Denver, CO · departure reliability

DEN

Denver International

Departures: 319,138
Period: July 2025 to June 2026
Carriers: 9
US rank: #2 by volume

Terminal building and aircraft stands at a US airport

Denver

Denver International lands a B+, about a point worse than the national rate of 77.6%. About one flight in four arrive 15 minutes late or worse, and those flights are late by about an hour on average. That is a workable record, not a spotless one. That rests on 319,138 flights, of which Delta Air Lines flew 11,579 at 83.1% on time.

Delta Air Lines is the most reliable of the nine carriers covered here at 83.1% on time across 11,579 flights.

On time

76.3%

Departures arriving under 15 minutes late at their destination

Avg delay

65 min

Across delayed flights only

Cancelled

0.79%

National rate is 1.81%

Best carrier

Delta

83.1% on time here

These figures cover 319,000 flights between July 2025 and June 2026. The median arrival is 4 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 DEN

The choice of carrier is not cosmetic here. Delta Air Lines arrives on time 83.1% of the time; JetBlue Airways manages 68.9%. Sample sizes sit next to every figure, because a two-point gap across 1,249 flights means less than a ten-point one.

On-time performance by carrier departing DEN
Airline	Flights	On time	Avg delay	Cancelled	Grade
United Airlines	107,305	78.4%	64 min	0.46%	B+
Southwest Airlines	88,768	69.4%	54 min	0.70%	C+
SkyWest Airlines	75,349	80.0%	77 min	1.13%	B
Frontier Airlines	22,581	78.0%	67 min	0.73%	B+
Delta Air Lines	11,579	83.1%	77 min	1.33%	B
American Airlines	8,874	76.8%	104 min	2.12%	B
Alaska Airlines	2,700	76.0%	56 min	0.89%	B+
JetBlue Airways	1,249	68.9%	89 min	2.80%	C
Allegiant Air	395	70.3%	110 min	1.27%	C

The spread between Delta and JetBlue is 14 points, wide enough that it should decide the booking. On a hundred trips that is 14 more arrivals inside the on-time window.

Route by route

Busiest routes out of DEN

Route-level records vary far more than the airport average. These are the 25 busiest departures from DEN, each with its own on-time rate against the airport-wide 76.3%.

Busiest routes from DEN by flight volume
Route	Flights	On time	Avg delay	Cancelled	Grade
DEN to PHX · Phoenix	8,930	75.7%	67 min	0.80%	B+
DEN to SLC · Salt Lake City	7,758	77.5%	61 min	0.48%	B+
DEN to LAX · Los Angeles	7,721	79.0%	62 min	0.51%	B+
DEN to LAS · Las Vegas	7,108	75.3%	63 min	0.66%	B+
DEN to SEA · Seattle	6,309	73.9%	57 min	0.76%	C+
DEN to ORD · Chicago	6,161	71.1%	88 min	1.07%	C
DEN to DFW · Dallas-Fort Worth	6,029	75.0%	85 min	2.07%	B
DEN to SAN · San Diego	5,949	75.6%	56 min	0.66%	B+
DEN to MSP · Minneapolis	5,848	77.6%	62 min	0.68%	B+
DEN to ATL · Atlanta	5,596	80.0%	62 min	0.86%	B+
DEN to SFO · San Francisco	5,415	65.8%	61 min	0.48%	C+
DEN to AUS · Austin	5,301	76.1%	61 min	0.60%	B+
DEN to COS · Colorado Springs	5,039	75.8%	67 min	1.45%	B
DEN to IAH · Houston	4,673	78.2%	62 min	0.21%	B+
DEN to LGA · New York	4,672	71.5%	68 min	2.74%	C
DEN to MCO · Orlando	4,583	77.1%	61 min	0.63%	B+
DEN to PDX · Portland	4,289	73.9%	53 min	0.44%	C+
DEN to MCI · Kansas City	4,269	75.5%	60 min	0.40%	B+
DEN to BOS · Boston	3,903	71.4%	70 min	1.18%	C
DEN to SMF · Sacramento	3,839	73.5%	56 min	0.34%	C+
DEN to SNA · Santa Ana	3,696	80.1%	47 min	0.35%	B+
DEN to STL · St. Louis	3,662	78.1%	58 min	0.38%	B+
DEN to BNA · Nashville	3,658	74.3%	58 min	0.68%	C+
DEN to IAD · Washington	3,558	80.3%	64 min	0.56%	B+
DEN to EWR · Newark	3,363	77.5%	80 min	1.58%	B

Departure window

The best time of day to leave DEN

Departure time matters more here than the choice of carrier. The gap between the best and worst window is 24 points, against 14 points between the best and worst carrier. Each bar is the on-time rate for flights scheduled inside that window.

5am–8am25,057 flights90.4%
8am–11am65,246 flights84.8%
11am–2pm69,964 flights79.7%
2pm–5pm47,992 flights73.2%
5pm–8pm69,035 flights66.3%
8pm–5am41,844 flights68.9%

Scale runs 60% to 95%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.

Book the early departure. Flights leaving between 5am–8am arrive on time 90.4% of the time, against 66.3% for the evening window. That is 24 points of difference for no extra money, and it comes from the same aircraft having had no earlier flight to fall behind on. The 11am–2pm window is the busiest, with 69,964 flights scheduled in it.

Across the year

When DEN runs late

DEN's year swings by 22 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.

Darker means more delays. Figures are on-time percentages.November best, July worst

July is the worst month at 63.0% on time, 22 points below November, the best at 84.7%. 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. July was the busiest month here, with 29,433 flights.

Across the week, Tuesday is the strongest day at 79.5% on time and Thursday the weakest at 74.0%. 6 points is a smaller lever than departure hour, but it is free.

Delay causes

Why DEN gets delayed

One category carries most of the weight here. Late-arriving aircraft accounts for 44% of the 4.84 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.

Late-arriving aircraft
44%
Carrier
32%
National Airspace System
19%
Extreme weather
4%
Security
0%

44% 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 4.84 million reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 10 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 split is drawn from 4,844,397 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 90.4% on time here.

Cancellations are rare at 0.79%, below the national 1.81% and low enough to earn the plus on the grade. Roughly one flight in 100 is called off; the risk here is arriving late, not not arriving.

7.9% of arrivals land an hour or more late, close to the national 8.1%. 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.

319,138 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 DEN

Put together: the calendar is the biggest lever here, not the carrier or the hour. November runs 84.7% on time and July 63.0%, a swing of 22 points. If the dates move at all, move them out of July before you think about anything else. 315,704 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.

Common questions

DEN delay questions

How often is Denver (DEN) 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 23.7% of the 319,138 flights in this analysis, against 22.4% nationally. Delayed flights are late by about an hour on average.

Which airline is most reliable on Denver (DEN)?

Delta Air Lines leads at 83.1% on time across 11,579 flights. JetBlue Airways is at the other end on 68.9%, 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 Denver (DEN)?

The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 90.4% on time. The 5pm–8pm window is the weakest at 66.3%, 24 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 July delays on Denver (DEN)?

July is the weakest month at 63.0% on time, compared with 84.7% in November. Across the year that is 22 points between the best and worst months. Moving flexible dates out of that month is one of the few things that reliably helps.

Where to go next

Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics, on-time performance data, July 2025 to June 2026. Updated monthly. How this data is collected.

Key figures