Route reliability record
BNA→JFK
Nashville to New York
- Flights
- 1,416
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Distance
- 765 mi
- Carriers
- 2
This route carries a cancellation problem, not just a delay problem: 4.7% of scheduled flights never operate, against 1.9% nationally. Of the ones that do fly, close to three flights in four arrive on time, worth a B− overall. The punctuality figure counts only flights that actually departed, so it flatters an operation that cancels this often. That rests on 1,416 BNA to JFK flights, of which Republic Airways flew 867 at 78.0% on time.
Best time to fly BNA to JFK: a 8am–11am departure, ideally on a Monday. Flights in that window arrived on time 86.3% of the time and Monday flights 80.1%, against 76.4% for the route overall.
The US average over the same twelve months is 77.3%, so there is little to separate this route from the country as a whole. The variation that matters here is internal: which carrier, and what time of day.
Key figures
On time
76.4%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 1,340 completed flights
Avg delay
69 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
4.66%
National rate is 1.89%
Best carrier
Republic
78.0% on time across 867 flights
These figures cover 1,416 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 8.9% of arrivals land a full hour or more behind schedule, against 8.3% nationally.
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Carrier by carrier
Which airline is most reliable on BNA to JFK
The two carriers here are closely matched: 4 points separate the best from the worst. At that spread, schedule and price are better tie-breakers than reliability. Sample sizes are shown so you can see which rows are worth weighing.
| Airline | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Republic Airways | 867 | 78.0% | 65 min | 3.11% | B− |
| JetBlue Airways | 549 | 73.8% | 74 min | 7.10% | C− |
JetBlue Airways cancels 7.1% of what it schedules here, the highest in the table. A cancelled flight never appears in an on-time rate, so read that column alongside the punctuality one rather than after it.
Flight by flight
Flights on BNA to JFK
The flight numbers below flew this route at least 250 times in the period, busiest first. Each has its own record, with its schedule and delay causes.
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Best ways to make this trip
The most reliable ways to fly Nashville to New York
Every airline on this route and on the routes between nearby airports, ranked by how often a scheduled flight actually operated and arrived on time. 3 of the top 5 use a different airport at one end.
| Option | Airline | Success | On time | Cancelled | Best departure | Most punctual flight |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. BNA → JFKNashville to New York | Republic Airways | 75.6% | 78.0% | 3.11% | 8am–11am, Mon | YX 4712 12:00 |
| 2. BNA → EWRNashville to Newark | United Airlines | 73.6% | 75.4% | 2.44% | 5am–8am, Tue | — |
| 3. BNA → LGANashville to New York | Republic Airways | 70.2% | 73.7% | 4.70% | 5am–8am, Sat | YX 4676 10:37 |
| 4. BNA → JFKNashville to New York | JetBlue Airways | 68.6% | 73.8% | 7.10% | 5am–8am, Fri | B6 1174 13:53 |
| 5. BNA → LGANashville to New York | Southwest Airlines | 66.7% | 68.2% | 2.27% | 5am–8am, Wed | — |
Success is the share of scheduled flights that operated and arrived less than 15 minutes late, so a cancelled flight counts against it. “(route)” means the best time comes from every carrier on the route rather than this airline alone.
Departure window
The best time of day to leave
Departure time matters more here than the choice of carrier. The gap between the best and worst window is 35 points, against 4 points between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am230 flights84.2%
- 8am–11am344 flights86.3%
- 11am–2pm526 flights75.3%
- 2pm–5pm188 flights67.8%
- 5pm–8pm128 flights50.9%
- 8pm–5am—
Scale runs 40% to 90%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
The 5pm–8pm window is where this operation falls apart: 50.9% on time, against 86.3% for the 8am–11am slot. By evening the aircraft flying these rotations have absorbed a full day of small delays and there is no slack left to recover in. The 11am–2pm window is the busiest, with 526 flights scheduled in it.
Explore
Filter BNA to JFK by airline, time, month and day
Pick a breakdown and a carrier. The dashed mark on each row is the same slice for every US flight.
On BNA to JFK, the best departure window is 8am–11am at 86.3% on time and the worst is 5pm–8pm at 50.9%, a wide gap of 35.4 points. All US flights leaving 8am–11am ran 83.9%.
- 5–8am84.2%
- 8–11am86.3%
- 11am–2pm75.3%
- 2–5pm67.8%
- 5–8pm50.9%
- 8pm–5am—
best all US flightsScale 40% to 95%. Cells under 30 flights show a dash.
Across the year
When delays peak on this route
This route's year swings by 25 points from best month to worst, which is wide. An annual average tells you very little about the week you are actually flying, so read the strip rather than the headline if your dates are fixed.
August is the worst month at 64.7% on time, 25 points below September, the best at 89.4%. Summer afternoon convection and peak-season schedules land on the same weeks every year, so this is a pattern you can book around rather than a run of bad luck. October was the busiest month here, with 157 flights.
Across the week, Monday is the strongest day at 80.1% on time and Thursday the weakest at 70.5%, a spread of 10 points.
Delay causes
Why this route gets delayed
Late-arriving aircraft accounts for 47% of the 22,000 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 47%Late-arriving aircraft
- 28%National Airspace System
- 24%Carrier
- 2%Extreme weather
- 0%Security
47% of delay minutes trace back to a late-arriving aircraft, meaning the plane was already behind before it got here. Across 22,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 31 to one. The split is drawn from 21,677 reported delay minutes.
The practical consequence: the 8am–11am departure is the one that starts clean. Its aircraft has no earlier leg to be late from, which is exactly why that window shows 86.3% on time here.
Cancellations run at 4.66%, against 1.89% nationally. That is about one flight in twenty 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 stage length
What a delay here actually costs
8.9% of arrivals land an hour or more late, close to the national 8.3%, so a 60 to 75 minute layover is reasonable here while anything under 45 minutes is a bet. Most delays on this route last a little over an hour, which a normal layover absorbs.
The 765 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 return leg runs 74.4% on time across 1,412 flights, within 2 points of this direction. The two legs are scored separately because they usually differ; on this city pair they happen not to.
The sample behind these figures is 1,416 flights, enough that the headline rate is stable to within roughly a point. The hour-block and month splits divide that further, so read the thinner bars with more caution than the headline.
Work out the risk of missing a connection in JFK after this flight
What to do with this
Booking this route
Put together: the delay figures matter less here than the 4.66% cancellation rate. A late arrival costs you a little over an hour; a cancelled flight costs you the day. Book the 8am–11am departure so there is still a schedule behind you if it goes wrong, and treat a same-day connection as optimistic. 1,340 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
BNA to JFK questions
How often is BNA to JFK delayed?
About one flight in four arrives at least 15 minutes late, which is the Department of Transportation's definition of a delayed arrival. That works out to 23.6% of the 1,416 flights in this analysis, against 22.7% nationally. Delayed flights are late by a little over an hour on average.
Which airline is most reliable on BNA to JFK?
Republic Airways leads at 78.0% on time across 867 flights. JetBlue Airways is at the other end on 73.8%, a gap of 4 points. Sample size matters as much as the percentage: a rate built from a few hundred flights moves around far more than one built from ten thousand.
What time of day has the fewest delays on BNA to JFK?
The 8am–11am departure window is the strongest at 86.3% on time. The 5pm–8pm window is the weakest at 50.9%, 35 points behind. Later departures inherit delays from earlier flights the same aircraft has already flown, which is why the curve slopes the way it does.
How bad are August delays on BNA to JFK?
August is the weakest month at 64.7% on time, compared with 89.4% in September. Across the year that is 25 points between the best and worst months. Moving flexible dates out of that month is one of the few things that reliably helps.
Related
Where to go next
- JFK to BNA — the return legseparate record
- Nashville International (BNA) delay statistics
- John F. Kennedy International (JFK) delay statistics
- Republic Airways on BNA to JFK78.0%
- JetBlue Airways on BNA to JFK73.8%
- BNA to ORD, a related route70.9%
- LAX to JFK, a related route77.5%
- BNA to DCA, a related route71.3%
- Republic Airways on-time record78.0%
- JetBlue Airways on-time record73.8%
- The US routes with the most cancellations
- Why the first flight of the morning is statistically safest
Direction matters. BNA to JFK and JFK to BNA are scored separately because they are separate operations, with different departure banks and different aircraft. Compare the return leg.
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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.