Alaska Airlines Has Taken Over Delta In This Key Travel Category

Whether one is starting out a busy travel itinerary of plane-train-hotel or just coming home from a long trip, the airline's punctuality is an integral part of traveler satisfaction with the flying experience.

Each month, aviation analytics company Cirium releases a report of airline delays and cancelations. As the country's second-largest airline by customers served and the one most connected to a luxury image, Delta Air Lines  (DAL) generally fares pretty well. 

In June 2024, its flights arrived on time 80.05% of the time while Delta was the only U.S. airline to make the top 10 of the world’s timeliest — the spot at the top belonged to Saudi Arabia's Saudia.

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When looking solely at U.S.-based airlines, Alaska Airlines  (ALK)  earned the top spot in June with 77.79% on-time arrivals.

Airlines slipped on punctuality in July but Delta dropped the most 

By the end of July, the tables had reversed and Delta slid to second place with a 72.36% on-time arrival rate. United Airlines  (UAL)  landed in second for U.S. airlines with 73.12% while Alaska scored top place at 77.51%.

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The lower numbers for airlines as a whole has to do with the CrowdStrike outage that sent aviation's Microsoft software into the “blue screen of death” on July 19 and resulted in days of chaos at the world's airports.

But while other airlines have sorted out the chaos within a few days after flights were able to resume, Delta spent weeks struggling to restart service. Microsoft later claimed that Delta rejected its offers to help amid the prolonged outages.

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Airlines struggled: 'Rearranging the leadership in July'

"The outage had varied impact across the region but undoubtedly caused declines in the on-time performance scores for most airlines and airports in the region while rearranging the leaderboard in July," Cirium wrote of the results.

On a global scale, Saudia once again took home the crown with a 88.15% score. Brazil-based  (AZUL)  earned second place with 85.2% while Chile-based LATAM Airlines  (LTMAQ)  landed in third place with 84.65% — something airlines are generally quick to announce with celebratory press releases. The industry standard for an on-time arrival is landing within 15 minutes of the scheduled time. 

North American airlines took the biggest hit to their rates overall and so, according to the Cirium report, July's numbers are not necessarily indicative of which airline is most likely to be on time as a whole and during a more predictable time. When analyzing the numbers for 2023, Cirium awarded Delta the Platinum Award for the best on-time performance.

"In July, North America saw the highest number of flight cancelations among all regions, with a staggering 98% increase," the Cirium report reads further. "A total of 23,393 canceled flights were recorded, compared to 11,806 in June."

When it comes to flight cancelations, Southwest Airlines  (LUV)  fared the best with a completion factor of 99.43% while Alaska was just a few decimal points behind at 99.40%. Delta was at 94.72%. In the month since the meltdown, Delta stock has slipped by 16% to $38.92 although it is down only 4% since the start of 2024. 

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