Flight number record
DL 979
Delta Air Lines · Los Angeles to New York
- Route
- LAX → JFK
- Departs
- 07:00
- Flights
- 363
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
Historical statistics for September 2025 to August 2026, not live status. For today’s DL 979, check with Delta Air Lines.
DL 979 earns an A−. More than four flights in five arrive inside the 15-minute window the DOT uses to define an on-time arrival, which puts it 9 points better than the national rate of 77.3%. When something does go wrong the average delay runs an hour and a half. That rests on 363 flights, with a median arrival 12 minutes early.
Set against the rest of the country, DL 979's record is 9 points better than the US average of 77.3%. That gap is worth roughly 93 fewer late arrivals for every thousand flights.
Key figures
On time
86.6%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 344 completed flights
Avg delay
89 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
3.31%
National rate is 1.89%
1 hour+ late
4.7%
National rate is 8.3%
These figures cover 363 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. The median arrival is 12 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 979 flies
DL 979 flies LAX to JFK without a single fixed slot. Its most common scheduled departure was 07:00, used on 192 of 363 flights, with 07:45 (93 flights) next.
- Departs 07:00192 flights52.9%
- Departs 07:4593 flights25.6%
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 07:00 departure sits in the 5am–8am window. Across every US flight scheduled in that window the on-time rate is 89.3%, and DL 979 runs 3 points worse at 86.6%. 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 979 next to LAX to JFK
Every carrier on LAX to JFK combined arrived on time 77.5% of the time across 10,289 flights, so DL 979 is 9 points ahead of it. Delta flew 3,367 flights on the same city pair under all its flight numbers, including this one, and those ran 79.4% on time. Across its whole network Delta Air Lines managed 81.1%, which this flight beats by 6 points.
| Compared with | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| DL 979thin sample | 363 | 86.6% | 89 min | 3.31% | A− |
| All Delta Air Lines on LAX–JFK | 3,367 | 79.4% | 87 min | 2.61% | B |
| All carriers on LAX–JFK | 10,289 | 77.5% | 90 min | 2.90% | B |
| Delta Air Lines, whole network | 1,039,517 | 81.1% | 71 min | 1.74% | B |
Across the year
DL 979 quarter by quarter
DL 979 did not run the same all year. Its best quarter was Apr–Jun 2026 at 95.5% on time and its weakest Jul–Sep 2026 at 82.1%, a swing of 13 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 202530 flights—
- Oct–Dec 202590 flights83.7%
- Jan–Mar 202690 flights82.4%
- Apr–Jun 202691 flights95.5%
- Jul–Sep 202662 flights82.1%
Scale runs 75% to 100%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
By weekday, DL 979 ranged from 80.4% on Sunday to 91.8% on Friday. With about 52 flights behind each day, a spread of 11 points is inside normal variation, so the day you fly is not worth changing for this flight.
Arrival by arrival
How late DL 979 runs when it is late
DL 979 often beats the schedule: 154 of 344 completed flights, 45%, arrived 15 minutes or more early. The 46 late arrivals split 14 under half an hour, 16 between 30 and 60 minutes, and 16 an hour or more.
- 15+ min early154 flights44.8%
- Within 15 min144 flights41.9%
- 15–29 min late14 flights4.1%
- 30–59 min late16 flights4.7%
- 1–2 hours late7 flights2.0%
- 2+ hours late9 flights2.6%
Scale runs 0% to 100%.
Share of 344 completed flights by arrival against schedule.
A late pushback is often recovered here: of 46 departures that left 15 minutes late or more, 15 still arrived on time. 15 flights left on time and still arrived late.
The worst days
Worst days for DL 979
The latest arrival of the period was on 15 August 2026, 8 hours 10 minutes behind schedule; most of its delay minutes were filed as carrier-caused (crew, maintenance, fuelling, baggage). Three of the five worst days fell in January 2026.
| Date | Arrived late by | Largest filed cause |
|---|---|---|
| 15 August 2026 | 8 hours 10 minutes | Carrier |
| 10 February 2026 | 6 hours 56 minutes | Carrier |
| 29 January 2026 | 6 hours 43 minutes | Carrier |
| 5 January 2026 | 4 hours 32 minutes | Carrier |
| 6 January 2026 | 3 hours 59 minutes | Carrier |
Delay causes
Why DL 979 runs late
Carrier accounts for 77% of the 4,084 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 77%Carrier
- 22%National Airspace System
- 1%Extreme weather
The largest share of delay minutes, 77%, falls under carrier control: crew scheduling, maintenance, fuelling, baggage. It accounts for 3,160 of the 4,084 delay minutes reported here. The split is drawn from 4,084 delay minutes reported on DL 979.
Cancellations run at 3.31%, against 1.89% nationally. That is about one flight in 30 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
Badly late arrivals are rare here: only 4.7% 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 2,475 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.
Every one of the 363 flights under DL 979 in the data flew LAX to JFK. 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 979
For a booking, the cancellation rate is the figure to plan around on DL 979: 3.31% of its 363 scheduled flights did not operate. A late arrival costs an hour and a half, but a cancellation costs the day, so leave a later option open.
Related
Where to go next
- LAX to JFK, every carrier and departure
- JFK to LAX, the return direction
- Delta Air Lines 934 on the same route86.7%
- Delta Air Lines 960 on the same route83.1%
- American Airlines 118 on the same route83.6%
- American Airlines 307 on the same route74.6%
- Delta Air Lines 958 on the same route82.4%
- American Airlines 274 on the same route57.9%
- 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
- 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, September 2025 to August 2026. Last updated ; recomputed monthly. How this data is collected.