How To Check American Airlines Flight Status
Finding out just what is going on with a particular flight can make you better equipped to survive the disruption that has plagued the airline industry over the past couple of years. If you’re booked to fly, it’s always worth checking that your flight hasn’t been delayed or canceled before heading off to the airport – it happens more often than you think.
Across the first half of 2022, ValuePenguin assessed that more than one in five domestic US flights were delayed, and 20% of those were delayed by 15 minutes or more. That’s almost double the number that were delayed in 2020, at the apex of the pandemic disruption. Cancelations have been abundant too, with 3.2% completely cut from schedules from January to May, the highest number since 2014.
At American Airlines, the performance was better than some, but still not great. Over the first half of the year, the airline has had 18.7% of its flights delayed, 57% more than the year before. The bottom line is, while we’re in the recovery time after the pandemic, your flight is more likely than ever to suffer a disruption.
The same goes if you’re on the hook to pick up a friend or relative from the airport. Their published landing time could go way out of the window if something’s gone wrong that day, so if you want a more accurate assessment of what time to leave the house, check that American Airlines flight status.
Thankfully it’s easy to do so, with multiple options for finding out the status of any American Airlines flight. The first port of call is the airline’s website or app, as we’ll see below.
Using American Airlines flight status checker
To access American Airlines’ own flight status checker, head to aa.com/travelInformation/flights/status. This is the flight status-checking tool, and is relatively easy to use. If you have the flight number to hand, go ahead and enter it to be taken straight to the latest information on that service. If not, no worries, just as long as you know where the flight is going to and from.
You can search by airport code if you know it, or just start typing the name of the airport, and a list of options will drop down. If you’re unsure of the name of the airport but know the city it’s in, click the magnifying glass to search by airports in different countries and states.
Once the correct details are entered, hit search to see all the services flying that route today. American Airlines flight status tool will show you all the departures for that day, including services with a stop on the way, so it will help to know what time your flight is departing and whether it’s nonstop or not.
When you’ve found your flight, click through to the full details using the ‘check status’ link. Here you’ll see what time the flight is planned for, what time it’s expected to depart, and whether it’s on time or not. Other useful information here includes details of terminals and gates being used, as well as the aircraft type – always good to know!
Of course, you don’t want to sit on this page for hours to see if anything changes, so if the flight is not for a little while, click through to ‘get alerts for this flight’ to be notified when its status changes. You’ll be notified when it's ready to take off, when it departs, and when it arrives.
American Airlines flight status – delayed
If your flight is delayed, it will be pretty obvious as soon as you click through to check the status. Instead of the green ‘On Time’, the flight will have an orange ‘Delayed’ next to it. It’s not possible to get the reasons for the delay on this flight status checker, but you can at least see what time American Airlines anticipates the service taking off and landing.
Again, it would be worth signing up for alerts on this screen so that you can be notified if anything changes with the current plan for the flight.
American Airlines flight status – canceled
Like a delayed flight, American Airlines status checker prints the word ‘Canceled’ in big red letters, so it’s very clear that this is the situation. If you’re a ticket holder for that canceled service, hopefully the airline has already gotten in touch with you and made arrangements for a different flight or some other resolution.
The tracker won’t show you the reasons why a flight has been pulled, and unless you’re particularly friendly with someone on the inside at AA, you’ll probably never know.
What else is in this post?
Other options for checking AA flight status
There are various other trackers in the mix that can tell you various things about the flight you’re interested in, sometimes more information than AA’s own status tool, or at least information presented in a different way.
We particularly enjoy FlightStats as a tracking tool, for the ease of use and the attractive way it presents information. The search here is super intuitive – you can type in the flight number, the airline name, and route (e.g., AA JFK to DEN) or just the names of the departure and arrival cities.
The visual nature of the data the site shares is very easy to understand, and we like that it includes a map where you can see if the airplane is in flight, as well as details of the aircraft’s altitude, heading, and remaining flight time. FlightStats is powered by Cirium, one of the world’s foremost authorities on airline schedules, so you know it’s going to be good.
For real-time tracking, you can’t beat FlightRadar24. Searches can be done by flight number or by aircraft tail number from the homepage. Clicking through to more information on an individual flight or aircraft will give you more detail on recent flights, landing times, and scheduled flights in the future.
The other resource we really enjoy using is FlightAware, a similar service to FlightRadar, but with a few more bells and whistles. Flights are overlain with weather, so you can see at a glance if there is a storm brewing on your flight path.
Another feature on this site is the unique ‘Misery Map’ for the United States. Here, you can see at a glance which airports in the network are experiencing the most delays and cancelations – the more red in the circle, the more disruption is going on. This is a good way to check out if there are issues with bad weather, understaffing or other problems that could lead to a delayed or canceled flight.
Hopefully, these tips will help you stay more informed on your American Airlines flight status next time you or a loved one is traveling.