Flight number record
DL 989
Delta Air Lines · New York to Atlanta
- Route
- LGA → ATL
- Departs
- 10:00
- Flights
- 328
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
Historical statistics for September 2025 to August 2026, not live status. For today’s DL 989, check with Delta Air Lines.
DL 989 lands a B−, 5 points better than the national rate of 77.3%. About one flight in six arrives 15 minutes late or worse, and those flights are late by about an hour on average. That rests on 328 flights, with a median arrival 12 minutes early.
Set against the rest of the country, DL 989's record is 5 points better than the US average of 77.3%. That gap is worth roughly 50 fewer late arrivals for every thousand flights.
Key figures
On time
82.3%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 317 completed flights
Avg delay
66 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
3.05%
National rate is 1.89%
1 hour+ late
4.4%
National rate is 8.3%
These figures cover 328 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 989 flies
DL 989 flies LGA to ATL without a single fixed slot. Its most common scheduled departure was 10:00, used on 167 of 328 flights, with 09:59 (160 flights) next.
- Departs 10:00167 flights50.9%
- Departs 09:59160 flights48.8%
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 10:00 departure sits in the 8am–11am window. Across every US flight scheduled in that window the on-time rate is 83.9%, and DL 989 runs level with that at 82.3%. 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 989 next to LGA to ATL
Every carrier on LGA to ATL combined arrived on time 75.5% of the time across 8,500 flights, so DL 989 is 7 points ahead of it. Delta flew 4,935 flights on the same city pair under all its flight numbers, including this one, and those ran 79.1% on time. Across its whole network Delta Air Lines managed 81.1%, close to this flight's figure.
| Compared with | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| DL 989thin sample | 328 | 82.3% | 66 min | 3.05% | B− |
| All Delta Air Lines on LGA–ATL | 4,935 | 79.1% | 73 min | 3.55% | B− |
| All carriers on LGA–ATL | 8,500 | 75.5% | 79 min | 4.36% | B− |
| Delta Air Lines, whole network | 1,039,517 | 81.1% | 71 min | 1.74% | B |
Across the year
DL 989 quarter by quarter
DL 989 did not run the same all year. Its best quarter was Jul–Sep 2025 at 96.7% on time and its weakest Oct–Dec 2025 at 72.2%, a swing of 25 points on roughly 66 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 202580 flights72.2%
- Jan–Mar 202676 flights90.1%
- Apr–Jun 202685 flights82.1%
- Jul–Sep 202657 flights79.2%
Scale runs 65% to 100%.
By weekday, DL 989 ranged from 78.6% on Sunday to 87.8% on Tuesday. With about 47 flights behind each day, a spread of 9 points is inside normal variation, so the day you fly is not worth changing for this flight.
Arrival by arrival
How late DL 989 runs when it is late
DL 989 often beats the schedule: 145 of 317 completed flights, 46%, arrived 15 minutes or more early. The 56 late arrivals split 20 under half an hour, 22 between 30 and 60 minutes, and 14 an hour or more.
- 15+ min early145 flights45.7%
- Within 15 min116 flights36.6%
- 15–29 min late20 flights6.3%
- 30–59 min late22 flights6.9%
- 1–2 hours late8 flights2.5%
- 2+ hours late6 flights1.9%
Scale runs 0% to 100%.
Share of 317 completed flights by arrival against schedule.
A late pushback is often recovered here: of 49 departures that left 15 minutes late or more, 15 still arrived on time. In the other direction, 22 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 ATL.
The worst days
Worst days for DL 989
The latest arrival of the period was on 30 October 2025, 11 hours 41 minutes behind schedule; most of its delay minutes were filed as national airspace system delay. On three of the five worst days the largest share was filed as a late-arriving aircraft.
| Date | Arrived late by | Largest filed cause |
|---|---|---|
| 30 October 2025 | 11 hours 41 minutes | National Airspace System |
| 14 December 2025 | 4 hours 20 minutes | National Airspace System |
| 9 July 2026 | 3 hours 47 minutes | Late-arriving aircraft |
| 18 April 2026 | 3 hours 34 minutes | Late-arriving aircraft |
| 27 August 2026 | 3 hours 26 minutes | Late-arriving aircraft |
Delay causes
Why DL 989 runs late
National Airspace System accounts for 45% of the 3,680 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 45%National Airspace System
- 28%Carrier
- 27%Late-arriving aircraft
45% of delay minutes are charged to the National Airspace System: air traffic volume, runway configuration, ground stops. No carrier can price its way out of that, which is why airport choice moves the number here more than carrier choice does. That is 1,673 minutes out of 3,680, against a national NAS share of 21%. The split is drawn from 3,680 delay minutes reported on DL 989.
Cancellations run at 3.05%, against 1.89% nationally. That is roughly 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 4.4% 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.
The 762 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 328 flights under DL 989 in the data flew LGA 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. 328 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 989
For a booking, the cancellation rate is the figure to plan around on DL 989: 3.05% of its 328 scheduled flights did not operate. A late arrival costs about an hour, but a cancellation costs the day, so leave a later option open.
Related
Where to go next
- LGA to ATL, every carrier and departure
- ATL to LGA, the return direction
- Delta Air Lines 550 on the same route89.4%
- Frontier Airlines 3287 on the same route60.8%
- Delta Air Lines 992 on the same route86.0%
- Delta Air Lines 968 on the same route74.1%
- Delta Air Lines 993 on the same route82.6%
- Delta Air Lines 974 on the same route79.6%
- LaGuardia (LGA) 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
- 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.