Carrier route record
YXBNA→RDU
Republic Airways · Nashville to Raleigh
- Flights
- 952
- Period
- July 2025 to June 2026
- Share of route
- 43%
- Carriers
- 2
Historical statistics for July 2025 to June 2026, not live status. For today’s flights, check with Republic Airways.
Republic on BNA to RDU sits in the middle of the pack with a B. Close to three flights in four arrive on time by the DOT's definition, 2 points worse than the national rate of 77.6%. The late ones land about an hour behind schedule. That rests on 952 flights, with a median arrival 3 minutes early.
The US average over the same twelve months is 77.6%, so there is little to separate Republic on BNA to RDU from the country as a whole. The variation that matters here is internal: which carrier, and what time of day.
Key figures
On time
75.5%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 923 completed flights
Avg delay
59 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
2.84%
National rate is 1.81%
Whole route
75.5%
Every carrier on BNA to RDU, 2,213 flights
These figures cover 952 flights between July 2025 and June 2026. The median arrival is 3 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
Republic against every carrier on BNA to RDU
Republic flew 952 of the 2,213 flights on BNA to RDU, about 43% of it. Its 75.5% on time is about level with the route as a whole at 75.5%. Ranked by on-time rate it is last of two carriers on the route, where the range runs from Southwest at 75.5% to Republic at 75.5%.
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Southwest Airlines | 1,261 | 75.5% | 47 min | 1.19% | B |
| Republic Airways (this page) | 952 | 75.5% | 59 min | 2.84% | B |
Flight by flight
Republic flight numbers on BNA to RDU
Departure window
When Republic runs best on this route
Departure time matters more here than the choice of carrier. The gap between the best and worst window is 18 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–8am223 flights86.0%
- 8am–11am8 flights—
- 11am–2pm351 flights76.0%
- 2pm–5pm111 flights71.3%
- 5pm–8pm236 flights68.0%
- 8pm–5am23 flights—
Scale runs 60% to 90%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
Book the early departure. Flights leaving between 5am–8am arrive on time 86.0% of the time, against 68.0% for the evening window. That is 18 points of difference for no extra money, and it comes from the same aircraft having had no earlier flight to fall behind on. The 11am–2pm window is the busiest, with 351 flights scheduled in it.
Across the year
Republic on BNA to RDU through the year
September is the best month on the calendar at 88.8% 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 93 flights.
Across the week, Saturday is the strongest day at 83.0% on time and Sunday the weakest at 68.4%. 15 points is a smaller lever than departure hour, but it is free.
Delay causes
Why Republic runs late on this route
One category carries most of the weight here. Late-arriving aircraft accounts for 56% of the 13,000 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.
- 56%Late-arriving aircraft
- 21%Carrier
- 20%National Airspace System
- 3%Extreme weather
56% 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 13,000 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 13,323 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 86.0% on time here.
Cancellations run at 2.84%, against 1.81% nationally. That is roughly one flight in 40 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 costs
7.7% 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 about an hour, which a normal layover absorbs.
At 442 miles this is a short hop, and stage length matters more than it looks. A flight this short spends under two hours in the air, which leaves almost nothing to claw back a late pushback with. Delay here is decided on the ground, in the turn, which is why the 5am–8am window matters as much as it does.
The return leg is a different operation and performs like one: it runs 78.9% on time across 954 flights, 3 points above this direction. Departure banks, aircraft rotations and the congestion at each end all differ, so scoring the two directions together would average away a real 3 points of difference.
One caution: this is a thin sample. 952 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 Republic on BNA to RDU
Put together: the delay figures matter less here than the 2.84% cancellation rate. A late arrival costs you about an hour; a cancelled flight costs you the day. Book the 5am–8am departure so there is still a schedule behind you if it goes wrong, and treat a same-day connection as optimistic. 923 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Related
Where to go next
- BNA to RDU, every carrier
- Republic on RDU to BNA, the return leg
- Southwest Airlines on BNA to RDU75.5%
- Republic Airways network-wide record
- Nashville International (BNA) delay statistics
- Raleigh-Durham International (RDU) delay statistics
- The US routes with the most cancellations
- Why the first flight of the morning is statistically safest
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.