Carrier performance at one airport
WN→DAL
Southwest Airlines at Dallas Love Field
- Departures
- 68,863
- Period
- June 2025 to May 2026
- Routes
- 25
- Rank here
- #2 of 2
Southwest Airlines at Dallas sits in the middle of the pack with a C. Close to three flights in four arrive on time by the DOT's definition, 4 points worse than the national rate of 77.4%. The late ones land about an hour behind schedule. That rests on 68,863 flights, of which Delta Air Lines flew 1,868 at 81.2% on time.
Measured against the airport rather than the country, Southwest Airlines runs half a point behind the 73.8% weighted average across all carriers at DAL. That is the comparison worth making: every operator here works the same runways, the same airspace and the same weather.
Key figures
On time
73.6%
67,768 completed departures
Avg delay
56 min
Across delayed flights only
Cancelled
1.36%
At DAL, this carrier only
Rank here
#2
Of 2 carriers clearing the floor at DAL
These figures cover 69,000 flights between June 2025 and May 2026. The median arrival is 2 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 DAL, ranked
The choice of carrier is not cosmetic here. Delta Air Lines arrives on time 81.2% of the time; Southwest Airlines manages 73.6%. Sample sizes sit next to every figure, because a two-point gap across 68,863 flights means less than a ten-point one.
| Airline | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Delta Air Lines | 1,868 | 81.2% | 91 min | 2.73% | B |
| Southwest Airlines (this page) | 68,863 | 73.6% | 56 min | 1.36% | C |
Delta leads Southwest by 8 points. Real, but small enough that a better departure time on the weaker carrier can outweigh it.
Route by route
Where Southwest Airlines flies from DAL
Southwest Airlines operates 25 routes out of DAL 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| DAL to HOU · Houston | 4,075 | 74.3% | 56 min | 1.79% | C |
| DAL to DEN · Denver | 3,017 | 69.0% | 58 min | 1.29% | C |
| DAL to PHX · Phoenix | 2,890 | 76.0% | 56 min | 2.18% | B |
| DAL to LAS · Las Vegas | 2,881 | 76.4% | 52 min | 1.25% | B |
| DAL to SAT · San Antonio | 2,716 | 79.4% | 57 min | 1.10% | B |
| DAL to MCO · Orlando | 2,650 | 70.8% | 54 min | 1.43% | C |
| DAL to BNA · Nashville | 2,408 | 73.1% | 56 min | 1.37% | C |
| DAL to AUS · Austin | 2,333 | 77.9% | 59 min | 1.03% | B |
| DAL to MSY · New Orleans | 2,293 | 75.7% | 57 min | 1.09% | B |
| DAL to MDW · Chicago | 2,156 | 71.3% | 56 min | 1.76% | C |
| DAL to MCI · Kansas City | 2,036 | 76.0% | 51 min | 1.62% | B |
| DAL to STL · St. Louis | 1,913 | 78.5% | 61 min | 1.36% | B |
| DAL to BWI · Baltimore | 1,827 | 74.3% | 61 min | 1.92% | C |
| DAL to ELP · El Paso | 1,768 | 73.1% | 56 min | 1.07% | C |
| DAL to DCA · Washington | 1,735 | 67.9% | 63 min | 1.61% | C |
| DAL to ABQ · Albuquerque | 1,653 | 77.2% | 54 min | 1.39% | B |
| DAL to SAN · San Diego | 1,576 | 75.4% | 52 min | 1.14% | B |
| DAL to ATL · Atlanta | 1,573 | 75.5% | 60 min | 1.65% | B |
| DAL to LBB · Lubbock | 1,549 | 78.7% | 55 min | 1.23% | B |
| DAL to LGA · New York | 1,492 | 64.0% | 67 min | 3.02% | D− |
| DAL to LAX · Los Angeles | 1,469 | 70.7% | 50 min | 1.09% | C |
| DAL to MAF · Midland | 1,350 | 79.6% | 59 min | 1.11% | B |
| DAL to TPA · Tampa | 1,320 | 69.9% | 54 min | 0.98% | C+ |
| DAL to AMA · Amarillo | 1,261 | 78.8% | 55 min | 1.11% | B |
| DAL to TUL · Tulsa | 1,047 | 78.5% | 56 min | 1.05% | 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 35 points, against 8 points between the best and worst carrier. Each bar is the on-time rate for flights scheduled inside that window.
- 5am–8am8,252 flights92.1%
- 8am–11am13,417 flights86.9%
- 11am–2pm13,274 flights76.3%
- 2pm–5pm13,126 flights68.9%
- 5pm–8pm11,858 flights60.1%
- 8pm–5am8,936 flights57.2%
Scale runs 50% to 100%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
The 8pm–5am window is where this operation falls apart: 57.2% on time, against 92.1% 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
Delays peak in May, when the on-time rate falls to 64.0%. January is the strongest month at 82.9%. Moving a flexible trip across that boundary buys 19 points.
Delay causes
What holds this operation up
- 49%Late-arriving aircraft
- 30%Carrier
- 17%National Airspace System
- 3%Extreme weather
- 0%Security
49% 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 995,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 14 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 1.36% against a national 1.80%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.23%.
7.8% 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 about an hour kind, which a normal layover absorbs.
68,863 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. January runs 82.9% on time and May 64.0%, a swing of 19 points. If the dates move at all, move them out of May before you think about anything else.
Common questions
Southwest Airlines at DAL
How often is Southwest Airlines at DAL 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 26.4% of the 68,863 flights in this analysis, against 22.6% nationally. Delayed flights are late by about an hour on average.
Which airline is most reliable on Southwest Airlines at DAL?
Delta Air Lines leads at 81.2% on time across 1,868 flights. Southwest Airlines is at the other end on 73.6%, a gap of 8 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 Southwest Airlines at DAL?
The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 92.1% on time. The 8pm–5am window is the weakest at 57.2%, 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 May delays on Southwest Airlines at DAL?
May is the weakest month at 64.0% on time, compared with 82.9% in January. 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.