Route reliability record
DCA→JAX
Washington to Jacksonville
- Flights
- 1,435
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Distance
- 634 mi
- Carriers
- 3
This route carries a cancellation problem, not just a delay problem: 3.3% 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 C− overall. The punctuality figure counts only flights that actually departed, so it flatters an operation that cancels this often. That rests on 1,435 DCA to JAX flights, with a median arrival 4 minutes early.
Best time to fly DCA to JAX: a 8am–11am departure, ideally on a Saturday. Flights in that window arrived on time 94.9% of the time and Saturday flights 81.4%, against 73.0% for the route overall.
The national on-time rate over the same period is 77.3%, so this route runs 4 points behind the country as a whole. Across a thousand flights that is about 43 extra late arrivals.
Key figures
On time
73.0%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 1,385 completed flights
Avg delay
73 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
3.28%
National rate is 1.89%
Best carrier
American
72.7% on time across 926 flights
These figures cover 1,435 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 10.4% 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 JAX
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 Airwaysthin sample | 154 | 85.2% | 53 min | 1.95% | A |
| American Airlines | 926 | 72.7% | 71 min | 2.16% | C |
| PSA Airlinesthin sample | 355 | 68.3% | 80 min | 6.76% | C− |
Timetable by Aviasales, a Travelpayouts partner. Booking through it may earn this site a commission at no cost to you; it changes no figure here.
Best ways to make this trip
The most reliable ways to fly Washington to Jacksonville
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 → JAXWashington to Jacksonville | United Airlines | 83.1% | 83.8% | 0.78% | 8am–11am, Wed (route) | UA 2084 09:00 |
| 2. BWI → JAXBaltimore to Jacksonville | Southwest Airlines | 74.8% | 76.0% | 1.64% | 8am–11am, Wed | — |
| 3. DCA → JAXWashington to Jacksonville | American Airlines | 71.1% | 72.7% | 2.16% | 5am–8am, Sat | — |
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 45 points, against half a point between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am358 flights86.9%
- 8am–11am41 flights94.9%
- 11am–2pm336 flights72.6%
- 2pm–5pm350 flights68.1%
- 5pm–8pm40 flights50.0%
- 8pm–5am310 flights62.4%
Scale runs 40% to 100%.
The 5pm–8pm window is where this operation falls apart: 50.0% on time, against 94.9% for the 8am–11am 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 5am–8am window is the busiest, with 358 flights scheduled in it.
Explore
Filter DCA to JAX 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 JAX, the best departure window is 8am–11am at 94.9% on time and the worst is 5pm–8pm at 50.0%, a wide gap of 44.9 points. All US flights leaving 8am–11am ran 83.9%.
- 5–8am86.9%
- 8–11am94.9%
- 11am–2pm72.6%
- 2–5pm68.1%
- 5–8pm50.0%
- 8pm–5am62.4%
best all US flightsScale 40% to 100%.
Across the year
When delays peak on this route
This route's year swings by 29 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.
April is the best month on the calendar at 89.7% on time. Shoulder season thins the schedule and takes the summer weather with it, and the operation gets its margin back. January was the busiest month here, with 146 flights.
Across the week, Saturday is the strongest day at 81.4% on time and Sunday the weakest at 62.6%, a spread of 19 points.
Delay causes
Why this route gets delayed
Late-arriving aircraft accounts for 56% of the 27,000 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 56%Late-arriving aircraft
- 27%Carrier
- 15%National Airspace System
- 2%Extreme weather
- 1%Security
56% of delay minutes trace back to a late-arriving aircraft, meaning the plane was already behind before it got here. Across 27,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 30 to one. The split is drawn from 27,112 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 94.9% on time here.
Cancellations run at 3.28%, 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
10.4% 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 634 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 73.1% on time across 1,437 flights, within half a point 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 1,435 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 JAX after this flight
What to do with this
Booking this route
Put together: the delay figures matter less here than the 3.28% cancellation rate. A late arrival costs you a little over an hour; a cancelled flight costs you the day. Book the 8am–11am departure so there is still a schedule behind you if it goes wrong, and treat a same-day connection as optimistic. 1,385 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
DCA to JAX questions
How often is DCA to JAX delayed?
About 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 27.0% of the 1,435 flights in this analysis, against 22.7% nationally. Delayed flights are late by a little over an hour on average.
How reliable is DCA to JAX compared with the rest of the country?
73.0% of flights arrive on time here against a national 77.3%, a difference of 4 points against it. That is worth a C− on this site's grading scale.
What time of day has the fewest delays on DCA to JAX?
The 8am–11am departure window is the strongest at 94.9% on time. The 5pm–8pm window is the weakest at 50.0%, 45 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 March delays on DCA to JAX?
March is the weakest month at 61.2% on time, compared with 89.7% in April. Across the year that is 29 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
- JAX to DCA — the return legseparate record
- Ronald Reagan Washington National (DCA) delay statistics
- Jacksonville International (JAX) delay statistics
- Republic Airways on DCA to JAX85.2%
- American Airlines on DCA to JAX72.7%
- PSA Airlines on DCA to JAX68.3%
- DCA to BOS, a related route70.1%
- ATL to JAX, a related route75.1%
- DCA to ORD, a related route73.8%
- Republic Airways on-time record85.2%
- American Airlines on-time record72.7%
- PSA Airlines on-time record68.3%
- The US routes with the most cancellations
- Why the first flight of the morning is statistically safest
Direction matters. DCA to JAX and JAX 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.