Route reliability record
DCA→ATL
Washington to Atlanta
- Flights
- 6,799
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Distance
- 547 mi
- Carriers
- 6
This route carries a cancellation problem, not just a delay problem: 3.6% of scheduled flights never operate, against 1.9% nationally. Of the ones that do fly, close to three flights in four arrive on time, worth a B− overall. The punctuality figure counts only flights that actually departed, so it flatters an operation that cancels this often. That rests on 6,799 DCA to ATL flights, of which Delta Air Lines flew 3,850 at 79.2% on time.
Best time to fly DCA to ATL: a 5am–8am departure, ideally on a Saturday. Flights in that window arrived on time 91.3% of the time and Saturday flights 82.3%, against 77.1% for the route overall.
Delta Air Lines is the most reliable of the four carriers covered here at 79.2% on time across 3,850 flights.
Key figures
On time
77.1%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 6,535 completed flights
Avg delay
79 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
3.60%
National rate is 1.89%
Best carrier
Delta
79.2% on time across 3,850 flights
These figures cover 6,799 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 9.2% 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 DCA to ATL
The choice of carrier is not cosmetic here. Delta Air Lines arrives on time 79.2% of the time; PSA Airlines manages 65.6%. Sample sizes sit next to every figure, because a two-point gap across 1,079 flights means less than a ten-point one.
| Airline | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Envoy Airthin sample | 286 | 81.9% | 63 min | 1.40% | B |
| Delta Air Lines | 3,850 | 79.2% | 88 min | 2.55% | B |
| Southwest Airlines | 1,075 | 78.9% | 61 min | 2.51% | B |
| Republic Airways | 474 | 78.3% | 56 min | 3.38% | B− |
| American Airlinesthin sample | 35 | 71.4% | 78 min | 0.00% | C+ |
| PSA Airlines | 1,079 | 65.6% | 81 min | 9.27% | C− |
PSA Airlines cancels 9.3% of what it schedules here, the highest in the table. A cancelled flight never appears in an on-time rate, so read that column alongside the punctuality one rather than after it.
Flight by flight
Flights on DCA to ATL
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.
- Delta 92610:1086.5% · 365 flights
- Delta 38012:2077.2% · 364 flights
- Delta 41006:0094.1% · 364 flights
- Delta 85018:0063.4% · 347 flights
- Delta 45509:0083.3% · 344 flights
- Delta 33006:5993.1% · 342 flights
- Delta 36016:0069.3% · 336 flights
- Delta 34307:5985.7% · 332 flights
- Delta 73713:4073.9% · 312 flights
- Delta 83220:4571.6% · 256 flights
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Best ways to make this trip
The most reliable ways to fly Washington to Atlanta
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. 3 of the top 5 use a different airport at one end.
| Option | Airline | Success | On time | Cancelled | Best departure | Most punctual flight |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. BWI → ATLBaltimore to Atlanta | Delta Air Lines | 84.2% | 86.0% | 2.11% | 5am–8am, Wed | DL 2950 06:00 |
| 2. IAD → ATLWashington to Atlanta | United Airlines | 79.3% | 79.9% | 0.73% | 8am–11am, Sat | UA 2739 08:15 |
| 3. IAD → ATLWashington to Atlanta | Delta Air Lines | 77.6% | 79.9% | 2.82% | 5am–8am, Thu | DL 2127 06:00 |
| 4. DCA → ATLWashington to Atlanta | Delta Air Lines | 77.2% | 79.2% | 2.55% | 5am–8am, Sat | DL 410 06:00 |
| 5. DCA → ATLWashington to Atlanta | Southwest Airlines | 76.9% | 78.9% | 2.51% | 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 28 points, against 14 points between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am1,276 flights91.3%
- 8am–11am1,527 flights84.2%
- 11am–2pm1,336 flights78.1%
- 2pm–5pm822 flights68.0%
- 5pm–8pm1,201 flights63.1%
- 8pm–5am637 flights66.7%
Scale runs 55% to 95%.
The 5pm–8pm window is where this operation falls apart: 63.1% on time, against 91.3% for the 5am–8am slot. By evening the aircraft flying these rotations have absorbed a full day of small delays and there is no slack left to recover in. The 8am–11am window is the busiest, with 1,527 flights scheduled in it.
Explore
Filter DCA to ATL 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 DCA to ATL, the best departure window is 5am–8am at 91.3% on time and the worst is 5pm–8pm at 63.1%, a wide gap of 28.2 points. All US flights leaving 5am–8am ran 89.3%.
- 5–8am91.3%
- 8–11am84.2%
- 11am–2pm78.1%
- 2–5pm68.0%
- 5–8pm63.1%
- 8pm–5am66.7%
best all US flightsScale 55% to 95%.
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.
July is the worst month at 61.5% on time, 24 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. September was the busiest month here, with 594 flights.
Across the week, Saturday is the strongest day at 82.3% on time and Sunday the weakest at 73.4%, a spread of 9 points.
Delay causes
Why this route gets delayed
Late-arriving aircraft accounts for 42% of the 118,000 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 42%Late-arriving aircraft
- 33%Carrier
- 20%National Airspace System
- 5%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 118,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 9 to one. The split is drawn from 118,307 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 91.3% on time here.
Cancellations run at 3.60%, against 1.89% nationally. That is about one flight in 30 cancelled outright. A cancelled flight is invisible in every on-time figure on this page, so the punctuality numbers above describe only the flights that actually operated.
Connections and stage length
What a delay here actually costs
9.2% 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 547 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 68.7% on time across 6,798 flights, 8 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 8 points of difference.
The sample behind these figures is 6,799 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 ATL after this flight
What to do with this
Booking this route
Put together: the delay figures matter less here than the 3.60% cancellation rate. A late arrival costs you a little over an hour; a cancelled flight costs you the day. Book the 5am–8am departure so there is still a schedule behind you if it goes wrong, and treat a same-day connection as optimistic. 6,535 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
DCA to ATL questions
How often is DCA to ATL delayed?
Roughly 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 22.9% of the 6,799 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 DCA to ATL?
Delta Air Lines leads at 79.2% on time across 3,850 flights. PSA Airlines is at the other end on 65.6%, a gap of 14 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 DCA to ATL?
The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 91.3% on time. The 5pm–8pm window is the weakest at 63.1%, 28 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 DCA to ATL?
July is the weakest month at 61.5% on time, compared with 85.0% in September. 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
- ATL to DCA — the return legseparate record
- Ronald Reagan Washington National (DCA) delay statistics
- Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International (ATL) delay statistics
- Envoy Air on DCA to ATL81.9%
- Delta Air Lines on DCA to ATL79.2%
- Southwest Airlines on DCA to ATL78.9%
- Republic Airways on DCA to ATL78.3%
- PSA Airlines on DCA to ATL65.6%
- DCA to BOS, a related route70.1%
- LGA to ATL, a related route75.5%
- DCA to ORD, a related route73.8%
- Envoy Air on-time record81.9%
- Delta Air Lines on-time record79.2%
- Southwest Airlines on-time record78.9%
- The US routes with the most cancellations
- Why the first flight of the morning is statistically safest
Direction matters. DCA to ATL and ATL to DCA 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.