Planning a trip this year? What airline you choose to fly might have an impact on whether that vacation starts on time or if you’ll be stuck in an airport for hours on end.
Turns out that some airlines are better at being punctual than others, according to an annual report by Cirium measuring airline on-time performance around the globe in 2024. They used flight status and arrival data from 600 sources to calculate which airlines arrived at the gate within 15 minutes of the scheduled gate arrival. Here are the 10 airlines that had the highest percentage of on-time arrivals in North America last year.
1. Delta Air Lines
On-Time Arrivals: 83.46%
Delta took the top spot in the report for the impressive fourth year in a row. Sure, there’s always going to be unforeseen delays in a trip, but if you book on Delta, you have the best chance at being on time.
2. United Airlines
On-Time Arrivals: 80.93%
United had the second most on-time flights in 2024. At almost 81%, that’s pretty good odds that you’ll get to your destination (and back home!) when you’re supposed to.
3. Alaska Airlines
On-Time Arrivals: 79.25%
Many people might not be aware of Alaska Airlines, but it operates many routes throughout the U.S. and especially the western half of the continent. It has a pretty good on-time track record.
4. American Airlines
On-Time Arrivals: 77.78%
American Airlines is the largest airline on the list, with over 2.1 million flights tracked. Of those millions of flights, just under 78% were on time.
5. Southwest Airlines
On-Time Arrivals: 77.77%
Southwest is practically tied with American for the amount of punctual arrivals in 2024. It’s basically a toss up between the two for which airline would be better to book based on this criteria.
Trending on Cheapism
6. Spirit Airlines
On-Time Arrivals: 76.05%
Low cost carrier Spirit gets a lot of flack, and the airline even filed for bankruptcy late last year. Though its on-time percentage isn’t terrible, it’s still anyone’s guess as to whether they’ll still be around in a year.
7. JetBlue
On-Time Arrivals: 74.53%
JetBlue flights were delayed just under three quarters of the time in 2024. That’s bad enough that the Department of Transportation just fined the airline $2 million for chronically late flights and “unrealistic scheduling.” Yikes.
8. Frontier Airlines
On-Time Arrivals: 71.57%
Frontier has a not-so-great reputation, so it’s probably not surprising to anyone that the low-cost carrier is 8th on this list. They’ll nickel and dime you for everything, and then get you there late on top of it.
Sign up for our newsletter
9. Air Canada
On-Time Arrivals: 71.36%
The largest airline of our neighbor to the north has a pretty terrible track record when it comes to being on time. Maybe consider flying a different airline if you plan to head to Montreal for your vacay.
10. WestJet
On-Time Arrivals: 70.99%
WestJet, the smallest carrier on the list with only 192,000 flights tracked last year, takes the bottom spot on the report’s list. Only about 71% of its flights arrive on time, which doesn’t inspire much confidence in booking.
For more travel news, sign up for our newsletters.
