Carrier performance at one airport
DL→PBI
Delta Air Lines at Palm Beach International
- Departures
- 7,257
- Period
- June 2025 to May 2026
- Routes
- 6
- Rank here
- #3 of 8
Delta Air Lines at West Palm Beach lands a B, about a point worse than the national rate of 77.4%. About one flight in four arrive 15 minutes late or worse, and those flights are late by a little over an hour on average. That is a workable record, not a spotless one. That rests on 7,257 flights, of which Southwest Airlines flew 2,831 at 77.6% on time.
Measured against the airport rather than the country, Delta Air Lines runs 2 points ahead of the 74.1% weighted average across all carriers at PBI. That is the comparison worth making: every operator here works the same runways, the same airspace and the same weather.
Key figures
On time
76.2%
7,051 completed departures
Avg delay
74 min
Across delayed flights only
Cancelled
2.60%
At PBI, this carrier only
Rank here
#3
Of 8 carriers clearing the floor at PBI
These figures cover 7,257 flights between June 2025 and May 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 9.2% of arrivals land a full hour or more behind schedule. That is the number that wrecks a connection, and it is not visible in an on-time percentage alone.
Against the competition
Every carrier at PBI, ranked
The choice of carrier is not cosmetic here. Southwest Airlines arrives on time 77.6% of the time; Frontier Airlines manages 52.3%. Sample sizes sit next to every figure, because a two-point gap across 480 flights means less than a ten-point one.
| Airline | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Southwest Airlines | 2,831 | 77.6% | 62 min | 0.95% | B+ |
| United Airlines | 4,201 | 76.6% | 94 min | 1.83% | B |
| Delta Air Lines (this page) | 7,257 | 76.2% | 74 min | 2.60% | B |
| American Airlines | 6,479 | 75.2% | 98 min | 2.35% | B |
| Spirit Airlines | 491 | 73.1% | 67 min | 6.72% | C− |
| JetBlue Airways | 8,865 | 70.7% | 78 min | 3.00% | C |
| Allegiant Air | 450 | 70.2% | 72 min | 0.67% | C+ |
| Frontier Airlines | 480 | 52.3% | 101 min | 3.12% | F− |
Spirit Airlines cancels 6.7% 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 PBI
Delta Air Lines operates 6 routes out of PBI 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| PBI to ATL · Atlanta | 3,760 | 82.8% | 64 min | 1.54% | B |
| PBI to LGA · New York | 1,553 | 70.8% | 66 min | 4.44% | C− |
| PBI to JFK · New York | 729 | 64.9% | 103 min | 4.80% | D− |
| PBI to BOS · Boston | 613 | 66.3% | 90 min | 3.10% | C− |
| PBI to DTW · Detroit | 475 | 74.3% | 75 min | 1.26% | C |
| PBI to MSP · Minneapolisthin sample | 127 | 64.8% | 74 min | 1.57% | D |
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 35 points, against 25 points between the best and worst carrier. Each bar is the on-time rate for flights scheduled inside that window.
- 5am–8am1,082 flights93.2%
- 8am–11am925 flights90.0%
- 11am–2pm1,997 flights78.4%
- 2pm–5pm1,258 flights67.4%
- 5pm–8pm1,260 flights67.2%
- 8pm–5am735 flights57.9%
Scale runs 50% to 100%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
The 8pm–5am window is where this operation falls apart: 57.9% on time, against 93.2% for the 5am–8am slot. By evening the aircraft flying these rotations have absorbed a full day of small delays and there is no slack left to recover in.
Across the year
Seasonal pattern
June is the worst month at 65.7% on time, 19 points below September, the best at 84.3%. 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
- 46%Late-arriving aircraft
- 29%Carrier
- 21%National Airspace System
- 4%Extreme weather
- 0%Security
46% 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 125,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 12 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 run at 2.60%, against 1.80% nationally. That is about one flight in 40 cancelled outright. A cancelled flight is invisible in every on-time figure on this page, so the punctuality numbers above describe only the flights that actually operated.
For anyone connecting, the number to weigh is not the on-time rate but the tail behind it. 9.2% of arrivals land a full hour or more behind schedule, against 8.2% nationally. A 45-minute layover does not survive that, and no amount of walking quickly changes it. Ninety minutes is the honest minimum here, and two hours if the onward flight is on a separate ticket.
The sample behind these figures is 7,257 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 84.3% on time and June 65.7%, a swing of 19 points. If the dates move at all, move them out of June before you think about anything else.
Common questions
Delta Air Lines at PBI
How often is Delta Air Lines at PBI delayed?
About one flight in four arrive at least 15 minutes late, which is the Department of Transportation's definition of a delayed arrival. That works out to 23.8% of the 7,257 flights in this analysis, against 22.6% nationally. Delayed flights are late by a little over an hour on average.
Which airline is most reliable on Delta Air Lines at PBI?
Southwest Airlines leads at 77.6% on time across 2,831 flights. Frontier Airlines is at the other end on 52.3%, a gap of 25 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 PBI?
The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 93.2% on time. The 8pm–5am window is the weakest at 57.9%, 35 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 PBI?
June is the weakest month at 65.7% on time, compared with 84.3% in September. Across the year that is 19 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.