Carrier route record
YXDCA→MSN
Republic Airways · Washington to Madison
- Flights
- 384
- Period
- July 2025 to June 2026
- Share of route
- 32%
- Carriers
- 4
Historical statistics for July 2025 to June 2026, not live status. For today’s flights, check with Republic Airways.
Republic on DCA to MSN lands a B−, level with the national rate of 77.6%. Roughly one flight in five arrives 15 minutes late or worse, and those flights are late by a little over an hour on average. That is a workable record, not a spotless one. That rests on 384 flights, with a median arrival 7 minutes early.
The US average over the same twelve months is 77.6%, so there is little to separate Republic on DCA to MSN from the country as a whole. The variation that matters here is internal: which carrier, and what time of day.
Key figures
On time
78.2%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 367 completed flights
Avg delay
72 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
4.43%
National rate is 1.81%
Whole route
72.0%
Every carrier on DCA to MSN, 1,191 flights
These figures cover 384 flights between July 2025 and June 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 9.8% of arrivals land a full hour or more behind schedule. That is the number that wrecks a connection, and it is not visible in an on-time percentage alone.
Carrier by carrier
Republic against every carrier on DCA to MSN
Republic flew 384 of the 1,191 flights on DCA to MSN, about 32% of it. Its 78.2% on time is 6 points better than the route as a whole, which runs 72.0%. Ranked by on-time rate it is first of four carriers on the route, where the range runs from Republic at 78.2% to American at 60.0%. Two of those carriers flew fewer than 365 flights here, so treat their positions as rough.
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 Airways (this page) | 384 | 78.2% | 72 min | 4.43% | B− |
| PSA Airlines | 783 | 69.1% | 85 min | 5.49% | C− |
| Envoy Airthin sample | 19 | 66.7% | 106 min | 5.26% | C− |
| American Airlinesthin sample | 5 | 60.0% | 33 min | 0.00% | D+ |
Flight by flight
Republic flight numbers on DCA to MSN
Departure window
When Republic runs best on this route
Departure time is the single lever a traveller controls, and it moves the odds more than most people expect. Each bar below is the on-time rate for flights scheduled to leave inside that window, across 384 flights.
- 5am–8am—
- 8am–11am1 flights—
- 11am–2pm31 flights80.0%
- 2pm–5pm327 flights77.9%
- 5pm–8pm—
- 8pm–5am25 flights—
Scale runs 70% to 85%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
The 11am–2pm window is the strongest at 80.0% on time. The full set of windows spans 2 points.
Across the year
Republic on DCA to MSN through the year
- Jul–Sep 2025134 flights82.8%
- Oct–Dec 202573 flights79.5%
- Jan–Mar 202699 flights67.4%
- Apr–Jun 202678 flights83.1%
Scale runs 60% to 90%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
Monthly volumes are too low here to break the year into twelve reliable readings. What the twelve-month total says is 78.2% on time across 384 flights.
Republic on DCA to MSN did not run the same all year. Its best quarter was Apr–Jun 2026 at 83.1% on time and its weakest Jan–Mar 2026 at 67.4%, a swing of 16 points on roughly 96 flights a quarter. The twelve-month rate averages over that, so if you are flying in a weak quarter the quarter's own figure is the better guide.
Across the week, Sunday is the strongest day at 85.0% on time and Thursday the weakest at 71.7%. 13 points is a smaller lever than departure hour, but it is free.
Delay causes
Why Republic runs late on this route
One category carries most of the weight here. Late-arriving aircraft accounts for 46% of the 5,755 delay minutes carriers reported, and the remaining four split what is left. The split is by minutes rather than by flights, so a few very long delays count for as much as many short ones.
- 46%Late-arriving aircraft
- 31%Carrier
- 20%National Airspace System
- 4%Extreme weather
46% of delay minutes trace back to a late-arriving aircraft, meaning the plane was already behind before it got here. That is a cascade, and cascades start small and grow through the day. Across 5,755 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 12 to one. It is the strongest argument for booking the first departure of the morning, when the aircraft has been sitting at the gate overnight with nothing to inherit. The split is drawn from 5,755 reported delay minutes.
Cancellations run at 4.43%, against 1.81% nationally. That is roughly 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 costs
For anyone connecting, the number to weigh is not the on-time rate but the tail behind it. 9.8% of arrivals land a full hour or more behind schedule, against 8.1% nationally. A 45-minute layover does not survive that, and no amount of walking quickly changes it. Ninety minutes is the honest minimum here, and two hours if the onward flight is on a separate ticket.
The 707 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. It is also long enough that the aircraft usually flies three or four legs a day rather than six, which slows how fast delay compounds.
The return leg is a different operation and performs like one: it runs 72.2% on time across 385 flights, 6 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 6 points of difference.
One caution: this is a thin sample. 384 flights over twelve months is enough to clear this site's floor but not enough to pin the rate down tightly, and a single bad week moves it by more than a point. Treat the grade as a rough reading.
What to do with this
Booking Republic on DCA to MSN
Put together: the delay figures matter less here than the 4.43% cancellation rate. A late arrival costs you a little over an hour; a cancelled flight costs you the day. Book the 11am–2pm departure so there is still a schedule behind you if it goes wrong, and treat a same-day connection as optimistic. 367 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Related
Where to go next
Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics, on-time performance data, July 2025 to June 2026. Last updated 15 September 2026; recomputed monthly. How this data is collected.