Carrier route record
UADEN→LGA
United Airlines · Denver to New York
- Flights
- 2,017
- Period
- July 2025 to June 2026
- Share of route
- 43%
- Carriers
- 4
Historical statistics for July 2025 to June 2026, not live status. For today’s flights, check with United Airlines.
United on DEN to LGA sits in the middle of the pack with a C. Close to three flights in four arrive on time by the DOT's definition, 4 points worse than the national rate of 77.6%. The late ones land a little over an hour behind schedule. That rests on 2,017 flights. The strongest carrier on the route with a full sample, Delta Air Lines, flew 1,036 at 79.0% on time.
The US average over the same twelve months is 77.6%, so there is little to separate United on DEN to LGA from the country as a whole. The variation that matters here is internal: which carrier, and what time of day.
Key figures
On time
74.0%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 1,962 completed flights
Avg delay
69 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
1.83%
National rate is 1.81%
Whole route
71.5%
Every carrier on DEN to LGA, 4,672 flights
These figures cover 2,017 flights between July 2025 and June 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 10.4% 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
United against every carrier on DEN to LGA
United flew 2,017 of the 4,672 flights on DEN to LGA, about 43% of it. Its 74.0% on time is 3 points better than the route as a whole, which runs 71.5%. Ranked by on-time rate it is number two of four carriers on the route, where the range runs from Delta at 79.0% to Frontier at 61.6%. One of those carriers flew fewer than 365 flights here, so treat their positions as rough.
The choice of carrier is not cosmetic here. Delta Air Lines arrives on time 79.0% of the time; Southwest Airlines manages 64.0%. Sample sizes sit next to every figure, because a two-point gap across 1,467 flights means less than a ten-point one.
| Airline | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Delta Air Lines | 1,036 | 79.0% | 81 min | 4.44% | B− |
| United Airlines (this page) | 2,017 | 74.0% | 69 min | 1.83% | C |
| Southwest Airlines | 1,467 | 64.0% | 60 min | 2.66% | D |
| Frontier Airlinesthin sample | 152 | 61.6% | 76 min | 3.95% | D− |
Delta Air Lines cancels 4.4% of what it schedules here, the highest in the table. A cancelled flight never appears in an on-time rate, so read that column alongside the punctuality one rather than after it.
Flight by flight
United flight numbers on DEN to LGA
Departure window
When United runs best on this route
Departure time matters more here than the choice of carrier. The gap between the best and worst window is 18 points, against 15 points between the best and worst carrier. Each bar is the on-time rate for flights scheduled inside that window.
- 5am–8am—
- 8am–11am706 flights83.5%
- 11am–2pm310 flights72.3%
- 2pm–5pm678 flights68.9%
- 5pm–8pm323 flights65.3%
- 8pm–5am—
Scale runs 55% to 90%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
Book the morning departure. Flights leaving between 8am–11am arrive on time 83.5% of the time, against 65.3% for the evening window. That is 18 points of difference for no extra money, and it comes from the same aircraft having had no earlier flight to fall behind on. The 8am–11am window is the busiest, with 706 flights scheduled in it.
Across the year
United on DEN to LGA through the year
July is the worst month at 59.9% on time, 23 points below February, the best at 83.3%. 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 176 flights.
Across the week, Saturday is the strongest day at 85.2% on time and Sunday the weakest at 68.4%. 17 points is a smaller lever than departure hour, but it is free.
Delay causes
Why United runs late on this route
One category carries most of the weight here. National Airspace System accounts for 57% of the 35,000 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.
- 57%National Airspace System
- 25%Late-arriving aircraft
- 15%Carrier
- 3%Extreme weather
57% of delay minutes are charged to the National Airspace System: air traffic volume, runway configuration, ground stops. No carrier can price its way out of that, which is why airport choice moves the number here more than carrier choice does. That is 20,000 minutes out of 35,000, against a national NAS share of 21%. The split is drawn from 35,351 reported delay minutes.
Cancellations sit at 1.83% against a national 1.81%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.89%.
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. 10.4% 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.
At 1,620 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 77.8% on time across 2,017 flights, 4 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 4 points of difference.
The sample behind these figures is 2,017 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.
What to do with this
Booking United on DEN to LGA
Put together: the calendar is the biggest lever here, not the carrier or the hour. February runs 83.3% on time and July 59.9%, a swing of 23 points. If the dates move at all, move them out of July before you think about anything else. 1,962 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Related
Where to go next
- DEN to LGA, every carrier
- United on LGA to DEN, the return leg
- Delta Air Lines on DEN to LGA79.0%
- Southwest Airlines on DEN to LGA64.0%
- Frontier Airlines on DEN to LGA61.6%
- United Airlines network-wide record
- Denver International (DEN) delay statistics
- LaGuardia (LGA) delay statistics
- Same route, different airline: where the carrier you pick matters most
- The best time of day to fly, according to 7.04 million flight records
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.