Guide
Flying in October: calm weather, and the airports that still struggle
October 2025 ran 79.7% on time against 77.3% for the year. Weather almost vanished; Honolulu (HNL) led at 87.4% and New York (LGA) trailed at 66.8%.
October is the month when weather almost disappears from the delay figures. In October 2025, extreme weather accounted for a smaller share of delay minutes than in any other month of the year, the summer storms were over and the first snow had not arrived. The national on-time rate was 79.7%, against 77.3% for the full year from September 2025 to August 2026.
That makes October a useful test. With the weather taken out, what is left is the structure of each airport: its runways, its schedule, its place in the air traffic system. The airports at the bottom of the October table are there because of what they are, not because of what the sky did. When I want to judge an airport rather than its weather, October is the month I open first.
The ranking
US average 79.7%
60.0%90.0%
Flights departing each airport in October 2025, scored on arrival. The dashed line is the national October figure. Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics, September 2025 to August 2026.
Honolulu (HNL) led at 87.4%, with Salt Lake City in October at 85.7%. Behind them came two northern Delta hubs that are usually mid-table: Detroit at 85.3% and Minneapolis at 84.7%. Both ran October well above their annual averages of 76.7% and 79.2%. Delta at Detroit had one of its best months of the year. These are hubs whose worst months are in winter, and October is the last month before winter reaches them.
The median airport ran 80.3% and 33 of the 60 airports cleared 80%. Near the bottom are the two hubs that rank near the bottom of every table: O'Hare in October ran 74.7% and Dallas-Fort Worth 75.0%. Both were better than their own annual averages. October lifts almost everyone, and those two simply start lowest. The very bottom of the table is where October gets specific.
New York's bad October
New York (LGA) came last. LaGuardia in October ran 66.8% on time against 72.4% for its year, and Newark in October ran 71.0% against 77.4%. For both it was one of the two weakest months of the twelve, worse than their summer.
The cause codes point away from the weather and away from the airlines. On both airports' October pages, the National Aviation System category, which covers air traffic control, airspace volume and non-extreme weather, carried a much bigger share of delay minutes than usual. Across the full year that category takes 29% of LaGuardia's delay minutes and 29% of Newark's; in October it took more than a third at both.
The carrier figures agree. Every airline with a page at LaGuardia had a bad October at once.
US average 79.7%
55.0%85.0%
Bars are October 2025; the figure under each is that airline's full-year rate at the airport. Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics, September 2025 to August 2026.
Southwest, United, American, Delta and Republic at LaGuardia all ran October several points below their annual level there, and United at Newark did the same. When five airlines with different fleets, crews and operations fall together at one airport, the constraint is the airport or the airspace above it, not any of the carriers.
I trust that kind of pattern more than any single airline's figure.
JFK is the useful control. JFK in October ran 74.2%, close to its annual 74.3%, and its airlines ran about normally. The three airports share a metropolitan airspace but not the same runways or the same approach flows.
A likely contributor sits outside the data. The federal government shutdown began on 1 October 2025, and air traffic controllers worked without pay through it. Staffing shortfalls at facilities serving the New York area would show up exactly this way: arrival rates cut, delays coded to the air traffic system, and every airline at the affected airports hit at once. The data is consistent with that; it cannot prove it. The air traffic control guide covers how the NAS category behaves at each airport across a full year.
Columbus Day weekend
The October long weekend was the worst stretch of the month. The 2025 Columbus Day weekend ran 74.4% on time against 81.8% in the normal weeks either side, 7.4 points worse. The earlier years looked nothing like it.
During the holidayNormal weeks either side
65.0%90.0%
All US flights. Normal weeks are the two weeks either side of the window, excluding other holidays. Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics, September 2025 to August 2026.
In 2023 the weekend ran 84.0% and in 2024 84.8%, both close to their surrounding weeks. The holiday itself adds little traffic; it is a long weekend for some workers and schools, not a national travel peak. What went wrong in 2025 fell on three of the four days, with only the Saturday close to normal, and in a handful of places: Newark, LaGuardia, JFK and Boston in the Northeast, plus an unusually poor weekend at Phoenix, where departures ran far below their normal level. LaGuardia and Boston also cancelled a meaningful share of their flights over the four days. The holiday page keeps every year side by side.
The lesson is not that Columbus Day is a bad weekend to fly. Two years out of three it was ordinary. It is that the long weekend carries whatever the weather and the air traffic system are doing that week, and in 2025 the Northeast had a bad one.
Airlines
US average 79.7%
65.0%90.0%
Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics, September 2025 to August 2026.
Delta Air Lines led at 84.0%. JetBlue Airways finished last at 74.6%, which for JetBlue was actually a little better than its full-year 71.3%: it sits at the bottom of most months. The more telling line is Republic, second from bottom at 76.2% against 78.1% for its year. Republic flies a large regional schedule out of LaGuardia and Newark, and its departures from both ran far below their usual level in October. An airline's October figure in this data is partly a measure of how much of its flying touches those two airports.
How I would use October
October is a good month nearly everywhere. Outside the New York area, most airports ran October at or above their annual average, and the weather risk is the lowest of the year.
For New York, pick JFK. In October 2025 JFK held its normal level while LaGuardia fell to 66.8% and Newark to 71.0%. Until another October shows that was a one-off, I would not book LaGuardia or Newark for an October trip with a connection behind it. The New York airports guide covers the three fields across a full year; in a month when the air traffic system is the constraint, the gap between them widens.
The hour still matters in a calm month. Added up across the October pages of all 60 airports, the 5pm–8pm departures ran about twenty points behind the 5am–8am ones, close to the 21.3-point gap for the whole year. Taking the weather out does not take out the chain of late aircraft through the day.
Fly the long weekend early in the day. On the 2025 Columbus Day weekend the first wave held up far better than the evening, the same shape as any other day, stretched further.
Use the calm to connect. A connection through Detroit, Minneapolis or Salt Lake City in October is about as safe as a connection gets in US flying. The connection risk tool puts a number on it for your inbound route.
Check the October pages: LaGuardia in October · Newark in October · JFK in October · Detroit in October · Columbus Day weekend