Route reliability record
DFW→CLT
Dallas-Fort Worth to Charlotte
- Flights
- 68,329
- Period
- June 2025 to May 2026
- Distance
- 934 mi
- Carriers
- 1
This route lands a B, about a point better than the national rate of 75.9%. Roughly one flight in four arrive 15 minutes late or worse, and those flights are late by about 50 minutes on average. That is a workable record, not a spotless one. That rests on 68,329 flights, with a median arrival 1 minutes early.
The US average over the same twelve months is 75.9%, 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
77.2%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 66,904 completed flights
Avg delay
49 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
1.82%
National rate is 2.23%
Best carrier
Breeze
77.2% on time across 68,329 flights
These figures cover 68,000 flights between June 2025 and May 2026. On-time means an arrival less than 15 minutes after the scheduled gate time, the same threshold the Department of Transportation uses in its own reports. Cancelled and diverted flights are excluded from the on-time rate and counted separately, which is why the cancellation column matters on its own.
Carrier by carrier
Which airline is most reliable on DFW to CLT
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Breeze Airways | 68,329 | 77.2% | 56 min | 1.82% | B |
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 10 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–8am10,591 flights82.2%
- 8am–11am14,007 flights78.2%
- 11am–2pm12,641 flights73.7%
- 2pm–5pm11,958 flights76.2%
- 5pm–8pm12,299 flights72.2%
- 8pm–5am6,833 flights77.7%
Scale runs 65% to 90%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
Book the early departure. Flights leaving between 5am–8am arrive on time 82.2% of the time, against 72.2% for the evening window. That is 10 points of difference for no extra money, and it comes from the same aircraft having had no earlier flight to fall behind on.
Across the year
When delays peak on this route
Twelve months, one bar each, drawn from the same 68,329 flights. The strip shows how much of this route's record is set by the calendar rather than by the operation.
The year is unusually even here, with only 3 points between the best and worst months. July is the softest at 75.6%, but the seasonal effect is small enough that it should not drive when you travel.
The day of the week is close to irrelevant here: 2 points separates the best day from the worst. Weekly demand peaks are not what drives the delays on this operation.
Delay causes
Why this route gets delayed
Carriers report a reason for every delay minute they cause, in five DOT categories. The split below is by minutes, not by number of flights, so a handful of very long weather delays weighs as much as many short ones. It covers 752,000 reported delay minutes.
- 41%Carrier
- 26%Late-arriving aircraft
- 26%National Airspace System
- 7%Extreme weather
- 0%Security
The largest share of delay minutes, 41%, falls under carrier control: crew scheduling, maintenance, fuelling, baggage. Unlike weather, that is a management outcome, and it is the category where the gap between two carriers on the same schedule is genuinely earned. It accounts for 308,000 of the 752,000 delay minutes reported here.
Cancellations sit at 1.82% against a national 2.23%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.27%.
Connections and stage length
What a delay here actually costs
7.5% of arrivals land an hour or more late, close to the national 8.6%. 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 are the about 50 minutes kind, which a normal layover absorbs.
The 934 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. It is also long enough that the aircraft usually flies three or four legs a day rather than six, which slows how fast delay compounds.
The return leg runs 77.5% on time across 32,013 flights, within half a point of this direction. The two legs are scored separately because they usually differ; on this city pair they happen not to.
68,329 flights sit behind these numbers, which is a large enough sample that the headline rate is not moving on noise. Where a sub-group falls below 30 flights the site shows a dash instead of a percentage.
What to do with this
Booking this route
Put together: avoid the 5pm–8pm departure. It runs 72.2% on time against 82.2% for the 5am–8am slot, and that 10 points is the largest single thing you control here. Breeze Airways is the strongest operator if the fares are close.
Common questions
DFW to CLT questions
How often is DFW to CLT delayed?
Roughly one flight in four arrive at least 15 minutes late, which is the Department of Transportation's definition of a delayed arrival. That works out to 22.8% of the 68,329 flights in this analysis, against 24.1% nationally. Delayed flights are late by about 50 minutes on average.
How reliable is DFW to CLT compared with the rest of the country?
77.2% of flights arrive on time here against a national 75.9%, a difference of about a point in its favour. That is worth a B on this site's grading scale.
What time of day has the fewest delays on DFW to CLT?
The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 82.2% on time. The 5pm–8pm window is the weakest at 72.2%, 10 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 DFW to CLT?
July is the weakest month at 75.6% on time, compared with 78.2% in September. Across the year that is 3 points between the best and worst months. The seasonal swing is modest enough that it should not decide when you travel.
Related
Where to go next
- CLT to DFW — the return legseparate record
- Dallas/Fort Worth International (DFW) delay statistics
- Charlotte Douglas International (CLT) delay statistics
- Breeze Airways on-time record77.2%
- The best time of day to fly, according to 11.3 million flight records
- Worst months to fly in the US, ranked by the data
Direction matters. DFW to CLT and CLT to DFW are scored separately because they are separate operations, with different departure banks and different aircraft. Compare the return leg.
Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics, on-time performance data, June 2025 to May 2026. Updated monthly. How this data is collected.