Carrier route record

DLAUS→MSP

Delta Air Lines · Austin to Minneapolis

Flights: 1,021
Period: July 2025 to June 2026
Share of route: 61%
Carriers: 3

Historical statistics for July 2025 to June 2026, not live status. For today’s flights, check with Delta Air Lines.

Delta on AUS to MSP lands a B, level with the national rate of 77.6%. Roughly one flight in four arrives 15 minutes late or worse, and those flights are late by an hour and a half on average. That is a workable record, not a spotless one. That rests on 1,021 flights, with a median arrival 6 minutes early.

The US average over the same twelve months is 77.6%, so there is little to separate Delta on AUS to MSP from the country as a whole. The variation that matters here is internal: which carrier, and what time of day.

On time

77.5%

Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 1,004 completed flights

Avg delay

92 min

Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights

Cancelled

1.27%

National rate is 1.81%

Whole route

76.6%

Every carrier on AUS to MSP, 1,678 flights

These figures cover 1,021 flights between July 2025 and June 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 8.7% 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.

Carrier by carrier

Delta against every carrier on AUS to MSP

Delta flew 1,021 of the 1,678 flights on AUS to MSP, most of the route. Its 77.5% on time is about level with the route as a whole at 76.6%. Ranked by on-time rate it is number two of three carriers on the route, where the range runs from SkyWest at 84.6% to Southwest at 66.1%. Two of those carriers flew fewer than 365 flights here, so treat their positions as rough.

Only one carrier clears this site's 365-flight floor here, so there is no comparison to draw. The table below is the full picture.

On-time performance by carrier on AUS to MSP
Airline	Flights	On time	Avg delay	Cancelled	Grade
SkyWest Airlinesthin sample	321	84.6%	111 min	0.31%	B+
Delta Air Lines (this page)	1,021	77.5%	92 min	1.27%	B
Southwest Airlinesthin sample	336	66.1%	45 min	0.00%	C+

Flight by flight

Delta flight numbers on AUS to MSP

Departure window

When Delta runs best on this route

Departure time matters more here than the choice of carrier. The gap between the best and worst window is 20 points, against half a point between the best and worst carrier. Each bar is the on-time rate for flights scheduled inside that window.

5am–8am365 flights89.5%
8am–11am—
11am–2pm53 flights77.4%
2pm–5pm316 flights71.3%
5pm–8pm287 flights69.4%
8pm–5am—

Scale runs 60% to 95%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.

Book the early departure. Flights leaving between 5am–8am arrive on time 89.5% of the time, against 69.4% for the evening window. That is 20 points of difference for no extra money, and it comes from the same aircraft having had no earlier flight to fall behind on. The 5am–8am window is the busiest, with 365 flights scheduled in it.

Across the year

Delta on AUS to MSP through the year

Darker means more delays. Figures are on-time percentages.September best, November worst

September is the best month on the calendar at 89.3% on time. Shoulder season thins the schedule and takes the summer weather with it, and the operation gets its margin back. January was the busiest month here, with 90 flights.

Across the week, Monday is the strongest day at 83.7% on time and Sunday the weakest at 73.2%. 11 points is a smaller lever than departure hour, but it is free.

Delay causes

Why Delta runs late on this route

One category carries most of the weight here. Carrier accounts for 50% of the 21,000 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.

Carrier
50%
Late-arriving aircraft
37%
National Airspace System
10%
Extreme weather
2%

37% of delay minutes trace back to a late-arriving aircraft, meaning the plane was already behind before it got here. That is a cascade, and cascades start small and grow through the day. Across 21,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 18 to one. It is the strongest argument for booking the first departure of the morning, when the aircraft has been sitting at the gate overnight with nothing to inherit. The split is drawn from 20,868 reported delay minutes.

The largest share of delay minutes, 50%, 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 10,000 of the 21,000 delay minutes reported here.

Cancellations sit at 1.27% against a national 1.81%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.39%.

Connections and stage length

What a delay here costs

8.7% of arrivals land an hour or more late, close to the national 8.1%. That is the figure that decides a connection, and it says a 60 to 75 minute layover is reasonable here while anything under 45 minutes is a bet. Most delays on this route last an hour and a half, which a normal layover absorbs.

The 1,042 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. It is also long enough that the aircraft usually flies three or four legs a day rather than six, which slows how fast delay compounds.

The return leg runs 77.4% on time across 1,021 flights, within half a point of this direction. The two legs are scored separately because they usually differ; on this city pair they happen not to.

One caution: this is a thin sample. 1,021 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 Delta on AUS to MSP

Put together: treat all of this as provisional. 1,021 flights over twelve months is enough to clear this site's floor and not enough to be confident to better than a couple of points. The 77.5% headline is the most reliable number on the page; the hour and month splits below it are built on a few dozen flights each. 1,004 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.

Where to go next

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.

Key figures