Route reliability record
HPN→DCA
White Plains to Washington
- Flights
- 1,351
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Distance
- 234 mi
- Carriers
- 1
This route carries a cancellation problem, not just a delay problem: 7.0% of scheduled flights never operate, against 1.9% nationally. Of the ones that do fly, a little over half of flights arrive on time, worth a D− overall. The punctuality figure counts only flights that actually departed, so it flatters an operation that cancels this often. That rests on 1,351 HPN to DCA flights, with a median arrival 5 minutes late.
Best time to fly HPN to DCA: a 5am–8am departure, ideally on a Saturday. Flights in that window arrived on time 77.9% of the time and Saturday flights 72.2%, against 59.6% for the route overall.
The national on-time rate over the same period is 77.3%, so this route runs 18 points behind the country as a whole. Across a thousand flights that is about 177 extra late arrivals.
Key figures
On time
59.6%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 1,250 completed flights
Avg delay
110 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
7.03%
National rate is 1.89%
Best carrier
PSA
59.6% on time across 1,351 flights
These figures cover 1,351 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 17.8% 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 HPN to DCA
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| PSA Airlines | 1,351 | 59.6% | 110 min | 7.03% | D− |
Flight by flight
Flights on HPN to DCA
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 White Plains to Washington
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. 5 of the top 5 use a different airport at one end.
| Option | Airline | Success | On time | Cancelled | Best departure | Most punctual flight |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. ISP → BWIIslip to Baltimore | Southwest Airlines | 83.8% | 85.1% | 1.51% | 5am–8am, Fri | — |
| 2. EWR → IADNewark to Washington | United Airlines | 72.7% | 74.8% | 2.81% | 5am–8am, Sat (route) | UA 1366 06:00 |
| 3. LGA → IADNew York to Washington | Republic Airways | 70.7% | 76.1% | 7.13% | 5am–8am, Sat | YX 3688 14:55 |
| 4. JFK → DCANew York to Washington | Republic Airways | 64.8% | 69.1% | 6.22% | 5am–8am, Sat | YX 4538 06:30 |
| 5. LGA → DCANew York to Washington | Republic Airways | 61.9% | 65.7% | 5.83% | 5am–8am, Sat | YX 5770 06:00 |
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 36 points, against half a point between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am356 flights77.9%
- 8am–11am37 flights66.7%
- 11am–2pm345 flights60.5%
- 2pm–5pm300 flights42.2%
- 5pm–8pm313 flights53.7%
- 8pm–5am—
Scale runs 35% to 85%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
Book the early departure. Flights leaving between 5am–8am arrive on time 77.9% of the time, against 42.2% for the afternoon window. That is 36 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 356 flights scheduled in it.
Explore
Filter HPN to DCA 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 HPN to DCA, the best departure window is 5am–8am at 77.9% on time and the worst is 2pm–5pm at 42.2%, a wide gap of 35.7 points. All US flights leaving 5am–8am ran 89.3%.
- 5–8am77.9%
- 8–11am66.7%
- 11am–2pm60.5%
- 2–5pm42.2%
- 5–8pm53.7%
- 8pm–5am—
best all US flightsScale 35% to 95%. Cells under 30 flights show a dash.
Across the year
When delays peak on this route
This route's year swings by 29 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.
December is the weak month at 40.7% on time, against 69.7% in October. 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. January was the busiest month here, with 124 flights.
Across the week, Saturday is the strongest day at 72.2% on time and Sunday the weakest at 55.3%, a spread of 17 points.
Delay causes
Why this route gets delayed
Late-arriving aircraft accounts for 51% of the 56,000 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 51%Late-arriving aircraft
- 24%National Airspace System
- 17%Carrier
- 8%Extreme weather
- 0%Security
51% of delay minutes trace back to a late-arriving aircraft, meaning the plane was already behind before it got here. Across 56,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 7 to one. The split is drawn from 55,775 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 77.9% on time here.
Cancellations run at 7.03%, against 1.89% nationally. That is about one flight in fifteen 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
17.8% 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.
At 234 miles this is a short hop, and stage length matters more than it looks. A flight this short spends under two hours in the air, which leaves almost nothing to claw back a late pushback with. Delay here is decided on the ground, in the turn, which is why the 5am–8am window matters as much as it does.
The return leg runs 61.6% on time across 1,354 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 1,351 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 DCA after this flight
What to do with this
Booking this route
Put together: the delay figures matter less here than the 7.03% cancellation rate. A late arrival costs you close to two hours; 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. 1,250 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
HPN to DCA questions
How often is HPN to DCA delayed?
Roughly one flight in two arrives at least 15 minutes late, which is the Department of Transportation's definition of a delayed arrival. That works out to 40.4% of the 1,351 flights in this analysis, against 22.7% nationally. Delayed flights are late by close to two hours on average.
How reliable is HPN to DCA compared with the rest of the country?
59.6% of flights arrive on time here against a national 77.3%, a difference of 18 points against it. That is worth a D− on this site's grading scale.
What time of day has the fewest delays on HPN to DCA?
The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 77.9% on time. The 2pm–5pm window is the weakest at 42.2%, 36 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 December delays on HPN to DCA?
December is the weakest month at 40.7% on time, compared with 69.7% in October. Across the year that is 29 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
- DCA to HPN — the return legseparate record
- Ronald Reagan Washington National (DCA) delay statistics
- HPN to PBI, a related route72.9%
- BOS to DCA, a related route72.6%
- HPN to ORD, a related route78.1%
- PSA Airlines on-time record59.6%
- The US routes with the most cancellations
- Why the first flight of the morning is statistically safest
Direction matters. HPN to DCA and DCA to HPN 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.