Flight number record
DL 1618
Delta Air Lines · Birmingham to Atlanta
- Route
- BHM → ATL
- Departs
- 06:20
- Flights
- 361
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
Historical statistics for September 2025 to August 2026, not live status. For today’s DL 1618, check with Delta Air Lines.
DL 1618 earns an A. Close to nine flights in ten arrive inside the 15-minute window the DOT uses to define an on-time arrival, which puts it 11 points better than the national rate of 77.3%. When something does go wrong the average delay runs about an hour. That rests on 361 flights, with a median arrival 13 minutes early.
Set against the rest of the country, DL 1618's record is 11 points better than the US average of 77.3%. That gap is worth roughly 107 fewer late arrivals for every thousand flights.
Key figures
On time
88.0%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 351 completed flights
Avg delay
58 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
2.49%
National rate is 1.89%
1 hour+ late
2.8%
National rate is 8.3%
These figures cover 361 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. The median arrival is 13 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.
Fare search by Aviasales, a Travelpayouts partner. Booking through it may earn this site a commission at no cost to you; it changes no figure here.
Schedule
When DL 1618 flies
DL 1618 flies BHM to ATL without a single fixed slot. Its most common scheduled departure was 06:20, used on 134 of 361 flights, with 06:15 (78 flights) next.
- Departs 06:20134 flights37.1%
- Departs 06:1578 flights21.6%
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 06:20 departure sits in the 5am–8am window. Across every US flight scheduled in that window the on-time rate is 89.3%, and DL 1618 runs level with that at 88.0%. Early departures usually start with an aircraft that has not flown yet that day, which is most of why the window does well.
Timetable by Aviasales, a Travelpayouts partner. Booking through it may earn this site a commission at no cost to you; it changes no figure here.
Against the route
DL 1618 next to BHM to ATL
Every carrier on BHM to ATL combined arrived on time 87.2% of the time across 3,371 flights, so DL 1618 is about level with it. Across its whole network Delta Air Lines managed 81.1%, which this flight beats by 7 points.
| Compared with | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| DL 1618thin sample | 361 | 88.0% | 58 min | 2.49% | A |
| All Delta Air Lines on BHM–ATL | 3,371 | 87.2% | 83 min | 1.72% | A |
| All carriers on BHM–ATL | 3,371 | 87.2% | 83 min | 1.72% | A |
| Delta Air Lines, whole network | 1,039,517 | 81.1% | 71 min | 1.74% | B |
Across the year
DL 1618 quarter by quarter
DL 1618 did not run the same all year. Its best quarter was Jul–Sep 2025 at 93.3% on time and its weakest Jan–Mar 2026 at 75.0%, a swing of 18 points on roughly 72 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 202530 flights93.3%
- Oct–Dec 202591 flights93.2%
- Jan–Mar 202687 flights75.0%
- Apr–Jun 202691 flights90.8%
- Jul–Sep 202662 flights91.9%
Scale runs 65% to 100%.
By weekday, DL 1618 ranged from 84.0% on Tuesday to 94.0% on Wednesday. With about 52 flights behind each day, a spread of 10 points is inside normal variation, so the day you fly is not worth changing for this flight.
Arrival by arrival
How late DL 1618 runs when it is late
DL 1618 often beats the schedule: 159 of 351 completed flights, 45%, arrived 15 minutes or more early. Most of the lateness is short. 24 of the 42 late arrivals were under half an hour behind, and 10 reached an hour or more.
- 15+ min early159 flights45.3%
- Within 15 min150 flights42.7%
- 15–29 min late24 flights6.8%
- 30–59 min late8 flights2.3%
- 1–2 hours late4 flights1.1%
- 2+ hours late6 flights1.7%
Scale runs 0% to 100%.
Share of 351 completed flights by arrival against schedule.
5 of 27 late departures made up the time and arrived on time, 19% of them. In the other direction, 20 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 ATL.
The worst days
Worst days for DL 1618
The latest arrival of the period was on 14 November 2025, 6 hours 43 minutes behind schedule; most of its delay minutes were filed as carrier-caused (crew, maintenance, fuelling, baggage). The same cause led on three of the five worst days.
| Date | Arrived late by | Largest filed cause |
|---|---|---|
| 14 November 2025 | 6 hours 43 minutes | Carrier |
| 7 December 2025 | 4 hours 50 minutes | National Airspace System |
| 28 October 2025 | 2 hours 29 minutes | National Airspace System |
| 25 July 2026 | 2 hours 17 minutes | Carrier |
| 26 May 2026 | 2 hours 13 minutes | Carrier |
Delay causes
Why DL 1618 runs late
Carrier accounts for 48% of the 2,430 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 48%Carrier
- 41%National Airspace System
- 6%Late-arriving aircraft
- 5%Extreme weather
The largest share of delay minutes, 48%, falls under carrier control: crew scheduling, maintenance, fuelling, baggage. It accounts for 1,162 of the 2,430 delay minutes reported here. The split is drawn from 2,430 delay minutes reported on DL 1618.
Cancellations sit at 2.49% against a national 1.89%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.28%.
Connections and routes
What a delay on this flight costs
Badly late arrivals are rare here: only 2.8% land an hour or more behind schedule, against 8.3% 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.
Every one of the 361 flights under DL 1618 in the data flew BHM to ATL. 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. 361 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 1618
For a booking, read DL 1618 as 88.0% on time with 2.49% cancelled over 361 flights. Those are rates from the past twelve months, not a forecast for any particular day.
Related
Where to go next
- BHM to ATL, every carrier and departure
- ATL to BHM, the return direction
- Delta Air Lines 3012 on the same route86.5%
- Delta Air Lines 1369 on the same route87.5%
- Delta Air Lines 3100 on the same route93.8%
- Delta Air Lines 2484 on the same route79.4%
- Delta Air Lines 3164 on the same route92.7%
- Delta Air Lines 2162 on the same route94.3%
- Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International (ATL) 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
- Late aircraft, weather, or the airline: what actually causes US flight delays
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.