Route reliability record
MCO→ISP
Orlando to Islip
- Flights
- 1,441
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Distance
- 971 mi
- Carriers
- 3
This route lands a B, about a point worse than the national rate of 77.3%. About one flight in four arrives 15 minutes late or worse, and those flights are late by about an hour on average. That rests on 1,441 MCO to ISP flights, of which JetBlue Airways flew 416 at 86.3% on time.
Best time to fly MCO to ISP: a 5am–8am departure, ideally on a Tuesday. Flights in that window arrived on time 91.9% of the time and Tuesday flights 83.3%, against 76.2% 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
76.2%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 1,415 completed flights
Avg delay
57 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
1.67%
National rate is 1.89%
Best carrier
JetBlue
86.3% on time across 416 flights
These figures cover 1,441 flights between September 2025 and August 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.
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Carrier by carrier
Which airline is most reliable on MCO to ISP
The choice of carrier is not cosmetic here. JetBlue Airways arrives on time 86.3% of the time; Southwest Airlines manages 67.3%. Sample sizes sit next to every figure, because a two-point gap across 665 flights means less than a ten-point one.
| Airline | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| JetBlue Airways | 416 | 86.3% | 69 min | 1.20% | A |
| Frontier Airlinesthin sample | 360 | 81.0% | 62 min | 2.22% | B |
| Southwest Airlines | 665 | 67.3% | 52 min | 1.65% | C |
The spread between JetBlue and Southwest is 19 points, wide enough that it should decide the booking. On a hundred trips that is 19 more arrivals inside the on-time window.
Flight by flight
Flights on MCO to ISP
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.
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Best ways to make this trip
The most reliable ways to fly Orlando to Islip
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. MCO → ISPOrlando to Islip | JetBlue Airways | 85.3% | 86.3% | 1.20% | 8am–11am, Sun | B6 546 06:15 |
| 2. MCO → EWROrlando to Newark | United Airlines | 76.7% | 78.6% | 2.36% | 5am–8am, Wed | UA 1643 14:37 |
| 3. MCO → JFKOrlando to New York | Delta Air Lines | 75.4% | 77.9% | 3.23% | 5am–8am, Wed | DL 2702 06:00 |
| 4. MCO → LGAOrlando to New York | Delta Air Lines | 72.3% | 75.7% | 4.53% | 5am–8am, Wed | — |
| 5. MCO → JFKOrlando to New York | JetBlue Airways | 68.4% | 71.5% | 4.31% | 5am–8am, Tue | B6 1184 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 37 points, against 19 points between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am343 flights91.9%
- 8am–11am356 flights87.3%
- 11am–2pm199 flights73.2%
- 2pm–5pm126 flights70.7%
- 5pm–8pm168 flights58.9%
- 8pm–5am249 flights55.3%
Scale runs 45% to 95%.
The 8pm–5am window is where this operation falls apart: 55.3% on time, against 91.9% 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 8am–11am window is the busiest, with 356 flights scheduled in it.
Explore
Filter MCO to ISP 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 MCO to ISP, the best departure window is 5am–8am at 91.9% on time and the worst is 8pm–5am at 55.3%, a wide gap of 36.6 points. All US flights leaving 5am–8am ran 89.3%.
- 5–8am91.9%
- 8–11am87.3%
- 11am–2pm73.2%
- 2–5pm70.7%
- 5–8pm58.9%
- 8pm–5am55.3%
best all US flightsScale 45% to 95%.
Across the year
When delays peak on this route
This route's year swings by 23 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 88.8% on time. Shoulder season thins the schedule and takes the summer weather with it, and the operation gets its margin back. August was the busiest month here, with 143 flights.
Across the week, Tuesday is the strongest day at 83.3% on time and Saturday the weakest at 72.9%, a spread of 10 points.
Delay causes
Why this route gets delayed
Late-arriving aircraft accounts for 45% of the 19,000 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 45%Late-arriving aircraft
- 34%Carrier
- 16%National Airspace System
- 5%Extreme weather
- 1%Security
45% of delay minutes trace back to a late-arriving aircraft, meaning the plane was already behind before it got here. Across 19,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 9 to one. The split is drawn from 19,153 reported delay minutes.
The practical consequence: the 5am–8am departure is the one that starts clean. Its aircraft has no earlier leg to be late from, which is exactly why that window shows 91.9% on time here.
Cancellations sit at 1.67% against a national 1.89%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.14%.
Connections and stage length
What a delay here actually costs
6.8% 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.
The 971 miles between these two airports put this in the middle of the US network, around two and a half to three hours of block time. That is enough cruise to absorb a ten-minute late pushback and not enough to absorb thirty.
The return leg runs 74.4% on time across 1,442 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 1,441 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 ISP 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 88.8% on time and March 65.7%, a swing of 23 points. If the dates move at all, move them out of March before you think about anything else. 1,415 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
MCO to ISP questions
How often is MCO to ISP 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 23.8% of the 1,441 flights in this analysis, against 22.7% nationally. Delayed flights are late by about an hour on average.
Which airline is most reliable on MCO to ISP?
JetBlue Airways leads at 86.3% on time across 416 flights. Southwest Airlines is at the other end on 67.3%, a gap of 19 points. Sample size matters as much as the percentage: a rate built from a few hundred flights moves around far more than one built from ten thousand.
What time of day has the fewest delays on MCO to ISP?
The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 91.9% on time. The 8pm–5am window is the weakest at 55.3%, 37 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 MCO to ISP?
March is the weakest month at 65.7% on time, compared with 88.8% in September. Across the year that is 23 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
- ISP to MCO — the return legseparate record
- Orlando International (MCO) delay statistics
- JetBlue Airways on MCO to ISP86.3%
- Frontier Airlines on MCO to ISP81.0%
- Southwest Airlines on MCO to ISP67.3%
- MCO to ATL, a related route74.9%
- BWI to ISP, a related route77.8%
- MCO to EWR, a related route75.0%
- JetBlue Airways on-time record86.3%
- Frontier Airlines on-time record81.0%
- Southwest Airlines on-time record67.3%
- Why the first flight of the morning is statistically safest
- Same route, different airline: where the carrier you pick matters most
Direction matters. MCO to ISP and ISP to MCO 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.