Route reliability record
FLL→DFW
Fort Lauderdale to Dallas-Fort Worth
- Flights
- 3,149
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Distance
- 1,119 mi
- Carriers
- 4
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, 5 points worse than the national rate of 77.3%. The late ones land an hour and a half behind schedule. That rests on 3,149 FLL to DFW flights, of which American Airlines flew 2,032 at 74.0% on time.
Best time to fly FLL to DFW: a 5am–8am departure, ideally on a Tuesday. Flights in that window arrived on time 88.5% of the time and Tuesday flights 78.8%, against 72.1% for the route overall.
The national on-time rate over the same period is 77.3%, so this route runs 5 points behind the country as a whole. Across a thousand flights that is about 52 extra late arrivals.
Key figures
On time
72.1%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 3,042 completed flights
Avg delay
86 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
2.83%
National rate is 1.89%
Best carrier
American
74.0% on time across 2,032 flights
These figures cover 3,149 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 11.6% 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 DFW
The two carriers here are closely matched: 3 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| American Airlines | 2,032 | 74.0% | 98 min | 2.66% | C |
| JetBlue Airwaysthin sample | 312 | 72.0% | 72 min | 2.24% | C |
| Spirit Airlines | 600 | 70.7% | 65 min | 3.50% | C− |
| Frontier Airlinesthin sample | 205 | 57.1% | 67 min | 3.41% | D− |
Spirit Airlines cancels 3.5% 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.
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 Dallas-Fort Worth
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. 2 of the top 4 use a different airport at one end.
| Option | Airline | Success | On time | Cancelled | Best departure | Most punctual flight |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. MIA → DFWMiami to Dallas-Fort Worth | American Airlines | 73.7% | 75.5% | 2.35% | 5am–8am, Tue | AA 1226 05:00 |
| 2. FLL → DFWFort Lauderdale to Dallas-Fort Worth | American Airlines | 72.0% | 74.0% | 2.66% | 5am–8am, Thu | — |
| 3. PBI → DFWWest Palm Beach to Dallas-Fort Worth | American Airlines | 70.9% | 73.0% | 2.90% | 5am–8am, Wed | AA 1220 07:00 |
| 4. FLL → DFWFort Lauderdale to Dallas-Fort Worth | Spirit Airlines | 68.2% | 70.7% | 3.50% | 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 34 points, against 3 points between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am718 flights88.5%
- 8am–11am330 flights85.3%
- 11am–2pm696 flights77.3%
- 2pm–5pm341 flights54.7%
- 5pm–8pm635 flights54.8%
- 8pm–5am429 flights65.0%
Scale runs 45% to 95%.
Book the early departure. Flights leaving between 5am–8am arrive on time 88.5% of the time, against 54.7% for the afternoon window. That is 34 points of difference for no extra money, and it comes from the same aircraft having had no earlier flight to fall behind on. The 5am–8am window is the busiest, with 718 flights scheduled in it.
Explore
Filter FLL to DFW 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 DFW, the best departure window is 5am–8am at 88.5% on time and the worst is 2pm–5pm at 54.7%, a wide gap of 33.8 points. All US flights leaving 5am–8am ran 89.3%.
- 5–8am88.5%
- 8–11am85.3%
- 11am–2pm77.3%
- 2–5pm54.7%
- 5–8pm54.8%
- 8pm–5am65.0%
best all US flightsScale 45% 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.
July is the worst month at 61.9% on time, 18 points below October, the best at 79.4%. Summer afternoon convection and peak-season schedules land on the same weeks every year, so this is a pattern you can book around rather than a run of bad luck. March was the busiest month here, with 348 flights.
Across the week, Tuesday is the strongest day at 78.8% on time and Sunday the weakest at 63.5%, 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 73,000 reported delay minutes.
- 38%Late-arriving aircraft
- 37%Carrier
- 18%National Airspace System
- 8%Extreme weather
- 0%Security
38% of delay minutes trace back to a late-arriving aircraft, meaning the plane was already behind before it got here. Across 73,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 5 to one. The split is drawn from 72,862 reported delay minutes.
The largest share of delay minutes, 37%, falls under carrier control: crew scheduling, maintenance, fuelling, baggage. It accounts for 27,000 of the 73,000 delay minutes reported here.
Cancellations run at 2.83%, against 1.89% nationally. That is roughly one flight in 40 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
11.6% 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 1,119 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 69.7% on time across 3,143 flights, within 2 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 3,149 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 DFW after this flight
What to do with this
Booking this route
Put together: the delay figures matter less here than the 2.83% cancellation rate. A late arrival costs you an hour and a half; a cancelled flight costs you the day. Book the 5am–8am departure so there is still a schedule behind you if it goes wrong, and treat a same-day connection as optimistic. 3,042 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
FLL to DFW questions
How often is FLL to DFW delayed?
Roughly one flight in four arrives at least 15 minutes late, which is the Department of Transportation's definition of a delayed arrival. That works out to 27.9% of the 3,149 flights in this analysis, against 22.7% nationally. Delayed flights are late by an hour and a half on average.
Which airline is most reliable on FLL to DFW?
American Airlines leads at 74.0% on time across 2,032 flights. Spirit Airlines is at the other end on 70.7%, a gap of 3 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 FLL to DFW?
The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 88.5% on time. The 2pm–5pm window is the weakest at 54.7%, 34 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 July delays on FLL to DFW?
July is the weakest month at 61.9% on time, compared with 79.4% in October. 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
- DFW to FLL — the return legseparate record
- Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International (FLL) delay statistics
- Dallas/Fort Worth International (DFW) delay statistics
- American Airlines on FLL to DFW74.0%
- JetBlue Airways on FLL to DFW72.0%
- Spirit Airlines on FLL to DFW70.7%
- Frontier Airlines on FLL to DFW57.1%
- FLL to ATL, a related route71.0%
- ORD to DFW, a related route70.4%
- FLL to LGA, a related route64.8%
- American Airlines on-time record74.0%
- JetBlue Airways on-time record72.0%
- Spirit Airlines on-time record70.7%
- The US routes with the most cancellations
- Why the first flight of the morning is statistically safest
Direction matters. FLL to DFW and DFW 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.