Carrier route record

WNMSP→AUS

Southwest Airlines · Minneapolis to Austin

Flights: 336
Period: July 2025 to June 2026
Share of route: 20%
Carriers: 3

Historical statistics for July 2025 to June 2026, not live status. For today’s flights, check with Southwest Airlines.

Southwest on MSP to AUS lands a B+, 2 points worse than the national rate of 77.6%. About one flight in four arrives 15 minutes late or worse, and those flights are late by about 45 minutes on average. That is a workable record, not a spotless one. That rests on 336 flights, with a median arrival 3 minutes early.

The US average over the same twelve months is 77.6%, so there is little to separate Southwest on MSP to AUS from the country as a whole. The variation that matters here is internal: which carrier, and what time of day.

On time

76.0%

Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 333 completed flights

Avg delay

46 min

Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights

Cancelled

0.60%

National rate is 1.81%

Whole route

78.7%

Every carrier on MSP to AUS, 1,678 flights

These figures cover 336 flights between July 2025 and June 2026. The median arrival is 3 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.

Carrier by carrier

Southwest against every carrier on MSP to AUS

Southwest flew 336 of the 1,678 flights on MSP to AUS, about 20% of it. Its 76.0% on time is 3 points worse than the route as a whole, which runs 78.7%. Ranked by on-time rate it is last of three carriers on the route, where the range runs from SkyWest at 85.3% to Southwest at 76.0%. One of those carriers flew fewer than 365 flights here, so treat their positions as rough.

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.

On-time performance by carrier on MSP to AUS
Airline	Flights	On time	Avg delay	Cancelled	Grade
SkyWest Airlinesthin sample	321	85.3%	66 min	0.31%	A+
Delta Air Lines	1,021	77.4%	61 min	0.88%	B+
Southwest Airlines (this page)thin sample	336	76.0%	46 min	0.60%	B+

Departure window

When Southwest runs best on this route

Departure time matters more here than the choice of carrier. The gap between the best and worst window is 27 points, against half a point between the best and worst carrier. Each bar is the on-time rate for flights scheduled inside that window.

5am–8am36 flights88.9%
8am–11am72 flights84.7%
11am–2pm153 flights75.3%
2pm–5pm55 flights61.8%
5pm–8pm20 flights—
8pm–5am—

Scale runs 55% to 95%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.

Book the early departure. Flights leaving between 5am–8am arrive on time 88.9% of the time, against 61.8% for the afternoon window. That is 27 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 153 flights scheduled in it.

Across the year

Southwest on MSP to AUS through the year

Jul–Sep 202584 flights67.5%
Oct–Dec 2025115 flights76.5%
Jan–Mar 202655 flights85.2%
Apr–Jun 202682 flights77.8%

Scale runs 60% to 90%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.

Monthly volumes are too low here to break the year into twelve reliable readings. What the twelve-month total says is 76.0% on time across 336 flights.

Southwest on MSP to AUS did not run the same all year. Its best quarter was Jan–Mar 2026 at 85.2% on time and its weakest Jul–Sep 2025 at 67.5%, a swing of 18 points on roughly 84 flights a quarter. The twelve-month rate averages over that, so if you are flying in a weak quarter the quarter's own figure is the better guide.

Across the week, Wednesday is the strongest day at 90.7% on time and Sunday the weakest at 63.5%. 27 points is a smaller lever than departure hour, but it is free.

Delay causes

Why Southwest runs late on this route

One category carries most of the weight here. Late-arriving aircraft accounts for 53% of the 3,663 delay minutes carriers reported, and the remaining four split what is left. The split is by minutes rather than by flights, so a few very long delays count for as much as many short ones.

Late-arriving aircraft
53%
Carrier
24%
National Airspace System
23%

53% of delay minutes trace back to a late-arriving aircraft, meaning the plane was already behind before it got here. That is a cascade, and cascades start small and grow through the day. Across 3,663 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 53 to one. It is the strongest argument for booking the first departure of the morning, when the aircraft has been sitting at the gate overnight with nothing to inherit. The split is drawn from 3,663 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 88.9% on time here.

Cancellations are rare at 0.60%, below the national 1.81% 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 costs

5.4% of arrivals land an hour or more late, close to the national 8.1%. That is the figure that decides a connection, and it says a 60 to 75 minute layover is reasonable here while anything under 45 minutes is a bet. Most delays on this route last about 45 minutes, which a normal layover absorbs.

The 1,042 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. It is also long enough that the aircraft usually flies three or four legs a day rather than six, which slows how fast delay compounds.

The return leg is a different operation and performs like one: it runs 66.1% on time across 336 flights, 10 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 10 points of difference.

One caution: this is a thin sample. 336 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.

What to do with this

Booking Southwest on MSP to AUS

Put together: treat all of this as provisional. 336 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 76.0% headline is the most reliable number on the page; the hour and month splits below it are built on a few dozen flights each. 333 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.

Where to go next

Source: US DOT Bureau of Transportation Statistics, on-time performance data, July 2025 to June 2026. Last updated 15 September 2026; recomputed monthly. How this data is collected.

Key figures