Carrier route record
WNFLL→DEN
Southwest Airlines · Fort Lauderdale to Denver
- Flights
- 383
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Share of route
- 24%
- Carriers
- 3
Historical statistics for September 2025 to August 2026, not live status. For today’s flights, check with Southwest Airlines.
Southwest on FLL to DEN sits in the middle of the pack with a C+. About seven flights in ten arrive on time by the DOT's definition, 9 points worse than the national rate of 77.3%. The late ones land about 50 minutes behind schedule. That rests on 383 flights, with a median arrival 2 minutes late.
The national on-time rate over the same period is 77.3%, so Southwest on FLL to DEN runs 9 points behind the country as a whole. Across a thousand flights that is about 91 extra late arrivals.
Key figures
On time
68.2%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 381 completed flights
Avg delay
51 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
0.00%
National rate is 1.89%
Whole route
83.0%
Every carrier on FLL to DEN, 1,579 flights
These figures cover 383 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. On-time means an arrival less than 15 minutes after the scheduled gate time, the same threshold the Department of Transportation uses in its own reports. Cancelled and diverted flights are excluded from the on-time rate and counted separately, which is why the cancellation column matters on its own.
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Carrier by carrier
Southwest against every carrier on FLL to DEN
Southwest flew 383 of the 1,579 flights on FLL to DEN, about 24% of it. Its 68.2% on time is 15 points worse than the route as a whole, which runs 83.0%. Ranked by on-time rate it is last of three carriers on the route, where the range runs from United at 87.9% to Southwest at 68.2%. One of those carriers flew fewer than 365 flights here, so treat their positions as rough.
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 | 1,174 | 87.9% | 106 min | 0.17% | A+ |
| JetBlue Airwaysthin sample | 22 | 76.2% | 101 min | 4.55% | B− |
| Southwest Airlines (this page) | 383 | 68.2% | 51 min | 0.00% | C+ |
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Departure window
When Southwest runs best on this route
Departure time matters more here than the choice of carrier. The gap between the best and worst window is 44 points, against half a point between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am54 flights96.2%
- 8am–11am83 flights81.9%
- 11am–2pm88 flights66.7%
- 2pm–5pm150 flights52.7%
- 5pm–8pm8 flights—
- 8pm–5am—
Scale runs 45% to 100%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
Book the early departure. Flights leaving between 5am–8am arrive on time 96.2% of the time, against 52.7% for the afternoon window. That is 44 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 150 flights scheduled in it.
Across the year
Southwest on FLL to DEN through the year
February is the weak month at 56.4% on time, against 79.4% in November. 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. December was the busiest month here, with 42 flights.
Across the week, Thursday is the strongest day at 83.3% on time and Sunday the weakest at 43.9%, a spread of 39 points.
Arrival by arrival
How late Southwest on FLL to DEN runs when it is late
The 121 late arrivals split 49 under half an hour, 45 between 30 and 60 minutes, and 27 an hour or more.
- 15+ min early58 flights15.2%
- Within 15 min202 flights53.0%
- 15–29 min late49 flights12.9%
- 30–59 min late45 flights11.8%
- 1–2 hours late18 flights4.7%
- 2+ hours late9 flights2.4%
Scale runs 0% to 100%.
Share of 381 completed flights by arrival against schedule.
A late pushback is often recovered here: of 143 departures that left 15 minutes late or more, 44 still arrived on time. In the other direction, 22 flights left on time yet arrived 15 minutes late or more, so that delay built up after pushback: in the air, in a holding pattern or on the ground at DEN.
The worst days
Worst days for Southwest on FLL to DEN
The latest arrival of the period was on 15 March 2026, 7 hours 36 minutes behind schedule; most of its delay minutes were filed as national airspace system delay. On three of the five worst days the largest share was filed as a late-arriving aircraft.
| Date | Arrived late by | Largest filed cause |
|---|---|---|
| 15 March 2026 | 7 hours 36 minutes | National Airspace System |
| 20 June 2026 | 4 hours 1 minute | Late-arriving aircraft |
| 19 December 2025 | 2 hours 52 minutes | Late-arriving aircraft |
| 5 July 2026 | 2 hours 50 minutes | Carrier |
| 16 March 2026 | 2 hours 45 minutes | Late-arriving aircraft |
Delay causes
Why Southwest runs late on this route
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 6,167 reported delay minutes.
- 34%National Airspace System
- 32%Late-arriving aircraft
- 31%Carrier
- 3%Extreme weather
- 0%Security
34% 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 2,114 minutes out of 6,167, against a national NAS share of 21%. The split is drawn from 6,167 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 96.2% on time here.
Cancellations are rare at 0.00%, below the national 1.89% and low enough to earn the plus on the grade. Almost no flights are called off; the risk here is arriving late, not not arriving.
Connections and stage length
What a delay here costs
7.1% 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 about 50 minutes, which a normal layover absorbs.
At 1,703 miles this is transcontinental flying, and long routes get a quiet structural advantage. Scheduled block time on a flight this length carries more padding in absolute minutes, so a twenty-minute late departure often still becomes an on-time arrival. Read the on-time rate here as slightly flattering next to a short-haul route with the same operational quality.
The return leg is a different operation and performs like one: it runs 63.9% on time across 383 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.
One caution: this is a thin sample. 383 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.
What to do with this
Booking Southwest on FLL to DEN
Put together: treat all of this as provisional. 383 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 68.2% headline is the most reliable number on the page; the hour and month splits below it are built on a few dozen flights each. 381 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Related
Where to go next
- FLL to DEN, every carrier
- Southwest on DEN to FLL, the return leg
- United Airlines on FLL to DEN87.9%
- Southwest Airlines network-wide record
- Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International (FLL) delay statistics
- Denver International (DEN) delay statistics
- The best time of day to fly, according to 7.05 million flight records
- Worst months to fly in the US, ranked by the data
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.