Route reliability record
DCA→TPA
Washington to Tampa
- Flights
- 2,248
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Distance
- 814 mi
- Carriers
- 3
This route sits in the middle of the pack with a C. Close to three flights in four arrive on time by the DOT's definition, 3 points worse than the national rate of 77.3%. The late ones land a little over an hour behind schedule. That rests on 2,248 DCA to TPA flights, of which Southwest Airlines flew 698 at 78.8% on time.
Best time to fly DCA to TPA: a 5am–8am departure, ideally on a Tuesday. Flights in that window arrived on time 95.5% of the time and Tuesday flights 79.7%, against 73.9% 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
73.9%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 2,185 completed flights
Avg delay
79 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
2.62%
National rate is 1.89%
Best carrier
Southwest
78.8% on time across 698 flights
These figures cover 2,248 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 10.9% 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 TPA
The choice of carrier is not cosmetic here. Southwest Airlines arrives on time 78.8% of the time; American Airlines manages 71.3%. Sample sizes sit next to every figure, because a two-point gap across 1,524 flights means less than a ten-point one.
| Airline | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Republic Airwaysthin sample | 26 | 92.3% | 27 min | 0.00% | A+ |
| Southwest Airlines | 698 | 78.8% | 67 min | 2.44% | B |
| American Airlines | 1,524 | 71.3% | 84 min | 2.76% | C |
Southwest leads American by 8 points. Real, but small enough that a better departure time on the weaker carrier can outweigh it.
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Best ways to make this trip
The most reliable ways to fly Washington to Tampa
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. 3 of the top 5 use a different airport at one end.
| Option | Airline | Success | On time | Cancelled | Best departure | Most punctual flight |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. IAD → TPAWashington to Tampa | United Airlines | 83.2% | 83.6% | 0.45% | 8am–11am, Tue | UA 683 09:00 |
| 2. BWI → SRQBaltimore to Sarasota | Southwest Airlines | 78.6% | 80.1% | 1.92% | 8am–11am, Wed | — |
| 3. DCA → TPAWashington to Tampa | Southwest Airlines | 76.9% | 78.8% | 2.44% | 5am–8am, Tue | — |
| 4. BWI → TPABaltimore to Tampa | Southwest Airlines | 76.9% | 78.3% | 1.84% | 5am–8am, Tue | — |
| 5. DCA → TPAWashington to Tampa | American Airlines | 69.3% | 71.3% | 2.76% | 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 41 points, against 8 points between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am364 flights95.5%
- 8am–11am688 flights82.5%
- 11am–2pm278 flights75.4%
- 2pm–5pm382 flights58.0%
- 5pm–8pm397 flights54.4%
- 8pm–5am139 flights70.7%
Scale runs 45% to 100%.
The 5pm–8pm window is where this operation falls apart: 54.4% on time, against 95.5% 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 8am–11am window is the busiest, with 688 flights scheduled in it.
Explore
Filter DCA to TPA 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 TPA, the best departure window is 5am–8am at 95.5% on time and the worst is 5pm–8pm at 54.4%, a wide gap of 41.1 points. All US flights leaving 5am–8am ran 89.3%.
- 5–8am95.5%
- 8–11am82.5%
- 11am–2pm75.4%
- 2–5pm58.0%
- 5–8pm54.4%
- 8pm–5am70.7%
best all US flightsScale 45% to 100%.
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.
July is the worst month at 63.6% on time, 22 points below April, the best at 85.6%. Summer afternoon convection and peak-season schedules land on the same weeks every year, so this is a pattern you can book around rather than a run of bad luck. March was the busiest month here, with 218 flights.
Across the week, Tuesday is the strongest day at 79.7% on time and Sunday the weakest at 65.6%, a spread of 14 points.
Delay causes
Why this route gets delayed
Late-arriving aircraft accounts for 57% of the 45,000 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 57%Late-arriving aircraft
- 24%Carrier
- 16%National Airspace System
- 3%Extreme weather
- 0%Security
57% of delay minutes trace back to a late-arriving aircraft, meaning the plane was already behind before it got here. Across 45,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 21 to one. The split is drawn from 45,160 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 95.5% on time here.
Cancellations run at 2.62%, against 1.89% nationally. That is about one flight in 40 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
10.9% 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 814 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 74.7% on time across 2,249 flights, within about 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 2,248 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 TPA after this flight
What to do with this
Booking this route
Put together: the calendar is the biggest lever here, not the carrier or the hour. April runs 85.6% on time and July 63.6%, a swing of 22 points. If the dates move at all, move them out of July before you think about anything else. 2,185 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
DCA to TPA questions
How often is DCA to TPA 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 26.1% of the 2,248 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 TPA?
Southwest Airlines leads at 78.8% on time across 698 flights. American Airlines is at the other end on 71.3%, a gap of 8 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 TPA?
The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 95.5% on time. The 5pm–8pm window is the weakest at 54.4%, 41 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 July delays on DCA to TPA?
July is the weakest month at 63.6% on time, compared with 85.6% in April. 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
- TPA to DCA — the return legseparate record
- Ronald Reagan Washington National (DCA) delay statistics
- Tampa International (TPA) delay statistics
- Southwest Airlines on DCA to TPA78.8%
- American Airlines on DCA to TPA71.3%
- DCA to BOS, a related route70.1%
- ATL to TPA, a related route73.0%
- DCA to ORD, a related route73.8%
- Republic Airways on-time record92.3%
- Southwest Airlines on-time record78.8%
- American Airlines on-time record71.3%
- The US routes with the most cancellations
- Why the first flight of the morning is statistically safest
Direction matters. DCA to TPA and TPA 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.