Carrier route record
DLJFK→PDX
Delta Air Lines · New York to Portland
- Flights
- 550
- Period
- July 2025 to June 2026
- Share of route
- 60%
- Carriers
- 2
Historical statistics for July 2025 to June 2026, not live status. For today’s flights, check with Delta Air Lines.
Delta on JFK to PDX sits in the middle of the pack with a C. About seven flights in ten arrive on time by the DOT's definition, 6 points worse than the national rate of 77.6%. The late ones land about an hour behind schedule. That rests on 550 flights, with a median arrival 3 minutes early.
The national on-time rate over the same period is 77.6%, so Delta on JFK to PDX runs 6 points behind the country as a whole. Across a thousand flights that is about 56 extra late arrivals.
Key figures
On time
72.0%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 536 completed flights
Avg delay
67 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
2.18%
National rate is 1.81%
Whole route
72.1%
Every carrier on JFK to PDX, 914 flights
These figures cover 550 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
Delta against every carrier on JFK to PDX
Delta flew 550 of the 914 flights on JFK to PDX, most of the route. Its 72.0% on time is about level with the route as a whole at 72.1%. Ranked by on-time rate it is last of two carriers on the route, where the range runs from Alaska at 72.2% to Delta at 72.0%. One of those carriers flew fewer than 365 flights here, so treat their positions as rough.
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Alaska Airlinesthin sample | 364 | 72.2% | 64 min | 2.75% | C |
| Delta Air Lines (this page) | 550 | 72.0% | 67 min | 2.18% | C |
Flight by flight
Delta flight numbers on JFK to PDX
Departure window
When Delta runs best on this route
Departure time matters more here than the choice of carrier. The gap between the best and worst window is 21 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–11am186 flights85.8%
- 11am–2pm—
- 2pm–5pm—
- 5pm–8pm348 flights65.1%
- 8pm–5am16 flights—
Scale runs 55% to 90%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
Book the morning departure. Flights leaving between 8am–11am arrive on time 85.8% of the time, against 65.1% for the evening window. That is 21 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 348 flights scheduled in it.
Across the year
Delta on JFK to PDX through the year
Delays peak in March, when the on-time rate falls to 46.7%. August is the strongest month at 85.2%. Moving a flexible trip across that boundary buys 39 points. July was the busiest month here, with 62 flights.
Across the week, Monday is the strongest day at 75.0% on time and Thursday the weakest at 67.1%. 8 points is a smaller lever than departure hour, but it is free.
Delay causes
Why Delta runs late on this route
One category carries most of the weight here. National Airspace System accounts for 47% of the 10,000 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.
- 47%National Airspace System
- 38%Carrier
- 15%Late-arriving aircraft
- 0%Extreme weather
The largest share of delay minutes, 38%, falls under carrier control: crew scheduling, maintenance, fuelling, baggage. Unlike weather, that is a management outcome, and it is the category where the gap between two carriers on the same schedule is genuinely earned. It accounts for 3,822 of the 10,000 delay minutes reported here. The split is drawn from 10,098 reported delay minutes.
47% 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 4,709 minutes out of 10,000, against a national NAS share of 21%.
Cancellations sit at 2.18% against a national 1.81%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.36%.
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.
At 2,454 miles this is transcontinental flying, and long routes get a quiet structural advantage. Scheduled block time on a flight this length carries more padding in absolute minutes, so a twenty-minute late departure often still becomes an on-time arrival. Read the on-time rate here as slightly flattering next to a short-haul route with the same operational quality.
The return leg is a different operation and performs like one: it runs 86.7% on time across 550 flights, 15 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 15 points of difference.
One caution: this is a thin sample. 550 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 Delta on JFK to PDX
Put together: treat all of this as provisional. 550 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 72.0% headline is the most reliable number on the page; the hour and month splits below it are built on a few dozen flights each. 536 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Related
Where to go next
- JFK to PDX, every carrier
- Delta on PDX to JFK, the return leg
- Alaska Airlines on JFK to PDX72.2%
- Delta Air Lines network-wide record
- John F. Kennedy International (JFK) delay statistics
- Portland International (PDX) delay statistics
- How often a connection fails at the major US hubs
- The best time of day to fly, according to 7.04 million flight records
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.