Route reliability record
MCO→SFO
Orlando to San Francisco
- Flights
- 1,378
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Distance
- 2,446 mi
- Carriers
- 2
This route lands a B+, 2 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 about an hour on average. That rests on 1,378 MCO to SFO flights, with a median arrival 9 minutes early.
Best time to fly MCO to SFO: a 5am–8am departure, ideally on a Tuesday. Flights in that window arrived on time 95.0% of the time and Tuesday flights 85.1%, against 79.7% 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
79.7%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 1,371 completed flights
Avg delay
63 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
0.36%
National rate is 1.89%
Best carrier
United
81.6% on time across 1,100 flights
These figures cover 1,378 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. The median arrival is 9 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 SFO
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| United Airlines | 1,100 | 81.6% | 64 min | 0.27% | B+ |
| Alaska Airlinesthin sample | 278 | 72.5% | 62 min | 0.72% | C+ |
Flight by flight
Flights on MCO to SFO
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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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 26 points, against half a point between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am201 flights95.0%
- 8am–11am468 flights85.9%
- 11am–2pm—
- 2pm–5pm24 flights—
- 5pm–8pm511 flights68.6%
- 8pm–5am174 flights79.7%
Scale runs 60% to 100%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
Book the early departure. Flights leaving between 5am–8am arrive on time 95.0% of the time, against 68.6% for the evening window. That is 26 points of difference for no extra money, and it comes from the same aircraft having had no earlier flight to fall behind on. The 5pm–8pm window is the busiest, with 511 flights scheduled in it.
Explore
Filter MCO to SFO 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 SFO, the best departure window is 5am–8am at 95.0% on time and the worst is 5pm–8pm at 68.6%, a wide gap of 26.4 points. All US flights leaving 5am–8am ran 89.3%.
- 5–8am95.0%
- 8–11am85.9%
- 11am–2pm—
- 2–5pm—
- 5–8pm68.6%
- 8pm–5am79.7%
best all US flightsScale 60% to 100%. Cells under 30 flights show a dash.
Across the year
When delays peak on this route
This route's year swings by 18 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.
June is the worst month at 70.7% on time, 18 points below March, 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. December was the busiest month here, with 151 flights.
Across the week, Tuesday is the strongest day at 85.1% on time and Sunday the weakest at 74.5%, a spread of 11 points.
Delay causes
Why this route gets delayed
National Airspace System accounts for 47% of the 18,000 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 47%National Airspace System
- 34%Late-arriving aircraft
- 17%Carrier
- 2%Extreme weather
- 0%Security
47% 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 8,311 minutes out of 18,000, against a national NAS share of 21%. The split is drawn from 17,601 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 95.0% on time here.
Cancellations are rare at 0.36%, below the national 1.89% and low enough to earn the plus on the grade. Roughly one flight in 100 is called off; the risk here is arriving late, not not arriving.
Connections and stage length
What a delay here actually costs
7.4% 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 2,446 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 86.0% on time across 1,376 flights, 6 points above 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 6 points of difference.
The sample behind these figures is 1,378 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 SFO 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. March runs 88.3% on time and June 70.7%, a swing of 18 points. If the dates move at all, move them out of June before you think about anything else. 1,371 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
MCO to SFO questions
How often is MCO to SFO 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 20.3% of the 1,378 flights in this analysis, against 22.7% nationally. Delayed flights are late by about an hour on average.
How reliable is MCO to SFO compared with the rest of the country?
79.7% of flights arrive on time here against a national 77.3%, a difference of 2 points in its favour. That is worth a B+ on this site's grading scale.
What time of day has the fewest delays on MCO to SFO?
The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 95.0% on time. The 5pm–8pm window is the weakest at 68.6%, 26 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 June delays on MCO to SFO?
June is the weakest month at 70.7% on time, compared with 88.3% in March. Across the year that is 18 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
- SFO to MCO — the return legseparate record
- Orlando International (MCO) delay statistics
- San Francisco International (SFO) delay statistics
- United Airlines on MCO to SFO81.6%
- Alaska Airlines on MCO to SFO72.5%
- MCO to ATL, a related route74.9%
- LAX to SFO, a related route60.1%
- MCO to EWR, a related route75.0%
- United Airlines on-time record81.6%
- Alaska Airlines on-time record72.5%
- Why the first flight of the morning is statistically safest
- The best time of day to fly, according to 7.05 million flight records
Direction matters. MCO to SFO and SFO 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.