Flight number record
DL 897
Delta Air Lines · Salt Lake City to Atlanta
- Route
- SLC → ATL
- Departs
- 08:10
- Flights
- 365
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
Historical statistics for September 2025 to August 2026, not live status. For today’s DL 897, check with Delta Air Lines.
DL 897 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 15 points better than the national rate of 77.3%. When something does go wrong the average delay runs roughly 50 minutes. That rests on 365 flights, with a median arrival 13 minutes early.
Set against the rest of the country, DL 897's record is 15 points better than the US average of 77.3%. That gap is worth roughly 147 fewer late arrivals for every thousand flights.
Key figures
On time
92.0%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 363 completed flights
Avg delay
49 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
0.55%
National rate is 1.89%
1 hour+ late
1.9%
National rate is 8.3%
These figures cover 365 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.
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Schedule
When DL 897 flies
DL 897 flies SLC to ATL without a single fixed slot. Its most common scheduled departure was 08:10, used on 110 of 365 flights, with 08:05 (88 flights) and 08:00 (60 flights) next.
- Departs 08:10110 flights30.1%
- Departs 08:0588 flights24.1%
- Departs 08:0060 flights16.4%
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 08:10 departure sits in the 8am–11am window. Across every US flight scheduled in that window the on-time rate is 83.9%, and DL 897 runs 8 points better at 92.0%. Early departures usually start with an aircraft that has not flown yet that day, which is most of why the window does well.
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Against the route
DL 897 next to SLC to ATL
Every carrier on SLC to ATL combined arrived on time 86.4% of the time across 2,974 flights, so DL 897 is 6 points ahead of it. Delta flew 2,968 flights on the same city pair under all its flight numbers, including this one, and those ran 86.5% on time. Across its whole network Delta Air Lines managed 81.1%, which this flight beats by 11 points.
| Compared with | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| DL 897 | 365 | 92.0% | 49 min | 0.55% | A+ |
| All Delta Air Lines on SLC–ATL | 2,968 | 86.5% | 65 min | 0.57% | A+ |
| All carriers on SLC–ATL | 2,974 | 86.4% | 67 min | 0.57% | A+ |
| Delta Air Lines, whole network | 1,039,517 | 81.1% | 71 min | 1.74% | B |
Across the year
DL 897 quarter by quarter
DL 897 did not run the same all year. Its best quarter was Jul–Sep 2025 at 96.7% on time and its weakest Jul–Sep 2026 at 78.7%, a swing of 18 points on roughly 73 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 flights96.7%
- Oct–Dec 202592 flights96.7%
- Jan–Mar 202690 flights91.1%
- Apr–Jun 202691 flights95.6%
- Jul–Sep 202662 flights78.7%
Scale runs 70% to 100%.
By weekday, DL 897 ranged from 86.5% on Friday to 98.0% on Sunday. With about 52 flights behind each day, a spread of 12 points is inside normal variation, so the day you fly is not worth changing for this flight.
Arrival by arrival
How late DL 897 runs when it is late
DL 897 often beats the schedule: 163 of 363 completed flights, 45%, arrived 15 minutes or more early. The 29 late arrivals split 10 under half an hour, 12 between 30 and 60 minutes, and 7 an hour or more.
- 15+ min early163 flights44.9%
- Within 15 min171 flights47.1%
- 15–29 min late10 flights2.8%
- 30–59 min late12 flights3.3%
- 1–2 hours late5 flights1.4%
- 2+ hours late2 flights0.6%
Scale runs 0% to 100%.
Share of 363 completed flights by arrival against schedule.
A late pushback is often recovered here: of 29 departures that left 15 minutes late or more, 9 still arrived on time. 9 flights left on time and still arrived late.
The worst days
Worst days for DL 897
The latest arrival of the period was on 13 February 2026, 2 hours 21 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 |
|---|---|---|
| 13 February 2026 | 2 hours 21 minutes | Carrier |
| 21 March 2026 | 2 hours 3 minutes | Carrier |
| 10 March 2026 | 1 hour 35 minutes | Late-arriving aircraft |
| 17 July 2026 | 1 hour 27 minutes | National Airspace System |
| 23 July 2026 | 1 hour 20 minutes | Carrier |
Delay causes
Why DL 897 runs late
Carrier accounts for 54% of the 1,408 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 54%Carrier
- 31%National Airspace System
- 10%Late-arriving aircraft
- 5%Extreme weather
The largest share of delay minutes, 54%, falls under carrier control: crew scheduling, maintenance, fuelling, baggage. It accounts for 759 of the 1,408 delay minutes reported here. The split is drawn from 1,408 delay minutes reported on DL 897.
Cancellations are rare at 0.55%, 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
Badly late arrivals are rare here: only 1.9% 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.
At 1,590 miles this is transcontinental flying, and long routes get a quiet structural advantage. Scheduled block time on a flight this length carries more padding in absolute minutes, so a twenty-minute late departure often still becomes an on-time arrival. Read the on-time rate here as slightly flattering next to a short-haul route with the same operational quality.
Every one of the 365 flights under DL 897 in the data flew SLC 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. 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 897
For a booking, DL 897 has one of the better records a US domestic flight can show: 92.0% on time and 0.55% cancelled. That is a base rate, not a promise about any single day.
Related
Where to go next
- SLC to ATL, every carrier and departure
- ATL to SLC, the return direction
- Delta Air Lines 906 on the same route84.1%
- Delta Air Lines 907 on the same route94.8%
- Delta Air Lines 885 on the same route80.6%
- Delta Air Lines 912 on the same route87.0%
- Delta Air Lines 905 on the same route84.8%
- Delta Air Lines 835 on the same route83.6%
- Salt Lake City International (SLC) delay statistics
- 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
- 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.