Salt Lake City, UT · departure reliability
SLC
Salt Lake City International
- Departures
- 117,874
- Period
- July 2025 to June 2026
- Carriers
- 8
- US rank
- #18 by volume
Salt Lake City
Salt Lake City International earns a B+. More than four flights in five arrive inside the 15-minute window the DOT uses to define an on-time arrival, which puts it 7 points better than the national rate of 77.6%. When something does go wrong the average delay runs about an hour. That rests on 117,874 flights, of which SkyWest Airlines flew 36,254 at 90.7% on time.
SkyWest Airlines is the most reliable of the eight carriers covered here at 90.7% on time across 36,254 flights.
Key figures
On time
84.8%
Departures arriving under 15 minutes late at their destination
Avg delay
65 min
Across delayed flights only
Cancelled
0.76%
National rate is 1.81%
Best carrier
SkyWest
90.7% on time here
These figures cover 118,000 flights between July 2025 and June 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 SLC
The choice of carrier is not cosmetic here. SkyWest Airlines arrives on time 90.7% of the time; JetBlue Airways manages 75.3%. Sample sizes sit next to every figure, because a two-point gap across 576 flights means less than a ten-point one.
| Airline | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Delta Air Lines | 54,634 | 83.8% | 62 min | 0.74% | B+ |
| SkyWest Airlines | 36,254 | 90.7% | 65 min | 0.43% | A+ |
| Southwest Airlines | 11,290 | 78.1% | 50 min | 0.56% | B+ |
| United Airlines | 4,875 | 80.2% | 73 min | 1.01% | B |
| American Airlines | 4,635 | 78.7% | 102 min | 2.55% | B |
| Frontier Airlines | 3,504 | 79.8% | 88 min | 1.46% | B |
| Alaska Airlines | 1,621 | 75.5% | 49 min | 1.73% | B |
| JetBlue Airways | 576 | 75.3% | 90 min | 3.47% | B− |
JetBlue Airways cancels 3.5% 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 SLC
Route-level records vary far more than the airport average. These are the 25 busiest departures from SLC, each with its own on-time rate against the airport-wide 84.8%.
| Route | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| SLC to DEN · Denver | 7,757 | 77.8% | 61 min | 0.55% | B+ |
| SLC to PHX · Phoenix | 5,759 | 83.9% | 71 min | 0.56% | B+ |
| SLC to LAX · Los Angeles | 4,146 | 86.2% | 55 min | 0.46% | A+ |
| SLC to SEA · Seattle | 4,108 | 80.2% | 53 min | 0.97% | B+ |
| SLC to DFW · Dallas-Fort Worth | 3,869 | 78.6% | 90 min | 2.58% | B |
| SLC to LAS · Las Vegas | 3,741 | 77.9% | 64 min | 0.64% | B+ |
| SLC to SFO · San Francisco | 3,472 | 69.0% | 64 min | 0.95% | C+ |
| SLC to ORD · Chicago | 3,198 | 75.3% | 90 min | 1.22% | B |
| SLC to ATL · Atlanta | 2,972 | 87.3% | 65 min | 0.54% | A+ |
| SLC to SAN · San Diego | 2,958 | 83.2% | 54 min | 0.85% | B+ |
| SLC to PDX · Portland | 2,382 | 87.7% | 60 min | 0.97% | A+ |
| SLC to SMF · Sacramento | 2,158 | 85.7% | 61 min | 0.70% | A+ |
| SLC to IAH · Houston | 1,957 | 84.7% | 75 min | 0.82% | B+ |
| SLC to JFK · New York | 1,931 | 82.0% | 76 min | 1.92% | B |
| SLC to SNA · Santa Ana | 1,854 | 84.2% | 59 min | 0.70% | B+ |
| SLC to SJC · San Jose | 1,810 | 87.0% | 65 min | 0.39% | A+ |
| SLC to AUS · Austin | 1,783 | 82.1% | 59 min | 0.62% | B+ |
| SLC to BOI · Boise | 1,742 | 87.1% | 57 min | 0.80% | A+ |
| SLC to SGU · St. George | 1,725 | 92.1% | 71 min | 0.17% | A+ |
| SLC to OAK · Oakland | 1,670 | 90.2% | 53 min | 0.18% | A+ |
| SLC to GEG · Spokane | 1,666 | 86.7% | 74 min | 0.48% | A+ |
| SLC to MSP · Minneapolis | 1,589 | 86.5% | 54 min | 0.25% | A+ |
| SLC to DTW · Detroit | 1,567 | 89.5% | 64 min | 0.19% | A+ |
| SLC to LGB · Long Beach | 1,552 | 87.4% | 46 min | 0.26% | A+ |
| SLC to MCO · Orlando | 1,530 | 82.4% | 56 min | 0.65% | B+ |
Departure window
The best time of day to leave SLC
Departure time matters more here than the choice of carrier. The gap between the best and worst window is 11 points, against 15 points between the best and worst carrier. Each bar is the on-time rate for flights scheduled inside that window.
- 5am–8am10,131 flights91.2%
- 8am–11am24,059 flights88.3%
- 11am–2pm23,109 flights84.4%
- 2pm–5pm20,814 flights81.7%
- 5pm–8pm15,494 flights80.2%
- 8pm–5am24,267 flights84.3%
Scale runs 70% to 95%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
Book the early departure. Flights leaving between 5am–8am arrive on time 91.2% of the time, against 80.2% for the evening window. That is 11 points of difference for no extra money, and it comes from the same aircraft having had no earlier flight to fall behind on. The 8pm–5am window is the busiest, with 24,267 flights scheduled in it.
Across the year
When SLC runs late
Twelve months, one bar each, drawn from the same 117,874 flights. The strip shows how much of SLC's record is set by the calendar rather than by the operation.
July is the worst month at 79.5% on time, 9 points below September, the best at 88.2%. 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. March was the busiest month here, with 10,632 flights.
Across the week, Tuesday is the strongest day at 87.5% on time and Sunday the weakest at 82.9%. 5 points is a smaller lever than departure hour, but it is free.
Delay causes
Why SLC gets delayed
One category carries most of the weight here. Carrier accounts for 47% of the 1.15 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.
- 47%Carrier
- 27%Late-arriving aircraft
- 21%National Airspace System
- 5%Extreme weather
- 0%Security
The largest share of delay minutes, 47%, falls under carrier control: crew scheduling, maintenance, fuelling, baggage. Unlike weather, that is a management outcome, and it is the category where the gap between two carriers on the same schedule is genuinely earned. It accounts for 542,000 of the 1.15 million delay minutes reported here. The split is drawn from 1,150,707 reported delay minutes.
Cancellations are rare at 0.76%, 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.
Badly late arrivals are rare here: only 4.7% land an hour or more behind schedule, against 8.1% nationally. Connections built on this flight are about as safe as US domestic connections get, though a cancelled flight still ignores every layover you give it.
117,874 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 SLC
Put together: avoid the 5pm–8pm departure. It runs 80.2% on time against 91.2% for the 5am–8am slot, and that 11 points is the largest single thing you control here. SkyWest Airlines is the strongest operator if the fares are close. 116,638 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
SLC delay questions
How often is Salt Lake City (SLC) delayed?
About one flight in seven arrive at least 15 minutes late, which is the Department of Transportation's definition of a delayed arrival. That works out to 15.2% of the 117,874 flights in this analysis, against 22.4% nationally. Delayed flights are late by about an hour on average.
Which airline is most reliable on Salt Lake City (SLC)?
SkyWest Airlines leads at 90.7% on time across 36,254 flights. JetBlue Airways is at the other end on 75.3%, a gap of 15 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 Salt Lake City (SLC)?
The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 91.2% on time. The 5pm–8pm window is the weakest at 80.2%, 11 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 Salt Lake City (SLC)?
July is the weakest month at 79.5% on time, compared with 88.2% in September. Across the year that is 9 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
- SLC to DEN — Denver77.8%
- SLC to PHX — Phoenix83.9%
- SLC to LAX — Los Angeles86.2%
- SLC to SEA — Seattle80.2%
- SLC to DFW — Dallas-Fort Worth78.6%
- SLC to LAS — Las Vegas77.9%
- Delta Air Lines on-time record83.8%
- SkyWest Airlines on-time record90.7%
- Southwest Airlines on-time record78.1%
- United Airlines on-time record80.2%
- The best time of day to fly, according to 7.04 million flight records
- Worst months to fly in the US, ranked by the data
Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics, on-time performance data, July 2025 to June 2026. Updated monthly. How this data is collected.