Route reliability record
LAS→DCA
Las Vegas to Washington
- Flights
- 728
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Distance
- 2,089 mi
- Carriers
- 2
This route sits in the middle of the pack with a C+. Close to three flights in four arrive on time by the DOT's definition, 3 points worse than the national rate of 77.3%. The late ones land about an hour behind schedule. That rests on 728 LAS to DCA flights, with a median arrival 5 minutes early.
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
74.3%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 716 completed flights
Avg delay
56 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
0.96%
National rate is 1.89%
Best carrier
—
No carrier clears the floor
These figures cover 728 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. The median arrival is 5 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 LAS to DCA
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| American Airlinesthin sample | 364 | 78.9% | 79 min | 1.37% | B |
| Southwest Airlinesthin sample | 364 | 69.7% | 40 min | 0.55% | C+ |
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Best ways to make this trip
The most reliable ways to fly Las Vegas 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. 2 of the top 2 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 | 87.7% | 88.2% | 0.62% | 8pm–5am, Tue | UA 2382 13:23 |
| 2. LAS → BWILas Vegas to Baltimore | Southwest Airlines | 77.7% | 78.6% | 1.10% | 5am–8am, 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 is the single lever a traveller controls, and it moves the odds more than most people expect. Each bar below is the on-time rate for flights scheduled to leave inside that window, across 728 flights.
- 5am–8am4 flights—
- 8am–11am331 flights69.1%
- 11am–2pm393 flights78.7%
- 2pm–5pm—
- 5pm–8pm—
- 8pm–5am—
Scale runs 60% to 85%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
The best window here is not the first bank but the 11am–2pm slot at 78.7% on time, ahead of 8am–11am at 69.1%. Where the curve peaks mid-day rather than at dawn, the constraint is usually congestion at one end rather than the aircraft's own rotation. The 11am–2pm window is the busiest, with 393 flights scheduled in it.
Explore
Filter LAS 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 LAS to DCA, the best departure window is 11am–2pm at 78.7% on time and the worst is 8am–11am at 69.1%, a real gap of 9.6 points. All US flights leaving 11am–2pm ran 78.3%.
- 5–8am—
- 8–11am69.1%
- 11am–2pm78.7%
- 2–5pm—
- 5–8pm—
- 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 32 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 56.7% on time, 32 points below April, the best at 88.3%. 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. January was the busiest month here, with 62 flights.
Across the week, Saturday is the strongest day at 86.1% on time and Friday the weakest at 68.3%, a spread of 18 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 10,000 reported delay minutes.
- 39%Carrier
- 31%National Airspace System
- 27%Late-arriving aircraft
- 3%Extreme weather
The largest share of delay minutes, 39%, falls under carrier control: crew scheduling, maintenance, fuelling, baggage. It accounts for 4,080 of the 10,000 delay minutes reported here. The split is drawn from 10,336 reported delay minutes.
Cancellations sit at 0.96% against a national 1.89%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.69%.
Connections and stage length
What a delay here actually costs
7.1% of arrivals land an hour or more late, close to the national 8.3%, so a 60 to 75 minute layover is reasonable here while anything under 45 minutes is a bet. Most delays on this route last about an hour, which a normal layover absorbs.
At 2,089 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 69.2% on time across 729 flights, 5 points below 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 5 points of difference.
One caution: this is a thin sample. 728 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.
Work out the risk of missing a connection in DCA after this flight
What to do with this
Booking this route
Put together: treat all of this as provisional. 728 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 74.3% headline is the most reliable number on the page; the hour and month splits below it are built on a few dozen flights each. 716 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
LAS to DCA questions
How often is LAS to DCA 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 25.7% of the 728 flights in this analysis, against 22.7% nationally. Delayed flights are late by about an hour on average.
How reliable is LAS to DCA compared with the rest of the country?
74.3% of flights arrive on time here against a national 77.3%, a difference of 3 points against it. That is worth a C+ on this site's grading scale.
What time of day has the fewest delays on LAS to DCA?
The 11am–2pm departure window is the strongest at 78.7% on time. The 8am–11am window is the weakest at 69.1%, 10 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 DCA?
July is the weakest month at 56.7% on time, compared with 88.3% in April. Across the year that is 32 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 LAS — the return legseparate record
- Harry Reid International (LAS) delay statistics
- Ronald Reagan Washington National (DCA) delay statistics
- American Airlines on LAS to DCA78.9%
- Southwest Airlines on LAS to DCA69.7%
- LAS to LAX, a related route77.9%
- BOS to DCA, a related route72.6%
- LAS to DEN, a related route76.5%
- American Airlines on-time record78.9%
- Southwest Airlines on-time record69.7%
- The best time of day to fly, according to 7.05 million flight records
- Worst months to fly in the US, ranked by the data
Direction matters. LAS to DCA and DCA to LAS 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.