Route reliability record
CLT→DEN
Charlotte to Denver
- Flights
- 2,784
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Distance
- 1,337 mi
- Carriers
- 5
This route lands a B, about a point better than the national rate of 77.3%. Roughly one flight in five arrives 15 minutes late or worse, and those flights are late by about an hour on average. That rests on 2,784 CLT to DEN flights, of which United Airlines flew 674 at 86.6% on time.
Best time to fly CLT to DEN: a 8am–11am departure, ideally on a Wednesday. Flights in that window arrived on time 89.9% of the time and Wednesday flights 83.8%, against 78.1% 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
78.1%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 2,739 completed flights
Avg delay
62 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
1.26%
National rate is 1.89%
Best carrier
United
86.6% on time across 674 flights
These figures cover 2,784 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. The median arrival is 7 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.
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Carrier by carrier
Which airline is most reliable on CLT to DEN
The choice of carrier is not cosmetic here. United Airlines arrives on time 86.6% of the time; American Airlines manages 75.3%. Sample sizes sit next to every figure, because a two-point gap across 1,726 flights means less than a ten-point one.
| Airline | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| United Airlines | 674 | 86.6% | 78 min | 1.34% | A |
| SkyWest Airlinesthin sample | 20 | 84.2% | 214 min | 5.00% | B− |
| Southwest Airlinesthin sample | 140 | 75.7% | 42 min | 2.14% | B |
| American Airlines | 1,726 | 75.3% | 60 min | 1.10% | B |
| Frontier Airlinesthin sample | 224 | 74.7% | 59 min | 1.34% | C |
United leads American by 11 points. Real, but small enough that a better departure time on the weaker carrier can outweigh it.
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Best ways to make this trip
The most reliable ways to fly Charlotte to Denver
Every airline on this route, ranked by how often a scheduled flight actually operated and arrived on time, with its best departure time and most punctual flight number. No nearby airport pair beat these.
| Option | Airline | Success | On time | Cancelled | Best departure | Most punctual flight |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. CLT → DENCharlotte to Denver | United Airlines | 85.4% | 86.6% | 1.34% | 8am–11am, Wed | — |
| 2. CLT → DENCharlotte to Denver | American Airlines | 74.5% | 75.3% | 1.10% | 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 22 points, against 11 points between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am154 flights88.9%
- 8am–11am616 flights89.9%
- 11am–2pm591 flights80.0%
- 2pm–5pm465 flights76.1%
- 5pm–8pm602 flights68.8%
- 8pm–5am356 flights68.0%
Scale runs 60% to 95%.
Book the morning departure. Flights leaving between 8am–11am arrive on time 89.9% of the time, against 68.0% for the overnight window. That is 22 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 616 flights scheduled in it.
Explore
Filter CLT to DEN 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 CLT to DEN, the best departure window is 8am–11am at 89.9% on time and the worst is 8pm–5am at 68.0%, a wide gap of 21.9 points. All US flights leaving 8am–11am ran 83.9%.
- 5–8am88.9%
- 8–11am89.9%
- 11am–2pm80.0%
- 2–5pm76.1%
- 5–8pm68.8%
- 8pm–5am68.0%
best all US flightsScale 60% to 95%.
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.
July is the worst month at 62.6% on time, 25 points below January, the best at 87.9%. 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 250 flights.
Across the week, Wednesday is the strongest day at 83.8% on time and Thursday the weakest at 74.3%, a spread of 10 points.
Delay causes
Why this route gets delayed
Late-arriving aircraft accounts for 42% of the 38,000 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 42%Late-arriving aircraft
- 28%Carrier
- 26%National Airspace System
- 3%Extreme weather
- 0%Security
42% of delay minutes trace back to a late-arriving aircraft, meaning the plane was already behind before it got here. Across 38,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 14 to one. The split is drawn from 37,521 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 89.9% on time here.
Cancellations sit at 1.26% against a national 1.89%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.36%.
Connections and stage length
What a delay here actually costs
7.6% 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 about an hour, which a normal layover absorbs.
The 1,337 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 82.5% on time across 2,781 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.
The sample behind these figures is 2,784 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 DEN 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. January runs 87.9% on time and July 62.6%, a swing of 25 points. If the dates move at all, move them out of July before you think about anything else. 2,739 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
CLT to DEN questions
How often is CLT to DEN delayed?
Roughly 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 21.9% of the 2,784 flights in this analysis, against 22.7% nationally. Delayed flights are late by about an hour on average.
Which airline is most reliable on CLT to DEN?
United Airlines leads at 86.6% on time across 674 flights. American Airlines is at the other end on 75.3%, a gap of 11 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 CLT to DEN?
The 8am–11am departure window is the strongest at 89.9% on time. The 8pm–5am window is the weakest at 68.0%, 22 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 July delays on CLT to DEN?
July is the weakest month at 62.6% on time, compared with 87.9% in January. 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
- DEN to CLT — the return legseparate record
- Charlotte Douglas International (CLT) delay statistics
- Denver International (DEN) delay statistics
- United Airlines on CLT to DEN86.6%
- Southwest Airlines on CLT to DEN75.7%
- American Airlines on CLT to DEN75.3%
- Frontier Airlines on CLT to DEN74.7%
- CLT to MCO, a related route71.6%
- PHX to DEN, a related route76.7%
- CLT to ORD, a related route72.4%
- United Airlines on-time record86.6%
- SkyWest Airlines on-time record84.2%
- Southwest Airlines on-time record75.7%
- Same route, different airline: where the carrier you pick matters most
- Why the first flight of the morning is statistically safest
Direction matters. CLT to DEN and DEN to CLT 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.