Route reliability record
IAD→MSP
Washington to Minneapolis
- Flights
- 1,026
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Distance
- 907 mi
- Carriers
- 4
This route earns an A. More than four flights in five arrive inside the 15-minute window the DOT uses to define an on-time arrival, which puts it 9 points better than the national rate of 77.3%. When something does go wrong the average delay runs an hour and a half. That rests on 1,026 IAD to MSP flights, with a median arrival 11 minutes early.
Best time to fly IAD to MSP: a 5am–8am departure, ideally on a Thursday. Flights in that window arrived on time 92.2% of the time and Thursday flights 89.8%, against 85.9% for the route overall.
Set against the rest of the country, this route's record is 9 points better than the US average of 77.3%. That gap is worth roughly 86 fewer late arrivals for every thousand flights.
Key figures
On time
85.9%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 1,008 completed flights
Avg delay
97 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
1.46%
National rate is 1.89%
Best carrier
SkyWest
85.8% on time across 851 flights
These figures cover 1,026 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. The median arrival is 11 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
Which airline is most reliable on IAD to MSP
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Delta Air Linesthin sample | 2 | 100.0% | — | 0.00% | A+ |
| United Airlinesthin sample | 64 | 90.6% | 40 min | 0.00% | A+ |
| SkyWest Airlines | 851 | 85.8% | 104 min | 1.18% | A |
| Republic Airwaysthin sample | 109 | 83.5% | 69 min | 4.59% | B− |
Flight by flight
Flights on IAD to MSP
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.
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Best ways to make this trip
The most reliable ways to fly Washington to Minneapolis
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. 4 of the top 5 use a different airport at one end.
| Option | Airline | Success | On time | Cancelled | Best departure | Most punctual flight |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. IAD → MSPWashington to Minneapolis | SkyWest Airlines | 84.8% | 85.8% | 1.18% | 5am–8am, Thu | OO 3996 06:00 |
| 2. BWI → MSPBaltimore to Minneapolis | Delta Air Lines | 82.8% | 84.4% | 1.84% | 2pm–5pm, Tue | DL 2872 06:00 |
| 3. DCA → MSPWashington to Minneapolis | Delta Air Lines | 77.4% | 78.9% | 1.88% | 5am–8am, Sat | DL 1193 06:05 |
| 4. BWI → MSPBaltimore to Minneapolis | Southwest Airlines | 65.6% | 67.4% | 2.60% | 8am–11am, Tue | — |
| 5. DCA → MSPWashington to Minneapolis | PSA Airlines | 60.7% | 65.4% | 7.20% | 8am–11am, Sat | — |
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 15 points, against half a point between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am340 flights92.2%
- 8am–11am136 flights88.0%
- 11am–2pm248 flights84.9%
- 2pm–5pm128 flights77.6%
- 5pm–8pm174 flights79.5%
- 8pm–5am—
Scale runs 70% to 100%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
Book the early departure. Flights leaving between 5am–8am arrive on time 92.2% of the time, against 77.6% for the afternoon window. That is 15 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 340 flights scheduled in it.
Explore
Filter IAD to MSP 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 IAD to MSP, the best departure window is 5am–8am at 92.2% on time and the worst is 2pm–5pm at 77.6%, a wide gap of 14.6 points. All US flights leaving 5am–8am ran 89.3%.
- 5–8am92.2%
- 8–11am88.0%
- 11am–2pm84.9%
- 2–5pm77.6%
- 5–8pm79.5%
- 8pm–5am—
best all US flightsScale 60% to 95%. Cells under 30 flights show a dash.
Across the year
When delays peak on this route
This route's year swings by 23 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 72.4% on time, against 95.0% in September. 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. July was the busiest month here, with 147 flights.
Across the week, Thursday is the strongest day at 89.8% on time and Monday the weakest at 81.3%, a spread of 9 points.
Delay causes
Why this route gets delayed
Carrier accounts for 68% of the 14,000 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 68%Carrier
- 16%Extreme weather
- 12%National Airspace System
- 4%Late-arriving aircraft
- 1%Security
Extreme weather accounts for 16% of delay minutes, well above the single-digit share typical across the system. Weather delays are lumpy: they arrive as whole bad days rather than as a steady drag, so the monthly strip above is the more useful view of the risk. The national share is 6%, so this operation carries roughly 2.7 times the usual weather exposure. The split is drawn from 13,815 reported delay minutes.
The largest share of delay minutes, 68%, falls under carrier control: crew scheduling, maintenance, fuelling, baggage. It accounts for 9,336 of the 14,000 delay minutes reported here.
Cancellations sit at 1.46% against a national 1.89%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.29%.
Connections and stage length
What a delay here actually costs
6.4% 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 an hour and a half, which a normal layover absorbs.
The 907 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 is a different operation and performs like one: it runs 82.2% on time across 1,024 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. 1,026 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.
Work out the risk of missing a connection in MSP after this flight
What to do with this
Booking this route
Put together: treat all of this as provisional. 1,026 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 85.9% headline is the most reliable number on the page; the hour and month splits below it are built on a few dozen flights each. 1,008 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
IAD to MSP questions
How often is IAD to MSP delayed?
About one flight in seven arrives at least 15 minutes late, which is the Department of Transportation's definition of a delayed arrival. That works out to 14.1% of the 1,026 flights in this analysis, against 22.7% nationally. Delayed flights are late by an hour and a half on average.
How reliable is IAD to MSP compared with the rest of the country?
85.9% of flights arrive on time here against a national 77.3%, a difference of 9 points in its favour. That is worth a A on this site's grading scale.
What time of day has the fewest delays on IAD to MSP?
The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 92.2% on time. The 2pm–5pm window is the weakest at 77.6%, 15 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 IAD to MSP?
December is the weakest month at 72.4% on time, compared with 95.0% in September. Across the year that is 23 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
- MSP to IAD — the return legseparate record
- Washington Dulles International (IAD) delay statistics
- Minneapolis-St Paul International (MSP) delay statistics
- SkyWest Airlines on IAD to MSP85.8%
- Republic Airways on IAD to MSP83.5%
- IAD to ATL, a related route78.0%
- ORD to MSP, a related route69.9%
- IAD to DEN, a related route83.1%
- Delta Air Lines on-time record100.0%
- United Airlines on-time record90.6%
- SkyWest Airlines on-time record85.8%
- 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
Direction matters. IAD to MSP and MSP to IAD 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.