Route reliability record
LNK→DEN
Lincoln to Denver
- Flights
- 1,588
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Distance
- 423 mi
- Carriers
- 1
This route lands a B+, 3 points better than the national rate of 77.3%. About one flight in five arrives 15 minutes late or worse, and those flights are late by close to two hours on average. That rests on 1,588 LNK to DEN flights, with a median arrival 10 minutes early.
Best time to fly LNK to DEN: a 5am–8am departure, ideally on a Sunday. Flights in that window arrived on time 89.3% of the time and Sunday flights 83.8%, against 80.1% for the route overall.
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
80.1%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 1,566 completed flights
Avg delay
107 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
0.94%
National rate is 1.89%
Best carrier
SkyWest
80.1% on time across 1,588 flights
These figures cover 1,588 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 10.0% of arrivals land a full hour or more behind schedule, against 8.3% nationally.
Fare search by Aviasales, a Travelpayouts partner. Booking through it may earn this site a commission at no cost to you; it changes no figure here.
Carrier by carrier
Which airline is most reliable on LNK to DEN
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| SkyWest Airlines | 1,588 | 80.1% | 107 min | 0.94% | B+ |
Flight by flight
Flights on LNK to DEN
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 Lincoln to Denver
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. OMA → DENOmaha to Denver | SkyWest Airlines | 84.4% | 85.0% | 0.71% | 11am–2pm, Tue | — |
| 2. LNK → DENLincoln to Denver | SkyWest Airlines | 79.3% | 80.1% | 0.94% | 5am–8am, Sun | OO 5866 06:00 |
| 3. OMA → DENOmaha to Denver | United Airlines | 77.8% | 78.2% | 0.47% | 5am–8am, Wed | UA 792 09:05 |
| 4. OMA → DENOmaha to Denver | Southwest Airlines | 71.4% | 71.8% | 0.51% | 5am–8am, Tue | — |
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 23 points, against half a point between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am347 flights89.3%
- 8am–11am366 flights78.2%
- 11am–2pm511 flights84.6%
- 2pm–5pm—
- 5pm–8pm364 flights66.4%
- 8pm–5am—
Scale runs 60% to 95%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
Book the early departure. Flights leaving between 5am–8am arrive on time 89.3% of the time, against 66.4% for the evening window. That is 23 points of difference for no extra money, and it comes from the same aircraft having had no earlier flight to fall behind on. The 11am–2pm window is the busiest, with 511 flights scheduled in it.
Explore
Filter LNK to DEN 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 LNK to DEN, the best departure window is 5am–8am at 89.3% on time and the worst is 5pm–8pm at 66.4%, a wide gap of 22.9 points. All US flights leaving 5am–8am ran 89.3%.
- 5–8am89.3%
- 8–11am78.2%
- 11am–2pm84.6%
- 2–5pm—
- 5–8pm66.4%
- 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 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.
August is the worst month at 69.2% on time, 22 points below November, 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. August was the busiest month here, with 151 flights.
Across the week, Sunday is the strongest day at 83.8% on time and Saturday the weakest at 76.5%, a spread of 7 points.
Delay causes
Why this route gets delayed
Carrier accounts for 45% of the 33,000 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 45%Carrier
- 24%Late-arriving aircraft
- 17%National Airspace System
- 14%Extreme weather
Extreme weather accounts for 14% of delay minutes, well above the single-digit share typical across the system. Weather delays are lumpy: they arrive as whole bad days rather than as a steady drag, so the monthly strip above is the more useful view of the risk. The national share is 6%, so this operation carries roughly 2.3 times the usual weather exposure. The split is drawn from 33,276 reported delay minutes.
The largest share of delay minutes, 45%, falls under carrier control: crew scheduling, maintenance, fuelling, baggage. It accounts for 15,000 of the 33,000 delay minutes reported here.
Cancellations sit at 0.94% against a national 1.89%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.44%.
Connections and stage length
What a delay here actually costs
10.0% 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 423 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 is a different operation and performs like one: it runs 77.1% on time across 1,585 flights, 3 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 3 points of difference.
The sample behind these figures is 1,588 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 DEN 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. November runs 91.0% on time and August 69.2%, a swing of 22 points. If the dates move at all, move them out of August before you think about anything else. 1,566 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
LNK to DEN questions
How often is LNK to DEN 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 19.9% of the 1,588 flights in this analysis, against 22.7% nationally. Delayed flights are late by close to two hours on average.
How reliable is LNK to DEN compared with the rest of the country?
80.1% of flights arrive on time here against a national 77.3%, a difference of 3 points in its favour. That is worth a B+ on this site's grading scale.
What time of day has the fewest delays on LNK to DEN?
The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 89.3% on time. The 5pm–8pm window is the weakest at 66.4%, 23 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 August delays on LNK to DEN?
August is the weakest month at 69.2% on time, compared with 91.0% in November. 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
- DEN to LNK — the return legseparate record
- Denver International (DEN) delay statistics
- LNK to ORD, a related route74.3%
- PHX to DEN, a related route76.7%
- SLC to DEN, a related route79.0%
- SkyWest Airlines on-time record80.1%
- How often a connection fails at the major US hubs
- The best time of day to fly, according to 7.05 million flight records
Direction matters. LNK to DEN and DEN to LNK are scored separately because they are separate operations, with different departure banks and different aircraft. Compare the return leg.
Embed LNK to DEN’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, September 2025 to August 2026. Last updated ; recomputed monthly. How this data is collected.