Carrier route record
UAIAD→CMH
United Airlines · Washington to Columbus
- Flights
- 409
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Share of route
- 44%
- Carriers
- 2
Historical statistics for September 2025 to August 2026, not live status. For today’s flights, check with United Airlines.
United on IAD to CMH lands a B+, 6 points better than the national rate of 77.3%. About one flight in six arrives 15 minutes late or worse, and those flights are late by a little over an hour on average. That rests on 409 flights, with a median arrival 8 minutes early.
Set against the rest of the country, United's IAD to CMH record is 6 points better than the US average of 77.3%. That gap is worth roughly 57 fewer late arrivals for every thousand flights.
Key figures
On time
83.0%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 407 completed flights
Avg delay
69 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
0.24%
National rate is 1.89%
Whole route
82.1%
Every carrier on IAD to CMH, 936 flights
These figures cover 409 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. The median arrival is 8 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.
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Carrier by carrier
United against every carrier on IAD to CMH
United flew 409 of the 936 flights on IAD to CMH, about 44% of it. Its 83.0% on time is about level with the route as a whole at 82.1%. Ranked by on-time rate it is first of two carriers on the route, where the range runs from United at 83.0% to Republic at 81.4%.
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 (this page) | 409 | 83.0% | 69 min | 0.24% | B+ |
| Republic Airways | 527 | 81.4% | 77 min | 1.90% | B |
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Departure window
When United runs best on this route
Departure time matters more here than the choice of carrier. The gap between the best and worst window is 15 points, against half a point between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am—
- 8am–11am144 flights88.8%
- 11am–2pm105 flights89.5%
- 2pm–5pm—
- 5pm–8pm159 flights74.1%
- 8pm–5am1 flights—
Scale runs 65% to 95%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
The best window here is not the first bank but the 11am–2pm slot at 89.5% on time, ahead of 5pm–8pm at 74.1%. Where the curve peaks mid-day rather than at dawn, the constraint is usually congestion at one end rather than the aircraft's own rotation. The 5pm–8pm window is the busiest, with 159 flights scheduled in it.
Across the year
United on IAD to CMH through the year
- Jul–Sep 202569 flights91.3%
- Oct–Dec 202575 flights85.3%
- Jan–Mar 2026131 flights76.0%
- Apr–Jun 202692 flights91.3%
- Jul–Sep 202642 flights69.0%
Scale runs 60% to 95%.
Monthly volumes are too low here to break the year into twelve reliable readings. What the twelve-month total says is 83.0% on time across 409 flights.
United on IAD to CMH did not run the same all year. Its best quarter was Jul–Sep 2025 at 91.3% on time and its weakest Jul–Sep 2026 at 69.0%, a swing of 22 points on roughly 82 flights a quarter. The twelve-month rate averages over that, so if you are flying in a weak quarter the quarter's own figure is the better guide.
Across the week, Wednesday is the strongest day at 89.4% on time and Sunday the weakest at 73.2%, a spread of 16 points.
Arrival by arrival
How late United on IAD to CMH runs when it is late
The 69 late arrivals split 26 under half an hour, 18 between 30 and 60 minutes, and 25 an hour or more.
- 15+ min early100 flights24.6%
- Within 15 min238 flights58.5%
- 15–29 min late26 flights6.4%
- 30–59 min late18 flights4.4%
- 1–2 hours late12 flights2.9%
- 2+ hours late13 flights3.2%
Scale runs 0% to 100%.
Share of 407 completed flights by arrival against schedule.
Time lost at the gate mostly stays lost. Of 54 departures that left 15 minutes late or more, only 4 made it up before arrival. 19 flights left on time and still arrived late.
The worst days
Worst days for United on IAD to CMH
The latest arrival of the period was on 20 May 2026, 6 hours 45 minutes behind schedule; most of its delay minutes were filed as a late-arriving aircraft. On three of the five worst days the largest share was filed as carrier-caused (crew, maintenance, fuelling, baggage).
| Date | Arrived late by | Largest filed cause |
|---|---|---|
| 20 May 2026 | 6 hours 45 minutes | Late-arriving aircraft |
| 13 March 2026 | 6 hours 36 minutes | Carrier |
| 1 February 2026 | 3 hours 6 minutes | Late-arriving aircraft |
| 15 February 2026 | 3 hours 2 minutes | Carrier |
| 27 August 2026 | 3 hours 2 minutes | Carrier |
Delay causes
Why United runs late on this route
Carrier accounts for 47% of the 4,775 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 47%Carrier
- 26%Late-arriving aircraft
- 22%National Airspace System
- 5%Extreme weather
The largest share of delay minutes, 47%, falls under carrier control: crew scheduling, maintenance, fuelling, baggage. It accounts for 2,227 of the 4,775 delay minutes reported here. The split is drawn from 4,775 reported delay minutes.
Cancellations are rare at 0.24%, below the national 1.89% 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 costs
6.1% 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 a little over an hour, which a normal layover absorbs.
At 299 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 11am–2pm window matters as much as it does.
The return leg is a different operation and performs like one: it runs 78.8% on time across 408 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. 409 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 United on IAD to CMH
Put together: treat all of this as provisional. 409 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 83.0% headline is the most reliable number on the page; the hour and month splits below it are built on a few dozen flights each. 407 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Related
Where to go next
- IAD to CMH, every carrier
- United on CMH to IAD, the return leg
- Republic Airways on IAD to CMH81.4%
- United Airlines network-wide record
- Washington Dulles International (IAD) delay statistics
- John Glenn Columbus International (CMH) delay statistics
- The best time of day to fly, according to 7.05 million flight records
- How to read this site: grades, sample sizes, and honest caveats
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.