Flight number record
DL 1493
Delta Air Lines · Washington to Minneapolis
- Route
- DCA → MSP
- Departs
- 07:45
- Flights
- 279
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
Historical statistics for September 2025 to August 2026, not live status. For today’s DL 1493, check with Delta Air Lines.
DL 1493 lands a B, 5 points better than the national rate of 77.3%. Roughly 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 279 flights, with a median arrival 8 minutes early.
Set against the rest of the country, DL 1493's record is 5 points better than the US average of 77.3%. That gap is worth roughly 45 fewer late arrivals for every thousand flights.
Key figures
On time
81.8%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 275 completed flights
Avg delay
97 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
1.43%
National rate is 1.89%
1 hour+ late
6.2%
National rate is 8.3%
These figures cover 279 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. The median arrival is 8 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.
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Schedule
When DL 1493 flies
DL 1493 flies DCA to MSP without a single fixed slot. Its most common scheduled departure was 07:45, used on 146 of 279 flights, with 07:35 (56 flights) and 07:40 (48 flights) next.
- Departs 07:45146 flights52.3%
- Departs 07:3556 flights20.1%
- Departs 07:4048 flights17.2%
Scale runs 0% to 100%.
Share of scheduled departures at each local time. Times used on fewer than one flight in ten are not listed.
A 07:45 departure sits in the 5am–8am window. Across every US flight scheduled in that window the on-time rate is 89.3%, and DL 1493 runs 8 points worse at 81.8%. Early departures usually start with an aircraft that has not flown yet that day, which is most of why the window does well.
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Against the route
DL 1493 next to DCA to MSP
Every carrier on DCA to MSP combined arrived on time 75.6% of the time across 2,632 flights, so DL 1493 is 6 points ahead of it. Delta flew 1,701 flights on the same city pair under all its flight numbers, including this one, and those ran 78.9% on time. Across its whole network Delta Air Lines managed 81.1%, close to this flight's figure.
| Compared with | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| DL 1493thin sample | 279 | 81.8% | 97 min | 1.43% | B |
| All Delta Air Lines on DCA–MSP | 1,701 | 78.9% | 94 min | 1.88% | B |
| All carriers on DCA–MSP | 2,632 | 75.6% | 90 min | 3.23% | B− |
| Delta Air Lines, whole network | 1,039,517 | 81.1% | 71 min | 1.74% | B |
Across the year
DL 1493 quarter by quarter
DL 1493 did not run the same all year. Its best quarter was Apr–Jun 2026 at 88.1% on time and its weakest Jan–Mar 2026 at 75.0%, a swing of 13 points on roughly 70 flights a quarter. The twelve-month rate averages over that, so if you are flying in a weak quarter the quarter's own figure is the better guide.
- Jul–Sep 202522 flights—
- Oct–Dec 202569 flights79.7%
- Jan–Mar 202666 flights75.0%
- Apr–Jun 202669 flights88.1%
- Jul–Sep 202653 flights79.2%
Scale runs 65% to 95%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
By weekday, DL 1493 ranged from 75.0% on Thursday to 86.5% on Monday. With about 40 flights behind each day, a spread of 12 points is inside normal variation, so the day you fly is not worth changing for this flight.
Arrival by arrival
How late DL 1493 runs when it is late
DL 1493 often beats the schedule: 76 of 275 completed flights, 28%, arrived 15 minutes or more early. The 50 late arrivals split 16 under half an hour, 17 between 30 and 60 minutes, and 17 an hour or more.
- 15+ min early76 flights27.6%
- Within 15 min149 flights54.2%
- 15–29 min late16 flights5.8%
- 30–59 min late17 flights6.2%
- 1–2 hours late8 flights2.9%
- 2+ hours late9 flights3.3%
Scale runs 0% to 100%.
Share of 275 completed flights by arrival against schedule.
Time lost at the gate mostly stays lost. Of 37 departures that left 15 minutes late or more, only 4 made it up before arrival. In the other direction, 17 flights left on time yet arrived 15 minutes late or more, so that delay built up after pushback: in the air, in a holding pattern or on the ground at MSP.
The worst days
Worst days for DL 1493
The latest arrival of the period was on 27 July 2026, 15 hours 22 minutes behind schedule; most of its delay minutes were filed as carrier-caused (crew, maintenance, fuelling, baggage). The same cause led on five of the five worst days.
| Date | Arrived late by | Largest filed cause |
|---|---|---|
| 27 July 2026 | 15 hours 22 minutes | Carrier |
| 12 March 2026 | 14 hours 3 minutes | Carrier |
| 16 April 2026 | 5 hours 5 minutes | Carrier |
| 30 December 2025 | 4 hours 4 minutes | Carrier |
| 8 August 2026 | 3 hours 47 minutes | Carrier |
Delay causes
Why DL 1493 runs late
Carrier accounts for 79% of the 4,836 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 79%Carrier
- 21%National Airspace System
- 0%Extreme weather
The largest share of delay minutes, 79%, falls under carrier control: crew scheduling, maintenance, fuelling, baggage. It accounts for 3,798 of the 4,836 delay minutes reported here. The split is drawn from 4,836 delay minutes reported on DL 1493.
Cancellations sit at 1.43% against a national 1.89%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.00%.
Connections and routes
What a delay on this flight costs
6.2% 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 an hour and a half, which a normal layover absorbs.
The 931 miles between these two airports put this in the middle of the US network, around two and a half to three hours of block time. That is enough cruise to absorb a ten-minute late pushback and not enough to absorb thirty.
Every one of the 279 flights under DL 1493 in the data flew DCA to MSP. The number was not reused on any other city pair, which makes this a clean record of one route.
One caution: this is a thin sample. 279 flights over twelve months is enough to clear this site's floor but not enough to pin the rate down tightly, and a single bad week moves it by more than a point. Treat the grade as a rough reading.
What to do with this
Booking DL 1493
For a booking, read DL 1493 as 81.8% on time with 1.43% cancelled over 279 flights. Those are rates from the past twelve months, not a forecast for any particular day.
Related
Where to go next
- DCA to MSP, every carrier and departure
- MSP to DCA, the return direction
- Delta Air Lines 1193 on the same route87.4%
- Delta Air Lines 2963 on the same route73.8%
- Delta Air Lines 2958 on the same route76.9%
- Ronald Reagan Washington National (DCA) delay statistics
- Minneapolis-St Paul International (MSP) delay statistics
- Delta Air Lines on-time record
- Every Delta Air Lines flight number with a record
- The most and least reliable flight numbers in the US
- The best day of the week to fly, and why it is the second lever
A flight number here means Delta Air Lines’s own number as it reports to the DOT. How the figures are computed is on the methodology page.
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.