Route reliability record
IND→EWR
Indianapolis to Newark
- Flights
- 2,205
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Distance
- 645 mi
- Carriers
- 3
This route carries a cancellation problem, not just a delay problem: 4.8% of scheduled flights never operate, against 1.9% nationally. Of the ones that do fly, more than four flights in five arrive on time, worth an A− overall. The punctuality figure counts only flights that actually departed, so it flatters an operation that cancels this often. That rests on 2,205 IND to EWR flights, with a median arrival 14 minutes early.
Best time to fly IND to EWR: a 8am–11am departure, ideally on a Saturday. Flights in that window arrived on time 93.3% of the time and Saturday flights 88.7%, against 85.6% for the route overall.
Set against the rest of the country, this route's record is 8 points better than the US average of 77.3%. That gap is worth roughly 83 fewer late arrivals for every thousand flights.
Key figures
On time
85.6%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 2,097 completed flights
Avg delay
78 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
4.76%
National rate is 1.89%
Best carrier
Republic
85.0% on time across 1,947 flights
These figures cover 2,205 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. The median arrival is 14 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 IND to EWR
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 Airlinesthin sample | 4 | 100.0% | — | 0.00% | A+ |
| Spirit Airlinesthin sample | 254 | 89.5% | 94 min | 5.51% | A− |
| Republic Airways | 1,947 | 85.0% | 76 min | 4.67% | A− |
Flight by flight
Flights on IND to EWR
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 Indianapolis to Newark
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 3 use a different airport at one end.
| Option | Airline | Success | On time | Cancelled | Best departure | Most punctual flight |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. IND → EWRIndianapolis to Newark | Republic Airways | 81.0% | 85.0% | 4.67% | 8am–11am, Sat | YX 3567 06:00 |
| 2. IND → JFKIndianapolis to New York | Republic Airways | 80.0% | 82.8% | 3.39% | 5am–8am, Fri | YX 4631 07:11 |
| 3. IND → LGAIndianapolis to New York | Republic Airways | 76.9% | 80.9% | 4.90% | 5am–8am, Sat (route) | YX 4797 07:00 |
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 19 points, against half a point between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am528 flights93.1%
- 8am–11am507 flights93.3%
- 11am–2pm410 flights82.8%
- 2pm–5pm387 flights78.1%
- 5pm–8pm372 flights74.1%
- 8pm–5am1 flights—
Scale runs 65% to 100%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
Book the morning departure. Flights leaving between 8am–11am arrive on time 93.3% of the time, against 74.1% for the evening window. That is 19 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 528 flights scheduled in it.
Explore
Filter IND to EWR 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 IND to EWR, the best departure window is 8am–11am at 93.3% on time and the worst is 5pm–8pm at 74.1%, a wide gap of 19.2 points. All US flights leaving 8am–11am ran 83.9%.
- 5–8am93.1%
- 8–11am93.3%
- 11am–2pm82.8%
- 2–5pm78.1%
- 5–8pm74.1%
- 8pm–5am—
best all US flightsScale 60% to 100%. Cells under 30 flights show a dash.
Across the year
When delays peak on this route
This route's year swings by 20 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 73.2% on time, against 92.7% in May. 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. December was the busiest month here, with 208 flights.
Across the week, Saturday is the strongest day at 88.7% on time and Monday the weakest at 82.1%, a spread of 7 points.
Delay causes
Why this route gets delayed
National Airspace System accounts for 54% of the 24,000 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 54%National Airspace System
- 23%Late-arriving aircraft
- 21%Carrier
- 1%Extreme weather
54% 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 13,000 minutes out of 24,000, against a national NAS share of 21%. The split is drawn from 23,540 reported delay minutes.
Cancellations run at 4.76%, against 1.89% nationally. That is about one flight in twenty 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
5.3% 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.
The 645 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 81.7% on time across 2,204 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.
The sample behind these figures is 2,205 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 EWR after this flight
What to do with this
Booking this route
Put together: the delay figures matter less here than the 4.76% cancellation rate. A late arrival costs you a little over an hour; a cancelled flight costs you the day. Book the 8am–11am departure so there is still a schedule behind you if it goes wrong, and treat a same-day connection as optimistic. 2,097 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
IND to EWR questions
How often is IND to EWR 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 14.4% of the 2,205 flights in this analysis, against 22.7% nationally. Delayed flights are late by a little over an hour on average.
How reliable is IND to EWR compared with the rest of the country?
85.6% of flights arrive on time here against a national 77.3%, a difference of 8 points in its favour. That is worth a A− on this site's grading scale.
What time of day has the fewest delays on IND to EWR?
The 8am–11am departure window is the strongest at 93.3% on time. The 5pm–8pm window is the weakest at 74.1%, 19 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 IND to EWR?
December is the weakest month at 73.2% on time, compared with 92.7% in May. Across the year that is 20 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
- EWR to IND — the return legseparate record
- Indianapolis International (IND) delay statistics
- Newark Liberty International (EWR) delay statistics
- Spirit Airlines on IND to EWR89.5%
- Republic Airways on IND to EWR85.0%
- IND to ORD, a related route76.7%
- MCO to EWR, a related route75.0%
- IND to ATL, a related route87.9%
- United Airlines on-time record100.0%
- Spirit Airlines on-time record89.5%
- Republic Airways on-time record85.0%
- The US routes with the most cancellations
- The best time of day to fly, according to 7.05 million flight records
Direction matters. IND to EWR and EWR to IND 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.