Carrier performance at one airport
WN→MCO
Southwest Airlines at Orlando International
- Departures
- 51,275
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Routes
- 25
- Rank here
- #7 of 10
Southwest Airlines at Orlando sits in the middle of the pack with a C. About seven flights in ten arrive on time by the DOT's definition, 5 points worse than the national rate of 77.3%. The late ones land about an hour behind schedule. That rests on 51,275 flights, of which United Airlines flew 15,054 at 81.5% on time.
Measured against the airport rather than the country, Southwest Airlines runs 2 points behind the 74.6% weighted average across all carriers at MCO. That is the comparison worth making: every operator here works the same runways, the same airspace and the same weather.
Key figures
On time
72.6%
50,571 completed departures
Avg delay
57 min
Across delayed flights only
Cancelled
1.12%
At MCO, this carrier only
Rank here
#7
Of 10 carriers clearing the floor at MCO
These figures cover 51,000 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 8.1% of arrivals land a full hour or more behind schedule, against 8.3% nationally.
Against the competition
Every carrier at MCO, ranked
The choice of carrier is not cosmetic here. United Airlines arrives on time 81.5% of the time; Allegiant Air manages 67.8%. Sample sizes sit next to every figure, because a two-point gap across 407 flights means less than a ten-point one.
| Airline | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| United Airlines | 15,054 | 81.5% | 83 min | 1.11% | B |
| Delta Air Lines | 21,571 | 77.9% | 83 min | 1.94% | B |
| Alaska Airlines | 2,396 | 77.7% | 58 min | 0.63% | B+ |
| Frontier Airlines | 19,073 | 76.3% | 79 min | 1.68% | B |
| Republic Airways | 404 | 75.8% | 60 min | 0.50% | B+ |
| American Airlines | 19,654 | 74.4% | 90 min | 1.97% | C |
| Southwest Airlines (this page) | 51,275 | 72.6% | 57 min | 1.12% | C |
| JetBlue Airways | 18,799 | 71.3% | 77 min | 2.72% | C |
| Spirit Airlines | 11,307 | 70.1% | 67 min | 4.34% | C− |
| Allegiant Air | 407 | 67.8% | 93 min | 1.72% | C |
Spirit Airlines cancels 4.3% 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 Southwest Airlines flies from MCO
Southwest Airlines operates 25 routes out of MCO 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| MCO to BWI · Baltimore | 3,621 | 77.2% | 59 min | 1.93% | B |
| MCO to BNA · Nashville | 2,715 | 73.2% | 55 min | 1.18% | C |
| MCO to DAL · Dallas | 2,643 | 73.2% | 59 min | 1.78% | C |
| MCO to MDW · Chicago | 2,532 | 69.6% | 58 min | 1.82% | C |
| MCO to SJU · San Juan | 2,112 | 69.9% | 49 min | 0.62% | C+ |
| MCO to STL · St. Louis | 2,108 | 77.2% | 62 min | 0.66% | B+ |
| MCO to HOU · Houston | 2,056 | 75.6% | 57 min | 1.07% | B |
| MCO to DEN · Denver | 1,918 | 73.0% | 56 min | 0.47% | C+ |
| MCO to AUS · Austin | 1,901 | 76.0% | 59 min | 0.84% | B+ |
| MCO to PIT · Pittsburgh | 1,703 | 75.2% | 57 min | 0.88% | B+ |
| MCO to IND · Indianapolis | 1,675 | 73.0% | 58 min | 1.31% | C |
| MCO to MSY · New Orleans | 1,625 | 74.2% | 61 min | 0.49% | C+ |
| MCO to CMH · Columbus | 1,512 | 74.1% | 58 min | 1.19% | C |
| MCO to MCI · Kansas City | 1,316 | 71.3% | 56 min | 0.99% | C+ |
| MCO to MKE · Milwaukee | 1,187 | 69.1% | 55 min | 0.84% | C+ |
| MCO to ATL · Atlanta | 1,093 | 69.9% | 64 min | 1.56% | C |
| MCO to DCA · Washington | 1,093 | 67.2% | 56 min | 1.74% | C |
| MCO to LAS · Las Vegas | 960 | 77.2% | 53 min | 0.00% | B+ |
| MCO to BUF · Buffalo | 949 | 65.3% | 52 min | 1.05% | C |
| MCO to PVD · Providence | 896 | 77.6% | 57 min | 1.34% | B |
| MCO to BHM · Birmingham | 861 | 70.3% | 60 min | 0.81% | C+ |
| MCO to RDU · Raleigh | 841 | 71.8% | 60 min | 1.78% | C |
| MCO to PHX · Phoenix | 841 | 78.9% | 54 min | 0.36% | B+ |
| MCO to SAT · San Antonio | 757 | 74.5% | 59 min | 0.40% | C+ |
| MCO to SDF · Louisville | 747 | 72.9% | 57 min | 2.14% | C |
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 39 points, against 14 points between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am6,009 flights94.5%
- 8am–11am12,470 flights85.3%
- 11am–2pm6,275 flights74.6%
- 2pm–5pm8,244 flights67.3%
- 5pm–8pm9,700 flights60.8%
- 8pm–5am8,577 flights55.2%
Scale runs 45% to 100%.
The 8pm–5am window is where this operation falls apart: 55.2% on time, against 94.5% 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. The 8am–11am window is the busiest, with 12,470 flights scheduled in it.
Across the year
Seasonal pattern
August is the worst month at 66.5% on time, 18 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. March was the busiest month here, with 4,688 flights.
Delay causes
What holds this operation up
- 47%Late-arriving aircraft
- 30%Carrier
- 17%National Airspace System
- 5%Extreme weather
- 1%Security
47% of delay minutes trace back to a late-arriving aircraft, meaning the plane was already behind before it got here. Across 785,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 10 to one. The split is drawn from 785,122 reported delay minutes.
Cancellations sit at 1.12% against a national 1.89%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.26%.
8.1% of arrivals land an hour or more late, close to the national 8.3%, so a 60 to 75 minute layover is reasonable here while anything under 45 minutes is a bet. Most delays on this route last about an hour, which a normal layover absorbs.
51,275 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. September runs 84.3% on time and August 66.5%, a swing of 18 points. If the dates move at all, move them out of August before you think about anything else. 50,571 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
Southwest Airlines at MCO
How often is Southwest Airlines at MCO delayed?
Roughly one flight in four arrives at least 15 minutes late, which is the Department of Transportation's definition of a delayed arrival. That works out to 27.4% of the 51,275 flights in this analysis, against 22.7% nationally. Delayed flights are late by about an hour on average.
Which airline is most reliable on Southwest Airlines at MCO?
United Airlines leads at 81.5% on time across 15,054 flights. Allegiant Air is at the other end on 67.8%, a gap of 14 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 MCO?
The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 94.5% on time. The 8pm–5am window is the weakest at 55.2%, 39 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 August delays on Southwest Airlines at MCO?
August is the weakest month at 66.5% on time, compared with 84.3% in September. Across the year that is 18 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, September 2025 to August 2026. Last updated ; recomputed monthly. How this data is collected.