Route reliability record
MSP→PHL
Minneapolis to Philadelphia
- Flights
- 2,085
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Distance
- 981 mi
- Carriers
- 5
This route carries a cancellation problem, not just a delay problem: 3.9% of scheduled flights never operate, against 1.9% nationally. Of the ones that do fly, about four flights in five arrive on time, worth a B− overall. The punctuality figure counts only flights that actually departed, so it flatters an operation that cancels this often. That rests on 2,085 MSP to PHL flights, of which Delta Air Lines flew 1,217 at 81.3% on time.
Best time to fly MSP to PHL: a 5am–8am departure, ideally on a Wednesday. Flights in that window arrived on time 88.9% of the time and Wednesday flights 83.4%, against 79.4% 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
79.4%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 1,995 completed flights
Avg delay
93 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
3.93%
National rate is 1.89%
Best carrier
Delta
81.3% on time across 1,217 flights
These figures cover 2,085 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 9.1% of arrivals land a full hour or more behind schedule, against 8.3% nationally.
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Carrier by carrier
Which airline is most reliable on MSP to PHL
The two carriers here are closely matched: 4 points separate the best from the worst. At that spread, schedule and price are better tie-breakers than reliability. Sample sizes are shown so you can see which rows are worth weighing.
| Airline | Flights | On time | Avg delay | Cancelled | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Republic Airwaysthin sample | 83 | 81.5% | 79 min | 2.41% | B |
| Delta Air Lines | 1,217 | 81.3% | 75 min | 2.88% | B |
| PSA Airlines | 617 | 77.1% | 113 min | 6.97% | B− |
| SkyWest Airlinesthin sample | 20 | 75.0% | 55 min | 0.00% | B+ |
| American Airlinesthin sample | 148 | 73.1% | 136 min | 1.35% | C |
PSA Airlines cancels 7.0% of what it schedules here, the highest in the table. A cancelled flight never appears in an on-time rate, so read that column alongside the punctuality one rather than after it.
Flight by flight
Flights on MSP to PHL
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 Minneapolis to Philadelphia
Every airline on this route, ranked by how often a scheduled flight actually operated and arrived on time, with its best departure time and most punctual flight number. No nearby airport pair beat these.
| Option | Airline | Success | On time | Cancelled | Best departure | Most punctual flight |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. MSP → PHLMinneapolis to Philadelphia | Delta Air Lines | 79.0% | 81.3% | 2.88% | 5am–8am, Wed | DL 2688 06:55 |
| 2. MSP → PHLMinneapolis to Philadelphia | PSA Airlines | 71.7% | 77.1% | 6.97% | 5am–8am, Tue | — |
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 17 points, against 4 points between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am675 flights88.9%
- 8am–11am108 flights88.8%
- 11am–2pm367 flights72.8%
- 2pm–5pm522 flights72.3%
- 5pm–8pm91 flights79.3%
- 8pm–5am322 flights75.5%
Scale runs 65% to 95%.
Book the early departure. Flights leaving between 5am–8am arrive on time 88.9% of the time, against 72.3% for the afternoon window. That is 17 points of difference for no extra money, and it comes from the same aircraft having had no earlier flight to fall behind on. The 5am–8am window is the busiest, with 675 flights scheduled in it.
Explore
Filter MSP to PHL 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 MSP to PHL, the best departure window is 5am–8am at 88.9% on time and the worst is 2pm–5pm at 72.3%, a wide gap of 16.6 points. All US flights leaving 5am–8am ran 89.3%.
- 5–8am88.9%
- 8–11am88.8%
- 11am–2pm72.8%
- 2–5pm72.3%
- 5–8pm79.3%
- 8pm–5am75.5%
best all US flightsScale 60% to 95%.
Across the year
When delays peak on this route
This route's year swings by 17 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.
December is the weak month at 68.6% on time, against 85.2% in May. Winter delays cluster: a single storm system can account for most of a month's shortfall, so an average December hides both very good weeks and genuinely unflyable days. May was the busiest month here, with 209 flights.
Across the week, Wednesday is the strongest day at 83.4% on time and Friday the weakest at 76.8%, a spread of 7 points.
Delay causes
Why this route gets delayed
Carrier accounts for 46% of the 38,000 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 46%Carrier
- 33%Late-arriving aircraft
- 18%National Airspace System
- 2%Extreme weather
- 0%Security
The largest share of delay minutes, 46%, falls under carrier control: crew scheduling, maintenance, fuelling, baggage. It accounts for 18,000 of the 38,000 delay minutes reported here. The split is drawn from 38,094 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 run at 3.93%, against 1.89% nationally. That is about one flight in 25 cancelled outright. A cancelled flight is invisible in every on-time figure on this page, so the punctuality numbers above describe only the flights that actually operated.
Connections and stage length
What a delay here actually costs
9.1% of arrivals land a full hour or more behind schedule, against 8.3% nationally. Ninety minutes is the honest minimum for a connection here, and two hours if the onward flight is on a separate ticket.
The 981 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 78.1% on time across 2,086 flights, within about a point 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 2,085 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 PHL after this flight
What to do with this
Booking this route
Put together: the delay figures matter less here than the 3.93% cancellation rate. A late arrival costs you an hour and a half; a cancelled flight costs you the day. Book the 5am–8am departure so there is still a schedule behind you if it goes wrong, and treat a same-day connection as optimistic. 1,995 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
MSP to PHL questions
How often is MSP to PHL 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 20.6% of the 2,085 flights in this analysis, against 22.7% nationally. Delayed flights are late by an hour and a half on average.
Which airline is most reliable on MSP to PHL?
Delta Air Lines leads at 81.3% on time across 1,217 flights. PSA Airlines is at the other end on 77.1%, a gap of 4 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 MSP to PHL?
The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 88.9% on time. The 2pm–5pm window is the weakest at 72.3%, 17 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 December delays on MSP to PHL?
December is the weakest month at 68.6% on time, compared with 85.2% in May. Across the year that is 17 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
- PHL to MSP — the return legseparate record
- Minneapolis-St Paul International (MSP) delay statistics
- Philadelphia International (PHL) delay statistics
- Delta Air Lines on MSP to PHL81.3%
- PSA Airlines on MSP to PHL77.1%
- American Airlines on MSP to PHL73.1%
- MSP to ORD, a related route70.0%
- ATL to PHL, a related route74.6%
- MSP to DEN, a related route77.8%
- Republic Airways on-time record81.5%
- Delta Air Lines on-time record81.3%
- PSA Airlines on-time record77.1%
- The US routes with the most cancellations
- Why the first flight of the morning is statistically safest
Direction matters. MSP to PHL and PHL to MSP 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.