Route reliability record
CLT→ORF
Charlotte to Norfolk
- Flights
- 2,491
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Distance
- 290 mi
- Carriers
- 3
This route 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 a little over an hour behind schedule. That rests on 2,491 CLT to ORF flights, of which American Airlines flew 1,490 at 77.6% on time.
Best time to fly CLT to ORF: a 5am–8am departure, ideally on a Wednesday. Flights in that window arrived on time 88.7% of the time and Wednesday flights 84.4%, against 74.1% 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
74.1%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 2,444 completed flights
Avg delay
73 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
1.57%
National rate is 1.89%
Best carrier
American
77.6% on time across 1,490 flights
These figures cover 2,491 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 11.1% 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 CLT to ORF
The choice of carrier is not cosmetic here. American Airlines arrives on time 77.6% of the time; PSA Airlines manages 68.9%. Sample sizes sit next to every figure, because a two-point gap across 997 flights means less than a ten-point one.
| Airline | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| American Airlines | 1,490 | 77.6% | 71 min | 1.54% | B |
| PSA Airlines | 997 | 68.9% | 75 min | 1.50% | C |
| SkyWest Airlinesthin sample | 4 | 66.7% | 298 min | 25.00% | C− |
American leads PSA by 9 points. Real, but small enough that a better departure time on the weaker carrier can outweigh it.
Flight by flight
Flights on CLT to ORF
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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Best ways to make this trip
The most reliable ways to fly Charlotte to Norfolk
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 → ORFCharlotte to Norfolk | American Airlines | 76.4% | 77.6% | 1.54% | 5am–8am, Wed | — |
| 2. CLT → ORFCharlotte to Norfolk | PSA Airlines | 67.9% | 68.9% | 1.50% | 8am–11am, Wed | OH 5622 20:24 |
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 23 points, against 9 points between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am135 flights88.7%
- 8am–11am322 flights85.1%
- 11am–2pm530 flights82.0%
- 2pm–5pm453 flights68.8%
- 5pm–8pm468 flights66.2%
- 8pm–5am583 flights67.7%
Scale runs 60% to 95%.
Book the early departure. Flights leaving between 5am–8am arrive on time 88.7% of the time, against 66.2% for the evening window. That is 23 points of difference for no extra money, and it comes from the same aircraft having had no earlier flight to fall behind on. The 8pm–5am window is the busiest, with 583 flights scheduled in it.
Explore
Filter CLT to ORF 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 ORF, the best departure window is 5am–8am at 88.7% on time and the worst is 5pm–8pm at 66.2%, a wide gap of 22.5 points. All US flights leaving 5am–8am ran 89.3%.
- 5–8am88.7%
- 8–11am85.1%
- 11am–2pm82.0%
- 2–5pm68.8%
- 5–8pm66.2%
- 8pm–5am67.7%
best all US flightsScale 60% to 95%.
Across the year
When delays peak on this route
This route's year swings by 23 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 58.7% on time, 23 points below November, the best at 81.8%. 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. August was the busiest month here, with 243 flights.
Across the week, Wednesday is the strongest day at 84.4% on time and Sunday the weakest at 69.7%, a spread of 15 points.
Delay causes
Why this route gets delayed
Late-arriving aircraft accounts for 54% of the 46,000 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 54%Late-arriving aircraft
- 31%Carrier
- 8%National Airspace System
- 7%Extreme weather
- 0%Security
54% of delay minutes trace back to a late-arriving aircraft, meaning the plane was already behind before it got here. Across 46,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 8 to one. The split is drawn from 46,382 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 88.7% on time here.
Cancellations sit at 1.57% against a national 1.89%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.32%.
Connections and stage length
What a delay here actually costs
11.1% 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.
At 290 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 81.3% on time across 2,491 flights, 7 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 7 points of difference.
The sample behind these figures is 2,491 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 ORF 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. November runs 81.8% on time and July 58.7%, a swing of 23 points. If the dates move at all, move them out of July before you think about anything else. 2,444 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
CLT to ORF questions
How often is CLT to ORF delayed?
About one flight in four arrives at least 15 minutes late, which is the Department of Transportation's definition of a delayed arrival. That works out to 25.9% of the 2,491 flights in this analysis, against 22.7% nationally. Delayed flights are late by a little over an hour on average.
Which airline is most reliable on CLT to ORF?
American Airlines leads at 77.6% on time across 1,490 flights. PSA Airlines is at the other end on 68.9%, a gap of 9 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 ORF?
The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 88.7% on time. The 5pm–8pm window is the weakest at 66.2%, 23 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 ORF?
July is the weakest month at 58.7% on time, compared with 81.8% in November. Across the year that is 23 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
- ORF to CLT — the return legseparate record
- Charlotte Douglas International (CLT) delay statistics
- American Airlines on CLT to ORF77.6%
- PSA Airlines on CLT to ORF68.9%
- CLT to MCO, a related route71.6%
- ATL to ORF, a related route78.7%
- CLT to ORD, a related route72.4%
- American Airlines on-time record77.6%
- PSA Airlines on-time record68.9%
- SkyWest Airlines on-time record66.7%
- Why the first flight of the morning is statistically safest
- How often a connection fails at the major US hubs
Direction matters. CLT to ORF and ORF 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.