Carrier route record

F9IAD→TPA

Frontier Airlines · Washington to Tampa

Flights: 186
Period: July 2025 to June 2026
Share of route: 14%
Carriers: 2

Historical statistics for July 2025 to June 2026, not live status. For today’s flights, check with Frontier Airlines.

Frontier on IAD to TPA sits in the middle of the pack with a C−. Close to three flights in four arrive on time by the DOT's definition, 3 points worse than the national rate of 77.6%. The late ones land a little over an hour behind schedule. That rests on 186 flights, with a median arrival 17 minutes early.

The US average over the same twelve months is 77.6%, so there is little to separate Frontier on IAD to TPA from the country as a whole. The variation that matters here is internal: which carrier, and what time of day.

On time

74.9%

Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 179 completed flights

Avg delay

77 min

Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights

Cancelled

3.76%

National rate is 1.81%

Whole route

81.2%

Every carrier on IAD to TPA, 1,366 flights

These figures cover 186 flights between July 2025 and June 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 10.1% of arrivals land a full hour or more behind schedule. That is the number that wrecks a connection, and it is not visible in an on-time percentage alone.

Carrier by carrier

Frontier against every carrier on IAD to TPA

Frontier flew 186 of the 1,366 flights on IAD to TPA, about 14% of it. Its 74.9% on time is 6 points worse than the route as a whole, which runs 81.2%. Ranked by on-time rate it is last of two carriers on the route, where the range runs from United at 82.2% to Frontier at 74.9%.

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.

On-time performance by carrier on IAD to TPA
Airline	Flights	On time	Avg delay	Cancelled	Grade
United Airlines	1,180	82.2%	67 min	0.42%	B+
Frontier Airlines (this page)thin sample	186	74.9%	77 min	3.76%	C−

Departure window

When Frontier runs best on this route

Departure time matters more here than the choice of carrier. The gap between the best and worst window is 49 points, against half a point between the best and worst carrier. Each bar is the on-time rate for flights scheduled inside that window.

5am–8am—
8am–11am25 flights—
11am–2pm27 flights—
2pm–5pm44 flights87.5%
5pm–8pm58 flights44.6%
8pm–5am32 flights93.8%

Scale runs 35% to 100%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.

The 5pm–8pm window is where this operation falls apart: 44.6% on time, against 93.8% for the 8pm–5am 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 5pm–8pm window is the busiest, with 58 flights scheduled in it.

Across the year

Frontier on IAD to TPA through the year

Jul–Sep 202559 flights52.6%
Oct–Dec 202550 flights77.6%
Jan–Mar 202643 flights87.5%
Apr–Jun 202634 flights93.9%

Scale runs 45% to 100%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.

Monthly volumes are too low here to break the year into twelve reliable readings. What the twelve-month total says is 74.9% on time across 186 flights.

Frontier on IAD to TPA did not run the same all year. Its best quarter was Apr–Jun 2026 at 93.9% on time and its weakest Jul–Sep 2025 at 52.6%, a swing of 41 points on roughly 47 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, Monday is the strongest day at 80.6% on time and Sunday the weakest at 69.4%. 11 points is a smaller lever than departure hour, but it is free.

Delay causes

Why Frontier runs late on this route

One category carries most of the weight here. Late-arriving aircraft accounts for 54% of the 3,468 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.

Late-arriving aircraft
54%
National Airspace System
26%
Carrier
19%
Extreme weather
1%

54% of delay minutes trace back to a late-arriving aircraft, meaning the plane was already behind before it got here. That is a cascade, and cascades start small and grow through the day. Across 3,468 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 54 to one. It is the strongest argument for booking the first departure of the morning, when the aircraft has been sitting at the gate overnight with nothing to inherit. The split is drawn from 3,468 reported delay minutes.

Cancellations run at 3.76%, against 1.81% nationally. That is about one flight in 25 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 costs

For anyone connecting, the number to weigh is not the on-time rate but the tail behind it. 10.1% of arrivals land a full hour or more behind schedule, against 8.1% nationally. A 45-minute layover does not survive that, and no amount of walking quickly changes it. Ninety minutes is the honest minimum here, and two hours if the onward flight is on a separate ticket.

The 811 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. It is also long enough that the aircraft usually flies three or four legs a day rather than six, which slows how fast delay compounds.

The return leg is a different operation and performs like one: it runs 80.4% on time across 186 flights, 6 points above 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 6 points of difference.

One caution: this is a thin sample. 186 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 Frontier on IAD to TPA

Put together: the delay figures matter less here than the 3.76% cancellation rate. A late arrival costs you a little over an hour; a cancelled flight costs you the day. Book the 8pm–5am departure so there is still a schedule behind you if it goes wrong, and treat a same-day connection as optimistic. 179 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.

Where to go next

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.

Key figures