Route reliability record
JFK→DCA
New York to Washington
- Flights
- 2,518
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Distance
- 213 mi
- Carriers
- 2
This route carries a cancellation problem, not just a delay problem: 6.4% of scheduled flights never operate, against 1.9% nationally. Of the ones that do fly, about two flights in three arrive on time, worth a C− overall. The punctuality figure counts only flights that actually departed, so it flatters an operation that cancels this often. That rests on 2,518 JFK to DCA flights, of which Republic Airways flew 2,073 at 69.1% on time.
Best time to fly JFK to DCA: a 5am–8am departure, ideally on a Saturday. Flights in that window arrived on time 83.2% of the time and Saturday flights 78.6%, against 66.2% for the route overall.
The national on-time rate over the same period is 77.3%, so this route runs 11 points behind the country as a whole. Across a thousand flights that is about 111 extra late arrivals.
Key figures
On time
66.2%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 2,349 completed flights
Avg delay
72 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
6.39%
National rate is 1.89%
Best carrier
Republic
69.1% on time across 2,073 flights
These figures cover 2,518 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 13.1% 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 JFK to DCA
The choice of carrier is not cosmetic here. Republic Airways arrives on time 69.1% of the time; JetBlue Airways manages 52.7%. Sample sizes sit next to every figure, because a two-point gap across 445 flights means less than a ten-point one.
| Airline | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Republic Airways | 2,073 | 69.1% | 69 min | 6.22% | C− |
| JetBlue Airways | 445 | 52.7% | 83 min | 7.19% | F− |
JetBlue Airways cancels 7.2% of what it schedules here, the highest in the table. A cancelled flight never appears in an on-time rate, so read that column alongside the punctuality one rather than after it.
Flight by flight
Flights on JFK 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.
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Best ways to make this trip
The most reliable ways to fly New York 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. 4 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 27 points, against 16 points between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am162 flights83.2%
- 8am–11am535 flights80.2%
- 11am–2pm69 flights61.8%
- 2pm–5pm560 flights56.2%
- 5pm–8pm261 flights62.6%
- 8pm–5am931 flights62.0%
Scale runs 50% to 90%.
Book the early departure. Flights leaving between 5am–8am arrive on time 83.2% of the time, against 56.2% for the afternoon window. That is 27 points of difference for no extra money, and it comes from the same aircraft having had no earlier flight to fall behind on. The 8pm–5am window is the busiest, with 931 flights scheduled in it.
Explore
Filter JFK 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 JFK to DCA, the best departure window is 5am–8am at 83.2% on time and the worst is 2pm–5pm at 56.2%, a wide gap of 27.0 points. All US flights leaving 5am–8am ran 89.3%.
- 5–8am83.2%
- 8–11am80.2%
- 11am–2pm61.8%
- 2–5pm56.2%
- 5–8pm62.6%
- 8pm–5am62.0%
best all US flightsScale 50% to 95%.
Across the year
When delays peak on this route
This route's year swings by 30 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.
February is the weak month at 52.6% on time, against 82.9% 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. November was the busiest month here, with 263 flights.
Across the week, Saturday is the strongest day at 78.6% on time and Thursday the weakest at 57.2%, a spread of 21 points.
Delay causes
Why this route gets delayed
National Airspace System accounts for 43% of the 57,000 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 43%National Airspace System
- 33%Late-arriving aircraft
- 22%Carrier
- 3%Extreme weather
- 0%Security
43% 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 25,000 minutes out of 57,000, against a national NAS share of 21%. The split is drawn from 57,475 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 83.2% on time here.
Cancellations run at 6.39%, 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
13.1% 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 213 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 is a different operation and performs like one: it runs 77.0% on time across 2,486 flights, 11 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 11 points of difference.
The sample behind these figures is 2,518 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 6.39% cancellation rate. A late arrival costs you a little over an hour; 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. 2,349 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
JFK to DCA questions
How often is JFK to DCA delayed?
About one flight in three arrives at least 15 minutes late, which is the Department of Transportation's definition of a delayed arrival. That works out to 33.8% of the 2,518 flights in this analysis, against 22.7% nationally. Delayed flights are late by a little over an hour on average.
Which airline is most reliable on JFK to DCA?
Republic Airways leads at 69.1% on time across 2,073 flights. JetBlue Airways is at the other end on 52.7%, a gap of 16 points. Sample size matters as much as the percentage: a rate built from a few hundred flights moves around far more than one built from ten thousand.
What time of day has the fewest delays on JFK to DCA?
The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 83.2% on time. The 2pm–5pm window is the weakest at 56.2%, 27 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 February delays on JFK to DCA?
February is the weakest month at 52.6% on time, compared with 82.9% in September. Across the year that is 30 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 JFK — the return legseparate record
- John F. Kennedy International (JFK) delay statistics
- Ronald Reagan Washington National (DCA) delay statistics
- Republic Airways on JFK to DCA69.1%
- JetBlue Airways on JFK to DCA52.7%
- JFK to LAX, a related route75.4%
- BOS to DCA, a related route72.6%
- JFK to SFO, a related route71.4%
- Republic Airways on-time record69.1%
- JetBlue Airways on-time record52.7%
- The US routes with the most cancellations
- Why the first flight of the morning is statistically safest
Direction matters. JFK to DCA and DCA to JFK 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.