Route reliability record
BOS→CMH
Boston to Columbus
- Flights
- 2,003
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Distance
- 640 mi
- Carriers
- 3
This route lands a B, 3 points better than the national rate of 77.3%. About one flight in five arrives 15 minutes late or worse, and those flights are late by a little over an hour on average. That rests on 2,003 BOS to CMH flights, with a median arrival 11 minutes early.
Best time to fly BOS to CMH: a 5am–8am departure, ideally on a Thursday. Flights in that window arrived on time 93.3% of the time and Thursday flights 83.4%, against 80.3% 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
80.3%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 1,945 completed flights
Avg delay
73 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
2.70%
National rate is 1.89%
Best carrier
Republic
79.6% on time across 1,886 flights
These figures cover 2,003 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 8.5% 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 BOS to CMH
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 Airlinesthin sample | 18 | 94.4% | 28 min | 0.00% | A+ |
| Envoy Airthin sample | 99 | 89.9% | 71 min | 0.00% | A+ |
| Republic Airways | 1,886 | 79.6% | 74 min | 2.86% | B |
Flight by flight
Flights on BOS to CMH
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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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 26 points, against half a point between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am93 flights93.3%
- 8am–11am582 flights89.5%
- 11am–2pm179 flights87.2%
- 2pm–5pm548 flights79.8%
- 5pm–8pm577 flights67.8%
- 8pm–5am24 flights—
Scale runs 60% to 100%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
Book the early departure. Flights leaving between 5am–8am arrive on time 93.3% of the time, against 67.8% for the evening window. That is 26 points of difference for no extra money, and it comes from the same aircraft having had no earlier flight to fall behind on. The 8am–11am window is the busiest, with 582 flights scheduled in it.
Explore
Filter BOS to CMH 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 BOS to CMH, the best departure window is 5am–8am at 93.3% on time and the worst is 5pm–8pm at 67.8%, a wide gap of 25.5 points. All US flights leaving 5am–8am ran 89.3%.
- 5–8am93.3%
- 8–11am89.5%
- 11am–2pm87.2%
- 2–5pm79.8%
- 5–8pm67.8%
- 8pm–5am—
best all US flightsScale 60% to 100%. Cells under 30 flights show a dash.
Across the year
When delays peak on this route
This route's year swings by 15 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.
Delays peak in October, when the on-time rate falls to 72.9%. June is the strongest month at 88.0%. Moving a flexible trip across that boundary buys 15 points. September was the busiest month here, with 180 flights.
Across the week, Thursday is the strongest day at 83.4% on time and Sunday the weakest at 76.3%, a spread of 7 points.
Delay causes
Why this route gets delayed
Late-arriving aircraft accounts for 52% of the 28,000 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 52%Late-arriving aircraft
- 31%Carrier
- 14%National Airspace System
- 2%Extreme weather
- 0%Security
52% of delay minutes trace back to a late-arriving aircraft, meaning the plane was already behind before it got here. Across 28,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 24 to one. The split is drawn from 28,127 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 93.3% on time here.
Cancellations run at 2.70%, against 1.89% nationally. That is about 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 actually costs
8.5% 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 640 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 82.5% on time across 2,005 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 2,003 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 CMH after this flight
What to do with this
Booking this route
Put together: the calendar is the biggest lever here, not the carrier or the hour. June runs 88.0% on time and October 72.9%, a swing of 15 points. If the dates move at all, move them out of October before you think about anything else. 1,945 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
BOS to CMH questions
How often is BOS to CMH delayed?
About one flight in five arrives at least 15 minutes late, which is the Department of Transportation's definition of a delayed arrival. That works out to 19.7% of the 2,003 flights in this analysis, against 22.7% nationally. Delayed flights are late by a little over an hour on average.
How reliable is BOS to CMH compared with the rest of the country?
80.3% of flights arrive on time here against a national 77.3%, a difference of 3 points in its favour. That is worth a B on this site's grading scale.
What time of day has the fewest delays on BOS to CMH?
The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 93.3% on time. The 5pm–8pm window is the weakest at 67.8%, 26 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 October delays on BOS to CMH?
October is the weakest month at 72.9% on time, compared with 88.0% in June. Across the year that is 15 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
- CMH to BOS — the return legseparate record
- Boston Logan International (BOS) delay statistics
- John Glenn Columbus International (CMH) delay statistics
- BOS to DCA, a related route72.6%
- ORD to CMH, a related route73.5%
- BOS to ORD, a related route71.9%
- Spirit Airlines on-time record94.4%
- Envoy Air on-time record89.9%
- Republic Airways on-time record79.6%
- The US routes with the most cancellations
- Why the first flight of the morning is statistically safest
Direction matters. BOS to CMH and CMH to BOS 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.