Route reliability record
COS→DFW
Colorado Springs to Dallas-Fort Worth
- Flights
- 1,933
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Distance
- 592 mi
- Carriers
- 3
This route lands a B, level with the national rate of 77.3%. Roughly one flight in five arrives 15 minutes late or worse, and those flights are late by close to two hours on average. That rests on 1,933 COS to DFW flights, of which SkyWest Airlines flew 696 at 76.9% on time.
Best time to fly COS to DFW: a 8am–11am departure, ideally on a Tuesday. Flights in that window arrived on time 85.6% of the time and Tuesday flights 80.3%, against 77.9% 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
77.9%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 1,884 completed flights
Avg delay
112 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
2.22%
National rate is 1.89%
Best carrier
SkyWest
76.9% on time across 696 flights
These figures cover 1,933 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 9.8% 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 COS to DFW
The two carriers here are closely matched: half a point separate the best from the worst. At that spread, schedule and price are better tie-breakers than reliability. Sample sizes are shown so you can see which rows are worth weighing.
| Airline | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Envoy Airthin sample | 200 | 87.2% | 71 min | 1.50% | A |
| SkyWest Airlines | 696 | 76.9% | 127 min | 2.16% | B |
| American Airlines | 1,037 | 76.7% | 106 min | 2.41% | B |
No carrier stands out. SkyWest tops the table at 76.9%, half a point clear of the bottom, which is inside the range this kind of sample moves year to year.
Flight by flight
Flights on COS to DFW
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 Colorado Springs to Dallas-Fort Worth
Every airline on this route and on the routes between nearby airports, ranked by how often a scheduled flight actually operated and arrived on time. 1 of the top 3 use a different airport at one end.
| Option | Airline | Success | On time | Cancelled | Best departure | Most punctual flight |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. COS → DALColorado Springs to Dallas | Southwest Airlines | 80.6% | 81.3% | 0.89% | 5am–8am, Sat | — |
| 2. COS → DFWColorado Springs to Dallas-Fort Worth | SkyWest Airlines | 75.2% | 76.9% | 2.16% | 2pm–5pm, Tue | OO 6390 08:15 |
| 3. COS → DFWColorado Springs to Dallas-Fort Worth | American Airlines | 74.9% | 76.7% | 2.41% | 5am–8am, Thu | — |
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 18 points, against half a point between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am476 flights84.6%
- 8am–11am570 flights85.6%
- 11am–2pm362 flights70.5%
- 2pm–5pm284 flights67.4%
- 5pm–8pm241 flights69.5%
- 8pm–5am—
Scale runs 60% to 90%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
Book the morning departure. Flights leaving between 8am–11am arrive on time 85.6% of the time, against 67.4% for the afternoon window. That is 18 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 570 flights scheduled in it.
Explore
Filter COS to DFW 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 COS to DFW, the best departure window is 8am–11am at 85.6% on time and the worst is 2pm–5pm at 67.4%, a wide gap of 18.2 points. All US flights leaving 8am–11am ran 83.9%.
- 5–8am84.6%
- 8–11am85.6%
- 11am–2pm70.5%
- 2–5pm67.4%
- 5–8pm69.5%
- 8pm–5am—
best all US flightsScale 60% to 95%. Cells under 30 flights show a dash.
Across the year
When delays peak on this route
This route's year swings by 14 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 71.2% on time, 14 points below September, the best at 85.0%. 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 186 flights.
Across the week, Tuesday is the strongest day at 80.3% on time and Sunday the weakest at 72.7%, a spread of 8 points.
Delay causes
Why this route gets delayed
Carrier accounts for 52% of the 47,000 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 52%Carrier
- 29%Late-arriving aircraft
- 10%Extreme weather
- 9%National Airspace System
- 0%Security
The largest share of delay minutes, 52%, falls under carrier control: crew scheduling, maintenance, fuelling, baggage. It accounts for 24,000 of the 47,000 delay minutes reported here. The split is drawn from 46,662 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 85.6% on time here.
Cancellations sit at 2.22% against a national 1.89%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.31%.
Connections and stage length
What a delay here actually costs
9.8% 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 592 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 72.5% on time across 1,934 flights, 5 points below 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 5 points of difference.
The sample behind these figures is 1,933 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 DFW 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. September runs 85.0% on time and July 71.2%, a swing of 14 points. If the dates move at all, move them out of July before you think about anything else. 1,884 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
COS to DFW questions
How often is COS to DFW 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 22.1% of the 1,933 flights in this analysis, against 22.7% nationally. Delayed flights are late by close to two hours on average.
Which airline is most reliable on COS to DFW?
SkyWest Airlines leads at 76.9% on time across 696 flights. American Airlines is at the other end on 76.7%, a gap of half a point. 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 COS to DFW?
The 8am–11am departure window is the strongest at 85.6% on time. The 2pm–5pm window is the weakest at 67.4%, 18 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 COS to DFW?
July is the weakest month at 71.2% on time, compared with 85.0% in September. Across the year that is 14 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
- DFW to COS — the return legseparate record
- Dallas/Fort Worth International (DFW) delay statistics
- Envoy Air on COS to DFW87.2%
- SkyWest Airlines on COS to DFW76.9%
- American Airlines on COS to DFW76.7%
- COS to DEN, a related route81.4%
- ORD to DFW, a related route70.4%
- COS to PHX, a related route81.3%
- Envoy Air on-time record87.2%
- SkyWest Airlines on-time record76.9%
- American Airlines on-time record76.7%
- How often a connection fails at the major US hubs
- The best time of day to fly, according to 7.05 million flight records
Direction matters. COS to DFW and DFW to COS 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.