Carrier route record

F9CLE→DFW

Frontier Airlines · Cleveland to Dallas-Fort Worth

Flights: 169
Period: September 2025 to August 2026
Share of route: 10%
Carriers: 3

Historical statistics for September 2025 to August 2026, not live status. For today’s flights, check with Frontier Airlines.

Frontier on CLE to DFW 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 77.3%. The late ones land about an hour behind schedule. That rests on 169 flights, with a median arrival 4 minutes early.

The US average over the same twelve months is 77.3%, so there is little to separate Frontier on CLE to DFW from the country as a whole. The variation that matters here is internal: which carrier, and what time of day.

On time

74.1%

Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 166 completed flights

Avg delay

59 min

Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights

Cancelled

1.18%

National rate is 1.89%

Whole route

76.1%

Every carrier on CLE to DFW, 1,615 flights

These figures cover 169 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 9.0% of arrivals land a full hour or more behind schedule, against 8.3% nationally.

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Carrier by carrier

Frontier against every carrier on CLE to DFW

Frontier flew 169 of the 1,615 flights on CLE to DFW, about 10% of it. Its 74.1% on time is 2 points worse than the route as a whole, which runs 76.1%. Ranked by on-time rate it is last of three carriers on the route, where the range runs from Envoy at 86.4% to Frontier at 74.1%. One 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 CLE to DFW
Airline	Flights	On time	Avg delay	Cancelled	Grade
Envoy Airthin sample	24	86.4%	37 min	8.33%	A−
American Airlines	1,422	76.2%	98 min	2.32%	B
Frontier Airlines (this page)thin sample	169	74.1%	59 min	1.18%	C

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Departure window

When Frontier 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.

5am–8am27 flights—
8am–11am34 flights51.5%
11am–2pm35 flights88.6%
2pm–5pm40 flights74.4%
5pm–8pm26 flights—
8pm–5am7 flights—

Scale runs 45% to 95%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.

The best window here is not the first bank but the 11am–2pm slot at 88.6% on time, ahead of 8am–11am at 51.5%. Where the curve peaks mid-day rather than at dawn, the constraint is usually congestion at one end rather than the aircraft's own rotation. The 2pm–5pm window is the busiest, with 40 flights scheduled in it.

Across the year

Frontier on CLE to DFW through the year

Jul–Sep 202517 flights—
Oct–Dec 202533 flights78.8%
Jan–Mar 202621 flights—
Apr–Jun 202664 flights70.3%
Jul–Sep 202634 flights71.9%

Scale runs 60% to 85%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.

Monthly volumes are too low here to break the year into twelve reliable readings. What the twelve-month total says is 74.1% on time across 169 flights.

Quarter by quarter Frontier on CLE to DFW held fairly steady: 78.8% in Oct–Dec 2025, 70.3% in Apr–Jun 2026 and 71.9% in Jul–Sep 2026. A spread of 9 points is about what a sample of this size moves on its own, so the annual figure is a fair summary.

Arrival by arrival

How late Frontier on CLE to DFW runs when it is late

Frontier on CLE to DFW often beats the schedule: 57 of 166 completed flights, 34%, arrived 15 minutes or more early. The 43 late arrivals split 16 under half an hour, 12 between 30 and 60 minutes, and 15 an hour or more.

15+ min early57 flights34.3%
Within 15 min66 flights39.8%
15–29 min late16 flights9.6%
30–59 min late12 flights7.2%
1–2 hours late10 flights6.0%
2+ hours late5 flights3.0%

Scale runs 0% to 100%.

Share of 166 completed flights by arrival against schedule.

8 of 34 late departures made up the time and arrived on time, 24% of them. In the other direction, 17 flights left on time yet arrived 15 minutes late or more, so that delay built up after pushback: in the air, in a holding pattern or on the ground at DFW.

The worst days

Worst days for Frontier on CLE to DFW

The latest arrival of the period was on 23 March 2026, 3 hours 57 minutes behind schedule; most of its delay minutes were filed as carrier-caused (crew, maintenance, fuelling, baggage). The same cause led on three of the five worst days.

The latest arrivals of Frontier on CLE to DFW in the period
Date	Arrived late by	Largest filed cause
23 March 2026	3 hours 57 minutes	Carrier
29 December 2025	2 hours 30 minutes	Carrier
24 November 2025	2 hours 20 minutes	National Airspace System
20 February 2026	2 hours 13 minutes	Carrier
19 June 2026	2 hours 3 minutes	National Airspace System

Delay causes

Why Frontier runs late on this route

National Airspace System accounts for 42% of the 2,530 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.

National Airspace System
42%
Carrier
38%
Late-arriving aircraft
17%
Extreme weather
2%

The largest share of delay minutes, 38%, falls under carrier control: crew scheduling, maintenance, fuelling, baggage. It accounts for 963 of the 2,530 delay minutes reported here. The split is drawn from 2,530 reported delay minutes.

42% of delay minutes are charged to the National Airspace System: air traffic volume, runway configuration, ground stops. No carrier can price its way out of that, which is why airport choice moves the number here more than carrier choice does. That is 1,072 minutes out of 2,530, against a national NAS share of 21%.

Cancellations sit at 1.18% against a national 1.89%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.59%.

Connections and stage length

What a delay here costs

9.0% of arrivals land a full hour or more behind schedule, against 8.3% nationally. Ninety minutes is the honest minimum for a connection here, and two hours if the onward flight is on a separate ticket.

The 1,021 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 is a different operation and performs like one: it runs 78.3% on time across 168 flights, 4 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 4 points of difference.

One caution: this is a thin sample. 169 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 Frontier on CLE to DFW

Put together: treat all of this as provisional. 169 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 74.1% headline is the most reliable number on the page; the hour and month splits below it are built on a few dozen flights each. 166 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.

Where to go next

Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics, on-time performance data, September 2025 to August 2026. Last updated 22 October 2026; recomputed monthly. How this data is collected.

Key figures