Route reliability record
FLL→CVG
Fort Lauderdale to Cincinnati
- Flights
- 975
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Distance
- 932 mi
- Carriers
- 3
This route sits in the middle of the pack with a C. About seven flights in ten arrive on time by the DOT's definition, 7 points worse than the national rate of 77.3%. The late ones land an hour and a half behind schedule. That rests on 975 FLL to CVG flights, with a median arrival 2 minutes early.
Best time to fly FLL to CVG: a 8am–11am departure, ideally on a Wednesday. Flights in that window arrived on time 82.6% of the time and Wednesday flights 82.0%, against 70.3% for the route overall.
The national on-time rate over the same period is 77.3%, so this route runs 7 points behind the country as a whole. Across a thousand flights that is about 70 extra late arrivals.
Key figures
On time
70.3%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 963 completed flights
Avg delay
91 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
1.03%
National rate is 1.89%
Best carrier
Delta
71.8% on time across 525 flights
These figures cover 975 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 12.9% 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 FLL to CVG
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 | 525 | 71.8% | 84 min | 0.95% | C+ |
| Allegiant Airthin sample | 257 | 71.5% | 100 min | 0.39% | C+ |
| Frontier Airlinesthin sample | 193 | 64.6% | 96 min | 2.07% | D |
Flight by flight
Flights on FLL to CVG
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.
Best ways to make this trip
The most reliable ways to fly Fort Lauderdale to Cincinnati
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. 1 of the top 2 use a different airport at one end.
| Option | Airline | Success | On time | Cancelled | Best departure | Most punctual flight |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. MIA → CVGMiami to Cincinnati | Envoy Air | 83.0% | 83.5% | 0.62% | 8am–11am, Tue | — |
| 2. FLL → CVGFort Lauderdale to Cincinnati | Delta Air Lines | 71.1% | 71.8% | 0.95% | 11am–2pm, Wed | DL 661 17:59 |
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 33 points, against half a point between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am18 flights—
- 8am–11am121 flights82.6%
- 11am–2pm289 flights78.5%
- 2pm–5pm62 flights49.2%
- 5pm–8pm442 flights63.4%
- 8pm–5am43 flights71.4%
Scale runs 40% to 90%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
Book the morning departure. Flights leaving between 8am–11am arrive on time 82.6% of the time, against 49.2% for the afternoon window. That is 33 points of difference for no extra money, and it comes from the same aircraft having had no earlier flight to fall behind on. The 5pm–8pm window is the busiest, with 442 flights scheduled in it.
Explore
Filter FLL to CVG 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 FLL to CVG, the best departure window is 8am–11am at 82.6% on time and the worst is 2pm–5pm at 49.2%, a wide gap of 33.4 points. All US flights leaving 8am–11am ran 83.9%.
- 5–8am—
- 8–11am82.6%
- 11am–2pm78.5%
- 2–5pm49.2%
- 5–8pm63.4%
- 8pm–5am71.4%
best all US flightsScale 40% to 95%. Cells under 30 flights show a dash.
Across the year
When delays peak on this route
This route's year swings by 33 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.
October is the best month on the calendar at 84.3% 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 114 flights.
Across the week, Wednesday is the strongest day at 82.0% on time and Sunday the weakest at 62.0%, a spread of 20 points.
Delay causes
Why this route gets delayed
Late-arriving aircraft accounts for 58% of the 26,000 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 58%Late-arriving aircraft
- 27%Carrier
- 14%National Airspace System
- 2%Extreme weather
58% of delay minutes trace back to a late-arriving aircraft, meaning the plane was already behind before it got here. Across 26,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 25 to one. The split is drawn from 25,975 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 82.6% on time here.
Cancellations sit at 1.03% against a national 1.89%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.21%.
Connections and stage length
What a delay here actually costs
12.9% 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.
The 932 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 76.3% on time across 975 flights, 6 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 6 points of difference.
One caution: this is a thin sample. 975 flights over twelve months is enough to clear this site's floor but not enough to pin the rate down tightly, and a single bad week moves it by more than a point. Treat the grade as a rough reading.
Work out the risk of missing a connection in CVG after this flight
What to do with this
Booking this route
Put together: treat all of this as provisional. 975 flights over twelve months is enough to clear this site's floor and not enough to be confident to better than a couple of points. The 70.3% headline is the most reliable number on the page; the hour and month splits below it are built on a few dozen flights each. 963 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
FLL to CVG questions
How often is FLL to CVG delayed?
Roughly 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 29.7% of the 975 flights in this analysis, against 22.7% nationally. Delayed flights are late by an hour and a half on average.
How reliable is FLL to CVG compared with the rest of the country?
70.3% of flights arrive on time here against a national 77.3%, a difference of 7 points against it. That is worth a C on this site's grading scale.
What time of day has the fewest delays on FLL to CVG?
The 8am–11am departure window is the strongest at 82.6% on time. The 2pm–5pm window is the weakest at 49.2%, 33 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 March delays on FLL to CVG?
March is the weakest month at 51.4% on time, compared with 84.3% in October. Across the year that is 33 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
- CVG to FLL — the return legseparate record
- Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International (FLL) delay statistics
- Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International (CVG) delay statistics
- Delta Air Lines on FLL to CVG71.8%
- Allegiant Air on FLL to CVG71.5%
- Frontier Airlines on FLL to CVG64.6%
- FLL to ATL, a related route71.0%
- ORD to CVG, a related route72.1%
- FLL to LGA, a related route64.8%
- Delta Air Lines on-time record71.8%
- Allegiant Air on-time record71.5%
- Frontier Airlines on-time record64.6%
- Why the first flight of the morning is statistically safest
- How often a connection fails at the major US hubs
Direction matters. FLL to CVG and CVG to FLL 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.