Carrier route record
DLMSP→DCA
Delta Air Lines · Minneapolis to Washington
- Flights
- 1,701
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Share of route
- 65%
- Carriers
- 5
Historical statistics for September 2025 to August 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, about a point worse than the national rate of 77.3%. The late ones land about an hour behind schedule. That rests on 1,701 flights, with a median arrival 7 minutes early.
The US average over the same twelve months is 77.3%, 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
75.9%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 1,662 completed flights
Avg delay
61 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
1.94%
National rate is 1.89%
Whole route
74.6%
Every carrier on MSP to DCA, 2,632 flights
These figures cover 1,701 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 8.4% of arrivals land a full hour or more behind schedule, against 8.3% nationally.
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Carrier by carrier
Delta against every carrier on MSP to DCA
Delta flew 1,701 of the 2,632 flights on MSP to DCA, most of the route. Its 75.9% on time is about level with the route as a whole at 74.6%. Ranked by on-time rate it is number two of five carriers on the route, where the range runs from Republic at 78.1% 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Republic Airwaysthin sample | 199 | 78.1% | 71 min | 5.03% | B− |
| Delta Air Lines (this page) | 1,701 | 75.9% | 61 min | 1.94% | B |
| PSA Airlines | 528 | 72.2% | 168 min | 6.06% | C− |
| Envoy Airthin sample | 163 | 67.5% | 65 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
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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 20 points, against half a point between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am350 flights84.0%
- 8am–11am352 flights84.2%
- 11am–2pm1 flights—
- 2pm–5pm361 flights76.1%
- 5pm–8pm290 flights64.3%
- 8pm–5am347 flights69.0%
Scale runs 55% to 90%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
The 5pm–8pm window is where this operation falls apart: 64.3% on time, against 84.2% 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 361 flights scheduled in it.
Across the year
Delta on MSP to DCA through the year
July is the worst month at 66.4% on time, 20 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. July was the busiest month here, with 149 flights.
Across the week, Saturday is the strongest day at 81.5% on time and Friday the weakest at 70.5%, a spread of 11 points.
Arrival by arrival
How late Delta on MSP to DCA runs when it is late
Delta on MSP to DCA often beats the schedule: 542 of 1,662 completed flights, 33%, arrived 15 minutes or more early. The 400 late arrivals split 125 under half an hour, 136 between 30 and 60 minutes, and 139 an hour or more.
- 15+ min early542 flights32.6%
- Within 15 min720 flights43.3%
- 15–29 min late125 flights7.5%
- 30–59 min late136 flights8.2%
- 1–2 hours late94 flights5.7%
- 2+ hours late45 flights2.7%
Scale runs 0% to 100%.
Share of 1,662 completed flights by arrival against schedule.
49 of 365 late departures made up the time and arrived on time, 13% of them. In the other direction, 84 flights left on time yet arrived 15 minutes late or more, so that delay built up after pushback: in the air, in a holding pattern or on the ground at DCA.
The worst days
Worst days for Delta on MSP to DCA
The latest arrival of the period was on 14 July 2026, 7 hours 16 minutes behind schedule; most of its delay minutes were filed as national airspace system delay. The five worst days are spread across July, December, August and March, with no single month standing out.
| Date | Arrived late by | Largest filed cause |
|---|---|---|
| 14 July 2026 | 7 hours 16 minutes | National Airspace System |
| 21 July 2026 | 6 hours 39 minutes | National Airspace System |
| 14 December 2025 | 5 hours 41 minutes | Extreme weather |
| 7 August 2026 | 5 hours 17 minutes | Carrier |
| 13 March 2026 | 4 hours 51 minutes | Carrier |
Delay causes
Why Delta runs late on this route
Carrier accounts for 42% of the 24,000 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 42%Carrier
- 41%National Airspace System
- 13%Late-arriving aircraft
- 3%Extreme weather
41% 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 10,000 minutes out of 24,000, against a national NAS share of 21%. The split is drawn from 24,414 reported delay minutes.
The largest share of delay minutes, 42%, falls under carrier control: crew scheduling, maintenance, fuelling, baggage. It accounts for 10,000 of the 24,000 delay minutes reported here.
Cancellations sit at 1.94% against a national 1.89%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.35%.
Connections and stage length
What a delay here costs
8.4% 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.
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.
The return leg is a different operation and performs like one: it runs 78.9% on time across 1,701 flights, 3 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 3 points of difference.
The sample behind these figures is 1,701 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 66.4%, a swing of 20 points. If the dates move at all, move them out of July before you think about anything else. 1,662 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 DCA78.1%
- PSA Airlines on MSP to DCA72.2%
- Envoy Air on MSP to DCA67.5%
- 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 7.05 million flight records
- Connecting flights: how much buffer the data says you need
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.