Flight number record
DL 2086
Delta Air Lines · Atlanta to Des Moines
- Route
- ATL → DSM
- Departs
- 15:15
- Flights
- 286
- Period
- July 2025 to June 2026
Historical statistics for July 2025 to June 2026, not live status. For today’s DL 2086, check with Delta Air Lines.
DL 2086 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 286 flights, with a median arrival 8 minutes early.
Set against the rest of the country, DL 2086's record is 7 points better than the US average of 77.6%. That gap is worth roughly 65 fewer late arrivals for every thousand flights.
Key figures
On time
84.1%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 277 completed flights
Avg delay
64 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
2.80%
National rate is 1.81%
1 hour+ late
6.1%
National rate is 8.1%
These figures cover 286 flights between July 2025 and June 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.
Schedule
When DL 2086 flies
DL 2086 flies ATL to DSM without a single fixed slot. Its most common scheduled departure was 15:15, used on 58 of 286 flights, with 16:34 (35 flights) and 16:40 (30 flights) next. Carriers retime flights through the season, so the rates here blend slightly different positions in the aircraft's day.
- Departs 15:1558 flights20.3%
- Departs 16:3435 flights12.2%
- Departs 16:4030 flights10.5%
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 15:15 departure sits in the 2pm–5pm window. Across every US flight scheduled in that window the on-time rate is 72.4%, and DL 2086 runs 12 points better at 84.1%. Midday slots inherit some of the morning's delays without yet carrying the full weight of the evening's.
Against the route
DL 2086 next to ATL to DSM
Every carrier on ATL to DSM combined arrived on time 85.5% of the time across 1,249 flights, so DL 2086 is about level with it. Across its whole network Delta Air Lines managed 81.6%, which this flight beats by 3 points.
| Compared with | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| DL 2086thin sample | 286 | 84.1% | 64 min | 2.80% | B |
| All Delta Air Lines on ATL–DSM | 1,249 | 85.5% | 61 min | 2.24% | A |
| All carriers on ATL–DSM | 1,249 | 85.5% | 61 min | 2.24% | A |
| Delta Air Lines, whole network | 1,038,570 | 81.6% | 71 min | 1.62% | B |
Across the year
DL 2086 quarter by quarter
Quarter by quarter DL 2086 held fairly steady: 84.1% in Jul–Sep 2025, 87.9% in Oct–Dec 2025, 85.4% in Jan–Mar 2026 and 80.0% in Apr–Jun 2026. A spread of 8 points is about what a sample of this size moves on its own, so the annual figure is a fair summary.
- Jul–Sep 202589 flights84.1%
- Oct–Dec 202569 flights87.9%
- Jan–Mar 202649 flights85.4%
- Apr–Jun 202679 flights80.0%
Scale runs 70% to 95%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
By weekday, DL 2086 did best on Monday at 90.2% on time and worst on Thursday at 76.2%. Each day rests on about 41 flights, so a gap of 14 points is worth noticing but could still narrow in another year.
Delay causes
Why DL 2086 runs late
One category carries most of the weight here. Carrier accounts for 61% of the 2,832 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.
- 61%Carrier
- 19%Late-arriving aircraft
- 14%National Airspace System
- 7%Extreme weather
The largest share of delay minutes, 61%, 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 1,720 of the 2,832 delay minutes reported here. The split is drawn from 2,832 delay minutes reported on DL 2086.
Cancellations run at 2.80%, against 1.81% nationally. That is roughly one flight in 40 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
6.1% of arrivals land an hour or more late, close to the national 8.1%. That is the figure that decides a connection, and it says a 60 to 75 minute layover is reasonable here while anything under 45 minutes is a bet. Most delays on this route last about an hour, which a normal layover absorbs.
The 743 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.
DL 2086 is not only a ATL to DSM flight. It also flew DSM to ATL (286 flights, 86.6% on time) often enough to be scored on its own. Airlines attach one number to several legs of an aircraft's day, and each leg keeps its own record here, so check which city pair is on your booking before reading a rate.
One caution: this is a thin sample. 286 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.
| Also flown as | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| DSM to ATLthin sample | 286 | 86.6% | 95 min | 3.15% | A− |
What to do with this
Booking DL 2086
For a booking, the cancellation rate is the figure to plan around on DL 2086: 2.80% of its 286 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
- ATL to DSM, every carrier and departure
- DSM to ATL, the return direction
- Delta Air Lines 1704 on the same route87.2%
- Delta Air Lines 2306 on the same route82.9%
- 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
- 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.