Route reliability record
LGA→DCA
New York to Washington
- Flights
- 4,840
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Distance
- 214 mi
- Carriers
- 3
This route carries a cancellation problem, not just a delay problem: 5.8% of scheduled flights never operate, against 1.9% nationally. Of the ones that do fly, about two flights in three arrive on time, worth a C− overall. The punctuality figure counts only flights that actually departed, so it flatters an operation that cancels this often. That rests on 4,840 LGA to DCA flights, with a median arrival right on schedule.
Best time to fly LGA to DCA: a 5am–8am departure, ideally on a Saturday. Flights in that window arrived on time 82.1% of the time and Saturday flights 82.8%, against 65.5% for the route overall.
The national on-time rate over the same period is 77.3%, so this route runs 12 points behind the country as a whole. Across a thousand flights that is about 118 extra late arrivals.
Key figures
On time
65.5%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 4,553 completed flights
Avg delay
62 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
5.76%
National rate is 1.89%
Best carrier
Republic
65.7% on time across 4,699 flights
These figures cover 4,840 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 11.6% 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 LGA 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Republic Airways | 4,699 | 65.7% | 61 min | 5.83% | C− |
| American Airlinesthin sample | 24 | 60.9% | 110 min | 4.17% | D− |
| Delta Air Linesthin sample | 117 | 58.4% | 84 min | 3.42% | D− |
Flight by flight
Flights on LGA to DCA
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.
Best ways to make this trip
The most reliable ways to fly New York 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. 4 of the top 5 use a different airport at one end.
| Option | Airline | Success | On time | Cancelled | Best departure | Most punctual flight |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. ISP → BWIIslip to Baltimore | Southwest Airlines | 83.8% | 85.1% | 1.51% | 5am–8am, Fri | — |
| 2. EWR → IADNewark to Washington | United Airlines | 72.7% | 74.8% | 2.81% | 5am–8am, Sat (route) | UA 1366 06:00 |
| 3. LGA → IADNew York to Washington | Republic Airways | 70.7% | 76.1% | 7.13% | 5am–8am, Sat | YX 3688 14:55 |
| 4. JFK → DCANew York to Washington | Republic Airways | 64.8% | 69.1% | 6.22% | 5am–8am, Sat | YX 4538 06:30 |
| 5. LGA → DCANew York to Washington | Republic Airways | 61.9% | 65.7% | 5.83% | 5am–8am, Sat | YX 5770 06:00 |
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 31 points, against half a point between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am777 flights82.1%
- 8am–11am888 flights76.0%
- 11am–2pm770 flights68.7%
- 2pm–5pm818 flights56.2%
- 5pm–8pm985 flights55.8%
- 8pm–5am602 flights50.6%
Scale runs 40% to 90%.
The 8pm–5am window is where this operation falls apart: 50.6% on time, against 82.1% for the 5am–8am slot. By evening the aircraft flying these rotations have absorbed a full day of small delays and there is no slack left to recover in. The 5pm–8pm window is the busiest, with 985 flights scheduled in it.
Explore
Filter LGA 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 LGA to DCA, the best departure window is 5am–8am at 82.1% on time and the worst is 8pm–5am at 50.6%, a wide gap of 31.5 points. All US flights leaving 5am–8am ran 89.3%.
- 5–8am82.1%
- 8–11am76.0%
- 11am–2pm68.7%
- 2–5pm56.2%
- 5–8pm55.8%
- 8pm–5am50.6%
best all US flightsScale 40% to 95%.
Across the year
When delays peak on this route
This route's year swings by 27 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 81.4% on time. Shoulder season thins the schedule and takes the summer weather with it, and the operation gets its margin back. March was the busiest month here, with 436 flights.
Across the week, Saturday is the strongest day at 82.8% on time and Friday the weakest at 62.0%, a spread of 21 points.
Delay causes
Why this route gets delayed
National Airspace System accounts for 42% of the 97,000 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 42%National Airspace System
- 36%Late-arriving aircraft
- 19%Carrier
- 3%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 97,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 11 to one. The split is drawn from 96,768 reported delay minutes.
42% 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 41,000 minutes out of 97,000, against a national NAS share of 21%.
Cancellations run at 5.76%, against 1.89% nationally. That is roughly one flight in fifteen 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
11.6% 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.
At 214 miles this is a short hop, and stage length matters more than it looks. A flight this short spends under two hours in the air, which leaves almost nothing to claw back a late pushback with. Delay here is decided on the ground, in the turn, which is why the 5am–8am window matters as much as it does.
The return leg runs 65.6% on time across 4,843 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 4,840 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 DCA after this flight
What to do with this
Booking this route
Put together: the delay figures matter less here than the 5.76% cancellation rate. A late arrival costs you about an hour; 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. 4,553 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
LGA to DCA questions
How often is LGA to DCA delayed?
About one flight in three arrives at least 15 minutes late, which is the Department of Transportation's definition of a delayed arrival. That works out to 34.5% of the 4,840 flights in this analysis, against 22.7% nationally. Delayed flights are late by about an hour on average.
How reliable is LGA to DCA compared with the rest of the country?
65.5% of flights arrive on time here against a national 77.3%, a difference of 12 points against it. That is worth a C− on this site's grading scale.
What time of day has the fewest delays on LGA to DCA?
The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 82.1% on time. The 8pm–5am window is the weakest at 50.6%, 31 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 March delays on LGA to DCA?
March is the weakest month at 54.0% on time, compared with 81.4% in September. Across the year that is 27 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 LGA — the return legseparate record
- LaGuardia (LGA) delay statistics
- Ronald Reagan Washington National (DCA) delay statistics
- Republic Airways on LGA to DCA65.7%
- Delta Air Lines on LGA to DCA58.4%
- LGA to ORD, a related route66.7%
- BOS to DCA, a related route72.6%
- LGA to ATL, a related route75.5%
- Republic Airways on-time record65.7%
- American Airlines on-time record60.9%
- Delta Air Lines on-time record58.4%
- The US routes with the most cancellations
- Why the first flight of the morning is statistically safest
Direction matters. LGA to DCA and DCA to LGA 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.