Route reliability record
DEN→BDL
Denver to Hartford
- Flights
- 887
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Distance
- 1,671 mi
- Carriers
- 2
This route sits in the middle of the pack with a B. Close to three flights in four arrive on time by the DOT's definition, 2 points worse than the national rate of 77.3%. The late ones land about an hour behind schedule. That rests on 887 DEN to BDL flights, with a median arrival 3 minutes early.
Best time to fly DEN to BDL: a 8am–11am departure, ideally on a Wednesday. Flights in that window arrived on time 86.5% of the time and Wednesday flights 82.2%, against 75.2% 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
75.2%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 876 completed flights
Avg delay
55 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
1.24%
National rate is 1.89%
Best carrier
United
79.3% on time across 727 flights
These figures cover 887 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. The median arrival is 3 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.
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Carrier by carrier
Which airline is most reliable on DEN to BDL
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| United Airlines | 727 | 79.3% | 57 min | 0.83% | B+ |
| Southwest Airlinesthin sample | 160 | 56.1% | 51 min | 3.12% | D− |
Flight by flight
Flights on DEN to BDL
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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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 29 points, against half a point between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am—
- 8am–11am374 flights86.5%
- 11am–2pm20 flights—
- 2pm–5pm48 flights57.8%
- 5pm–8pm444 flights67.7%
- 8pm–5am1 flights—
Scale runs 50% to 90%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
Book the morning departure. Flights leaving between 8am–11am arrive on time 86.5% of the time, against 57.8% for the afternoon window. That is 29 points of difference for no extra money, and it comes from the same aircraft having had no earlier flight to fall behind on. The 5pm–8pm window is the busiest, with 444 flights scheduled in it.
Explore
Filter DEN to BDL 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 DEN to BDL, the best departure window is 8am–11am at 86.5% on time and the worst is 2pm–5pm at 57.8%, a wide gap of 28.7 points. All US flights leaving 8am–11am ran 83.9%.
- 5–8am—
- 8–11am86.5%
- 11am–2pm—
- 2–5pm57.8%
- 5–8pm67.7%
- 8pm–5am—
best all US flightsScale 50% to 95%. Cells under 30 flights show a dash.
Across the year
When delays peak on this route
This route's year swings by 32 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.
August is the worst month at 57.8% on time, 32 points below April, the best at 90.0%. 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. October was the busiest month here, with 92 flights.
Across the week, Wednesday is the strongest day at 82.2% on time and Sunday the weakest at 70.9%, a spread of 11 points.
Delay causes
Why this route gets delayed
Late-arriving aircraft accounts for 48% of the 12,000 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 48%Late-arriving aircraft
- 31%Carrier
- 19%National Airspace System
- 3%Extreme weather
48% of delay minutes trace back to a late-arriving aircraft, meaning the plane was already behind before it got here. Across 12,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 16 to one. The split is drawn from 11,999 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 86.5% on time here.
Cancellations sit at 1.24% against a national 1.89%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.00%.
Connections and stage length
What a delay here actually costs
7.0% 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.
At 1,671 miles this is transcontinental flying, and long routes get a quiet structural advantage. Scheduled block time on a flight this length carries more padding in absolute minutes, so a twenty-minute late departure often still becomes an on-time arrival. Read the on-time rate here as slightly flattering next to a short-haul route with the same operational quality.
The return leg is a different operation and performs like one: it runs 82.6% on time across 887 flights, 7 points above 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 7 points of difference.
One caution: this is a thin sample. 887 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 BDL after this flight
What to do with this
Booking this route
Put together: treat all of this as provisional. 887 flights over twelve months is enough to clear this site's floor and not enough to be confident to better than a couple of points. The 75.2% headline is the most reliable number on the page; the hour and month splits below it are built on a few dozen flights each. 876 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
DEN to BDL questions
How often is DEN to BDL 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 24.8% of the 887 flights in this analysis, against 22.7% nationally. Delayed flights are late by about an hour on average.
How reliable is DEN to BDL compared with the rest of the country?
75.2% of flights arrive on time here against a national 77.3%, a difference of 2 points against it. That is worth a B on this site's grading scale.
What time of day has the fewest delays on DEN to BDL?
The 8am–11am departure window is the strongest at 86.5% on time. The 2pm–5pm window is the weakest at 57.8%, 29 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 August delays on DEN to BDL?
August is the weakest month at 57.8% on time, compared with 90.0% in April. Across the year that is 32 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
- BDL to DEN — the return legseparate record
- Denver International (DEN) delay statistics
- United Airlines on DEN to BDL79.3%
- Southwest Airlines on DEN to BDL56.1%
- DEN to PHX, a related route75.6%
- ORD to BDL, a related route74.5%
- DEN to SLC, a related route78.2%
- United Airlines on-time record79.3%
- Southwest Airlines on-time record56.1%
- Why the first flight of the morning is statistically safest
- The best time of day to fly, according to 7.05 million flight records
Direction matters. DEN to BDL and BDL to DEN 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.