Flight number record
DL 2603
Delta Air Lines · Detroit to New York
- Route
- DTW → LGA
- Departs
- 21:50
- Flights
- 363
- Period
- July 2025 to June 2026
Historical statistics for July 2025 to June 2026, not live status. For today’s DL 2603, check with Delta Air Lines.
DL 2603 sits in the middle of the pack with a C−. Close to three flights in four arrive on time by the DOT's definition, 4 points worse than the national rate of 77.6%. The late ones land a little over an hour behind schedule. That rests on 363 flights, with a median arrival 5 minutes early.
The national on-time rate over the same period is 77.6%, so DL 2603 runs 4 points behind the country as a whole. Across a thousand flights that is about 41 extra late arrivals.
Key figures
On time
73.5%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 336 completed flights
Avg delay
69 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
6.89%
National rate is 1.81%
1 hour+ late
8.6%
National rate is 8.1%
These figures cover 363 flights between July 2025 and June 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 8.6% of arrivals land a full hour or more behind schedule. That is the number that wrecks a connection, and it is not visible in an on-time percentage alone.
Schedule
When DL 2603 flies
DL 2603 flies DTW to LGA without a single fixed slot. Its most common scheduled departure was 21:50, used on 106 of 363 flights, with 21:55 (60 flights) and 21:35 (55 flights) next. Carriers retime flights through the season, so the rates here blend slightly different positions in the aircraft's day.
- Departs 21:50106 flights29.2%
- Departs 21:5560 flights16.5%
- Departs 21:3555 flights15.2%
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 21:50 departure sits in the 8pm–5am window. Across every US flight scheduled in that window the on-time rate is 70.5%, and DL 2603 runs 3 points better at 73.5%. By that time of day most aircraft have flown several legs already, and whatever went wrong earlier is still in the schedule.
Against the route
DL 2603 next to DTW to LGA
Every carrier on DTW to LGA combined arrived on time 75.4% of the time across 4,011 flights, so DL 2603 is 2 points behind it. Delta flew 1,979 flights on the same city pair under all its flight numbers, including this one, and those ran 77.3% on time. Across its whole network Delta Air Lines managed 81.6%, which this flight trails by 8 points.
| Compared with | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| DL 2603thin sample | 363 | 73.5% | 69 min | 6.89% | C− |
| All Delta Air Lines on DTW–LGA | 1,979 | 77.3% | 69 min | 3.49% | B− |
| All carriers on DTW–LGA | 4,011 | 75.4% | 75 min | 5.11% | B− |
| Delta Air Lines, whole network | 1,038,570 | 81.6% | 71 min | 1.62% | B |
Across the year
DL 2603 quarter by quarter
DL 2603 did not run the same all year. Its best quarter was Jul–Sep 2025 at 80.5% on time and its weakest Jan–Mar 2026 at 69.2%, a swing of 11 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 flights80.5%
- Oct–Dec 202590 flights71.8%
- Jan–Mar 202690 flights69.2%
- Apr–Jun 202691 flights72.1%
Scale runs 60% to 85%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
By weekday, DL 2603 did best on Saturday at 85.7% on time and worst on Monday at 64.4%. Each day rests on about 52 flights, so a gap of 21 points is worth noticing but could still narrow in another year.
Delay causes
Why DL 2603 runs late
One category carries most of the weight here. Carrier accounts for 45% of the 6,160 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.
- 45%Carrier
- 38%National Airspace System
- 16%Late-arriving aircraft
- 1%Extreme weather
The largest share of delay minutes, 45%, 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 2,802 of the 6,160 delay minutes reported here. The split is drawn from 6,160 delay minutes reported on DL 2603.
Cancellations run at 6.89%, against 1.81% nationally. That is about one flight in fifteen 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
8.6% 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 a little over an hour, which a normal layover absorbs.
The 502 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.
Every one of the 363 flights under DL 2603 in the data flew DTW to LGA. 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. 363 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 2603
For a booking, the cancellation rate is the figure to plan around on DL 2603: 6.89% of its 363 scheduled flights did not operate. A late arrival costs a little over an hour, but a cancellation costs the day, so leave a later option open.
Related
Where to go next
- DTW to LGA, every carrier and departure
- LGA to DTW, the return direction
- Delta Air Lines 2589 on the same route86.0%
- Delta Air Lines 2602 on the same route75.4%
- Delta Air Lines 1487 on the same route90.7%
- Republic Airways 4477 on the same route84.9%
- Delta Air Lines 2604 on the same route59.3%
- Detroit Metropolitan Wayne County (DTW) delay statistics
- LaGuardia (LGA) 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.