Carrier performance at one airport
OO→DEN
SkyWest Airlines at Denver International
- Departures
- 75,448
- Period
- June 2025 to May 2026
- Routes
- 25
- Rank here
- #2 of 9
SkyWest Airlines at Denver lands a B, 2 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 a little over an hour on average. That is a workable record, not a spotless one. That rests on 75,448 flights, of which Delta Air Lines flew 11,605 at 82.4% on time.
Measured against the airport rather than the country, SkyWest Airlines runs 3 points ahead of the 76.0% weighted average across all carriers at DEN. That is the comparison worth making: every operator here works the same runways, the same airspace and the same weather.
Key figures
On time
79.4%
74,203 completed departures
Avg delay
79 min
Across delayed flights only
Cancelled
1.19%
At DEN, this carrier only
Rank here
#2
Of 9 carriers clearing the floor at DEN
These figures cover 75,000 flights between June 2025 and May 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 8.1% 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 DEN, ranked
The choice of carrier is not cosmetic here. Delta Air Lines arrives on time 82.4% of the time; Allegiant Air manages 65.1%. Sample sizes sit next to every figure, because a two-point gap across 413 flights means less than a ten-point one.
| Airline | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Delta Air Lines | 11,605 | 82.4% | 79 min | 1.36% | B |
| SkyWest Airlines (this page) | 75,448 | 79.4% | 79 min | 1.19% | B |
| United Airlines | 106,792 | 78.2% | 65 min | 0.48% | B+ |
| Frontier Airlines | 22,257 | 77.1% | 68 min | 0.76% | B+ |
| American Airlines | 8,855 | 76.6% | 104 min | 2.03% | B |
| Alaska Airlines | 2,642 | 74.3% | 58 min | 0.87% | C+ |
| Southwest Airlines | 89,073 | 69.6% | 55 min | 0.71% | C+ |
| JetBlue Airways | 1,242 | 69.0% | 91 min | 2.66% | C |
| Allegiant Air | 413 | 65.1% | 128 min | 1.45% | C |
The spread between Delta and Allegiant is 17 points, wide enough that it should decide the booking. On a hundred trips that is 17 more arrivals inside the on-time window.
Route by route
Where SkyWest Airlines flies from DEN
SkyWest Airlines operates 25 routes out of DEN 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| DEN to COS · Colorado Springs | 3,259 | 75.6% | 78 min | 2.06% | B |
| DEN to ASE · Aspen | 2,717 | 74.2% | 101 min | 5.15% | C− |
| DEN to CPR · Casper | 2,543 | 77.6% | 80 min | 1.10% | B |
| DEN to RAP · Rapid City | 2,170 | 78.0% | 74 min | 1.47% | B |
| DEN to LNK · Lincoln | 1,598 | 74.8% | 95 min | 0.94% | C+ |
| DEN to SAF · Santa Fe | 1,591 | 80.2% | 78 min | 1.13% | B |
| DEN to IDA · Idaho Falls | 1,570 | 78.5% | 69 min | 0.76% | B+ |
| DEN to BIS · Bismarck | 1,536 | 75.4% | 85 min | 0.98% | B+ |
| DEN to GJT · Grand Junction | 1,470 | 80.3% | 66 min | 1.97% | B |
| DEN to DRO · Durango | 1,465 | 81.8% | 77 min | 1.64% | B |
| DEN to SLC · Salt Lake City | 1,381 | 79.3% | 64 min | 0.87% | B+ |
| DEN to OKC · Oklahoma City | 1,323 | 81.3% | 68 min | 0.45% | B+ |
| DEN to FSD · Sioux Falls | 1,293 | 84.2% | 71 min | 1.16% | B |
| DEN to SGF · Springfield | 1,267 | 77.7% | 71 min | 0.79% | B+ |
| DEN to LAX · Los Angeles | 1,260 | 79.7% | 83 min | 0.79% | B+ |
| DEN to ICT · Wichita | 1,245 | 85.5% | 72 min | 0.80% | A+ |
| DEN to MAF · Midland | 1,199 | 78.0% | 80 min | 0.83% | B+ |
| DEN to MOT · Minot | 1,177 | 75.0% | 85 min | 1.10% | B |
| DEN to TUL · Tulsa | 1,109 | 85.1% | 70 min | 0.72% | A+ |
| DEN to SGU · St. George | 1,086 | 80.2% | 82 min | 0.28% | B+ |
| DEN to LIT · Little Rock | 1,078 | 79.0% | 85 min | 0.83% | B+ |
| DEN to BIL · Billings | 1,056 | 80.1% | 56 min | 1.33% | B |
| DEN to GUC · Gunnison | 994 | 81.2% | 96 min | 0.80% | B+ |
| DEN to DSM · Des Moines | 935 | 88.4% | 70 min | 1.07% | A |
| DEN to COD · Cody | 931 | 78.8% | 79 min | 1.29% | 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 19 points, against 17 points between the best and worst carrier. Each bar is the on-time rate for flights scheduled inside that window.
- 5am–8am2,601 flights88.4%
- 8am–11am14,749 flights86.5%
- 11am–2pm18,843 flights82.8%
- 2pm–5pm12,091 flights77.9%
- 5pm–8pm13,484 flights69.9%
- 8pm–5am13,680 flights76.2%
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 69.9% for the evening window. That is 19 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 66.4% on time, 24 points below November, the best at 90.1%. 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
- 37%Carrier
- 32%Late-arriving aircraft
- 20%National Airspace System
- 10%Extreme weather
- 0%Security
The largest share of delay minutes, 37%, falls under carrier control: crew scheduling, maintenance, fuelling, baggage. Unlike weather, that is a management outcome, and it is the category where the gap between two carriers on the same schedule is genuinely earned. It accounts for 447,000 of the 1.21 million delay minutes reported here.
Cancellations sit at 1.19% against a national 1.80%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.46%.
8.1% 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 a little over an hour kind, which a normal layover absorbs.
75,448 flights sit behind these numbers, which is a large enough sample that the headline rate is not moving on noise. Where a sub-group falls below 30 flights the site shows a dash instead of a percentage.
Put together: the calendar is the biggest lever here, not the carrier or the hour. November runs 90.1% on time and June 66.4%, a swing of 24 points. If the dates move at all, move them out of June before you think about anything else.
Common questions
SkyWest Airlines at DEN
How often is SkyWest Airlines at DEN 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 20.6% of the 75,448 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 SkyWest Airlines at DEN?
Delta Air Lines leads at 82.4% on time across 11,605 flights. Allegiant Air is at the other end on 65.1%, a gap of 17 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 SkyWest Airlines at DEN?
The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 88.4% on time. The 5pm–8pm window is the weakest at 69.9%, 19 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 SkyWest Airlines at DEN?
June is the weakest month at 66.4% on time, compared with 90.1% in November. Across the year that is 24 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.