Route reliability record
DCA→IND
Washington to Indianapolis
- Flights
- 2,022
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Distance
- 500 mi
- Carriers
- 4
This route carries a cancellation problem, not just a delay problem: 3.8% 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 2,022 DCA to IND flights, with a median arrival 7 minutes early.
Best time to fly DCA to IND: a 5am–8am departure, ideally on a Saturday. Flights in that window arrived on time 92.5% of the time and Saturday flights 87.4%, against 77.1% 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
77.1%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 1,940 completed flights
Avg delay
63 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
3.81%
National rate is 1.89%
Best carrier
Republic
77.3% on time across 1,854 flights
These figures cover 2,022 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 8.6% 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 IND
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Envoy Airthin sample | 5 | 80.0% | 27 min | 0.00% | B+ |
| American Airlinesthin sample | 28 | 77.8% | 26 min | 3.57% | B− |
| Republic Airways | 1,854 | 77.3% | 63 min | 3.34% | B− |
| PSA Airlinesthin sample | 135 | 74.4% | 78 min | 10.37% | C− |
Flight by flight
Flights on DCA to IND
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 Indianapolis
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. 2 of the top 3 use a different airport at one end.
| Option | Airline | Success | On time | Cancelled | Best departure | Most punctual flight |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. IAD → INDWashington to Indianapolis | Republic Airways | 83.3% | 84.3% | 1.18% | 8am–11am, Wed (route) | YX 3561 08:24 |
| 2. BWI → INDBaltimore to Indianapolis | Southwest Airlines | 75.3% | 76.3% | 1.32% | 8am–11am, Wed | — |
| 3. DCA → INDWashington to Indianapolis | Republic Airways | 74.7% | 77.3% | 3.34% | 5am–8am, Sat | YX 4701 10:30 |
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 half a point between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am266 flights92.5%
- 8am–11am350 flights85.4%
- 11am–2pm370 flights76.4%
- 2pm–5pm345 flights75.8%
- 5pm–8pm535 flights68.8%
- 8pm–5am156 flights64.4%
Scale runs 55% to 100%.
The 8pm–5am window is where this operation falls apart: 64.4% on time, against 92.5% 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 535 flights scheduled in it.
Explore
Filter DCA to IND 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 IND, the best departure window is 5am–8am at 92.5% on time and the worst is 8pm–5am at 64.4%, a wide gap of 28.1 points. All US flights leaving 5am–8am ran 89.3%.
- 5–8am92.5%
- 8–11am85.4%
- 11am–2pm76.4%
- 2–5pm75.8%
- 5–8pm68.8%
- 8pm–5am64.4%
best all US flightsScale 55% to 95%.
Across the year
When delays peak on this route
This route's year swings by 26 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.
December is the weak month at 60.7% on time, against 87.0% in October. Winter delays cluster: a single storm system can account for most of a month's shortfall, so an average December hides both very good weeks and genuinely unflyable days. October was the busiest month here, with 178 flights.
Across the week, Saturday is the strongest day at 87.4% on time and Sunday the weakest at 71.5%, a spread of 16 points.
Delay causes
Why this route gets delayed
Late-arriving aircraft accounts for 55% of the 28,000 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 55%Late-arriving aircraft
- 21%Carrier
- 16%National Airspace System
- 8%Extreme weather
55% of delay minutes trace back to a late-arriving aircraft, meaning the plane was already behind before it got here. Across 28,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 7 to one. The split is drawn from 27,957 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 92.5% on time here.
Cancellations run at 3.81%, 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
8.6% 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 500 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 74.1% on time across 2,021 flights, 3 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 3 points of difference.
The sample behind these figures is 2,022 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 IND after this flight
What to do with this
Booking this route
Put together: the delay figures matter less here than the 3.81% cancellation rate. A late arrival costs you about 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. 1,940 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
DCA to IND questions
How often is DCA to IND 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 2,022 flights in this analysis, against 22.7% nationally. Delayed flights are late by about an hour on average.
How reliable is DCA to IND compared with the rest of the country?
77.1% of flights arrive on time here against a national 77.3%, a difference of half a point against it. That is worth a B− on this site's grading scale.
What time of day has the fewest delays on DCA to IND?
The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 92.5% on time. The 8pm–5am window is the weakest at 64.4%, 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 December delays on DCA to IND?
December is the weakest month at 60.7% on time, compared with 87.0% in October. Across the year that is 26 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
- IND to DCA — the return legseparate record
- Ronald Reagan Washington National (DCA) delay statistics
- Indianapolis International (IND) delay statistics
- Republic Airways on DCA to IND77.3%
- PSA Airlines on DCA to IND74.4%
- DCA to BOS, a related route70.1%
- ORD to IND, a related route74.1%
- DCA to ORD, a related route73.8%
- Envoy Air on-time record80.0%
- American Airlines on-time record77.8%
- Republic Airways on-time record77.3%
- The US routes with the most cancellations
- Why the first flight of the morning is statistically safest
Direction matters. DCA to IND and IND to DCA are scored separately because they are separate operations, with different departure banks and different aircraft. Compare the return leg.
Embed DCA to IND’s on-time badge on your site
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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.