Flight Delay Statistics (2026 Data)

Seven in ten US flights arrive on time, and the hour on your boarding pass is one of the best predictors of whether yours will. In August 2026, 71.43%¹ of the 608,389¹ flights scheduled by the 12¹ reporting airlines reached the gate less than 15 minutes late, while flights booked to leave before 7am made it on time far more often than flights leaving in the evening.²

These flight delay statistics come from the official flight-by-flight records for August 2026, the latest month available, with full-year 2025 and the 2004-2025 record for context. They show how often flights are late, what delays them, how the odds change by hour, airline, airport and day, and what US rules give you when a flight goes wrong, with practical advice from an airline captain.

How often US flights are late

A US flight counts as on time when it arrives less than 15 minutes after its scheduled arrival time; cancelled and diverted flights are never on time.¹ That 15-minute line is how much delay in a flight is allowed before it shows up in the statistics as late. In August 2026, 71.43%¹ of scheduled flights met it, 26.24%¹ arrived 15 minutes or more late, 1.86%¹ were cancelled and 0.47%¹ were diverted to another airport.¹

In flights, that is 434,571¹ on time, 159,636¹ late, 11,313¹ cancelled and 2,869¹ diverted over the month's 31² days, or about 5,150² late arrivals and 365² cancellations a day among roughly 19,625² scheduled flights.² A flight that did arrive late was, on average, 78.2 minutes¹ behind schedule.¹

How late the late flights were

Most flights that operate are not late at all. Of the 594,207¹ flights that arrived in August 2026, 56.77%² landed before their scheduled time and another 16.36%² arrived up to 14 minutes late.² Lateness was concentrated in a long tail: 6.28%² of arriving flights were 1-2 hours late and 2.24%² were three hours or more late, the point at which US refund rules start to apply to domestic trips.²³

August 2026 against 2025

August 2026 was weaker than the year before. In the wider monthly series, which counts flights by marketing, operating and codeshare carrier (673,065⁴ flights in August 2026, against 608,389¹ in the flight-level file), 76.42%⁴ of scheduled flights arrived on time in full-year 2025 and 76.78%⁴ in August 2025, against 71.53%⁴ in August 2026.⁴ That series puts August 2026 0.10² points above the 71.43%¹ measured flight by flight for the 12 carriers above, so the two agree closely on the on-time rate.² Cancellations differ more between the two, but move the same way: 1.04%⁴ of flights in August 2025 and 2.00%⁴ in August 2026 on the wider series, against 1.86%¹ in the flight-level file.⁴

Across the first eight months of 2026, 74.66%⁴ of flights arrived on time and 2.27%⁴ were cancelled, against 75.69%⁴ and 1.63%⁴ in January-August 2025.⁴ The weakest month of 2026 so far was July, at 69.49%⁴, and the strongest April, at 79.18%⁴. Summer is usually the hardest season: in 2025, June and July were the only months below 71%⁴ on time.⁴

Cancellations moved more than on-time rates. January 2026 had the highest cancellation rate of the three years shown, 4.82%⁴, and August 2026, at 2.00%⁴, was almost twice August 2025's 1.04%⁴.⁴ August was also a high month in 2024, at 2.03%⁴, so a summer month with storms can cancel as many flights as a winter one.

Taken over the same eight months of each year, 2026 has the lowest on-time rate of the five years compared, 74.66%⁴, and the highest cancellation rate since 2022, when 2.96%⁴ of flights were cancelled.⁴ It also has the highest share of flights delayed by a late-arriving aircraft, 8.66%⁴, against 7.5%⁴ in 2019.

The long-run record

Over two decades the on-time rate has moved in a fairly narrow band, from a low of 73.42%⁴ in 2007 to a high of 84.5%⁴ in 2020, when traffic collapsed.⁴ Full-year 2025, at 76.42%⁴, was the lowest full year since 2014 (76.25%⁴). What has changed more is the length of a delay: a late flight arrived 51.4 minutes⁴ late on average in 2004 and 74.0 minutes⁴ late in 2025, and January-August 2026 reached 75.3 minutes⁴.⁴

The share of flights that are late has changed less than the length of each delay. Every year from 2021 to 2025 a delayed flight ran longer than the year before: 66.9⁴ minutes in 2021, 67.7⁴ in 2022, 69.7⁴ in 2023, 72.2⁴ in 2024 and 74.0⁴ in 2025.⁴

The average flight delay time

How long a delay lasts depends on which flights are averaged. The flights that arrived 15 minutes or more late in August 2026 ran up 12,470,559¹ minutes of delay between them, or 20.5 minutes² for every scheduled flight of the 12 reporting carriers once on-time, cancelled and diverted flights are counted in. The wider monthly series, which also counts codeshare flights, is a different count of flights: on it, August 2026 came to 20.7 minutes⁴ per scheduled flight and full-year 2025 to 16.1 minutes⁴.

The typical flight is not late at all. Among the 14⁵ large carriers in the 2025 flight-level data, the median flight arrived 6 minutes⁵ early, and with early arrivals counted as zero the average arrival delay was 17.3 minutes⁵. For a passenger on a flight that is already late, the average flight delay is well over an hour (78.2 minutes¹ in August 2026), several times the average across all flights.

The average number of flight delays per day

In 2025, 4,617⁴ flights a day arrived 15 minutes or more late, out of 21,197⁴ scheduled to arrive each day, more than in 2019 (4,185⁴). Average flight cancellations per day came to 324⁴ in 2025, up from 281⁴ in 2024, and 58⁴ flights a day were diverted. In January-August 2026 the daily averages rose again, to 4,890⁴ delays and 489⁴ cancellations. Part of the long-run rise comes from the wider group of carriers counted since 2018: scheduled flights per day jump from 15,547⁴ in 2017 to 21,503⁴ in 2018, so daily counts before and after 2018 do not compare directly, while shares such as the on-time rate do.

Diversions are rare but rising. A flight is diverted when it lands somewhere other than its planned destination. The diversion rate was 0.19%⁴ of scheduled flights in 2004 and 0.27%⁴ in 2025, the highest full year in the series, and January-August 2026 reached 0.33%⁴, or 72⁴ diversions a day.

Airports and states

Where you leave from matters too. Among the 30² airports with the most scheduled departures in August 2026, Houston Intercontinental had the best on-time rate for departing flights, 79.04%¹, just ahead of Minneapolis-St. Paul at 78.69%¹.¹ At the other end, New York JFK departures arrived on time 60.09%¹ of the time, Washington Reagan National 62.57%¹ and Chicago O'Hare, the busiest airport of the month with 33,187¹ departures, 62.86%¹.¹

Cancellations were concentrated in the Northeast: 7.11%¹ of departures from Washington Reagan National were cancelled, 6.60%¹ at New York JFK and 6.55%¹ at New York LaGuardia, against 0.33%¹ at Dallas Love Field and 0.34%¹ at Salt Lake City.¹ Newark had the longest average delay of the 30, 99.8 minutes¹ for a late flight.

Late-arriving aircraft weighed most at San Diego, where they delayed 17.98%¹ of departures, Chicago Midway (15.49%¹) and Chicago O'Hare (13.95%¹), against 4.36%¹ at Minneapolis-St. Paul.¹ Aviation-system delays were highest at San Francisco, 13.21%¹ of departures, and New York JFK, 12.47%¹. Average flight delays by airport, counting only the flights that were late, ran from 51.9 minutes¹ at Dallas Love Field and 54.6¹ at Seattle-Tacoma to 94.5¹ at New York LaGuardia, second only to Newark.

Average flight delay at New York airports

Over a full year the New York airports stand out for long delays. In 2025 a delayed arrival at New York JFK ran 84.5 minutes⁴ late and one at LaGuardia 81.6 minutes⁴; in January-August 2026 the figures were 85.7⁴ and 82.5⁴ minutes, and cancellations rose to 5.35%⁴ of scheduled arrivals at JFK and 6.37%⁴ at LaGuardia.

Average flight delay times at Newark airport

A delayed arrival at Newark ran 93.2 minutes⁴ late in 2025, up from 82.4⁴ in 2024, and the share of Newark arrivals on time fell from 76.20%⁴ to 70.00%⁴. January-August 2026 was better: 75.08%⁴ on time and 87.3 minutes⁴ for a delayed arrival. The worst year in the series was 2007, when only 59.45%⁴ of Newark arrivals and 58.5%⁴ of LaGuardia arrivals were on time.

SFO flight delays and the average delay for arrivals

In 2025, 75.05%⁴ of flights scheduled to arrive at San Francisco were on time, and a delayed arrival ran 66.8 minutes⁴ late, shorter than at the New York airports. The airport swings widely from year to year: 68.89%⁴ of arrivals were on time in 2024 and 61.72%⁴ in January-August 2026, the lowest of the four airports in the chart, with delayed arrivals 65.1 minutes⁴ late.

Grouping airports by state gives a wider view. Every state except Delaware, which had no departures by the reporting carriers in August 2026, is shaded on the map below; Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands are left out of the map.¹

By state, departures from Alaska (82.29%¹) and Hawaii (80.33%¹) were among the most punctual, while Illinois (63.61%¹) and New York (63.94%¹) were the lowest of the large states.¹ California, the state with the most departures, 65,727¹, had a cancellation rate of 0.74%¹.

What causes flight delays

Airlines report the cause of every flight that arrives 15 minutes or more late, in five categories. When a flight has several causes, it is split between them in proportion to the minutes of each.¹

• Late-arriving aircraft: the plane's previous flight arrived late, so this one left late.
• National Aviation System: air traffic control, airport operations, heavy traffic and non-extreme weather.
• Air carrier: within the airline's control, such as crew, maintenance, cleaning, baggage loading or fueling.
• Extreme weather: weather severe enough to stop or significantly delay the flight.
• Security: evacuations, re-boarding after a security breach or long screening lines.

In August 2026, a late-arriving aircraft delayed 10.08%¹ of all scheduled flights, more than any other cause. The aviation system accounted for 7.57%¹, the airlines' own operations for 7.47%¹, extreme weather for 1.06%¹ and security for 0.05%¹.¹ The most common cause of a delay is that the plane arriving to fly you was itself late.

Counted in minutes rather than flights, the chain effect is even larger. Late-arriving aircraft caused 41.32%² of all delay minutes in August 2026, the airlines' own operations 29.27%², the aviation system 23.30%² and extreme weather 5.97%².² Put another way, about 38.41%² of all late arrivals in the month were a delay carried over from an earlier flight.²

Cancellations have a different profile. Weather was the reason given for 46.62%² of the 11,313¹ cancellations in August 2026, the airlines' own reasons for 27.57%² and the aviation system for 25.81%²; none were recorded for security.²

The late-aircraft share has been rising for years. In full-year 2025, late-arriving aircraft delayed 7.96%⁴ of US flights, up from 5.9%⁴ in 2004, while aviation-system delays fell from 7.87%⁴ to 6.32%⁴ over the same period.⁴ Air carrier delays peaked at 7.61%⁴ in 2022.

The best time of day to fly

The chain effect shows up clearly across the day. Flights scheduled to leave before 7am arrived on time 89.4%² of the time in August 2026; flights scheduled between 5pm and 9pm managed only 57.4%², a gap of 32.0² points.² Hour by hour, the on-time rate fell from 90.12%¹ for departures before 6am to a low of 56.31%¹ in the 7pm hour, then recovered late at night, to 73.18%¹ in the 11pm hour, as traffic thinned.¹

The share of flights delayed by a late-arriving aircraft moved the other way. It was 0.58%¹ in the 6am hour, when most planes start the day at the gate, and climbed through the day to 21.29%¹ in the 8pm hour, when one flight in five was late because of an earlier flight.¹ Book the first flight out.

The other causes peak at different times. Aviation-system delays, which include afternoon thunderstorms and congestion, were highest in the 4pm hour, at 11.93%¹, and fell back to 3.03%¹ in the 11pm hour.¹ Air carrier delays rose more gently through the day, while extreme weather stayed at 2.21%¹ or less in every hour.

Cancellations follow the same clock. Evening departures between 5pm and 9pm were cancelled 3.21%² of the time, about 2.02² times the 1.59%² of flights leaving before 7am.² The cancellation rate was lowest in the 10am hour, 0.94%¹, and highest in the 10pm hour, 3.69%¹.¹

Time of day at the busiest airports

The morning advantage held at every one of the 15² busiest airports. At Denver, flights leaving before 7am arrived on time 91.30%¹ of the time, against 43.07%¹ for departures between 5pm and 9pm; at Orlando the rates were 91.33%¹ and 45.97%¹.¹ The gap was smallest at Minneapolis-St. Paul, 90.85%¹ against 72.79%¹.

Day of the week and day of the month

In August 2026, Tuesday departures were the most punctual, at 79.05%¹ on time, and Sunday the least, at 66.98%¹.¹ A single month mixes weekdays with weather, though: August had five Saturdays, Sundays and Mondays and four of every other day, so one stormy day moves a weekday's figure a long way.² Day by day, the on-time rate ran from 60.35%¹ on August 6 to 90.34%¹ on August 25, and the most cancellations came on August 7, when 1,421¹ flights, 6.91%¹ of the day's schedule, were cancelled.¹

Single days varied far more than weekdays. The weakest stretch came early in the month: nine of the first eleven days were below 70%¹ on time, while August 18, 19 and 25 were all above 87%¹.¹

Cancellations clustered on the same bad days. The ten days with the most cancellations accounted for 7,936² of the month's 11,313¹ cancelled flights, 70.15%² of them.²

On-time rates by airline

Among the 12¹ reporting airlines in August 2026, Envoy Air had the highest on-time rate, 78.70%¹, followed by Delta at 77.30%¹; JetBlue had the lowest, 59.75%¹.¹ Cancellation rates ranged from 0.36%¹ at Allegiant to 8.48%¹ at PSA Airlines, with Republic (6.68%¹) and JetBlue (6.17%¹) also well above the national 1.86%¹.¹ Late-arriving aircraft was the largest delay cause at 8² of the 12 airlines, from 9.55%¹ of flights at Alaska to 15.05%¹ at Frontier. The aviation system led at United (12.16%¹) and Republic (8.62%¹), and the airline's own operations at SkyWest (9.83%¹) and Delta (7.28%¹).¹

Figures are by operating carrier. Flights operated by regional airlines (Envoy, SkyWest, Republic, PSA) are shown under those airlines, so Delta, United and American figures differ slightly from DOT's marketing-carrier rankings.¹

How late a late flight runs also differs by airline. A delayed Alaska Airlines flight arrived 52.5 minutes¹ late on average in August 2026 and a delayed Southwest flight 59.3¹ minutes, against 101.0¹ minutes at Allegiant and 104.3¹ at PSA Airlines.¹

Every airline was more punctual in the morning than in the evening. Delta's flights leaving before 7am arrived on time 91.11%¹ of the time and its 5pm-9pm departures 66.55%¹; American's ran 89.89%¹ and 55.19%¹, United's 90.71%¹ and 55.49%¹.¹

Two outcomes matter most for a refund: a cancellation or an arrival three hours or more late. In August 2026, 2.18%¹ of scheduled US flights arrived three hours or more late and 1.86%¹ were cancelled, 4.04%² in all.² By airline the combined share ranged from 2.09%² at Southwest and 2.36%² at Alaska to 9.67%² at JetBlue and 12.59%² at PSA Airlines.²³

Over a full year the picture includes the smaller regional airlines too. Average flight delays by airline in 2025 ran from 50.8 minutes⁴ for a delayed Horizon Air flight to 104.0 minutes⁴ for a delayed GoJet flight. Among the four largest airlines, Southwest's delays were the shortest, 57.0 minutes⁴, and American's the longest, 83.3 minutes⁴, with Delta at 73.3 minutes⁴. Hawaiian had the best on-time rate of the year, 81.95%⁴, and PSA the lowest, 68.98%⁴.

Southwest Airlines and the time-of-day effect

Southwest, the airline with the most scheduled flights in August 2026, 116,362¹, arrived on time 69.13%¹ of the time, against 71.43%¹ for all carriers.¹ Its flights show the time-of-day pattern more strongly than the average: departures before 7am arrived on time 93.7%² of the time and departures between 5pm and 9pm 49.8%². In the same month, Southwest cancelled 0.81%¹ of its flights, against 1.86%¹ nationally.²¹ Among the 12 airlines, only Allegiant cancelled a smaller share, 0.36%¹.¹

Late-arriving aircraft delayed 14.06%¹ of Southwest flights over the month, compared with 10.08%¹ for all carriers, and the share rose from 0.02%¹ in the 6am hour to 32.39%¹ in the 8pm hour.¹

Average flight delays by route

Some routes run late far more often than others. Among the 524⁵ routes flown at least 3,000 times in 2025 by the 14 large carriers in the flight-level data, Dallas/Fort Worth to San Diego had the lowest on-time rate, 61.56%⁵, and five of the ten least punctual routes started at Dallas/Fort Worth. Atlanta to Newark and Chicago O'Hare to Newark both averaged 31.4 minutes⁵ of delay per arriving flight, with early arrivals counted as zero.

The most punctual routes are short hops in Hawaii and California. Honolulu to Hilo arrived on time 89.41%⁵ of the time and Los Angeles to Salt Lake City 89.29%⁵. The average flight delay from LAX to SFO was 58.3 minutes⁵ per delayed flight in 2025, on 10,840⁵ scheduled flights; counting every arriving flight it was 16.5 minutes⁵, and 73.12%⁵ arrived on time. The return, San Francisco to Los Angeles, did better at 78.19%⁵.

Average flight delays by flight number

Single flight numbers show the trips with the worst records. Of the 5,773⁵ flight numbers that flew the same route at least 250 times in 2025, Frontier 3216 from Los Angeles to Atlanta was the least punctual: 38.61%⁵ of its flights arrived on time, and its average arrival delay, with early arrivals counted as zero, was 46.0 minutes⁵. Seven of the 15 least punctual flight numbers flew into Newark, LaGuardia or JFK.

How US flight delays compare with Europe and the UK

Europe measures punctuality with almost the same 15-minute line, but as a share of flights operated, so the US rate is put on the same basis here, with cancelled and diverted flights left out; delay minutes are counted differently and are not compared. In 2024, 72.4%⁶ of European flights arrived within 15 minutes of schedule, against 79.38%² of operated US flights, and Europe has trailed the US every year since 2022, when its arrival punctuality fell to 64.5%⁷. Delays added an average of 17.5 minutes⁶ to every European departure in 2024, and knock-on delays from earlier flights made up 46%⁶ of the delay minutes, the same pattern as late-arriving aircraft in the US.

In the UK, the ten busiest airports ranged in 2025 from 77.3%¹² of flights on time at Glasgow to 64.5%¹² at Manchester, where the average delay was 19.8 minutes¹². Heathrow, the busiest, ran 76.7%¹² on time. UK figures count arrivals and departures together, so they are a guide rather than a like-for-like match with the US rates.

What you can do

The numbers point to one practical step: fly early. The pattern by hour is the pattern a pilot sees from the flight deck.

Capt. Helen Askew, airline captain and TSB Senior Author, Aviation, puts it this way: "An airplane does not have one flight a day, it has five or six, and every one is waiting for the one before. If the first leg leaves twenty minutes late, the turnaround cannot give the time back, and by the evening that small delay has been passed down the line to people who were never near the first problem. So my advice is simple: take the first flight of the day, because the airplane is already at the gate overnight and nothing has gone wrong yet."

How late a late flight runs matters most when you have a connection to make. Among flights leaving before 7am in August 2026, 4.18%¹ arrived 45 minutes or more late and 2.44%¹ 90 minutes or more late; among flights leaving between 5pm and 9pm the shares were 22.69%¹ and 11.45%¹.¹ Arrivals three hours or more late rose from 1.23%¹ to 3.44%¹ of flights over the same hours, and in the morning the late arrivals were also shorter.

Connections are where a late evening hurts most, because a delay on the first flight can cost the second one. Capt. Helen Askew, airline captain and TSB Senior Author, Aviation, adds: "If you must connect, give yourself at least ninety minutes, not the forty-five the website lets you book. Late in the day there is also less room to fix things, crews reach their legal duty limits and the last flight out is often already full, so a missed connection at seven in the evening can easily become a hotel night."

So how often is a flight on time? For a morning departure, roughly nine times in ten; for an evening one, closer to six in ten.² Where you have a choice, pick the airline and airport with the better record for your time of day from the tables above, and check the airline's own commitments for meals and hotels before you fly.¹³ As for how much you get for a delayed flight in cash under US law: nothing; the refunds set out below are the remedy.³

What you're owed when your flight is late (US)

• If your flight is cancelled, or a domestic flight's arrival moves 3 or more hours later (6 or more for international), and you choose not to travel, the airline must refund your fare, taxes and fees automatically: within 7 business days for credit card payments, 20 days otherwise.³ This is a refund, not compensation; US law has no cash compensation for delays.³
• Meals and hotels are not required by federal law. They depend on each airline's own customer-service commitments for delays within its control, listed on DOT's Airline Cancellation and Delay Dashboard.¹³
• A DOT rule published on 3 September 2026 will treat ten causes, including unscheduled maintenance and cyberattacks, as outside airline control for reporting. DOT expects it to reduce the meals, hotels and compensation airlines provide. It now takes effect on 1 February 2027 and is being challenged in court by the passenger group FlyersRights.¹⁴¹⁵¹⁶

Conclusions

1. Seven in ten flights are on time. In August 2026, 71.43% of scheduled US flights arrived less than 15 minutes late and 1.86% were cancelled.¹
2. Delays travel down the day. A late-arriving aircraft delayed 10.08% of flights, the largest single cause, and caused 41.32% of delay minutes.¹²
3. The first flight is the surest bet. Departures before 7am arrived on time 89.4% of the time and were cancelled 1.59% of the time, against 57.4% and 3.21% for 5pm-9pm departures.²
4. 2026 is running behind 2025. August 2026 was 71.53% on time on the monthly series, against 76.78% in August 2025 and 76.42% in full-year 2025.⁴
5. A refund is the only federal remedy. A cancellation or a 3-hour domestic delay (6 hours international) gives an automatic refund if you don't fly; meals and hotels depend on the airline.³¹³