Route reliability record
EWR→MSY
Newark to New Orleans
- Flights
- 1,218
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Distance
- 1,167 mi
- Carriers
- 4
This route lands a B, 2 points better than the national rate of 77.3%. About one flight in five arrives 15 minutes late or worse, and those flights are late by a little over an hour on average. That rests on 1,218 EWR to MSY flights, with a median arrival 12 minutes early.
Best time to fly EWR to MSY: a 5am–8am departure, ideally on a Tuesday. Flights in that window arrived on time 93.8% of the time and Tuesday flights 88.3%, against 79.7% 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
79.7%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 1,191 completed flights
Avg delay
78 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
2.22%
National rate is 1.89%
Best carrier
United
78.9% on time across 1,036 flights
These figures cover 1,218 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 8.1% 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 EWR to MSY
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Republic Airwaysthin sample | 153 | 89.0% | 51 min | 5.23% | A− |
| Frontier Airlinesthin sample | 5 | 80.0% | 58 min | 0.00% | B+ |
| United Airlines | 1,036 | 78.9% | 79 min | 1.74% | B |
| Spirit Airlinesthin sample | 24 | 56.5% | 102 min | 4.17% | D− |
Flight by flight
Flights on EWR to MSY
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 Newark to New Orleans
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 4 use a different airport at one end.
| Option | Airline | Success | On time | Cancelled | Best departure | Most punctual flight |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. EWR → MSYNewark to New Orleans | United Airlines | 77.5% | 78.9% | 1.74% | 5am–8am, Tue | UA 2468 12:33 |
| 2. JFK → MSYNew York to New Orleans | Delta Air Lines | 77.2% | 81.6% | 5.42% | 8am–11am, Fri | DL 1368 08:00 |
| 3. LGA → MSYNew York to New Orleans | Delta Air Lines | 75.3% | 79.1% | 4.79% | 5am–8am, Sat | DL 2411 07:30 |
| 4. JFK → MSYNew York to New Orleans | JetBlue Airways | 72.3% | 76.3% | 5.30% | 5am–8am, Wed | — |
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 18 points, against half a point between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am148 flights93.8%
- 8am–11am126 flights78.0%
- 11am–2pm359 flights80.8%
- 2pm–5pm362 flights76.5%
- 5pm–8pm18 flights—
- 8pm–5am205 flights75.6%
Scale runs 65% to 100%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
Book the early departure. Flights leaving between 5am–8am arrive on time 93.8% of the time, against 75.6% for the overnight 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 2pm–5pm window is the busiest, with 362 flights scheduled in it.
Explore
Filter EWR to MSY 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 EWR to MSY, the best departure window is 5am–8am at 93.8% on time and the worst is 8pm–5am at 75.6%, a wide gap of 18.2 points. All US flights leaving 5am–8am ran 89.3%.
- 5–8am93.8%
- 8–11am78.0%
- 11am–2pm80.8%
- 2–5pm76.5%
- 5–8pm—
- 8pm–5am75.6%
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 23 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.
April is the best month on the calendar at 89.9% on time. Shoulder season thins the schedule and takes the summer weather with it, and the operation gets its margin back. March was the busiest month here, with 124 flights.
Across the week, Tuesday is the strongest day at 88.3% on time and Sunday the weakest at 70.9%, a spread of 17 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 19,000 reported delay minutes.
- 39%Late-arriving aircraft
- 26%National Airspace System
- 25%Carrier
- 10%Extreme weather
39% of delay minutes trace back to a late-arriving aircraft, meaning the plane was already behind before it got here. Across 19,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 4 to one. The split is drawn from 18,920 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 93.8% on time here.
Cancellations sit at 2.22% against a national 1.89%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.00%.
Connections and stage length
What a delay here actually costs
8.1% 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 a little over an hour, which a normal layover absorbs.
The 1,167 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 86.3% on time across 1,218 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 1,218 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 MSY 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. April runs 89.9% on time and October 67.0%, a swing of 23 points. If the dates move at all, move them out of October before you think about anything else. 1,191 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
EWR to MSY questions
How often is EWR to MSY delayed?
About one flight in five arrives at least 15 minutes late, which is the Department of Transportation's definition of a delayed arrival. That works out to 20.3% of the 1,218 flights in this analysis, against 22.7% nationally. Delayed flights are late by a little over an hour on average.
How reliable is EWR to MSY compared with the rest of the country?
79.7% of flights arrive on time here against a national 77.3%, a difference of 2 points in its favour. That is worth a B on this site's grading scale.
What time of day has the fewest delays on EWR to MSY?
The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 93.8% on time. The 8pm–5am window is the weakest at 75.6%, 18 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 October delays on EWR to MSY?
October is the weakest month at 67.0% on time, compared with 89.9% in April. Across the year that is 23 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
- MSY to EWR — the return legseparate record
- Newark Liberty International (EWR) delay statistics
- Louis Armstrong New Orleans International (MSY) delay statistics
- Republic Airways on EWR to MSY89.0%
- United Airlines on EWR to MSY78.9%
- EWR to MCO, a related route77.9%
- ATL to MSY, a related route81.4%
- EWR to ATL, a related route76.9%
- Republic Airways on-time record89.0%
- Frontier Airlines on-time record80.0%
- United Airlines on-time record78.9%
- Why the first flight of the morning is statistically safest
- The best time of day to fly, according to 7.05 million flight records
Direction matters. EWR to MSY and MSY to EWR 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.