Carrier performance at one airport
NK→MCO
Spirit Airlines at Orlando International
- Departures
- 16,236
- Period
- June 2025 to May 2026
- Routes
- 25
- Rank here
- #9 of 10
Spirit Airlines at Orlando carries a cancellation problem, not just a delay problem: 3.3% of scheduled flights never operate, against 1.8% nationally. Of the ones that do fly, about seven flights in ten arrive on time, worth a C− overall. The punctuality figure counts only flights that actually departed, so it flatters an operation that cancels this often. That rests on 16,236 flights, of which United Airlines flew 15,037 at 80.7% on time.
Measured against the airport rather than the country, Spirit Airlines runs 4 points behind the 74.1% 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
69.7%
15,675 completed departures
Avg delay
68 min
Across delayed flights only
Cancelled
3.26%
At MCO, this carrier only
Rank here
#9
Of 10 carriers clearing the floor at MCO
These figures cover 16,000 flights between June 2025 and May 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 12.3% 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 MCO, ranked
The choice of carrier is not cosmetic here. United Airlines arrives on time 80.7% of the time; Allegiant Air manages 63.8%. Sample sizes sit next to every figure, because a two-point gap across 394 flights means less than a ten-point one.
| Airline | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| United Airlines | 15,037 | 80.7% | 89 min | 1.00% | B |
| Delta Air Lines | 21,391 | 77.0% | 84 min | 1.87% | B |
| Frontier Airlines | 17,376 | 76.6% | 76 min | 1.54% | B |
| Republic Airways | 680 | 75.9% | 69 min | 0.44% | B+ |
| Alaska Airlines | 2,492 | 75.1% | 60 min | 0.72% | B+ |
| American Airlines | 19,415 | 73.1% | 89 min | 2.10% | C |
| Southwest Airlines | 50,175 | 72.9% | 56 min | 1.02% | C |
| JetBlue Airways | 18,479 | 71.2% | 75 min | 1.98% | C |
| Spirit Airlines (this page) | 16,236 | 69.7% | 68 min | 3.26% | C− |
| Allegiant Air | 394 | 63.8% | 89 min | 1.02% | D |
Spirit Airlines cancels 3.3% 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 Spirit Airlines flies from MCO
Spirit 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 EWR · Newark | 1,182 | 68.4% | 74 min | 5.50% | C− |
| MCO to DTW · Detroit | 1,036 | 70.1% | 66 min | 1.74% | C |
| MCO to FLL · Fort Lauderdale | 798 | 71.9% | 61 min | 1.50% | C |
| MCO to BNA · Nashville | 794 | 72.3% | 69 min | 4.41% | C− |
| MCO to LGA · New York | 755 | 61.9% | 73 min | 5.43% | D− |
| MCO to IAH · Houston | 714 | 73.0% | 74 min | 2.38% | C |
| MCO to SJU · San Juan | 669 | 69.8% | 60 min | 0.90% | C+ |
| MCO to ACY · Atlantic City | 656 | 70.4% | 67 min | 5.03% | C− |
| MCO to BWI · Baltimore | 652 | 64.4% | 64 min | 2.91% | D |
| MCO to PHL · Philadelphia | 641 | 66.5% | 73 min | 4.99% | C− |
| MCO to ORD · Chicago | 639 | 59.5% | 74 min | 3.76% | D− |
| MCO to BOS · Boston | 581 | 69.3% | 61 min | 3.44% | C− |
| MCO to MSY · New Orleans | 572 | 73.4% | 68 min | 2.45% | C |
| MCO to DFW · Dallas-Fort Worth | 567 | 70.0% | 74 min | 3.00% | C |
| MCO to ATL · Atlanta | 527 | 65.8% | 67 min | 2.66% | C |
| MCO to CLT · Charlotte | 508 | 71.0% | 75 min | 4.13% | C− |
| MCO to PIT · Pittsburgh | 465 | 74.4% | 74 min | 3.23% | C− |
| MCO to IND · Indianapolis | 463 | 76.3% | 72 min | 2.16% | B |
| MCO to CMH · Columbus | 441 | 62.5% | 63 min | 2.72% | D |
| MCO to MEM · Memphisthin sample | 354 | 74.9% | 70 min | 2.26% | C |
| MCO to STT · Charlotte Amaliethin sample | 333 | 78.0% | 65 min | 1.50% | B |
| MCO to MCI · Kansas Citythin sample | 312 | 71.3% | 72 min | 3.53% | C− |
| MCO to PNS · Pensacolathin sample | 294 | 66.4% | 61 min | 3.40% | C− |
| MCO to MYR · Myrtle Beachthin sample | 292 | 69.7% | 62 min | 1.37% | C |
| MCO to SAT · San Antoniothin sample | 278 | 76.8% | 69 min | 5.40% | 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 32 points, against 17 points between the best and worst carrier. Each bar is the on-time rate for flights scheduled inside that window.
- 5am–8am2,236 flights90.9%
- 8am–11am2,688 flights77.0%
- 11am–2pm1,677 flights75.4%
- 2pm–5pm2,706 flights65.9%
- 5pm–8pm3,046 flights60.9%
- 8pm–5am3,883 flights59.0%
Scale runs 50% to 95%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
The 8pm–5am window is where this operation falls apart: 59.0% on time, against 90.9% 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
September is the best month on the calendar at 86.6% on time. Shoulder season thins the schedule and takes the summer weather with it, and the operation gets its margin back.
Delay causes
What holds this operation up
- 41%National Airspace System
- 32%Carrier
- 22%Late-arriving aircraft
- 5%Extreme weather
- 0%Security
41% of delay minutes are charged to the National Airspace System: air traffic volume, runway configuration, ground stops. No carrier can price its way out of that, which is why airport choice moves the number here more than carrier choice does. That is 134,000 minutes out of 325,000, against a national NAS share of 21%.
Cancellations run at 3.26%, against 1.80% nationally. That is about one flight in 30 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. 12.3% 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.
16,236 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 delay figures matter less here than the 3.26% cancellation rate. A late arrival costs you a little over an hour; a cancelled flight costs you the day. Book the 5am–8am departure so there is still a schedule behind you if it goes wrong, and treat a same-day connection as optimistic.
Common questions
Spirit Airlines at MCO
How often is Spirit Airlines at MCO delayed?
Roughly one flight in three arrive at least 15 minutes late, which is the Department of Transportation's definition of a delayed arrival. That works out to 30.3% of the 16,236 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 Spirit Airlines at MCO?
United Airlines leads at 80.7% on time across 15,037 flights. Allegiant Air is at the other end on 63.8%, 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 Spirit Airlines at MCO?
The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 90.9% on time. The 8pm–5am window is the weakest at 59.0%, 32 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 March delays on Spirit Airlines at MCO?
March is the weakest month at 51.3% on time, compared with 86.6% in September. Across the year that is 35 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.