Route reliability record
DTW→DCA
Detroit to Washington
- Flights
- 2,971
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Distance
- 405 mi
- Carriers
- 5
This route carries a cancellation problem, not just a delay problem: 4.2% of scheduled flights never operate, against 1.9% nationally. Of the ones that do fly, about seven flights in ten arrive on time, worth a C− overall. The punctuality figure counts only flights that actually departed, so it flatters an operation that cancels this often. That rests on 2,971 DTW to DCA flights, of which PSA Airlines flew 947 at 69.9% on time.
Best time to fly DTW to DCA: a 8am–11am departure, ideally on a Saturday. Flights in that window arrived on time 82.3% of the time and Saturday flights 83.7%, against 68.3% for the route overall.
The national on-time rate over the same period is 77.3%, so this route runs 9 points behind the country as a whole. Across a thousand flights that is about 90 extra late arrivals.
Key figures
On time
68.3%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 2,834 completed flights
Avg delay
79 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
4.24%
National rate is 1.89%
Best carrier
PSA
69.9% on time across 947 flights
These figures cover 2,971 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 11.5% 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 DTW to DCA
The two carriers here are closely matched: 2 points separate the best from the worst. At that spread, schedule and price are better tie-breakers than reliability. Sample sizes are shown so you can see which rows are worth weighing.
| Airline | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Envoy Airthin sample | 2 | 100.0% | — | 0.00% | A+ |
| PSA Airlines | 947 | 69.9% | 120 min | 6.76% | C− |
| Delta Air Lines | 1,741 | 68.2% | 60 min | 2.81% | C |
| Republic Airwaysthin sample | 277 | 63.9% | 69 min | 4.69% | D− |
| American Airlinesthin sample | 4 | 25.0% | 207 min | 0.00% | F+ |
PSA Airlines cancels 6.8% 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
Flights on DTW to DCA
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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Best ways to make this trip
The most reliable ways to fly Detroit to Washington
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. 3 of the top 5 use a different airport at one end.
| Option | Airline | Success | On time | Cancelled | Best departure | Most punctual flight |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. DTW → BWIDetroit to Baltimore | Delta Air Lines | 80.7% | 82.0% | 1.63% | 5am–8am, Sat | DL 1546 10:10 |
| 2. DTW → BWIDetroit to Baltimore | Southwest Airlines | 78.9% | 79.8% | 1.17% | 5am–8am, Wed | — |
| 3. DTW → IADDetroit to Washington | SkyWest Airlines | 69.1% | 69.9% | 1.16% | 5am–8am, Sat | — |
| 4. DTW → DCADetroit to Washington | Delta Air Lines | 66.3% | 68.2% | 2.81% | 8am–11am, Sat | DL 2476 10:00 |
| 5. DTW → DCADetroit to Washington | PSA Airlines | 65.2% | 69.9% | 6.76% | 11am–2pm, Sat | — |
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 31 points, against 2 points between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am669 flights81.2%
- 8am–11am678 flights82.3%
- 11am–2pm99 flights77.8%
- 2pm–5pm541 flights51.5%
- 5pm–8pm605 flights52.2%
- 8pm–5am379 flights67.3%
Scale runs 45% to 90%.
Book the morning departure. Flights leaving between 8am–11am arrive on time 82.3% of the time, against 51.5% for the afternoon window. That is 31 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 678 flights scheduled in it.
Explore
Filter DTW to DCA 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 DTW to DCA, the best departure window is 8am–11am at 82.3% on time and the worst is 2pm–5pm at 51.5%, a wide gap of 30.8 points. All US flights leaving 8am–11am ran 83.9%.
- 5–8am81.2%
- 8–11am82.3%
- 11am–2pm77.8%
- 2–5pm51.5%
- 5–8pm52.2%
- 8pm–5am67.3%
best all US flightsScale 45% to 95%.
Across the year
When delays peak on this route
This route's year swings by 25 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.
February is the weak month at 58.0% on time, against 83.2% in September. Winter delays cluster: a single storm system can account for most of a month's shortfall, so an average December hides both very good weeks and genuinely unflyable days. March was the busiest month here, with 271 flights.
Across the week, Saturday is the strongest day at 83.7% on time and Sunday the weakest at 61.4%, a spread of 22 points.
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 71,000 reported delay minutes.
- 37%National Airspace System
- 29%Carrier
- 28%Late-arriving aircraft
- 5%Extreme weather
- 0%Security
37% 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 26,000 minutes out of 71,000, against a national NAS share of 21%. The split is drawn from 70,866 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 82.3% on time here.
Cancellations run at 4.24%, against 1.89% nationally. That is about one flight in 25 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
11.5% 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.
At 405 miles this is a short hop, and stage length matters more than it looks. A flight this short spends under two hours in the air, which leaves almost nothing to claw back a late pushback with. Delay here is decided on the ground, in the turn, which is why the 8am–11am window matters as much as it does.
The return leg is a different operation and performs like one: it runs 75.3% on time across 2,972 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.
The sample behind these figures is 2,971 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 DCA after this flight
What to do with this
Booking this route
Put together: the delay figures matter less here than the 4.24% cancellation rate. A late arrival costs you a little over an hour; a cancelled flight costs you the day. Book the 8am–11am departure so there is still a schedule behind you if it goes wrong, and treat a same-day connection as optimistic. 2,834 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
DTW to DCA questions
How often is DTW to DCA delayed?
About one flight in three arrives at least 15 minutes late, which is the Department of Transportation's definition of a delayed arrival. That works out to 31.7% of the 2,971 flights in this analysis, against 22.7% nationally. Delayed flights are late by a little over an hour on average.
Which airline is most reliable on DTW to DCA?
PSA Airlines leads at 69.9% on time across 947 flights. Delta Air Lines is at the other end on 68.2%, a gap of 2 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 DTW to DCA?
The 8am–11am departure window is the strongest at 82.3% on time. The 2pm–5pm window is the weakest at 51.5%, 31 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 February delays on DTW to DCA?
February is the weakest month at 58.0% on time, compared with 83.2% in September. Across the year that is 25 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
- DCA to DTW — the return legseparate record
- Detroit Metropolitan Wayne County (DTW) delay statistics
- Ronald Reagan Washington National (DCA) delay statistics
- PSA Airlines on DTW to DCA69.9%
- Delta Air Lines on DTW to DCA68.2%
- Republic Airways on DTW to DCA63.9%
- DTW to ORD, a related route72.2%
- BOS to DCA, a related route72.6%
- DTW to ATL, a related route78.9%
- Envoy Air on-time record100.0%
- PSA Airlines on-time record69.9%
- Delta Air Lines on-time record68.2%
- The US routes with the most cancellations
- The best time of day to fly, according to 7.05 million flight records
Direction matters. DTW to DCA and DCA to DTW 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.