Route reliability record
DCA→BOS
Washington to Boston
- Flights
- 9,104
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Distance
- 399 mi
- Carriers
- 5
This route carries a cancellation problem, not just a delay problem: 4.3% of scheduled flights never operate, against 1.9% nationally. Of the ones that do fly, about seven flights in ten arrive on time, worth a C− overall. The punctuality figure counts only flights that actually departed, so it flatters an operation that cancels this often. That rests on 9,104 DCA to BOS flights, of which Republic Airways flew 3,998 at 76.9% on time.
Best time to fly DCA to BOS: a 5am–8am departure, ideally on a Saturday. Flights in that window arrived on time 91.2% of the time and Saturday flights 82.6%, against 70.1% for the route overall.
Republic Airways is the most reliable of the three carriers covered here at 76.9% on time across 3,998 flights.
Key figures
On time
70.1%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 8,707 completed flights
Avg delay
80 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
4.34%
National rate is 1.89%
Best carrier
Republic
76.9% on time across 3,998 flights
These figures cover 9,104 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 14.0% 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 BOS
The choice of carrier is not cosmetic here. Republic Airways arrives on time 76.9% of the time; JetBlue Airways manages 63.3%. Sample sizes sit next to every figure, because a two-point gap across 2,624 flights means less than a ten-point one.
| Airline | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Delta Air Linesthin sample | 8 | 87.5% | 53 min | 0.00% | A+ |
| Republic Airways | 3,998 | 76.9% | 70 min | 4.40% | B− |
| Envoy Airthin sample | 241 | 73.1% | 65 min | 7.47% | C− |
| American Airlines | 2,233 | 65.5% | 84 min | 2.96% | C |
| JetBlue Airways | 2,624 | 63.3% | 89 min | 5.14% | D− |
JetBlue Airways cancels 5.1% 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 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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Best ways to make this trip
The most reliable ways to fly Washington to Boston
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. 5 of the top 5 use a different airport at one end.
| Option | Airline | Success | On time | Cancelled | Best departure | Most punctual flight |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. BWI → MHTBaltimore to Manchester | Southwest Airlines | 83.0% | 84.2% | 1.39% | 5am–8am, Wed | — |
| 2. BWI → PVDBaltimore to Providence | Southwest Airlines | 77.8% | 79.6% | 2.28% | 5am–8am, Wed | — |
| 3. BWI → BOSBaltimore to Boston | Republic Airways | 77.2% | 80.5% | 4.09% | 5am–8am, Sat | YX 5703 10:54 |
| 4. IAD → BOSWashington to Boston | United Airlines | 75.5% | 77.1% | 2.07% | 8am–11am, Sat (route) | UA 641 08:35 |
| 5. DCA → PVDWashington to Providence | American Airlines | 74.4% | 77.0% | 3.33% | 8am–11am, Tue | — |
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 39 points, against 14 points between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am1,261 flights91.2%
- 8am–11am1,623 flights83.9%
- 11am–2pm1,684 flights73.6%
- 2pm–5pm1,501 flights58.4%
- 5pm–8pm1,730 flights52.6%
- 8pm–5am1,305 flights63.3%
Scale runs 45% to 95%.
The 5pm–8pm window is where this operation falls apart: 52.6% on time, against 91.2% 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 5pm–8pm window is the busiest, with 1,730 flights scheduled in it.
Explore
Filter DCA 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 DCA to BOS, the best departure window is 5am–8am at 91.2% on time and the worst is 5pm–8pm at 52.6%, a wide gap of 38.6 points. All US flights leaving 5am–8am ran 89.3%.
- 5–8am91.2%
- 8–11am83.9%
- 11am–2pm73.6%
- 2–5pm58.4%
- 5–8pm52.6%
- 8pm–5am63.3%
best all US flightsScale 45% to 95%.
Across the year
When delays peak on this route
This route's year swings by 16 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 60.7%. June is the strongest month at 76.6%. Moving a flexible trip across that boundary buys 16 points. March was the busiest month here, with 809 flights.
Across the week, Saturday is the strongest day at 82.6% on time and Sunday the weakest at 64.8%, a spread of 18 points.
Delay causes
Why this route gets delayed
Late-arriving aircraft accounts for 46% of the 209,000 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 46%Late-arriving aircraft
- 31%National Airspace System
- 19%Carrier
- 3%Extreme weather
- 0%Security
46% of delay minutes trace back to a late-arriving aircraft, meaning the plane was already behind before it got here. Across 209,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 15 to one. The split is drawn from 209,273 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 91.2% on time here.
Cancellations run at 4.34%, against 1.89% nationally. That is about one flight in 25 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
14.0% 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 399 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 runs 72.6% on time across 9,105 flights, within 3 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 9,104 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 delay figures matter less here than the 4.34% 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. 8,707 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
DCA to BOS questions
How often is DCA to BOS delayed?
Roughly one flight in three arrives at least 15 minutes late, which is the Department of Transportation's definition of a delayed arrival. That works out to 29.9% of the 9,104 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 BOS?
Republic Airways leads at 76.9% on time across 3,998 flights. JetBlue Airways is at the other end on 63.3%, 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 BOS?
The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 91.2% on time. The 5pm–8pm window is the weakest at 52.6%, 39 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 DCA to BOS?
September is the weakest month at 60.7% on time, compared with 76.6% in June. Across the year that is 16 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 DCA — the return legseparate record
- Ronald Reagan Washington National (DCA) delay statistics
- Boston Logan International (BOS) delay statistics
- Republic Airways on DCA to BOS76.9%
- Envoy Air on DCA to BOS73.1%
- American Airlines on DCA to BOS65.5%
- JetBlue Airways on DCA to BOS63.3%
- DCA to ORD, a related route73.8%
- ORD to BOS, a related route66.6%
- DCA to ATL, a related route77.1%
- Delta Air Lines on-time record87.5%
- Republic Airways on-time record76.9%
- Envoy Air on-time record73.1%
- The US routes with the most cancellations
- Same route, different airline: where the carrier you pick matters most
Direction matters. DCA to BOS and BOS 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.