Route reliability record
EWR→TPA
Newark to Tampa
- Flights
- 2,503
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Distance
- 997 mi
- Carriers
- 2
This route lands a B, 4 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 2,503 EWR to TPA flights, with a median arrival 10 minutes early.
Best time to fly EWR to TPA: a 5am–8am departure, ideally on a Tuesday. Flights in that window arrived on time 92.2% of the time and Tuesday flights 88.2%, against 80.9% 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
80.9%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 2,446 completed flights
Avg delay
72 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
2.16%
National rate is 1.89%
Best carrier
United
81.0% on time across 2,333 flights
These figures cover 2,503 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. The median arrival is 10 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.
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Carrier by carrier
Which airline is most reliable on EWR to TPA
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| United Airlines | 2,333 | 81.0% | 71 min | 2.19% | B |
| JetBlue Airwaysthin sample | 170 | 79.6% | 79 min | 1.76% | B |
Flight by flight
Flights on EWR to TPA
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 Tampa
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. 4 of the top 5 use a different airport at one end.
| Option | Airline | Success | On time | Cancelled | Best departure | Most punctual flight |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. EWR → TPANewark to Tampa | United Airlines | 79.2% | 81.0% | 2.19% | 5am–8am, Tue | UA 1979 07:00 |
| 2. JFK → TPANew York to Tampa | Delta Air Lines | 77.5% | 79.7% | 2.74% | 5am–8am, Wed | DL 2042 07:05 |
| 3. EWR → SRQNewark to Sarasota | United Airlines | 75.4% | 76.8% | 1.77% | 5am–8am, Mon | — |
| 4. LGA → TPANew York to Tampa | Delta Air Lines | 70.6% | 73.2% | 3.54% | 5am–8am, Wed | DL 2195 10:50 |
| 5. JFK → TPANew York to Tampa | JetBlue Airways | 68.9% | 73.1% | 5.81% | 5am–8am, Tue | B6 225 20:29 |
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 24 points, against half a point between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am346 flights92.2%
- 8am–11am559 flights83.0%
- 11am–2pm281 flights83.0%
- 2pm–5pm692 flights78.9%
- 5pm–8pm475 flights76.1%
- 8pm–5am150 flights68.5%
Scale runs 60% to 100%.
Book the early departure. Flights leaving between 5am–8am arrive on time 92.2% of the time, against 68.5% for the overnight window. That is 24 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 692 flights scheduled in it.
Explore
Filter EWR to TPA 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 TPA, the best departure window is 5am–8am at 92.2% on time and the worst is 8pm–5am at 68.5%, a wide gap of 23.7 points. All US flights leaving 5am–8am ran 89.3%.
- 5–8am92.2%
- 8–11am83.0%
- 11am–2pm83.0%
- 2–5pm78.9%
- 5–8pm76.1%
- 8pm–5am68.5%
best all US flightsScale 60% to 95%.
Across the year
When delays peak on this route
This route's year swings by 18 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 90.2% 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 246 flights.
Across the week, Tuesday is the strongest day at 88.2% on time and Sunday the weakest at 73.7%, a spread of 15 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 33,000 reported delay minutes.
- 37%Late-arriving aircraft
- 31%National Airspace System
- 27%Carrier
- 5%Extreme weather
37% of delay minutes trace back to a late-arriving aircraft, meaning the plane was already behind before it got here. Across 33,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 8 to one. The split is drawn from 33,488 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 92.2% on time here.
Cancellations sit at 2.16% against a national 1.89%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.12%.
Connections and stage length
What a delay here actually costs
6.8% 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 997 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 runs 78.4% on time across 2,506 flights, within 3 points of this direction. The two legs are scored separately because they usually differ; on this city pair they happen not to.
The sample behind these figures is 2,503 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 TPA 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 90.2% on time and October 72.1%, a swing of 18 points. If the dates move at all, move them out of October before you think about anything else. 2,446 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
EWR to TPA questions
How often is EWR to TPA 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 19.1% of the 2,503 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 TPA compared with the rest of the country?
80.9% of flights arrive on time here against a national 77.3%, a difference of 4 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 TPA?
The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 92.2% on time. The 8pm–5am window is the weakest at 68.5%, 24 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 TPA?
October is the weakest month at 72.1% on time, compared with 90.2% in April. Across the year that is 18 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
- TPA to EWR — the return legseparate record
- Newark Liberty International (EWR) delay statistics
- Tampa International (TPA) delay statistics
- United Airlines on EWR to TPA81.0%
- JetBlue Airways on EWR to TPA79.6%
- EWR to MCO, a related route77.9%
- ATL to TPA, a related route73.0%
- EWR to ATL, a related route76.9%
- United Airlines on-time record81.0%
- JetBlue Airways on-time record79.6%
- 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 TPA and TPA 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.