Flight number record
DL 951
Delta Air Lines · Los Angeles to New York
- Route
- LAX → JFK
- Departs
- 11:45
- Flights
- 332
- Period
- July 2025 to June 2026
Historical statistics for July 2025 to June 2026, not live status. For today’s DL 951, check with Delta Air Lines.
DL 951 sits in the middle of the pack with a C. About seven flights in ten arrive on time by the DOT's definition, 8 points worse than the national rate of 77.6%. The late ones land close to two hours behind schedule. That rests on 332 flights, with a median arrival 7 minutes early.
The national on-time rate over the same period is 77.6%, so DL 951 runs 8 points behind the country as a whole. Across a thousand flights that is about 76 extra late arrivals.
Key figures
On time
70.0%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 323 completed flights
Avg delay
104 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
2.11%
National rate is 1.81%
1 hour+ late
15.2%
National rate is 8.1%
These figures cover 332 flights between July 2025 and June 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 15.2% 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 951 flies
DL 951 flies LAX to JFK without a single fixed slot. Its most common scheduled departure was 11:45, used on 55 of 332 flights, with 10:10 (52 flights) and 11:35 (36 flights) next. Carriers retime flights through the season, so the rates here blend slightly different positions in the aircraft's day.
- Departs 11:4555 flights16.6%
- Departs 10:1052 flights15.7%
- Departs 11:3536 flights10.8%
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 11:45 departure sits in the 11am–2pm window. Across every US flight scheduled in that window the on-time rate is 78.8%, and DL 951 runs 9 points worse at 70.0%. Midday slots inherit some of the morning's delays without yet carrying the full weight of the evening's.
Against the route
DL 951 next to LAX to JFK
Every carrier on LAX to JFK combined arrived on time 79.1% of the time across 10,287 flights, so DL 951 is 9 points behind it. Delta flew 3,358 flights on the same city pair under all its flight numbers, including this one, and those ran 81.6% on time. Across its whole network Delta Air Lines managed 81.6%, which this flight trails by 12 points.
| Compared with | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| DL 951thin sample | 332 | 70.0% | 104 min | 2.11% | C |
| All Delta Air Lines on LAX–JFK | 3,358 | 81.6% | 93 min | 1.79% | B |
| All carriers on LAX–JFK | 10,287 | 79.1% | 92 min | 2.04% | B |
| Delta Air Lines, whole network | 1,038,570 | 81.6% | 71 min | 1.62% | B |
Across the year
DL 951 quarter by quarter
DL 951 did not run the same all year. Its best quarter was Oct–Dec 2025 at 79.5% on time and its weakest Jan–Mar 2026 at 63.5%, a swing of 16 points on roughly 83 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 flights66.3%
- Oct–Dec 202580 flights79.5%
- Jan–Mar 202677 flights63.5%
- Apr–Jun 202683 flights70.9%
Scale runs 55% to 85%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
By weekday, DL 951 did best on Friday at 79.6% on time and worst on Monday at 62.5%. Each day rests on about 47 flights, so a gap of 17 points is worth noticing but could still narrow in another year.
Delay causes
Why DL 951 runs late
One category carries most of the weight here. Carrier accounts for 58% of the 10,000 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.
- 58%Carrier
- 26%National Airspace System
- 16%Late-arriving aircraft
The largest share of delay minutes, 58%, 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 5,799 of the 10,000 delay minutes reported here. The split is drawn from 10,083 delay minutes reported on DL 951.
Cancellations sit at 2.11% against a national 1.81%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.60%.
Connections and routes
What a delay on this flight costs
For anyone connecting, the number to weigh is not the on-time rate but the tail behind it. 15.2% of arrivals land a full hour or more behind schedule, against 8.1% nationally. A 45-minute layover does not survive that, and no amount of walking quickly changes it. Ninety minutes is the honest minimum here, and two hours if the onward flight is on a separate ticket.
At 2,475 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.
The same number turns up on one other city pair in the data, including MYR to ATL (16), but none flew often enough under DL 951 to report a rate for. Carriers move flight numbers between routes, so the figures on this page apply to LAX to JFK only.
One caution: this is a thin sample. 332 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 951
For a booking, DL 951 is a flight to put a long connection behind. 15.2% of its completed flights arrived an hour or more late, which a short layover will not absorb. If the onward flight is on a separate ticket, the risk sits with you.
Related
Where to go next
- LAX to JFK, every carrier and departure
- JFK to LAX, the return direction
- Delta Air Lines 960 on the same route84.4%
- American Airlines 118 on the same route85.8%
- Delta Air Lines 934 on the same route89.4%
- Delta Air Lines 958 on the same route81.5%
- American Airlines 274 on the same route60.8%
- American Airlines 307 on the same route75.4%
- Los Angeles International (LAX) delay statistics
- John F. Kennedy International (JFK) 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
- The best time of day to fly, according to 7.04 million flight records
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.