Route reliability record
DCA→MYR
Washington to Myrtle Beach
- Flights
- 755
- Period
- July 2025 to June 2026
- Distance
- 372 mi
- Carriers
- 4
This route carries a cancellation problem, not just a delay problem: 4.9% of scheduled flights never operate, against 1.8% 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 755 DCA to MYR flights, with a median arrival 5 minutes early.
Best time to fly DCA to MYR: a 8am–11am departure, ideally on a Monday. Flights in that window arrived on time 82.6% of the time and Monday flights 83.0%, against 77.4% for the route overall.
The US average over the same twelve months is 77.6%, 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
77.4%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 718 completed flights
Avg delay
61 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
4.90%
National rate is 1.81%
Best carrier
PSA
77.1% on time across 610 flights
These figures cover 755 flights between July 2025 and June 2026. The median arrival is 5 minutes early, which is the part an average hides: most flights here are fine, and the on-time rate is decided by a tail of badly late ones. On-time means under 15 minutes late, the DOT's own threshold.
Carrier by carrier
Which airline is most reliable on DCA to MYR
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| American Airlinesthin sample | 3 | 100.0% | — | 0.00% | A+ |
| Republic Airwaysthin sample | 137 | 79.8% | 40 min | 5.84% | B− |
| PSA Airlines | 610 | 77.1% | 66 min | 4.59% | B− |
| Envoy Airthin sample | 5 | 25.0% | 33 min | 20.00% | F− |
Best ways to make this trip
The most reliable ways to fly Washington to Myrtle Beach
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. 1 of the top 2 use a different airport at one end.
| Option | Airline | Success | On time | Cancelled | Best departure | Most punctual flight |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. BWI → MYRBaltimore to Myrtle Beach | Southwest Airlines | 78.0% | 79.0% | 1.25% | 8am–11am, Fri | — |
| 2. DCA → MYRWashington to Myrtle Beach | PSA Airlines | 73.6% | 77.1% | 4.59% | 8am–11am, Mon | — |
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 22 points, against half a point between the best and worst carrier. Each bar is the on-time rate for flights scheduled inside that window.
- 5am–8am—
- 8am–11am458 flights82.6%
- 11am–2pm156 flights72.8%
- 2pm–5pm60 flights73.2%
- 5pm–8pm81 flights60.3%
- 8pm–5am—
Scale runs 50% to 90%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
The 5pm–8pm window is where this operation falls apart: 60.3% on time, against 82.6% 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 8am–11am window is the busiest, with 458 flights scheduled in it.
Across the year
When delays peak on this route
This route's year swings by 22 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 67.7% on time, against 89.6% in May. 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. May was the busiest month here, with 68 flights.
Across the week, Monday is the strongest day at 83.0% on time and Thursday the weakest at 69.0%. 14 points is a smaller lever than departure hour, but it is free.
Delay causes
Why this route gets delayed
One category carries most of the weight here. Late-arriving aircraft accounts for 58% of the 9,885 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.
- 58%Late-arriving aircraft
- 20%Carrier
- 17%National Airspace System
- 5%Extreme weather
- 1%Security
58% 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 9,885 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 9,885 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 82.6% on time here.
Cancellations run at 4.90%, against 1.81% nationally. That is about one flight in twenty 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
7.9% of arrivals land an hour or more late, close to the national 8.1%. That is the figure that decides a connection, and it says 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.
At 372 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 8am–11am window matters as much as it does.
The return leg is a different operation and performs like one: it runs 72.3% on time across 755 flights, 5 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 5 points of difference.
One caution: this is a thin sample. 755 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.
Work out the risk of missing a connection in MYR after this flight
What to do with this
Booking this route
Put together: the delay figures matter less here than the 4.90% cancellation rate. A late arrival costs you about 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. 718 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
DCA to MYR questions
How often is DCA to MYR 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 22.6% of the 755 flights in this analysis, against 22.4% nationally. Delayed flights are late by about an hour on average.
How reliable is DCA to MYR compared with the rest of the country?
77.4% of flights arrive on time here against a national 77.6%, 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 MYR?
The 8am–11am departure window is the strongest at 82.6% on time. The 5pm–8pm window is the weakest at 60.3%, 22 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 MYR?
December is the weakest month at 67.7% on time, compared with 89.6% in May. Across the year that is 22 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
- MYR to DCA — the return legseparate record
- Ronald Reagan Washington National (DCA) delay statistics
- Republic Airways on DCA to MYR79.8%
- PSA Airlines on DCA to MYR77.1%
- DCA to BOS, a related route71.4%
- CLT to MYR, a related route77.9%
- DCA to ORD, a related route74.3%
- American Airlines on-time record100.0%
- Republic Airways on-time record79.8%
- PSA Airlines on-time record77.1%
- The US routes with the most cancellations
- Why the first flight of the morning is statistically safest
Direction matters. DCA to MYR and MYR 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, July 2025 to June 2026. Last updated 15 September 2026; recomputed monthly. How this data is collected.