Carrier route record
WNBNA→MCO
Southwest Airlines · Nashville to Orlando
- Flights
- 2,587
- Period
- July 2025 to June 2026
- Share of route
- 75%
- Carriers
- 4
Historical statistics for July 2025 to June 2026, not live status. For today’s flights, check with Southwest Airlines.
Southwest on BNA to MCO sits in the middle of the pack with a C+. Close to three flights in four arrive on time by the DOT's definition, 3 points worse than the national rate of 77.6%. The late ones land about 50 minutes behind schedule. That rests on 2,587 flights, with a median arrival 2 minutes early.
The US average over the same twelve months is 77.6%, so there is little to separate Southwest on BNA to MCO from the country as a whole. The variation that matters here is internal: which carrier, and what time of day.
Key figures
On time
74.2%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 2,556 completed flights
Avg delay
51 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
0.77%
National rate is 1.81%
Whole route
75.0%
Every carrier on BNA to MCO, 3,465 flights
These figures cover 2,587 flights between July 2025 and June 2026. The median arrival is 2 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.
Carrier by carrier
Southwest against every carrier on BNA to MCO
Southwest flew 2,587 of the 3,465 flights on BNA to MCO, most of the route. Its 74.2% on time is about level with the route as a whole at 75.0%. Ranked by on-time rate it is number three of four carriers on the route, where the range runs from Spirit at 78.2% to Frontier at 73.5%. 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.
| Airline | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Spirit Airlines | 713 | 78.2% | 84 min | 4.63% | B− |
| Republic Airwaysthin sample | 29 | 75.9% | 48 min | 0.00% | B+ |
| Southwest Airlines (this page) | 2,587 | 74.2% | 51 min | 0.77% | C+ |
| Frontier Airlinesthin sample | 136 | 73.5% | 81 min | 0.00% | C+ |
Departure window
When Southwest runs best on this route
Departure time matters more here than the choice of carrier. The gap between the best and worst window is 37 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–8am550 flights90.9%
- 8am–11am458 flights85.0%
- 11am–2pm396 flights78.7%
- 2pm–5pm500 flights64.6%
- 5pm–8pm493 flights54.3%
- 8pm–5am190 flights66.7%
Scale runs 45% to 95%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
The 5pm–8pm window is where this operation falls apart: 54.3% on time, against 90.9% for the 5am–8am 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 5am–8am window is the busiest, with 550 flights scheduled in it.
Across the year
Southwest on BNA to MCO through the year
September is the best month on the calendar at 89.1% on time. Shoulder season thins the schedule and takes the summer weather with it, and the operation gets its margin back. June was the busiest month here, with 264 flights.
Across the week, Tuesday is the strongest day at 85.0% on time and Sunday the weakest at 67.0%. 18 points is a smaller lever than departure hour, but it is free.
Delay causes
Why Southwest runs late on this route
One category carries most of the weight here. Late-arriving aircraft accounts for 47% of the 34,000 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.
- 47%Late-arriving aircraft
- 27%Carrier
- 23%National Airspace System
- 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. That is a cascade, and cascades start small and grow through the day. Across 34,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 28 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 33,619 reported delay minutes.
The practical consequence: the 5am–8am departure is the one that starts clean. Its aircraft has no earlier leg to be late from, which is exactly why that window shows 90.9% on time here.
Cancellations are rare at 0.77%, below the national 1.81% and low enough to earn the plus on the grade. Roughly one flight in 100 is called off; the risk here is arriving late, not not arriving.
Connections and stage length
What a delay here costs
6.3% 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 about 50 minutes, which a normal layover absorbs.
The 616 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 74.8% on time across 2,590 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.
The sample behind these figures is 2,587 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.
What to do with this
Booking Southwest on BNA to MCO
Put together: the calendar is the biggest lever here, not the carrier or the hour. September runs 89.1% on time and May 59.8%, a swing of 29 points. If the dates move at all, move them out of May before you think about anything else. 2,556 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Related
Where to go next
- BNA to MCO, every carrier
- Southwest on MCO to BNA, the return leg
- Spirit Airlines on BNA to MCO78.2%
- Frontier Airlines on BNA to MCO73.5%
- Southwest Airlines network-wide record
- Nashville International (BNA) delay statistics
- Orlando International (MCO) delay statistics
- Why the first flight of the morning is statistically safest
- The best time of day to fly, according to 7.04 million flight records
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.