Route reliability record
DFW→BHM
Dallas-Fort Worth to Birmingham
- Flights
- 2,197
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Distance
- 597 mi
- Carriers
- 4
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 an hour and a half behind schedule. That rests on 2,197 DFW to BHM flights, of which Envoy Air flew 706 at 81.7% on time.
Best time to fly DFW to BHM: a 8am–11am departure, ideally on a Tuesday. Flights in that window arrived on time 85.1% of the time and Tuesday flights 83.2%, 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 2,132 completed flights
Avg delay
84 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
2.73%
National rate is 1.89%
Best carrier
Envoy
81.7% on time across 706 flights
These figures cover 2,197 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 10.6% 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 DFW to BHM
The choice of carrier is not cosmetic here. Envoy Air arrives on time 81.7% of the time; PSA Airlines manages 74.1%. Sample sizes sit next to every figure, because a two-point gap across 1,069 flights means less than a ten-point one.
| Airline | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Envoy Air | 706 | 81.7% | 64 min | 1.42% | B |
| SkyWest Airlinesthin sample | 268 | 77.8% | 82 min | 2.61% | B |
| PSA Airlines | 1,069 | 74.1% | 89 min | 3.46% | C− |
| American Airlinesthin sample | 154 | 48.0% | 100 min | 3.90% | F− |
PSA Airlines cancels 3.5% 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.
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Best ways to make this trip
The most reliable ways to fly Dallas-Fort Worth to Birmingham
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 3 use a different airport at one end.
| Option | Airline | Success | On time | Cancelled | Best departure | Most punctual flight |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. DFW → BHMDallas-Fort Worth to Birmingham | Envoy Air | 80.5% | 81.7% | 1.42% | 8am–11am, Tue | — |
| 2. DFW → BHMDallas-Fort Worth to Birmingham | PSA Airlines | 71.5% | 74.1% | 3.46% | 8am–11am, Tue | — |
| 3. DAL → BHMDallas to Birmingham | Southwest Airlines | 69.1% | 70.2% | 1.53% | 8am–11am, Tue | — |
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 15 points, against 8 points between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am249 flights84.9%
- 8am–11am313 flights85.1%
- 11am–2pm326 flights75.5%
- 2pm–5pm513 flights71.0%
- 5pm–8pm271 flights73.0%
- 8pm–5am525 flights69.8%
Scale runs 60% to 90%.
Book the morning departure. Flights leaving between 8am–11am arrive on time 85.1% of the time, against 69.8% for the overnight window. That is 15 points of difference for no extra money, and it comes from the same aircraft having had no earlier flight to fall behind on. The 8pm–5am window is the busiest, with 525 flights scheduled in it.
Explore
Filter DFW to BHM 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 DFW to BHM, the best departure window is 8am–11am at 85.1% on time and the worst is 8pm–5am at 69.8%, a wide gap of 15.3 points. All US flights leaving 8am–11am ran 83.9%.
- 5–8am84.9%
- 8–11am85.1%
- 11am–2pm75.5%
- 2–5pm71.0%
- 5–8pm73.0%
- 8pm–5am69.8%
best all US flightsScale 60% to 95%.
Across the year
When delays peak on this route
This route's year swings by 29 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.
June is the worst month at 58.0% on time, 29 points below September, the best at 87.4%. 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. May was the busiest month here, with 208 flights.
Across the week, Tuesday is the strongest day at 83.2% on time and Sunday the weakest at 68.0%, a spread of 15 points.
Delay causes
Why this route gets delayed
Late-arriving aircraft accounts for 50% of the 44,000 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 50%Late-arriving aircraft
- 29%Carrier
- 12%National Airspace System
- 9%Extreme weather
- 0%Security
50% of delay minutes trace back to a late-arriving aircraft, meaning the plane was already behind before it got here. Across 44,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 6 to one. The split is drawn from 44,221 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 85.1% on time here.
Cancellations run at 2.73%, against 1.89% nationally. That is roughly 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
10.6% 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 597 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 is a different operation and performs like one: it runs 80.1% on time across 2,196 flights, 5 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 5 points of difference.
The sample behind these figures is 2,197 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 BHM 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. September runs 87.4% on time and June 58.0%, a swing of 29 points. If the dates move at all, move them out of June before you think about anything else. 2,132 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
DFW to BHM questions
How often is DFW to BHM 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 2,197 flights in this analysis, against 22.7% nationally. Delayed flights are late by an hour and a half on average.
Which airline is most reliable on DFW to BHM?
Envoy Air leads at 81.7% on time across 706 flights. PSA Airlines is at the other end on 74.1%, 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 DFW to BHM?
The 8am–11am departure window is the strongest at 85.1% on time. The 8pm–5am window is the weakest at 69.8%, 15 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 June delays on DFW to BHM?
June is the weakest month at 58.0% on time, compared with 87.4% in September. Across the year that is 29 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
- BHM to DFW — the return legseparate record
- Dallas/Fort Worth International (DFW) delay statistics
- Envoy Air on DFW to BHM81.7%
- SkyWest Airlines on DFW to BHM77.8%
- PSA Airlines on DFW to BHM74.1%
- American Airlines on DFW to BHM48.0%
- DFW to ORD, a related route68.8%
- ATL to BHM, a related route83.1%
- DFW to ATL, a related route75.6%
- Envoy Air on-time record81.7%
- SkyWest Airlines on-time record77.8%
- PSA Airlines on-time record74.1%
- The US routes with the most cancellations
- Why the first flight of the morning is statistically safest
Direction matters. DFW to BHM and BHM to DFW 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.