Flight number record
DL 2981
Delta Air Lines · Atlanta to Minneapolis
- Route
- ATL → MSP
- Departs
- 15:58
- Flights
- 344
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
Historical statistics for September 2025 to August 2026, not live status. For today’s DL 2981, check with Delta Air Lines.
DL 2981 sits in the middle of the pack with a C+. About seven flights in ten arrive on time by the DOT's definition, 5 points worse than the national rate of 77.3%. The late ones land about an hour behind schedule. That rests on 344 flights, with a median arrival 1 minute late.
The national on-time rate over the same period is 77.3%, so DL 2981 runs 5 points behind the country as a whole. Across a thousand flights that is about 51 extra late arrivals.
Key figures
On time
72.2%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 342 completed flights
Avg delay
56 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
0.29%
National rate is 1.89%
1 hour+ late
7.0%
National rate is 8.3%
These figures cover 344 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. On-time means an arrival less than 15 minutes after the scheduled gate time, the same threshold the Department of Transportation uses in its own reports. Cancelled and diverted flights are excluded from the on-time rate and counted separately, which is why the cancellation column matters on its own.
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Schedule
When DL 2981 flies
DL 2981 flies ATL to MSP without a single fixed slot. Its most common scheduled departure was 15:58, used on 88 of 344 flights, with 15:20 (40 flights) and 15:31 (36 flights) next.
- Departs 15:5888 flights25.6%
- Departs 15:2040 flights11.6%
- Departs 15:3136 flights10.5%
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 15:58 departure sits in the 2pm–5pm window. Across every US flight scheduled in that window the on-time rate is 71.9%, and DL 2981 runs level with that at 72.2%. Midday slots inherit some of the morning's delays without yet carrying the full weight of the evening's.
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Against the route
DL 2981 next to ATL to MSP
Every carrier on ATL to MSP combined arrived on time 79.9% of the time across 3,509 flights, so DL 2981 is 8 points behind it. Delta flew 3,227 flights on the same city pair under all its flight numbers, including this one, and those ran 81.1% on time. Across its whole network Delta Air Lines managed 81.1%, which this flight trails by 9 points.
| Compared with | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| DL 2981thin sample | 344 | 72.2% | 56 min | 0.29% | C+ |
| All Delta Air Lines on ATL–MSP | 3,227 | 81.1% | 55 min | 0.40% | B+ |
| All carriers on ATL–MSP | 3,509 | 79.9% | 56 min | 0.43% | B+ |
| Delta Air Lines, whole network | 1,039,517 | 81.1% | 71 min | 1.74% | B |
Across the year
DL 2981 quarter by quarter
DL 2981 did not run the same all year. Its best quarter was Apr–Jun 2026 at 75.8% on time and its weakest Jul–Sep 2026 at 64.0%, a swing of 12 points on roughly 86 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 202591 flights67.0%
- Jan–Mar 202690 flights72.7%
- Apr–Jun 202691 flights75.8%
- Jul–Sep 202650 flights64.0%
Scale runs 55% to 80%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
By weekday, DL 2981 did best on Wednesday at 87.0% on time and worst on Sunday at 64.7%. Each day rests on about 49 flights, so a gap of 22 points is worth noticing but could still narrow in another year.
Arrival by arrival
How late DL 2981 runs when it is late
The 95 late arrivals split 35 under half an hour, 36 between 30 and 60 minutes, and 24 an hour or more.
- 15+ min early47 flights13.7%
- Within 15 min200 flights58.5%
- 15–29 min late35 flights10.2%
- 30–59 min late36 flights10.5%
- 1–2 hours late14 flights4.1%
- 2+ hours late10 flights2.9%
Scale runs 0% to 100%.
Share of 342 completed flights by arrival against schedule.
17 of 93 late departures made up the time and arrived on time, 18% of them. In the other direction, 19 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 2981
The latest arrival of the period was on 14 June 2026, 6 hours 21 minutes behind schedule; most of its delay minutes were filed as a late-arriving aircraft. Three of the five worst days fell in July 2026.
| Date | Arrived late by | Largest filed cause |
|---|---|---|
| 14 June 2026 | 6 hours 21 minutes | Late-arriving aircraft |
| 11 July 2026 | 4 hours 40 minutes | Carrier |
| 7 December 2025 | 4 hours 6 minutes | National Airspace System |
| 19 July 2026 | 3 hours 28 minutes | Late-arriving aircraft |
| 9 July 2026 | 3 hours 9 minutes | Carrier |
Delay causes
Why DL 2981 runs late
Carrier accounts for 46% of the 5,290 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 46%Carrier
- 31%Late-arriving aircraft
- 18%National Airspace System
- 5%Extreme weather
The largest share of delay minutes, 46%, falls under carrier control: crew scheduling, maintenance, fuelling, baggage. It accounts for 2,424 of the 5,290 delay minutes reported here. The split is drawn from 5,290 delay minutes reported on DL 2981.
Cancellations are rare at 0.29%, below the national 1.89% and low enough to earn the plus on the grade. Roughly one flight in 100 is called off; the risk here is arriving late, not not arriving.
Connections and routes
What a delay on this flight costs
7.0% 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 about an hour, which a normal layover absorbs.
The 907 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 344 flights under DL 2981 in the data flew ATL 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. 344 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 2981
For a booking, DL 2981 is one of the weaker ways to fly ATL to MSP: 8 points below the route as a whole. If the schedule allows, compare it with the other departures listed on the route page before settling on this one.
Related
Where to go next
- ATL to MSP, every carrier and departure
- MSP to ATL, the return direction
- Delta Air Lines 1310 on the same route77.6%
- Delta Air Lines 2668 on the same route92.0%
- Delta Air Lines 2901 on the same route85.6%
- Delta Air Lines 2654 on the same route68.6%
- Delta Air Lines 2825 on the same route84.1%
- Delta Air Lines 2960 on the same route89.0%
- Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International (ATL) 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
- Worst months to fly in the US, ranked by the data
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.