Carrier performance at one airport
DL→IAH
Delta Air Lines at George Bush Intercontinental
- Departures
- 8,344
- Period
- June 2025 to May 2026
- Routes
- 7
- Rank here
- #1 of 10
Delta Air Lines at Houston lands a B, 3 points better than the national rate of 77.4%. About one flight in five arrive 15 minutes late or worse, and those flights are late by an hour and a half on average. That is a workable record, not a spotless one. That rests on 8,344 flights, of which Delta Air Lines flew 8,344 at 80.3% on time.
Measured against the airport rather than the country, Delta Air Lines runs 2 points ahead of the 78.0% weighted average across all carriers at IAH. That is the comparison worth making: every operator here works the same runways, the same airspace and the same weather.
Key figures
On time
80.3%
8,158 completed departures
Avg delay
86 min
Across delayed flights only
Cancelled
1.89%
At IAH, this carrier only
Rank here
#1
Of 10 carriers clearing the floor at IAH
These figures cover 8,344 flights between June 2025 and May 2026. The median arrival is 8 minutes early, which is the part an average hides: most flights here are fine, and the on-time rate is decided by a tail of badly late ones. On-time means under 15 minutes late, the DOT's own threshold.
Against the competition
Every carrier at IAH, ranked
The choice of carrier is not cosmetic here. Delta Air Lines arrives on time 80.3% of the time; JetBlue Airways manages 60.3%. Sample sizes sit next to every figure, because a two-point gap across 493 flights means less than a ten-point one.
| Airline | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Delta Air Lines (this page) | 8,344 | 80.3% | 86 min | 1.89% | B |
| United Airlines | 73,829 | 79.3% | 67 min | 0.80% | B+ |
| Alaska Airlines | 1,208 | 77.2% | 56 min | 1.16% | B |
| American Airlines | 7,653 | 76.8% | 132 min | 2.61% | B |
| SkyWest Airlines | 14,441 | 76.2% | 94 min | 1.45% | B |
| Envoy Air | 1,489 | 76.1% | 80 min | 2.42% | B |
| Republic Airways | 874 | 74.2% | 74 min | 3.89% | C− |
| Spirit Airlines | 6,056 | 74.0% | 74 min | 2.77% | C |
| Frontier Airlines | 4,514 | 69.1% | 89 min | 1.71% | C |
| JetBlue Airways | 493 | 60.3% | 80 min | 2.23% | D |
Republic Airways cancels 3.9% of what it schedules here, the highest in the table. A cancelled flight never appears in an on-time rate, so read that column alongside the punctuality one rather than after it.
Route by route
Where Delta Air Lines flies from IAH
Delta Air Lines operates 7 routes out of IAH with enough volume to report. Route records inside one carrier at one airport still spread widely, because a short shuttle and a transcontinental have very different exposure to a late inbound.
| Route | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| IAH to ATL · Atlanta | 2,491 | 79.9% | 75 min | 2.29% | B |
| IAH to LGA · New York | 1,338 | 76.1% | 94 min | 3.96% | B− |
| IAH to DTW · Detroit | 1,321 | 82.3% | 86 min | 0.91% | B+ |
| IAH to MSP · Minneapolis | 1,273 | 78.1% | 94 min | 1.10% | B |
| IAH to SLC · Salt Lake City | 1,011 | 82.2% | 89 min | 0.30% | B+ |
| IAH to LAX · Los Angeles | 646 | 88.1% | 89 min | 1.24% | A |
| IAH to JFK · New Yorkthin sample | 263 | 79.2% | 88 min | 4.18% | B− |
Departure window
Best time of day for this operation
Departure time matters more here than the choice of carrier. The gap between the best and worst window is 21 points, against 20 points between the best and worst carrier. Each bar is the on-time rate for flights scheduled inside that window.
- 5am–8am2,522 flights88.4%
- 8am–11am830 flights81.1%
- 11am–2pm1,624 flights80.7%
- 2pm–5pm1,712 flights76.3%
- 5pm–8pm1,594 flights71.4%
- 8pm–5am62 flights67.2%
Scale runs 60% to 95%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
Book the early departure. Flights leaving between 5am–8am arrive on time 88.4% of the time, against 67.2% for the overnight window. That is 21 points of difference for no extra money, and it comes from the same aircraft having had no earlier flight to fall behind on.
Across the year
Seasonal pattern
June is the worst month at 69.9% on time, 22 points below September, the best at 91.9%. Summer afternoon convection and peak-season schedules land on the same weeks every year, so this is a pattern you can book around rather than a run of bad luck.
Delay causes
What holds this operation up
- 43%Carrier
- 37%Late-arriving aircraft
- 16%National Airspace System
- 4%Extreme weather
- 0%Security
37% of delay minutes trace back to a late-arriving aircraft, meaning the plane was already behind before it got here. That is a cascade, and cascades start small and grow through the day. Across 138,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 9 to one. It is the strongest argument for booking the first departure of the morning, when the aircraft has been sitting at the gate overnight with nothing to inherit.
Cancellations sit at 1.89% against a national 1.80%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.34%.
7.9% of arrivals land an hour or more late, close to the national 8.2%. That is the figure that decides a connection, and it says a 60 to 75 minute layover is reasonable here while anything under 45 minutes is a bet. Most delays on this route are the an hour and a half kind, which a normal layover absorbs.
The sample behind these figures is 8,344 flights, enough that the headline rate is stable to within roughly a point. The hour-block and month splits divide that further, so read the thinner bars with more caution than the headline.
Put together: the calendar is the biggest lever here, not the carrier or the hour. September runs 91.9% on time and June 69.9%, a swing of 22 points. If the dates move at all, move them out of June before you think about anything else.
Common questions
Delta Air Lines at IAH
How often is Delta Air Lines at IAH delayed?
About one flight in five arrive at least 15 minutes late, which is the Department of Transportation's definition of a delayed arrival. That works out to 19.7% of the 8,344 flights in this analysis, against 22.6% nationally. Delayed flights are late by an hour and a half on average.
Which airline is most reliable on Delta Air Lines at IAH?
Delta Air Lines leads at 80.3% on time across 8,344 flights. JetBlue Airways is at the other end on 60.3%, a gap of 20 points. Sample size matters as much as the percentage: a rate built from a few hundred flights moves around far more than one built from ten thousand.
What time of day has the fewest delays on Delta Air Lines at IAH?
The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 88.4% on time. The 8pm–5am window is the weakest at 67.2%, 21 points behind. Later departures inherit delays from earlier flights the same aircraft has already flown, which is why the curve slopes the way it does.
How bad are June delays on Delta Air Lines at IAH?
June is the weakest month at 69.9% on time, compared with 91.9% in September. Across the year that is 22 points between the best and worst months. Moving flexible dates out of that month is one of the few things that reliably helps.
Related
Where to go next
Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics, on-time performance data, June 2025 to May 2026. Updated monthly. How this data is collected.