Route reliability record
DSM→ATL
Des Moines to Atlanta
- Flights
- 1,254
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Distance
- 743 mi
- Carriers
- 1
This route earns an A. Close to nine flights in ten arrive inside the 15-minute window the DOT uses to define an on-time arrival, which puts it 12 points better than the national rate of 77.3%. When something does go wrong the average delay runs close to two hours. That rests on 1,254 DSM to ATL flights, with a median arrival 19 minutes early.
Best time to fly DSM to ATL: a 5am–8am departure, ideally on a Tuesday. Flights in that window arrived on time 94.1% of the time and Tuesday flights 90.8%, against 88.9% for the route overall.
Set against the rest of the country, this route's record is 12 points better than the US average of 77.3%. That gap is worth roughly 116 fewer late arrivals for every thousand flights.
Key figures
On time
88.9%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 1,216 completed flights
Avg delay
105 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
2.39%
National rate is 1.89%
Best carrier
Delta
88.9% on time across 1,254 flights
These figures cover 1,254 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. The median arrival is 19 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.
Fare search by Aviasales, a Travelpayouts partner. Booking through it may earn this site a commission at no cost to you; it changes no figure here.
Carrier by carrier
Which airline is most reliable on DSM to ATL
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Delta Air Lines | 1,254 | 88.9% | 105 min | 2.39% | A |
Flight by flight
Flights on DSM to ATL
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.
Timetable by Aviasales, a Travelpayouts partner. Booking through it may earn this site a commission at no cost to you; it changes no figure here.
Departure window
The best time of day to leave
Departure time is the single lever a traveller controls, and it moves the odds more than most people expect. Each bar below is the on-time rate for flights scheduled to leave inside that window, across 1,254 flights.
- 5am–8am350 flights94.1%
- 8am–11am34 flights91.2%
- 11am–2pm331 flights88.7%
- 2pm–5pm227 flights86.3%
- 5pm–8pm312 flights85.0%
- 8pm–5am—
Scale runs 75% to 100%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
Book the early departure. Flights leaving between 5am–8am arrive on time 94.1% of the time, against 85.0% for the evening window. That is 9 points of difference for no extra money, and it comes from the same aircraft having had no earlier flight to fall behind on. The 5am–8am window is the busiest, with 350 flights scheduled in it.
Explore
Filter DSM to ATL 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 DSM to ATL, the best departure window is 5am–8am at 94.1% on time and the worst is 5pm–8pm at 85.0%, a real gap of 9.1 points. All US flights leaving 5am–8am ran 89.3%.
- 5–8am94.1%
- 8–11am91.2%
- 11am–2pm88.7%
- 2–5pm86.3%
- 5–8pm85.0%
- 8pm–5am—
best all US flightsScale 60% to 100%. Cells under 30 flights show a dash.
Across the year
When delays peak on this route
This route's year swings by 16 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 80.2% on time, 16 points below October, the best at 95.8%. 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 121 flights.
Across the week, Tuesday is the strongest day at 90.8% on time and Monday the weakest at 86.8%, a spread of 4 points.
Delay causes
Why this route gets delayed
Carrier accounts for 52% of the 14,000 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 52%Carrier
- 33%Late-arriving aircraft
- 13%National Airspace System
- 2%Extreme weather
The largest share of delay minutes, 52%, falls under carrier control: crew scheduling, maintenance, fuelling, baggage. It accounts for 7,331 of the 14,000 delay minutes reported here. The split is drawn from 14,218 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 94.1% on time here.
Cancellations sit at 2.39% against a national 1.89%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.64%.
Connections and stage length
What a delay here actually costs
5.5% 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 close to two hours, which a normal layover absorbs.
The 743 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 84.7% on time across 1,253 flights, 4 points below 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 1,254 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 ATL 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. October runs 95.8% on time and July 80.2%, a swing of 16 points. If the dates move at all, move them out of July before you think about anything else. 1,216 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
DSM to ATL questions
How often is DSM to ATL delayed?
About one flight in nine arrives at least 15 minutes late, which is the Department of Transportation's definition of a delayed arrival. That works out to 11.1% of the 1,254 flights in this analysis, against 22.7% nationally. Delayed flights are late by close to two hours on average.
How reliable is DSM to ATL compared with the rest of the country?
88.9% of flights arrive on time here against a national 77.3%, a difference of 12 points in its favour. That is worth a A on this site's grading scale.
What time of day has the fewest delays on DSM to ATL?
The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 94.1% on time. The 5pm–8pm window is the weakest at 85.0%, 9 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 DSM to ATL?
July is the weakest month at 80.2% on time, compared with 95.8% in October. Across the year that is 16 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
- ATL to DSM — the return legseparate record
- Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International (ATL) delay statistics
- DSM to ORD, a related route73.6%
- LGA to ATL, a related route75.5%
- DSM to DEN, a related route83.5%
- Delta Air Lines on-time record88.9%
- Why the first flight of the morning is statistically safest
- The most punctual routes in the US, and the least
Direction matters. DSM to ATL and ATL to DSM are scored separately because they are separate operations, with different departure banks and different aircraft. Compare the return leg.
Embed DSM to ATL’s on-time badge on your site
Paste this into a web page. The badge shows the current on-time rate, cancellation rate and grade, and updates every month. Preview it, or build a badge for another route or airport.
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.