Dallas, TX · departure reliability
DAL
Dallas Love Field
- Departures
- 70,731
- Period
- June 2025 to May 2026
- Carriers
- 2
- US rank
- #30 by volume
Dallas
Dallas Love Field 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 70,731 flights, of which Delta Air Lines flew 1,868 at 81.2% on time.
The US average over the same twelve months is 77.4%, so there is little to separate dallas love field from the country as a whole. The variation that matters here is internal: which carrier, and what time of day.
Key figures
On time
73.8%
Departures arriving under 15 minutes late at their destination
Avg delay
56 min
Across delayed flights only
Cancelled
1.40%
National rate is 1.80%
Best carrier
Delta
81.2% on time here
These figures cover 71,000 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.
Carrier by carrier
Which airlines run best out of DAL
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Southwest Airlines | 68,863 | 73.6% | 56 min | 1.36% | C |
| Delta Air Lines | 1,868 | 81.2% | 91 min | 2.73% | B |
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
Busiest routes out of DAL
Route-level records vary far more than the airport average. These are the 25 busiest departures from DAL, each with its own on-time rate against the airport-wide 73.8%.
| Route | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| DAL to HOU · Houston | 4,075 | 74.3% | 56 min | 1.79% | C |
| DAL to ATL · Atlanta | 3,441 | 78.6% | 75 min | 2.24% | B |
| 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 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
The best time of day to leave DAL
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–8am8,727 flights91.8%
- 8am–11am13,772 flights87.0%
- 11am–2pm13,590 flights76.5%
- 2pm–5pm13,488 flights68.9%
- 5pm–8pm12,218 flights60.6%
- 8pm–5am8,936 flights57.2%
Scale runs 50% to 95%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
The 8pm–5am window is where this operation falls apart: 57.2% on time, against 91.8% 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
When DAL runs late
DAL's year swings by 19 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.
Delays peak in May, when the on-time rate falls to 64.3%. January is the strongest month at 82.8%. Moving a flexible trip across that boundary buys 19 points.
Across the week, Tuesday is the strongest day at 80.2% on time and Sunday the weakest at 69.5%. 11 points is a smaller lever than departure hour, but it is free.
Delay causes
Why DAL gets delayed
One category carries most of the weight here. Late-arriving aircraft accounts for 49% of the 1.03 million delay minutes carriers reported, and the remaining four split what is left. The split is by minutes rather than by flights, so a few very long delays count for as much as many short ones.
- 49%Late-arriving aircraft
- 30%Carrier
- 17%National Airspace System
- 4%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 1.03 million reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 13 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.
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 91.8% on time here.
Cancellations sit at 1.40% 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.
70,731 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 DAL
Put together: the calendar is the biggest lever here, not the carrier or the hour. January runs 82.8% on time and May 64.3%, a swing of 19 points. If the dates move at all, move them out of May before you think about anything else.
Common questions
DAL delay questions
How often is Dallas (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 26.2% of the 70,731 flights in this analysis, against 22.6% nationally. Delayed flights are late by about an hour on average.
Which airline is most reliable on Dallas (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 Dallas (DAL)?
The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 91.8% 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 Dallas (DAL)?
May is the weakest month at 64.3% on time, compared with 82.8% 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.