Cleveland, OH · departure reliability
CLE
Cleveland Hopkins International
- Departures
- 40,559
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Carriers
- 11
- US rank
- #45 by volume
Cleveland
Cleveland Hopkins International lands a B, 2 points better than the national rate of 77.3%. About one flight in five arrives 15 minutes late or worse, and those flights are late by a little over an hour on average. That rests on 40,559 flights, of which Delta Air Lines flew 3,534 at 87.4% on time.
Delta Air Lines is the most reliable of the eleven carriers covered here at 87.4% on time across 3,534 flights.
Key figures
On time
79.4%
Departures arriving under 15 minutes late at their destination
Avg delay
82 min
Across delayed flights only
Cancelled
2.40%
National rate is 1.89%
Best carrier
Delta
87.4% on time here
These figures cover 41,000 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 8.2% of arrivals land a full hour or more behind schedule, against 8.3% nationally.
Carrier by carrier
Which airlines run best out of CLE
The choice of carrier is not cosmetic here. Delta Air Lines arrives on time 87.4% of the time; Alaska Airlines manages 62.7%. Sample sizes sit next to every figure, because a two-point gap across 461 flights means less than a ten-point one.
| Airline | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| United Airlines | 8,949 | 84.2% | 81 min | 0.92% | B+ |
| Frontier Airlines | 6,400 | 75.5% | 84 min | 1.84% | B |
| Southwest Airlines | 5,439 | 80.5% | 56 min | 0.64% | B+ |
| Republic Airways | 4,848 | 79.3% | 78 min | 5.36% | B− |
| American Airlines | 4,369 | 79.8% | 96 min | 1.83% | B |
| Delta Air Lines | 3,534 | 87.4% | 77 min | 1.73% | A |
| PSA Airlines | 2,299 | 68.6% | 109 min | 8.31% | C− |
| SkyWest Airlines | 1,931 | 74.1% | 102 min | 2.12% | C |
| Envoy Air | 1,226 | 71.8% | 71 min | 3.67% | C− |
| JetBlue Airways | 880 | 75.1% | 79 min | 4.66% | B− |
| Alaska Airlines | 461 | 62.7% | 53 min | 1.52% | D |
PSA Airlines cancels 8.3% 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
Busiest routes out of CLE
Route-level records vary far more than the airport average. These are the 25 busiest departures from CLE, each with its own on-time rate against the airport-wide 79.4%.
| Route | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| CLE to ORD · Chicago | 4,895 | 74.5% | 84 min | 3.25% | C− |
| CLE to ATL · Atlanta | 3,398 | 84.6% | 77 min | 2.03% | B |
| CLE to EWR · Newark | 2,162 | 80.1% | 93 min | 3.84% | B− |
| CLE to MCO · Orlando | 2,125 | 79.4% | 97 min | 0.89% | B+ |
| CLE to DEN · Denver | 1,845 | 82.4% | 63 min | 0.54% | B+ |
| CLE to CLT · Charlotte | 1,780 | 79.9% | 102 min | 2.13% | B |
| CLE to LGA · New York | 1,772 | 76.0% | 82 min | 6.15% | B− |
| CLE to BOS · Boston | 1,620 | 77.7% | 75 min | 3.09% | B− |
| CLE to DFW · Dallas-Fort Worth | 1,615 | 76.1% | 93 min | 2.29% | B |
| CLE to DCA · Washington | 1,605 | 63.8% | 101 min | 8.10% | D− |
| CLE to FLL · Fort Lauderdale | 1,305 | 81.9% | 80 min | 2.68% | B |
| CLE to MDW · Chicago | 1,115 | 80.9% | 51 min | 1.08% | B |
| CLE to IAD · Washington | 1,072 | 87.1% | 101 min | 1.12% | A |
| CLE to DTW · Detroit | 1,051 | 78.7% | 114 min | 0.48% | B+ |
| CLE to TPA · Tampa | 1,046 | 79.9% | 77 min | 1.43% | B |
| CLE to BNA · Nashville | 1,038 | 82.8% | 60 min | 0.77% | B+ |
| CLE to PHX · Phoenix | 1,011 | 76.2% | 60 min | 0.79% | B+ |
| CLE to LAS · Las Vegas | 1,001 | 75.7% | 77 min | 1.80% | B |
| CLE to BWI · Baltimore | 971 | 84.8% | 52 min | 1.13% | B |
| CLE to PHL · Philadelphia | 961 | 80.2% | 92 min | 5.62% | B− |
| CLE to RSW · Fort Myers | 927 | 82.7% | 78 min | 1.19% | B |
| CLE to MIA · Miami | 892 | 79.7% | 95 min | 1.23% | B |
| CLE to IAH · Houston | 814 | 90.8% | 63 min | 0.00% | A+ |
| CLE to LAX · Los Angeles | 759 | 83.7% | 50 min | 0.40% | B+ |
| CLE to JFK · New York | 701 | 81.8% | 98 min | 6.13% | B− |
Departure window
The best time of day to leave CLE
Departure time matters more here than the choice of carrier. The gap between the best and worst window is 23 points, against 25 points between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am10,610 flights88.7%
- 8am–11am6,500 flights85.7%
- 11am–2pm6,147 flights80.5%
- 2pm–5pm7,888 flights75.5%
- 5pm–8pm7,111 flights66.9%
- 8pm–5am2,303 flights65.8%
Scale runs 55% to 95%.
Book the early departure. Flights leaving between 5am–8am arrive on time 88.7% of the time, against 65.8% for the overnight window. That is 23 points of difference for no extra money, and it comes from the same aircraft having had no earlier flight to fall behind on. The 5am–8am window is the busiest, with 10,610 flights scheduled in it.
Explore
Filter CLE departures by airline, time, month and day
Pick a breakdown and a carrier. The dashed mark on each row is the same slice for every US flight.
On departures from Cleveland (CLE), the best departure window is 5am–8am at 88.7% on time and the worst is 8pm–5am at 65.8%, a wide gap of 22.9 points. All US flights leaving 5am–8am ran 89.3%.
- 5–8am88.7%
- 8–11am85.7%
- 11am–2pm80.5%
- 2–5pm75.5%
- 5–8pm66.9%
- 8pm–5am65.8%
best all US flightsScale 55% to 95%.
Across the year
When CLE runs late
CLE's year swings by 15 points from best month to worst, which is wide. An annual average tells you very little about the week you are actually flying, so read the strip rather than the headline if your dates are fixed.
December is the weak month at 71.2% on time, against 85.8% in September. Winter delays cluster: a single storm system can account for most of a month's shortfall, so an average December hides both very good weeks and genuinely unflyable days. May was the busiest month here, with 3,745 flights.
Across the week, Wednesday is the strongest day at 83.5% on time and Sunday the weakest at 74.8%, a spread of 9 points.
CLE month by month
From Europe
Transatlantic routes into CLE
1 European airport sends scheduled passenger flights to CLE, 526 flights a year in both directions by the DOT's international count. The DOT keeps no delay record for international flights; the UK routes carry the CAA's departure punctuality, and every route sets its departure airport's EUROCONTROL figures beside CLE's own record above.
Delay causes
Why CLE gets delayed
Carriers report a reason for every delay minute they cause, in five DOT categories. The split below is by minutes, not by number of flights, so a handful of very long weather delays weighs as much as many short ones. It covers 667,000 reported delay minutes.
- 38%Late-arriving aircraft
- 30%Carrier
- 28%National Airspace System
- 4%Extreme weather
- 0%Security
38% of delay minutes trace back to a late-arriving aircraft, meaning the plane was already behind before it got here. Across 667,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 9 to one. The split is drawn from 667,297 reported delay minutes.
The practical consequence: the 5am–8am departure is the one that starts clean. Its aircraft has no earlier leg to be late from, which is exactly why that window shows 88.7% on time here.
Cancellations sit at 2.40% against a national 1.89%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.28%.
8.2% 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 a little over an hour, which a normal layover absorbs.
40,559 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.
What to do with this
Flying out of CLE
Put together: the calendar is the biggest lever here, not the carrier or the hour. September runs 85.8% on time and December 71.2%, a swing of 15 points. If the dates move at all, move them out of December before you think about anything else. 39,474 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
CLE delay questions
How often is Cleveland (CLE) delayed?
About one flight in five arrives 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 40,559 flights in this analysis, against 22.7% nationally. Delayed flights are late by a little over an hour on average.
Which airline is most reliable on Cleveland (CLE)?
Delta Air Lines leads at 87.4% on time across 3,534 flights. Alaska Airlines is at the other end on 62.7%, 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 Cleveland (CLE)?
The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 88.7% on time. The 8pm–5am window is the weakest at 65.8%, 23 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 December delays on Cleveland (CLE)?
December is the weakest month at 71.2% on time, compared with 85.8% in September. Across the year that is 15 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
- CLE to ORD — Chicago74.5%
- CLE to ATL — Atlanta84.6%
- CLE to EWR — Newark80.1%
- CLE to MCO — Orlando79.4%
- CLE to DEN — Denver82.4%
- CLE to CLT — Charlotte79.9%
- United Airlines on-time record84.2%
- Frontier Airlines on-time record75.5%
- Southwest Airlines on-time record80.5%
- Republic Airways on-time record79.3%
- Why the first flight of the morning is statistically safest
- The best time of day to fly, according to 7.05 million flight records
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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.