Route reliability record
JFK→DFW
New York to Dallas-Fort Worth
- Flights
- 1,953
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Distance
- 1,391 mi
- Carriers
- 3
This route carries a cancellation problem, not just a delay problem: 3.3% of scheduled flights never operate, against 1.9% nationally. Of the ones that do fly, close to three flights in four arrive on time, worth a B− overall. The punctuality figure counts only flights that actually departed, so it flatters an operation that cancels this often. That rests on 1,953 JFK to DFW flights, of which American Airlines flew 1,471 at 77.2% on time.
Best time to fly JFK to DFW: a 5am–8am departure, ideally on a Tuesday. Flights in that window arrived on time 91.5% of the time and Tuesday flights 83.7%, against 75.9% for the route overall.
The US average over the same twelve months is 77.3%, so there is little to separate this route from the country as a whole. The variation that matters here is internal: which carrier, and what time of day.
Key figures
On time
75.9%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 1,874 completed flights
Avg delay
91 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
3.33%
National rate is 1.89%
Best carrier
American
77.2% on time across 1,471 flights
These figures cover 1,953 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 9.9% 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 DFW
The choice of carrier is not cosmetic here. American Airlines arrives on time 77.2% of the time; Delta Air Lines manages 68.1%. Sample sizes sit next to every figure, because a two-point gap across 373 flights means less than a ten-point one.
| Airline | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Frontier Airlinesthin sample | 109 | 83.3% | 84 min | 0.92% | B+ |
| American Airlines | 1,471 | 77.2% | 89 min | 2.72% | B |
| Delta Air Lines | 373 | 68.1% | 96 min | 6.43% | C− |
Delta Air Lines cancels 6.4% 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 DFW
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 Dallas-Fort Worth
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. EWR → DFWNewark to Dallas-Fort Worth | United Airlines | 77.4% | 79.5% | 2.66% | 5am–8am, Tue | UA 454 09:00 |
| 2. EWR → DFWNewark to Dallas-Fort Worth | American Airlines | 76.8% | 80.1% | 4.10% | 5am–8am, Tue | AA 2728 06:00 |
| 3. JFK → DFWNew York to Dallas-Fort Worth | American Airlines | 75.1% | 77.2% | 2.72% | 5am–8am, Tue | AA 1953 11:00 |
| 4. LGA → DALNew York to Dallas | Southwest Airlines | 69.7% | 72.7% | 4.17% | 5am–8am, Fri | — |
| 5. LGA → DFWNew York to Dallas-Fort Worth | American Airlines | 67.7% | 71.2% | 4.92% | 5am–8am, Tue | AA 1987 07:30 |
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 24 points, against 9 points between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am149 flights91.5%
- 8am–11am333 flights84.6%
- 11am–2pm376 flights78.9%
- 2pm–5pm459 flights73.9%
- 5pm–8pm636 flights67.1%
- 8pm–5am—
Scale runs 60% to 95%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
Book the early departure. Flights leaving between 5am–8am arrive on time 91.5% of the time, against 67.1% for the evening window. That is 24 points of difference for no extra money, and it comes from the same aircraft having had no earlier flight to fall behind on. The 5pm–8pm window is the busiest, with 636 flights scheduled in it.
Explore
Filter JFK to DFW 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 DFW, the best departure window is 5am–8am at 91.5% on time and the worst is 5pm–8pm at 67.1%, a wide gap of 24.4 points. All US flights leaving 5am–8am ran 89.3%.
- 5–8am91.5%
- 8–11am84.6%
- 11am–2pm78.9%
- 2–5pm73.9%
- 5–8pm67.1%
- 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 17 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 68.3% on time, against 85.0% in February. 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 187 flights.
Across the week, Tuesday is the strongest day at 83.7% on time and Sunday the weakest at 69.1%, a spread of 15 points.
Delay causes
Why this route gets delayed
Carriers report a reason for every delay minute they cause, in five DOT categories. The split below is by minutes, not by number of flights, so a handful of very long weather delays weighs as much as many short ones. It covers 41,000 reported delay minutes.
- 36%Late-arriving aircraft
- 32%Carrier
- 25%National Airspace System
- 6%Extreme weather
- 0%Security
36% of delay minutes trace back to a late-arriving aircraft, meaning the plane was already behind before it got here. Across 41,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 6 to one. The split is drawn from 40,894 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 91.5% on time here.
Cancellations run at 3.33%, against 1.89% nationally. That is about one flight in 30 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
9.9% 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.
The 1,391 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 runs 74.6% on time across 1,948 flights, within about a point of this direction. The two legs are scored separately because they usually differ; on this city pair they happen not to.
The sample behind these figures is 1,953 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 DFW after this flight
What to do with this
Booking this route
Put together: the delay figures matter less here than the 3.33% cancellation rate. A late arrival costs you an hour and a half; 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. 1,874 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
JFK to DFW questions
How often is JFK to DFW delayed?
About one flight in four arrives at least 15 minutes late, which is the Department of Transportation's definition of a delayed arrival. That works out to 24.1% of the 1,953 flights in this analysis, against 22.7% nationally. Delayed flights are late by an hour and a half on average.
Which airline is most reliable on JFK to DFW?
American Airlines leads at 77.2% on time across 1,471 flights. Delta Air Lines is at the other end on 68.1%, a gap of 9 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 DFW?
The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 91.5% on time. The 5pm–8pm window is the weakest at 67.1%, 24 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 JFK to DFW?
December is the weakest month at 68.3% on time, compared with 85.0% in February. Across the year that is 17 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
- DFW to JFK — the return legseparate record
- John F. Kennedy International (JFK) delay statistics
- Dallas/Fort Worth International (DFW) delay statistics
- Frontier Airlines on JFK to DFW83.3%
- American Airlines on JFK to DFW77.2%
- Delta Air Lines on JFK to DFW68.1%
- JFK to LAX, a related route75.4%
- ORD to DFW, a related route70.4%
- JFK to SFO, a related route71.4%
- Frontier Airlines on-time record83.3%
- American Airlines on-time record77.2%
- Delta Air Lines on-time record68.1%
- The US routes with the most cancellations
- Why the first flight of the morning is statistically safest
Direction matters. JFK to DFW and DFW 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.