Route reliability record
FLL→SFO
Fort Lauderdale to San Francisco
- Flights
- 1,265
- Period
- July 2025 to June 2026
- Distance
- 2,584 mi
- Carriers
- 2
This route lands a B+, 2 points better than the national rate of 77.6%. About one flight in five arrives 15 minutes late or worse, and those flights are late by about an hour on average. That is a workable record, not a spotless one. That rests on 1,265 FLL to SFO flights, of which United Airlines flew 491 at 83.8% on time.
Best time to fly FLL to SFO: a 8am–11am departure, ideally on a Wednesday. Flights in that window arrived on time 90.2% of the time and Wednesday flights 86.6%, against 79.5% for the route overall.
The US average over the same twelve months is 77.6%, 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
79.5%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 1,256 completed flights
Avg delay
58 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
0.47%
National rate is 1.81%
Best carrier
United
83.8% on time across 491 flights
These figures cover 1,265 flights between July 2025 and June 2026. The median arrival is 7 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.
Carrier by carrier
Which airline is most reliable on FLL to SFO
The choice of carrier is not cosmetic here. United Airlines arrives on time 83.8% of the time; JetBlue Airways manages 76.7%. Sample sizes sit next to every figure, because a two-point gap across 774 flights means less than a ten-point one.
| Airline | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| United Airlines | 491 | 83.8% | 61 min | 0.41% | B+ |
| JetBlue Airways | 774 | 76.7% | 56 min | 0.52% | B+ |
United leads JetBlue by 7 points. Real, but small enough that a better departure time on the weaker carrier can outweigh it.
Flight by flight
Flights on FLL to SFO
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.
Best ways to make this trip
The most reliable ways to fly Fort Lauderdale to San Francisco
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. FLL → SFOFort Lauderdale to San Francisco | United Airlines | 83.5% | 83.8% | 0.41% | 8am–11am, Wed | — |
| 2. FLL → SFOFort Lauderdale to San Francisco | JetBlue Airways | 76.3% | 76.7% | 0.52% | 5am–8am, Wed | B6 277 20:00 |
| 3. MIA → SFOMiami to San Francisco | United Airlines | 72.0% | 72.2% | 0.32% | 5am–8am, Tue | UA 2423 18:35 |
| 4. MIA → SFOMiami to San Francisco | American Airlines | 70.6% | 71.2% | 0.91% | 5am–8am, Tue | — |
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 28 points, against 7 points between the best and worst carrier. Each bar is the on-time rate for flights scheduled inside that window.
- 5am–8am360 flights89.7%
- 8am–11am377 flights90.2%
- 11am–2pm12 flights—
- 2pm–5pm1 flights—
- 5pm–8pm166 flights68.7%
- 8pm–5am349 flights62.7%
Scale runs 55% to 95%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
The 8pm–5am window is where this operation falls apart: 62.7% on time, against 90.2% for the 8am–11am slot. By evening the aircraft flying these rotations have absorbed a full day of small delays and there is no slack left to recover in. The 8am–11am window is the busiest, with 377 flights scheduled in it.
Across the year
When delays peak on this route
This route's year swings by 19 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.
May is the best month on the calendar at 88.2% on time. Shoulder season thins the schedule and takes the summer weather with it, and the operation gets its margin back. December was the busiest month here, with 141 flights.
Across the week, Wednesday is the strongest day at 86.6% on time and Sunday the weakest at 73.9%. 13 points is a smaller lever than departure hour, but it is free.
Delay causes
Why this route gets delayed
One category carries most of the weight here. National Airspace System accounts for 43% of the 15,000 delay minutes carriers reported, and the remaining four split what is left. The split is by minutes rather than by flights, so a few very long delays count for as much as many short ones.
- 43%National Airspace System
- 31%Late-arriving aircraft
- 24%Carrier
- 2%Extreme weather
- 1%Security
43% 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 6,429 minutes out of 15,000, against a national NAS share of 21%. The split is drawn from 14,868 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 90.2% on time here.
Cancellations are rare at 0.47%, below the national 1.81% and low enough to earn the plus on the grade. Roughly one flight in 100 is called off; the risk here is arriving late, not not arriving.
Connections and stage length
What a delay here actually costs
6.1% of arrivals land an hour or more late, close to the national 8.1%. That is the figure that decides a connection, and it says a 60 to 75 minute layover is reasonable here while anything under 45 minutes is a bet. Most delays on this route last about an hour, which a normal layover absorbs.
At 2,584 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 runs 81.2% on time across 1,270 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 1,265 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 SFO 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. May runs 88.2% on time and April 69.6%, a swing of 19 points. If the dates move at all, move them out of April before you think about anything else. 1,256 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
FLL to SFO questions
How often is FLL to SFO 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 20.5% of the 1,265 flights in this analysis, against 22.4% nationally. Delayed flights are late by about an hour on average.
Which airline is most reliable on FLL to SFO?
United Airlines leads at 83.8% on time across 491 flights. JetBlue Airways is at the other end on 76.7%, a gap of 7 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 SFO?
The 8am–11am departure window is the strongest at 90.2% on time. The 8pm–5am window is the weakest at 62.7%, 28 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 April delays on FLL to SFO?
April is the weakest month at 69.6% on time, compared with 88.2% in May. Across the year that is 19 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
- SFO to FLL — the return legseparate record
- Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International (FLL) delay statistics
- San Francisco International (SFO) delay statistics
- United Airlines on FLL to SFO83.8%
- JetBlue Airways on FLL to SFO76.7%
- FLL to ATL, a related route71.8%
- LAX to SFO, a related route64.8%
- FLL to EWR, a related route70.4%
- United Airlines on-time record83.8%
- JetBlue Airways on-time record76.7%
- The best time of day to fly, according to 7.04 million flight records
- Worst months to fly in the US, ranked by the data
Direction matters. FLL to SFO and SFO 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, July 2025 to June 2026. Last updated 15 September 2026; recomputed monthly. How this data is collected.