Memphis, TN · departure reliability
MEM
Memphis International
- Departures
- 24,637
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Carriers
- 10
- US rank
- #58 by volume
Memphis
Memphis International lands a B, 3 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 an hour and a half on average. That rests on 24,637 flights, of which Delta Air Lines flew 4,425 at 86.8% on time.
Delta Air Lines is the most reliable of the ten carriers covered here at 86.8% on time across 4,425 flights.
Key figures
On time
80.0%
Departures arriving under 15 minutes late at their destination
Avg delay
82 min
Across delayed flights only
Cancelled
2.27%
National rate is 1.89%
Best carrier
Delta
86.8% on time here
These figures cover 25,000 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. The median arrival is 9 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 MEM
The choice of carrier is not cosmetic here. Delta Air Lines arrives on time 86.8% of the time; Allegiant Air manages 55.2%. Sample sizes sit next to every figure, because a two-point gap across 519 flights means less than a ten-point one.
| Airline | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Delta Air Lines | 4,425 | 86.8% | 95 min | 1.81% | A |
| Southwest Airlines | 4,207 | 78.0% | 53 min | 1.05% | B |
| American Airlines | 3,585 | 81.3% | 93 min | 2.23% | B |
| SkyWest Airlines | 3,443 | 79.5% | 95 min | 1.57% | B |
| Republic Airways | 3,062 | 79.7% | 79 min | 4.25% | B− |
| PSA Airlines | 1,759 | 73.4% | 93 min | 4.78% | C− |
| Envoy Air | 1,590 | 78.1% | 80 min | 2.39% | B |
| United Airlines | 1,420 | 82.9% | 77 min | 1.83% | B |
| Allegiant Air | 519 | 55.2% | 98 min | 0.77% | D+ |
| Spirit Airlines | 366 | 86.2% | 67 min | 3.01% | A− |
PSA Airlines cancels 4.8% 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 MEM
Route-level records vary far more than the airport average. These are the 21 busiest departures from MEM, each with its own on-time rate against the airport-wide 80.0%.
| Route | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| MEM to ATL · Atlanta | 3,432 | 86.2% | 93 min | 1.92% | A |
| MEM to ORD · Chicago | 2,529 | 74.8% | 82 min | 3.80% | C− |
| MEM to DFW · Dallas-Fort Worth | 2,347 | 76.1% | 94 min | 2.64% | B |
| MEM to CLT · Charlotte | 1,736 | 82.0% | 82 min | 2.13% | B |
| MEM to DEN · Denver | 1,395 | 77.7% | 72 min | 0.79% | B+ |
| MEM to LGA · New York | 1,096 | 78.6% | 85 min | 5.29% | B− |
| MEM to DCA · Washington | 1,092 | 75.0% | 88 min | 4.49% | B− |
| MEM to IAH · Houston | 1,075 | 80.9% | 77 min | 1.02% | B |
| MEM to DTW · Detroit | 990 | 82.3% | 109 min | 1.62% | B |
| MEM to MSP · Minneapolis | 900 | 86.5% | 93 min | 1.11% | A |
| MEM to HOU · Houston | 840 | 78.1% | 49 min | 0.60% | B+ |
| MEM to PHL · Philadelphia | 756 | 79.2% | 91 min | 4.37% | B− |
| MEM to MCO · Orlando | 715 | 78.6% | 61 min | 3.36% | B− |
| MEM to MDW · Chicago | 675 | 83.4% | 54 min | 1.78% | B |
| MEM to LAS · Las Vegas | 547 | 80.1% | 66 min | 0.55% | B+ |
| MEM to BNA · Nashville | 546 | 74.8% | 45 min | 0.37% | C+ |
| MEM to MIA · Miami | 529 | 82.6% | 101 min | 1.89% | B |
| MEM to EWR · Newark | 486 | 80.9% | 73 min | 4.94% | B− |
| MEM to PHX · Phoenix | 458 | 86.1% | 74 min | 1.09% | A |
| MEM to DAL · Dallas | 453 | 77.8% | 55 min | 1.10% | B |
| MEM to SLC · Salt Lake City | 365 | 90.3% | 122 min | 1.10% | A |
Departure window
The best time of day to leave MEM
Departure time matters more here than the choice of carrier. The gap between the best and worst window is 24 points, against 32 points between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am7,984 flights89.6%
- 8am–11am4,046 flights84.2%
- 11am–2pm3,791 flights79.5%
- 2pm–5pm4,012 flights72.0%
- 5pm–8pm4,272 flights67.7%
- 8pm–5am532 flights65.5%
Scale runs 55% to 95%.
Book the early departure. Flights leaving between 5am–8am arrive on time 89.6% of the time, against 65.5% for the overnight 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 5am–8am window is the busiest, with 7,984 flights scheduled in it.
Explore
Filter MEM 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 Memphis (MEM), the best departure window is 5am–8am at 89.6% on time and the worst is 8pm–5am at 65.5%, a wide gap of 24.1 points. All US flights leaving 5am–8am ran 89.3%.
- 5–8am89.6%
- 8–11am84.2%
- 11am–2pm79.5%
- 2–5pm72.0%
- 5–8pm67.7%
- 8pm–5am65.5%
best all US flightsScale 55% to 95%.
Across the year
When MEM runs late
MEM's year swings by 13 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.
July is the worst month at 74.1% on time, 13 points below September, the best at 87.5%. 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. October was the busiest month here, with 2,283 flights.
Across the week, Wednesday is the strongest day at 83.4% on time and Sunday the weakest at 76.2%, a spread of 7 points.
MEM month by month
Delay causes
Why MEM 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 394,000 reported delay minutes.
- 36%Carrier
- 36%Late-arriving aircraft
- 20%National Airspace System
- 8%Extreme weather
- 0%Security
36% of delay minutes trace back to a late-arriving aircraft, meaning the plane was already behind before it got here. Across 394,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 5 to one. The split is drawn from 394,415 reported delay minutes.
The largest share of delay minutes, 36%, falls under carrier control: crew scheduling, maintenance, fuelling, baggage. It accounts for 143,000 of the 394,000 delay minutes reported here.
Cancellations sit at 2.27% against a national 1.89%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.24%.
7.9% 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 an hour and a half, which a normal layover absorbs.
24,637 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 MEM
Put together: the calendar is the biggest lever here, not the carrier or the hour. September runs 87.5% on time and July 74.1%, a swing of 13 points. If the dates move at all, move them out of July before you think about anything else. 24,019 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
MEM delay questions
How often is Memphis (MEM) 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 20.0% of the 24,637 flights in this analysis, against 22.7% nationally. Delayed flights are late by an hour and a half on average.
Which airline is most reliable on Memphis (MEM)?
Delta Air Lines leads at 86.8% on time across 4,425 flights. Allegiant Air is at the other end on 55.2%, a gap of 32 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 Memphis (MEM)?
The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 89.6% on time. The 8pm–5am window is the weakest at 65.5%, 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 Memphis (MEM)?
July is the weakest month at 74.1% on time, compared with 87.5% in September. Across the year that is 13 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
- MEM to ATL — Atlanta86.2%
- MEM to ORD — Chicago74.8%
- MEM to DFW — Dallas-Fort Worth76.1%
- MEM to CLT — Charlotte82.0%
- MEM to DEN — Denver77.7%
- MEM to LGA — New York78.6%
- Delta Air Lines on-time record86.8%
- Southwest Airlines on-time record78.0%
- American Airlines on-time record81.3%
- SkyWest Airlines on-time record79.5%
- 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.