 PM	106 flights, too few to score	86.6% on time128 flights	87.8% on time125 flights	109 flights, too few to score	102 flights, too few to score	78 flights, too few to score	92 flights, too few to score
1 PM–2 PM	83.8% on time278 flights	85.0% on time253 flights	80.3% on time256 flights	79.8% on time258 flights	78.8% on time270 flights	86.0% on time246 flights	82.4% on time273 flights
2 PM–3 PM	114 flights, too few to score	109 flights, too few to score	98 flights, too few to score	106 flights, too few to score	116 flights, too few to score	114 flights, too few to score	60.7% on time123 flights
3 PM–4 PM	69.9% on time136 flights	104 flights, too few to score	102 flights, too few to score	63.4% on time134 flights	75.9% on time134 flights	101 flights, too few to score	98 flights, too few to score
4 PM–5 PM	74.1% on time147 flights	81.3% on time158 flights	79.2% on time157 flights	76.8% on time153 flights	73.5% on time149 flights	76.7% on time164 flights	71.0% on time164 flights
5 PM–6 PM	67.6% on time182 flights	74.5% on time161 flights	67.8% on time174 flights	68.8% on time159 flights	69.0% on time178 flights	68.3% on time125 flights	65.4% on time156 flights
6 PM–7 PM	94 flights, too few to score	87 flights, too few to score	86 flights, too few to score	93 flights, too few to score	87 flights, too few to score	86 flights, too few to score	94 flights, too few to score
7 PM–8 PM	70.2% on time128 flights	72.8% on time127 flights	78.9% on time130 flights	68.0% on time127 flights	72.0% on time137 flights	77.0% on time137 flights	69.5% on time145 flights
8 PM–9 PM	63.9% on time212 flights	67.6% on time190 flights	61.7% on time199 flights	63.1% on time202 flights	56.9% on time221 flights	70.0% on time220 flights	66.7% on time207 flights

By departure window

5–9 AM86.8%

9 AM–12 PM81.3%

12–3 PM78.1%

3–6 PM72.3%

6–9 PM69.4%

9 PM–5 AM64.1%

By departure hour

12 AM

3 AM

6 AM

9 AM

12 PM

3 PM

6 PM

9 PM

Why ORD → PHX runs late

July 2023 – July 2026

Late-arriving aircraft47.3%

the inbound aircraft was late, so this flight started late

The airline33.5%

crew, maintenance, boarding and fueling, all within the carrier’s control

Air traffic control14.5%

airspace and airport capacity, including weather-driven flow control

Weather4.5%

weather severe enough to stop this flight specifically

Security0.2%

screening or terminal security incidents

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

Late-arriving aircraft is the largest cause on ORD → PHX, at 47.3%: flights here mostly leave late because the plane came in late, and the day shows it: 5–9 AM departures arrived on time 86.8% of the time and 9 PM–5 AM departures 64.1%.

How this route holds up in bad weather

July 2023 – July 2026

Bad weather raises cancellations by a similar amount at both ends of ORD to PHX: 5.5 times the normal rate at ORD and 3.9 times at PHX. Cancelled in bad weather against normal hours: ORD 6.5% against 1.2%, PHX 2.5% against 0.6%. Flights that did leave PHX in bad weather arrived on time 53.7% of the time, against 80.6% in normal hours.

Bad weather and normal hours at the airports

Scheduled departures, July 2023 – July 2026

Departures from ORD and PHX in hours of bad weather and in normal hours
Departures from	ORD	PHX
Cancelled in bad weather	6.5%	2.5%
Cancelled in normal hours	1.2%	0.6%
Arrived on time, bad weather	55.7%	53.7%
Arrived on time, normal hours	77.1%	80.6%
Departures in bad weather	104,455	6,215

United Airlines (3.5% cancelled against 7.4% for the other carriers at ORD) and American Airlines (5.4% cancelled against 6.7% for the other carriers at ORD) cancelled fewer departures from ORD in bad weather than the other carriers there did in the same months. None of the route’s other carriers was clearly worse.

This route’s airlines in bad weather at ORD

All departures from ORD

Cancellation rates in bad weather at ORD for the airlines that fly ORD to PHX, against the other carriers at ORD in the same months
Airline	Bad-weather departures	Cancelled	Other carriers
United Airlines	31,269	3.5%below the others	7.4%
Frontier Airlines	1,047	6.0%about level	7.5%
American Airlines	17,789	5.4%below the others	6.7%
Southwest Airlines	2,055	4.2%about level	5.1%

These are airport figures, not route figures: every scheduled departure from ORD and PHX, to any destination, in hours the weather report called bad. The airline rows count each carrier’s departures from ORD on every route.

Weather source and limits. In full: ORD (airlines), PHX, 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.

Airlines on this route
Carrier	Flights	On time	Cancelled	Median delay	Severe
American Airlines	9,127	76.7%	1.16%	-6 min	9.1%
United Airlines	6,004	82.7%	0.75%	-9 min	5.9%
Southwest Airlines	1,916	72.7%	0.99%	-1 min	8.0%
Frontier Airlines	712	67.0%	2.95%	0 min	13.8%

American Airlines flew 51.4% of the 17,759 flights listed. Frontier Airlines cancelled 2.95% of its flights here against 0.75% for United Airlines.

United Airlines arrived on time 15.7 percentage points more often than Frontier Airlines on this route.

Flights on this route

Flight numbers with at least 600 operations here and still on the schedule.

Flights on this route
Flight	Scheduled	Operations	On time
UA602 United Airlines	7:55 PM	863	73.9%
AA866 American Airlines	11:20 AM	733	75.0%

Weekly and seasonal patterns

By day of week

Mon77.0%

Tue80.4%

Wed79.6%

Thu76.8%

Fri75.6%

Sat80.5%

Sun75.0%

Saturday is historically the most reliable day and Sunday the least, a gap of 5.5 percentage points.

By month

Jan

Feb

Mar

Apr

May

Jun

Jul

Aug

Sep

Oct

Nov

Dec

June is historically the weakest month and February the strongest, a spread of 17.1 percentage points.

Reliability over time

July 2023 – July 2026

24

25

26

Over the most recent 12 months (2025-08 to 2026-07), on-time arrivals averaged 73.1% against 81.0% in the 12 months before — declining by 7.9 percentage points.

Data and methodology

Calculated by FlyerIntel from 17,873 ORD → PHX 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

Analysis last recomputed September 26, 2026

ORD airport PHX airport Return direction PHX → ORD

ORD→PHX

Right now

Route reliability

Why ORD → PHX flights are cancelled

Share of cancellations

What each reason means

When it goes wrong

Will your connection be tight enough?

Best time to fly

By day and hour

By departure window

By departure hour

Why ORD → PHX runs late

How this route holds up in bad weather

Bad weather and normal hours at the airports

This route’s airlines in bad weather at ORD

Airlines on this route

Flights on this route

Weekly and seasonal patterns

By day of week

By month

Reliability over time

Data and methodology