Route reliability record
KOA→SFO
Kailua-Kona to San Francisco
- Flights
- 1,202
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Distance
- 2,368 mi
- Carriers
- 2
This route earns a B. More than four flights in five arrive inside the 15-minute window the DOT uses to define an on-time arrival, which puts it 7 points better than the national rate of 77.3%. When something does go wrong the average delay runs about an hour. That rests on 1,202 KOA to SFO flights, with a median arrival 9 minutes early.
Best time to fly KOA to SFO: a 5am–8am departure, ideally on a Tuesday. Flights in that window arrived on time 100.0% of the time and Tuesday flights 86.7%, against 84.6% for the route overall.
Set against the rest of the country, this route's record is 7 points better than the US average of 77.3%. That gap is worth roughly 73 fewer late arrivals for every thousand flights.
Key figures
On time
84.6%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 1,182 completed flights
Avg delay
66 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
1.41%
National rate is 1.89%
Best carrier
United
88.1% on time across 958 flights
These figures cover 1,202 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. The median arrival is 9 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 KOA to SFO
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 Airlines | 958 | 88.1% | 70 min | 1.46% | A |
| Alaska Airlinesthin sample | 244 | 71.0% | 60 min | 1.23% | C |
Flight by flight
Flights on KOA to SFO
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.
Timetable by Aviasales, a Travelpayouts partner. Booking through it may earn this site a commission at no cost to you; it changes no figure here.
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 21 points, against half a point between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am83 flights100.0%
- 8am–11am1 flights—
- 11am–2pm277 flights81.4%
- 2pm–5pm497 flights78.8%
- 5pm–8pm46 flights80.4%
- 8pm–5am298 flights93.5%
Scale runs 70% to 100%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
Book the early departure. Flights leaving between 5am–8am arrive on time 100.0% of the time, against 78.8% for the afternoon 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 2pm–5pm window is the busiest, with 497 flights scheduled in it.
Explore
Filter KOA to SFO 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 KOA to SFO, the best departure window is 5am–8am at 100.0% on time and the worst is 2pm–5pm at 78.8%, a wide gap of 21.2 points. All US flights leaving 5am–8am ran 89.3%.
- 5–8am100.0%
- 8–11am—
- 11am–2pm81.4%
- 2–5pm78.8%
- 5–8pm80.4%
- 8pm–5am93.5%
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 22 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.
September is the best month on the calendar at 93.5% on time. Shoulder season thins the schedule and takes the summer weather with it, and the operation gets its margin back. July was the busiest month here, with 155 flights.
Across the week, Tuesday is the strongest day at 86.7% on time and Thursday the weakest at 79.4%, a spread of 7 points.
Delay causes
Why this route gets delayed
Late-arriving aircraft accounts for 47% of the 12,000 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 47%Late-arriving aircraft
- 36%Carrier
- 17%National Airspace System
- 0%Extreme weather
47% of delay minutes trace back to a late-arriving aircraft, meaning the plane was already behind before it got here. Across 12,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 47 to one. The split is drawn from 12,017 reported delay minutes.
The largest share of delay minutes, 36%, falls under carrier control: crew scheduling, maintenance, fuelling, baggage. It accounts for 4,323 of the 12,000 delay minutes reported here.
Cancellations sit at 1.41% against a national 1.89%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.25%.
Connections and stage length
What a delay here actually costs
Badly late arrivals are rare here: only 4.3% land an hour or more behind schedule, against 8.3% nationally. Connections built on this flight are about as safe as US domestic connections get, though a cancelled flight still ignores every layover you give it.
At 2,368 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 runs 86.9% on time across 1,202 flights, within 2 points 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 1,202 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 SFO after this flight
What to do with this
Booking this route
Put together: the calendar is the biggest lever here, not the carrier or the hour. September runs 93.5% on time and October 71.2%, a swing of 22 points. If the dates move at all, move them out of October before you think about anything else. 1,182 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
KOA to SFO questions
How often is KOA to SFO delayed?
Roughly one flight in six arrives at least 15 minutes late, which is the Department of Transportation's definition of a delayed arrival. That works out to 15.4% of the 1,202 flights in this analysis, against 22.7% nationally. Delayed flights are late by about an hour on average.
How reliable is KOA to SFO compared with the rest of the country?
84.6% of flights arrive on time here against a national 77.3%, a difference of 7 points in its favour. That is worth a B on this site's grading scale.
What time of day has the fewest delays on KOA to SFO?
The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 100.0% on time. The 2pm–5pm window is the weakest at 78.8%, 21 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 October delays on KOA to SFO?
October is the weakest month at 71.2% on time, compared with 93.5% in September. Across the year that is 22 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
- SFO to KOA — the return legseparate record
- San Francisco International (SFO) delay statistics
- United Airlines on KOA to SFO88.1%
- Alaska Airlines on KOA to SFO71.0%
- KOA to HNL, a related route83.8%
- LAX to SFO, a related route60.1%
- KOA to LAX, a related route86.5%
- United Airlines on-time record88.1%
- Alaska Airlines on-time record71.0%
- Why the first flight of the morning is statistically safest
- The best time of day to fly, according to 7.05 million flight records
Direction matters. KOA to SFO and SFO to KOA 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.