Route reliability record
LAS→BWI
Las Vegas to Baltimore
- Flights
- 1,803
- Period
- July 2025 to June 2026
- Distance
- 2,106 mi
- Carriers
- 2
This route lands a B+, about a point better than the national rate of 77.6%. About one flight in five arrives 15 minutes late or worse, and those flights are late by about 50 minutes on average. That is a workable record, not a spotless one. That rests on 1,803 LAS to BWI flights, with a median arrival 4 minutes early.
Best time to fly LAS to BWI: a 5am–8am departure, ideally on a Saturday. Flights in that window arrived on time 93.3% of the time and Saturday flights 88.3%, against 78.5% for the route overall.
The US average over the same twelve months is 77.6%, 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
78.5%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 1,777 completed flights
Avg delay
50 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
0.94%
National rate is 1.81%
Best carrier
Southwest
78.5% on time across 1,625 flights
These figures cover 1,803 flights between July 2025 and June 2026. The median arrival is 4 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.
Carrier by carrier
Which airline is most reliable on LAS to BWI
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Spirit Airlinesthin sample | 178 | 79.0% | 93 min | 1.12% | B |
| Southwest Airlines | 1,625 | 78.5% | 46 min | 0.92% | B+ |
Best ways to make this trip
The most reliable ways to fly Las Vegas to Baltimore
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. 3 of the top 4 use a different airport at one end.
| Option | Airline | Success | On time | Cancelled | Best departure | Most punctual flight |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. LAS → IADLas Vegas to Washington | United Airlines | 88.3% | 88.8% | 0.59% | 8am–11am, Tue (route) | UA 2382 13:15 |
| 2. LAS → DCALas Vegas to Washington | American Airlines | 78.1% | 79.2% | 1.37% | 11am–2pm, Sat | — |
| 3. LAS → BWILas Vegas to Baltimore | Southwest Airlines | 77.8% | 78.5% | 0.92% | 5am–8am, Sat | — |
| 4. LAS → DCALas Vegas to Washington | Southwest Airlines | 71.4% | 71.8% | 0.55% | 8am–11am, Sat | — |
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 34 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–8am364 flights93.3%
- 8am–11am302 flights79.9%
- 11am–2pm237 flights72.3%
- 2pm–5pm328 flights59.5%
- 5pm–8pm84 flights60.2%
- 8pm–5am488 flights85.3%
Scale runs 50% to 100%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
Book the early departure. Flights leaving between 5am–8am arrive on time 93.3% of the time, against 59.5% for the afternoon window. That is 34 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 488 flights scheduled in it.
Across the year
When delays peak on this route
This route's year swings by 26 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.
July is the worst month at 65.0% on time, 26 points below January, the best at 91.0%. Summer afternoon convection and peak-season schedules land on the same weeks every year, so this is a pattern you can book around rather than a run of bad luck. October was the busiest month here, with 185 flights.
Across the week, Saturday is the strongest day at 88.3% on time and Sunday the weakest at 71.3%. 17 points is a smaller lever than departure hour, but it is free.
Delay causes
Why this route gets delayed
One category carries most of the weight here. Carrier accounts for 46% of the 19,000 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.
- 46%Carrier
- 38%Late-arriving aircraft
- 15%National Airspace System
- 1%Extreme weather
- 0%Security
38% of delay minutes trace back to a late-arriving aircraft, meaning the plane was already behind before it got here. That is a cascade, and cascades start small and grow through the day. Across 19,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 38 to one. It is the strongest argument for booking the first departure of the morning, when the aircraft has been sitting at the gate overnight with nothing to inherit. The split is drawn from 19,154 reported delay minutes.
The largest share of delay minutes, 46%, 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 8,880 of the 19,000 delay minutes reported here.
Cancellations sit at 0.94% against a national 1.81%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.50%.
Connections and stage length
What a delay here actually costs
Badly late arrivals are rare here: only 4.8% land an hour or more behind schedule, against 8.1% 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 2,106 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 78.9% on time across 1,811 flights, within half 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 1,803 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 BWI 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. January runs 91.0% on time and July 65.0%, a swing of 26 points. If the dates move at all, move them out of July before you think about anything else. 1,777 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
LAS to BWI questions
How often is LAS to BWI delayed?
About one flight in five arrives at least 15 minutes late, which is the Department of Transportation's definition of a delayed arrival. That works out to 21.5% of the 1,803 flights in this analysis, against 22.4% nationally. Delayed flights are late by about 50 minutes on average.
How reliable is LAS to BWI compared with the rest of the country?
78.5% of flights arrive on time here against a national 77.6%, a difference of about a point in its favour. That is worth a B+ on this site's grading scale.
What time of day has the fewest delays on LAS to BWI?
The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 93.3% on time. The 2pm–5pm window is the weakest at 59.5%, 34 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 July delays on LAS to BWI?
July is the weakest month at 65.0% on time, compared with 91.0% in January. Across the year that is 26 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
- BWI to LAS — the return legseparate record
- Harry Reid International (LAS) delay statistics
- Baltimore/Washington International Thurgood Marshall (BWI) delay statistics
- Spirit Airlines on LAS to BWI79.0%
- Southwest Airlines on LAS to BWI78.5%
- LAS to LAX, a related route78.8%
- ATL to BWI, a related route75.6%
- LAS to DEN, a related route77.0%
- Spirit Airlines on-time record79.0%
- Southwest Airlines on-time record78.5%
- Why the first flight of the morning is statistically safest
- The best time of day to fly, according to 7.04 million flight records
Direction matters. LAS to BWI and BWI to LAS are scored separately because they are separate operations, with different departure banks and different aircraft. Compare the return leg.
Embed LAS to BWI’s on-time badge on your site
Paste this into a web page. The badge shows the current on-time rate, cancellation rate and grade, and updates every month. Preview it, or build a badge for another route or airport.
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.