Flight number record
DL 998
Delta Air Lines · San Antonio to Atlanta
- Route
- SAT → ATL
- Departs
- 08:00
- Flights
- 284
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
Historical statistics for September 2025 to August 2026, not live status. For today’s DL 998, check with Delta Air Lines.
DL 998 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 an hour and a half. That rests on 284 flights, with a median arrival 9 minutes early.
Set against the rest of the country, DL 998's record is 15 points better than the US average of 77.3%. That gap is worth roughly 149 fewer late arrivals for every thousand flights.
Key figures
On time
92.2%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 281 completed flights
Avg delay
88 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
1.06%
National rate is 1.89%
1 hour+ late
2.5%
National rate is 8.3%
These figures cover 284 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. The median arrival is 9 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 998 flies
DL 998 flies SAT to ATL without a single fixed slot. Its most common scheduled departure was 08:00, used on 167 of 284 flights, with 07:55 (60 flights) and 07:40 (57 flights) next.
- Departs 08:00167 flights58.8%
- Departs 07:5560 flights21.1%
- Departs 07:4057 flights20.1%
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 08:00 departure sits in the 8am–11am window. Across every US flight scheduled in that window the on-time rate is 83.9%, and DL 998 runs 8 points better at 92.2%. 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 998 next to SAT to ATL
Every carrier on SAT to ATL combined arrived on time 85.9% of the time across 2,962 flights, so DL 998 is 6 points ahead of it. Delta flew 2,596 flights on the same city pair under all its flight numbers, including this one, and those ran 87.4% 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 998thin sample | 284 | 92.2% | 88 min | 1.06% | A |
| All Delta Air Lines on SAT–ATL | 2,596 | 87.4% | 79 min | 1.93% | A |
| All carriers on SAT–ATL | 2,962 | 85.9% | 76 min | 1.72% | A |
| Delta Air Lines, whole network | 1,039,517 | 81.1% | 71 min | 1.74% | B |
Across the year
DL 998 quarter by quarter
DL 998 did not run the same all year. Its best quarter was Oct–Dec 2025 at 97.4% on time and its weakest Jul–Sep 2026 at 86.9%, a swing of 11 points on roughly 71 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 202577 flights97.4%
- Jan–Mar 202624 flights—
- Apr–Jun 202691 flights91.0%
- Jul–Sep 202662 flights86.9%
Scale runs 80% to 100%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
By weekday, DL 998 ranged from 87.5% on Monday to 95.1% on Wednesday. With about 41 flights behind each day, a spread of 8 points is inside normal variation, so the day you fly is not worth changing for this flight.
Arrival by arrival
How late DL 998 runs when it is late
DL 998 often beats the schedule: 74 of 281 completed flights, 26%, arrived 15 minutes or more early. The 22 late arrivals split 7 under half an hour, 8 between 30 and 60 minutes, and 7 an hour or more.
- 15+ min early74 flights26.3%
- Within 15 min185 flights65.8%
- 15–29 min late7 flights2.5%
- 30–59 min late8 flights2.8%
- 1–2 hours late2 flights0.7%
- 2+ hours late5 flights1.8%
Scale runs 0% to 100%.
Share of 281 completed flights by arrival against schedule.
5 of 21 late departures made up the time and arrived on time, 24% of them. 6 flights left on time and still arrived late.
The worst days
Worst days for DL 998
The latest arrival of the period was on 11 May 2026, 9 hours 10 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 |
|---|---|---|
| 11 May 2026 | 9 hours 10 minutes | Carrier |
| 4 July 2026 | 3 hours 39 minutes | Carrier |
| 7 December 2025 | 3 hours 10 minutes | National Airspace System |
| 22 March 2026 | 2 hours 32 minutes | Carrier |
| 31 July 2026 | 2 hours 28 minutes | Carrier |
Delay causes
Why DL 998 runs late
Carrier accounts for 82% of the 1,929 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 82%Carrier
- 18%National Airspace System
The largest share of delay minutes, 82%, falls under carrier control: crew scheduling, maintenance, fuelling, baggage. It accounts for 1,579 of the 1,929 delay minutes reported here. The split is drawn from 1,929 delay minutes reported on DL 998.
Cancellations sit at 1.06% 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.
The 874 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.
The same number turns up on two other city pairs in the data, including MIA to BOS (62) and BOS to MIA (4), but none flew often enough under DL 998 to report a rate for. Carriers move flight numbers between routes, so the figures on this page apply to SAT to ATL only.
One caution: this is a thin sample. 284 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 998
For a booking, DL 998 has one of the better records a US domestic flight can show: 92.2% on time and 1.06% cancelled. That is a base rate, not a promise about any single day.
Related
Where to go next
- SAT to ATL, every carrier and departure
- ATL to SAT, the return direction
- Delta Air Lines 1073 on the same route93.8%
- Delta Air Lines 1066 on the same route93.1%
- Delta Air Lines 1408 on the same route80.1%
- Delta Air Lines 1676 on the same route86.7%
- San Antonio International (SAT) 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.