Flight number record
DL 904
Delta Air Lines · Atlanta to Sacramento
- Route
- ATL → SMF
- Departs
- 09:00
- Flights
- 365
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
Historical statistics for September 2025 to August 2026, not live status. For today’s DL 904, check with Delta Air Lines.
DL 904 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 12 points better than the national rate of 77.3%. When something does go wrong the average delay runs roughly 45 minutes. That rests on 365 flights, with a median arrival 7 minutes early.
Set against the rest of the country, DL 904's record is 12 points better than the US average of 77.3%. That gap is worth roughly 123 fewer late arrivals for every thousand flights.
Key figures
On time
89.6%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 357 completed flights
Avg delay
46 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
2.19%
National rate is 1.89%
1 hour+ late
2.5%
National rate is 8.3%
These figures cover 365 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. The median arrival is 7 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 904 flies
DL 904 flies ATL to SMF without a single fixed slot. Its most common scheduled departure was 09:00, used on 76 of 365 flights, with 09:05 (61 flights) and 09:15 (60 flights) next.
- Departs 09:0076 flights20.8%
- Departs 09:0561 flights16.7%
- Departs 09:1560 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 09:00 departure sits in the 8am–11am window. Across every US flight scheduled in that window the on-time rate is 83.9%, and DL 904 runs 6 points better at 89.6%. 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 904 next to ATL to SMF
Every carrier on ATL to SMF combined arrived on time 82.3% of the time across 1,007 flights, so DL 904 is 7 points ahead of it. Across its whole network Delta Air Lines managed 81.1%, which this flight beats by 9 points.
| Compared with | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| DL 904 | 365 | 89.6% | 46 min | 2.19% | A |
| All Delta Air Lines on ATL–SMF | 1,007 | 82.3% | 55 min | 1.19% | B |
| All carriers on ATL–SMF | 1,007 | 82.3% | 55 min | 1.19% | B |
| Delta Air Lines, whole network | 1,039,517 | 81.1% | 71 min | 1.74% | B |
Across the year
DL 904 quarter by quarter
Quarter by quarter DL 904 held fairly steady: 93.3% in Jul–Sep 2025, 87.6% in Oct–Dec 2025, 87.2% in Jan–Mar 2026, 91.1% in Apr–Jun 2026 and 91.9% in Jul–Sep 2026. A spread of 6 points is about what a sample of this size moves on its own, so the annual figure is a fair summary.
- Jul–Sep 202530 flights93.3%
- Oct–Dec 202592 flights87.6%
- Jan–Mar 202690 flights87.2%
- Apr–Jun 202691 flights91.1%
- Jul–Sep 202662 flights91.9%
Scale runs 80% to 100%.
By weekday, DL 904 ranged from 84.0% on Saturday to 94.2% on Friday. With about 52 flights behind each day, a spread of 10 points is inside normal variation, so the day you fly is not worth changing for this flight.
Arrival by arrival
How late DL 904 runs when it is late
The 37 late arrivals split 17 under half an hour, 11 between 30 and 60 minutes, and 9 an hour or more.
- 15+ min early85 flights23.8%
- Within 15 min235 flights65.8%
- 15–29 min late17 flights4.8%
- 30–59 min late11 flights3.1%
- 1–2 hours late8 flights2.2%
- 2+ hours late1 flights0.3%
Scale runs 0% to 100%.
Share of 357 completed flights by arrival against schedule.
10 of 34 late departures made up the time and arrived on time, 29% of them. 13 flights left on time and still arrived late.
The worst days
Worst days for DL 904
The latest arrival of the period was on 26 July 2026, 2 hours 30 minutes behind schedule; most of its delay minutes were filed as carrier-caused (crew, maintenance, fuelling, baggage). The same cause led on four of the five worst days.
| Date | Arrived late by | Largest filed cause |
|---|---|---|
| 26 July 2026 | 2 hours 30 minutes | Carrier |
| 21 December 2025 | 1 hour 56 minutes | Carrier |
| 27 October 2025 | 1 hour 47 minutes | National Airspace System |
| 1 March 2026 | 1 hour 44 minutes | Carrier |
| 22 June 2026 | 1 hour 38 minutes | Carrier |
Delay causes
Why DL 904 runs late
Carrier accounts for 67% of the 1,716 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 67%Carrier
- 25%National Airspace System
- 8%Late-arriving aircraft
The largest share of delay minutes, 67%, falls under carrier control: crew scheduling, maintenance, fuelling, baggage. It accounts for 1,150 of the 1,716 delay minutes reported here. The split is drawn from 1,716 delay minutes reported on DL 904.
Cancellations sit at 2.19% against a national 1.89%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.00%.
Connections and routes
What a delay on this flight costs
Badly late arrivals are rare here: only 2.5% 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 2,092 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.
DL 904 is not only a ATL to SMF flight. It also flew SMF to ATL (364 flights, 92.1% 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. 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.
| Also flown as | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| SMF to ATLthin sample | 364 | 92.1% | 100 min | 2.47% | A |
What to do with this
Booking DL 904
For a booking, read DL 904 as 89.6% on time with 2.19% cancelled over 365 flights. Those are rates from the past twelve months, not a forecast for any particular day.
Related
Where to go next
- ATL to SMF, every carrier and departure
- SMF to ATL, the return direction
- Delta Air Lines 682 on the same route81.5%
- Delta Air Lines 743 on the same route74.4%
- Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International (ATL) delay statistics
- Sacramento International (SMF) 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.