Carrier route record
DLMSP→DCA
Delta Air Lines · Minneapolis to Washington
- Flights
- 1,695
- Period
- July 2025 to June 2026
- Share of route
- 66%
- Carriers
- 5
Historical statistics for July 2025 to June 2026, not live status. For today’s flights, check with Delta Air Lines.
Delta on MSP to DCA sits in the middle of the pack with a B. Close to three flights in four arrive on time by the DOT's definition, 2 points worse than the national rate of 77.6%. The late ones land about an hour behind schedule. That rests on 1,695 flights, with a median arrival 7 minutes early.
The US average over the same twelve months is 77.6%, so there is little to separate Delta on MSP to DCA from the country as a whole. The variation that matters here is internal: which carrier, and what time of day.
Key figures
On time
75.6%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 1,649 completed flights
Avg delay
60 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
2.12%
National rate is 1.81%
Whole route
74.3%
Every carrier on MSP to DCA, 2,574 flights
These figures cover 1,695 flights between July 2025 and June 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 8.4% of arrivals land a full hour or more behind schedule. That is the number that wrecks a connection, and it is not visible in an on-time percentage alone.
Carrier by carrier
Delta against every carrier on MSP to DCA
Delta flew 1,695 of the 2,574 flights on MSP to DCA, most of the route. Its 75.6% on time is about level with the route as a whole at 74.3%. Ranked by on-time rate it is first of five carriers on the route, where the range runs from Delta at 75.6% to American at 61.5%. Three 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.
| Airline | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Delta Air Lines (this page) | 1,695 | 75.6% | 60 min | 2.12% | B |
| Republic Airwaysthin sample | 215 | 74.6% | 72 min | 5.58% | C− |
| PSA Airlines | 483 | 72.7% | 160 min | 5.59% | C− |
| Envoy Airthin sample | 140 | 66.7% | 66 min | 4.29% | C− |
| American Airlinesthin sample | 41 | 61.5% | 73 min | 4.88% | D− |
Flight by flight
Delta flight numbers on MSP to DCA
Departure window
When Delta runs best on this route
Departure time matters more here than the choice of carrier. The gap between the best and worst window is 22 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–8am352 flights83.1%
- 8am–11am352 flights85.0%
- 11am–2pm1 flights—
- 2pm–5pm362 flights76.4%
- 5pm–8pm296 flights62.6%
- 8pm–5am332 flights68.3%
Scale runs 55% to 90%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
The 5pm–8pm window is where this operation falls apart: 62.6% on time, against 85.0% for the 8am–11am 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 2pm–5pm window is the busiest, with 362 flights scheduled in it.
Across the year
Delta on MSP to DCA through the year
July is the worst month at 61.8% on time, 25 points below September, the best at 86.3%. 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. May was the busiest month here, with 146 flights.
Across the week, Tuesday is the strongest day at 84.9% on time and Thursday the weakest at 68.5%. 16 points is a smaller lever than departure hour, but it is free.
Delay causes
Why Delta runs late on this route
One category carries most of the weight here. Carrier accounts for 43% of the 24,000 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.
- 43%Carrier
- 38%National Airspace System
- 15%Late-arriving aircraft
- 4%Extreme weather
38% 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 9,164 minutes out of 24,000, against a national NAS share of 21%. The split is drawn from 24,230 reported delay minutes.
The largest share of delay minutes, 43%, falls under carrier control: crew scheduling, maintenance, fuelling, baggage. Unlike weather, that is a management outcome, and it is the category where the gap between two carriers on the same schedule is genuinely earned. It accounts for 10,000 of the 24,000 delay minutes reported here.
Cancellations sit at 2.12% against a national 1.81%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.59%.
Connections and stage length
What a delay here costs
8.4% 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 an hour, which a normal layover absorbs.
The 931 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 79.9% on time across 1,695 flights, 4 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 4 points of difference.
The sample behind these figures is 1,695 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.
What to do with this
Booking Delta on MSP to DCA
Put together: the calendar is the biggest lever here, not the carrier or the hour. September runs 86.3% on time and July 61.8%, a swing of 25 points. If the dates move at all, move them out of July before you think about anything else. 1,649 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Related
Where to go next
- MSP to DCA, every carrier
- Delta on DCA to MSP, the return leg
- Republic Airways on MSP to DCA74.6%
- PSA Airlines on MSP to DCA72.7%
- Envoy Air on MSP to DCA66.7%
- Delta Air Lines network-wide record
- Minneapolis-St Paul International (MSP) delay statistics
- Ronald Reagan Washington National (DCA) delay statistics
- The best time of day to fly, according to 7.04 million flight records
- Connecting flights: how much buffer the data says you need
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.