Flight number record
DL 2018
Delta Air Lines · New York to West Palm Beach
- Route
- JFK → PBI
- Departs
- 07:00
- Flights
- 365
- Period
- July 2025 to June 2026
Historical statistics for July 2025 to June 2026, not live status. For today’s DL 2018, check with Delta Air Lines.
DL 2018 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 77.6%. When something does go wrong the average delay runs about an hour. That rests on 365 flights, with a median arrival 13 minutes early.
Set against the rest of the country, DL 2018's record is 11 points better than the US average of 77.6%. That gap is worth roughly 105 fewer late arrivals for every thousand flights.
Key figures
On time
88.1%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 344 completed flights
Avg delay
58 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
5.21%
National rate is 1.81%
1 hour+ late
3.8%
National rate is 8.1%
These figures cover 365 flights between July 2025 and June 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.
Schedule
When DL 2018 flies
DL 2018 flies JFK to PBI without a single fixed slot. Its most common scheduled departure was 07:00, used on 128 of 365 flights, with 08:05 (69 flights) and 08:00 (60 flights) next. Carriers retime flights through the season, so the rates here blend slightly different positions in the aircraft's day.
- Departs 07:00128 flights35.1%
- Departs 08:0569 flights18.9%
- Departs 08:0060 flights16.4%
Scale runs 0% to 100%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
Share of scheduled departures at each local time. Times used on fewer than one flight in ten are not listed.
A 07:00 departure sits in the 5am–8am window. Across every US flight scheduled in that window the on-time rate is 89.3%, and DL 2018 runs level with that at 88.1%. Early departures usually start with an aircraft that has not flown yet that day, which is most of why the window does well.
Against the route
DL 2018 next to JFK to PBI
Every carrier on JFK to PBI combined arrived on time 74.2% of the time across 2,205 flights, so DL 2018 is 14 points ahead of it. Delta flew 729 flights on the same city pair under all its flight numbers, including this one, and those ran 80.7% on time. Across its whole network Delta Air Lines managed 81.6%, which this flight beats by 7 points.
| Compared with | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| DL 2018 | 365 | 88.1% | 58 min | 5.21% | A− |
| All Delta Air Lines on JFK–PBI | 729 | 80.7% | 68 min | 4.94% | B− |
| All carriers on JFK–PBI | 2,205 | 74.2% | 71 min | 4.04% | C− |
| Delta Air Lines, whole network | 1,038,570 | 81.6% | 71 min | 1.62% | B |
Across the year
DL 2018 quarter by quarter
DL 2018 did not run the same all year. Its best quarter was Apr–Jun 2026 at 93.3% on time and its weakest Jan–Mar 2026 at 81.2%, a swing of 12 points on roughly 91 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 202592 flights90.5%
- Oct–Dec 202592 flights86.8%
- Jan–Mar 202690 flights81.2%
- Apr–Jun 202691 flights93.3%
Scale runs 75% to 100%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
By weekday, DL 2018 did best on Tuesday at 96.1% on time and worst on Sunday at 79.6%. Each day rests on about 52 flights, so a gap of 17 points is worth noticing but could still narrow in another year.
Delay causes
Why DL 2018 runs late
One category carries most of the weight here. Carrier accounts for 60% of the 2,372 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.
- 60%Carrier
- 38%National Airspace System
- 2%Late-arriving aircraft
The largest share of delay minutes, 60%, 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 1,423 of the 2,372 delay minutes reported here. The split is drawn from 2,372 delay minutes reported on DL 2018.
Cancellations run at 5.21%, against 1.81% nationally. That is about one flight in twenty cancelled outright. A cancelled flight is invisible in every on-time figure on this page, so the punctuality numbers above describe only the flights that actually operated.
Connections and routes
What a delay on this flight costs
Badly late arrivals are rare here: only 3.8% 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.
The 1,028 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. It is also long enough that the aircraft usually flies three or four legs a day rather than six, which slows how fast delay compounds.
The same number turns up on one other city pair in the data, including PBI to JFK (140), but none flew often enough under DL 2018 to report a rate for. Carriers move flight numbers between routes, so the figures on this page apply to JFK to PBI only.
One caution: this is a thin sample. 365 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 2018
For a booking, the cancellation rate is the figure to plan around on DL 2018: 5.21% of its 365 scheduled flights did not operate. A late arrival costs about an hour, but a cancellation costs the day, so leave a later option open.
Related
Where to go next
- JFK to PBI, every carrier and departure
- PBI to JFK, the return direction
- Delta Air Lines 1638 on the same route73.4%
- JetBlue Airways 1053 on the same route60.3%
- JetBlue Airways 53 on the same route70.5%
- John F. Kennedy International (JFK) 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
- What a cancellation rate actually tells you (and what it hides)
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, July 2025 to June 2026. Last updated 15 September 2026; recomputed monthly. How this data is collected.