Route reliability record
CMH→BOS
Columbus to Boston
- Flights
- 2,005
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Distance
- 640 mi
- Carriers
- 3
This route lands a B, 5 points better than the national rate of 77.3%. About one flight in six arrives 15 minutes late or worse, and those flights are late by about an hour on average. That rests on 2,005 CMH to BOS flights, with a median arrival 13 minutes early.
Best time to fly CMH to BOS: a 5am–8am departure, ideally on a Saturday. Flights in that window arrived on time 93.8% of the time and Saturday flights 85.5%, against 82.5% for the route overall.
Set against the rest of the country, this route's record is 5 points better than the US average of 77.3%. That gap is worth roughly 52 fewer late arrivals for every thousand flights.
Key figures
On time
82.5%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 1,956 completed flights
Avg delay
64 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
2.29%
National rate is 1.89%
Best carrier
Republic
83.6% on time across 1,888 flights
These figures cover 2,005 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. The median arrival is 13 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 CMH to BOS
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Republic Airways | 1,888 | 83.6% | 61 min | 2.44% | B |
| Envoy Airthin sample | 99 | 71.7% | 86 min | 0.00% | C+ |
| Spirit Airlinesthin sample | 18 | 22.2% | 71 min | 0.00% | F+ |
Flight by flight
Flights on CMH to BOS
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 33 points, against half a point between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am544 flights93.8%
- 8am–11am291 flights91.6%
- 11am–2pm569 flights83.9%
- 2pm–5pm159 flights60.8%
- 5pm–8pm400 flights66.3%
- 8pm–5am42 flights84.6%
Scale runs 50% to 100%.
Book the early departure. Flights leaving between 5am–8am arrive on time 93.8% of the time, against 60.8% for the afternoon window. That is 33 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 569 flights scheduled in it.
Explore
Filter CMH to BOS 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 CMH to BOS, the best departure window is 5am–8am at 93.8% on time and the worst is 2pm–5pm at 60.8%, a wide gap of 33.0 points. All US flights leaving 5am–8am ran 89.3%.
- 5–8am93.8%
- 8–11am91.6%
- 11am–2pm83.9%
- 2–5pm60.8%
- 5–8pm66.3%
- 8pm–5am84.6%
best all US flightsScale 50% to 100%.
Across the year
When delays peak on this route
This route's year swings by 24 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 September, when the on-time rate falls to 66.1%. June is the strongest month at 90.5%. Moving a flexible trip across that boundary buys 24 points. September was the busiest month here, with 180 flights.
Across the week, Saturday is the strongest day at 85.5% on time and Monday the weakest at 78.8%, a spread of 7 points.
Delay causes
Why this route gets delayed
National Airspace System accounts for 59% of the 22,000 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 59%National Airspace System
- 21%Late-arriving aircraft
- 17%Carrier
- 3%Extreme weather
59% 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 13,000 minutes out of 22,000, against a national NAS share of 21%. The split is drawn from 21,780 reported delay minutes.
Cancellations sit at 2.29% against a national 1.89%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.15%.
Connections and stage length
What a delay here actually costs
7.2% 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 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 80.3% on time across 2,003 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 2,005 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 BOS 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 90.5% on time and September 66.1%, a swing of 24 points. If the dates move at all, move them out of September before you think about anything else. 1,956 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
CMH to BOS questions
How often is CMH to BOS delayed?
About one flight in six arrives at least 15 minutes late, which is the Department of Transportation's definition of a delayed arrival. That works out to 17.5% of the 2,005 flights in this analysis, against 22.7% nationally. Delayed flights are late by about an hour on average.
How reliable is CMH to BOS compared with the rest of the country?
82.5% of flights arrive on time here against a national 77.3%, a difference of 5 points in its favour. That is worth a B on this site's grading scale.
What time of day has the fewest delays on CMH to BOS?
The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 93.8% on time. The 2pm–5pm window is the weakest at 60.8%, 33 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 September delays on CMH to BOS?
September is the weakest month at 66.1% on time, compared with 90.5% in June. Across the year that is 24 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
- BOS to CMH — the return legseparate record
- John Glenn Columbus International (CMH) delay statistics
- Boston Logan International (BOS) delay statistics
- CMH to ORD, a related route75.4%
- DCA to BOS, a related route70.1%
- CMH to ATL, a related route84.8%
- Republic Airways on-time record83.6%
- Envoy Air on-time record71.7%
- Spirit Airlines on-time record22.2%
- The best time of day to fly, according to 7.05 million flight records
- Worst months to fly in the US, ranked by the data
Direction matters. CMH to BOS and BOS to CMH 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.