Route reliability record
MSY→MIA
New Orleans to Miami
- Flights
- 1,478
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Distance
- 674 mi
- Carriers
- 5
This route lands a B, 3 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 a little over an hour on average. That rests on 1,478 MSY to MIA flights, with a median arrival 8 minutes early.
Best time to fly MSY to MIA: a 5am–8am departure, ideally on a Tuesday. Flights in that window arrived on time 87.0% of the time and Tuesday flights 89.3%, against 80.2% 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
80.2%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 1,458 completed flights
Avg delay
82 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
1.29%
National rate is 1.89%
Best carrier
American
80.6% on time across 1,293 flights
These figures cover 1,478 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. The median arrival is 8 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 MSY to MIA
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Envoy Airthin sample | 105 | 82.7% | 50 min | 0.00% | B+ |
| American Airlines | 1,293 | 80.6% | 84 min | 1.24% | B |
| Frontier Airlinesthin sample | 4 | 75.0% | 15 min | 0.00% | B+ |
| Spirit Airlinesthin sample | 67 | 71.9% | 80 min | 4.48% | C− |
| Republic Airwaysthin sample | 9 | 66.7% | 101 min | 0.00% | C+ |
Timetable by Aviasales, a Travelpayouts partner. Booking through it may earn this site a commission at no cost to you; it changes no figure here.
Best ways to make this trip
The most reliable ways to fly New Orleans to Miami
Every airline on this route and on the routes between nearby airports, ranked by how often a scheduled flight actually operated and arrived on time. 3 of the top 4 use a different airport at one end.
| Option | Airline | Success | On time | Cancelled | Best departure | Most punctual flight |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. MSY → MIANew Orleans to Miami | American Airlines | 79.6% | 80.6% | 1.24% | 5am–8am, Tue | — |
| 2. MSY → FLLNew Orleans to Fort Lauderdale | Spirit Airlines | 74.3% | 77.5% | 4.07% | 5am–8am, Wed | — |
| 3. MSY → FLLNew Orleans to Fort Lauderdale | Southwest Airlines | 73.3% | 73.5% | 0.27% | 5am–8am, Wed | — |
| 4. MSY → FLLNew Orleans to Fort Lauderdale | JetBlue Airways | 67.4% | 68.9% | 2.19% | 5am–8am, Wed | B6 1822 07:00 |
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 19 points, against half a point between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am531 flights87.0%
- 8am–11am371 flights83.7%
- 11am–2pm173 flights80.1%
- 2pm–5pm30 flights—
- 5pm–8pm369 flights68.2%
- 8pm–5am4 flights—
Scale runs 60% to 90%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
Book the early departure. Flights leaving between 5am–8am arrive on time 87.0% of the time, against 68.2% for the evening window. That is 19 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 531 flights scheduled in it.
Explore
Filter MSY to MIA 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 MSY to MIA, the best departure window is 5am–8am at 87.0% on time and the worst is 5pm–8pm at 68.2%, a wide gap of 18.8 points. All US flights leaving 5am–8am ran 89.3%.
- 5–8am87.0%
- 8–11am83.7%
- 11am–2pm80.1%
- 2–5pm—
- 5–8pm68.2%
- 8pm–5am—
best all US flightsScale 60% to 95%. Cells under 30 flights show a dash.
Across the year
When delays peak on this route
This route's year swings by 16 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.
July is the worst month at 72.4% on time, 16 points below November, the best at 88.4%. 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. October was the busiest month here, with 139 flights.
Across the week, Tuesday is the strongest day at 89.3% on time and Sunday the weakest at 68.1%, a spread of 21 points.
Delay causes
Why this route gets delayed
Carrier accounts for 45% of the 23,000 delay minutes carriers reported here, and the remaining four split what is left.
- 45%Carrier
- 41%Late-arriving aircraft
- 11%National Airspace System
- 2%Extreme weather
- 0%Security
41% of delay minutes trace back to a late-arriving aircraft, meaning the plane was already behind before it got here. Across 23,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 18 to one. The split is drawn from 23,461 reported delay minutes.
The largest share of delay minutes, 45%, falls under carrier control: crew scheduling, maintenance, fuelling, baggage. It accounts for 11,000 of the 23,000 delay minutes reported here.
Cancellations sit at 1.29% against a national 1.89%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.07%.
Connections and stage length
What a delay here actually costs
7.1% 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 a little over an hour, which a normal layover absorbs.
The 674 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 74.5% on time across 1,480 flights, 6 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 6 points of difference.
The sample behind these figures is 1,478 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 MIA 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. November runs 88.4% on time and July 72.4%, a swing of 16 points. If the dates move at all, move them out of July before you think about anything else. 1,458 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
MSY to MIA questions
How often is MSY to MIA 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 19.8% of the 1,478 flights in this analysis, against 22.7% nationally. Delayed flights are late by a little over an hour on average.
How reliable is MSY to MIA compared with the rest of the country?
80.2% of flights arrive on time here against a national 77.3%, a difference of 3 points in its favour. That is worth a B on this site's grading scale.
What time of day has the fewest delays on MSY to MIA?
The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 87.0% on time. The 5pm–8pm window is the weakest at 68.2%, 19 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 July delays on MSY to MIA?
July is the weakest month at 72.4% on time, compared with 88.4% in November. Across the year that is 16 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
- MIA to MSY — the return legseparate record
- Louis Armstrong New Orleans International (MSY) delay statistics
- Miami International (MIA) delay statistics
- Envoy Air on MSY to MIA82.7%
- American Airlines on MSY to MIA80.6%
- MSY to ATL, a related route82.2%
- ATL to MIA, a related route71.2%
- MSY to IAH, a related route83.2%
- Envoy Air on-time record82.7%
- American Airlines on-time record80.6%
- Frontier Airlines on-time record75.0%
- 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. MSY to MIA and MIA to MSY 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.