Route reliability record
MYR→DCA
Myrtle Beach to Washington
- Flights
- 753
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Distance
- 372 mi
- Carriers
- 4
This route carries a cancellation problem, not just a delay problem: 6.4% of scheduled flights never operate, against 1.9% nationally. Of the ones that do fly, about seven flights in ten arrive on time, worth a C− overall. The punctuality figure counts only flights that actually departed, so it flatters an operation that cancels this often. That rests on 753 MYR to DCA flights, with a median arrival 6 minutes early.
Best time to fly MYR to DCA: a 8am–11am departure, ideally on a Saturday. Flights in that window arrived on time 86.0% of the time and Saturday flights 76.6%, against 70.6% for the route overall.
The national on-time rate over the same period is 77.3%, so this route runs 7 points behind the country as a whole. Across a thousand flights that is about 67 extra late arrivals.
Key figures
On time
70.6%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 704 completed flights
Avg delay
98 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
6.37%
National rate is 1.89%
Best carrier
PSA
70.1% on time across 582 flights
These figures cover 753 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 11.9% 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 MYR to DCA
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| American Airlinesthin sample | 3 | 100.0% | — | 0.00% | A+ |
| Republic Airwaysthin sample | 143 | 75.7% | 52 min | 4.90% | B− |
| PSA Airlines | 582 | 70.1% | 109 min | 6.70% | C− |
| Envoy Airthin sample | 25 | 47.8% | 66 min | 8.00% | F− |
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Best ways to make this trip
The most reliable ways to fly Myrtle Beach to Washington
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. 1 of the top 2 use a different airport at one end.
| Option | Airline | Success | On time | Cancelled | Best departure | Most punctual flight |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. MYR → BWIMyrtle Beach to Baltimore | Southwest Airlines | 82.2% | 83.2% | 1.26% | 5am–8am, Thu | — |
| 2. MYR → DCAMyrtle Beach to Washington | PSA Airlines | 65.4% | 70.1% | 6.70% | 11am–2pm, Sat | — |
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 31 points, against half a point between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am1 flights—
- 8am–11am104 flights86.0%
- 11am–2pm360 flights73.8%
- 2pm–5pm137 flights67.2%
- 5pm–8pm143 flights54.6%
- 8pm–5am8 flights—
Scale runs 45% to 90%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
The 5pm–8pm window is where this operation falls apart: 54.6% on time, against 86.0% 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 11am–2pm window is the busiest, with 360 flights scheduled in it.
Explore
Filter MYR to DCA 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 MYR to DCA, the best departure window is 8am–11am at 86.0% on time and the worst is 5pm–8pm at 54.6%, a wide gap of 31.4 points. All US flights leaving 8am–11am ran 83.9%.
- 5–8am—
- 8–11am86.0%
- 11am–2pm73.8%
- 2–5pm67.2%
- 5–8pm54.6%
- 8pm–5am—
best all US flightsScale 45% to 95%. Cells under 30 flights show a dash.
Across the year
When delays peak on this route
This route's year swings by 42 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.
May is the best month on the calendar at 92.5% on time. Shoulder season thins the schedule and takes the summer weather with it, and the operation gets its margin back. May was the busiest month here, with 68 flights.
Across the week, Saturday is the strongest day at 76.6% on time and Sunday the weakest at 63.6%, a spread of 13 points.
Delay causes
Why this route gets delayed
Carriers report a reason for every delay minute they cause, in five DOT categories. The split below is by minutes, not by number of flights, so a handful of very long weather delays weighs as much as many short ones. It covers 20,000 reported delay minutes.
- 41%Late-arriving aircraft
- 24%National Airspace System
- 23%Carrier
- 12%Extreme weather
- 1%Security
Extreme weather accounts for 12% of delay minutes, well above the single-digit share typical across the system. Weather delays are lumpy: they arrive as whole bad days rather than as a steady drag, so the monthly strip above is the more useful view of the risk. The national share is 6%, so this operation carries roughly 2.0 times the usual weather exposure. The split is drawn from 20,226 reported delay minutes.
41% of delay minutes trace back to a late-arriving aircraft, meaning the plane was already behind before it got here. Across 20,000 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 3 to one.
Cancellations run at 6.37%, against 1.89% nationally. That is about one flight in fifteen 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
11.9% 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.
At 372 miles this is a short hop, and stage length matters more than it looks. A flight this short spends under two hours in the air, which leaves almost nothing to claw back a late pushback with. Delay here is decided on the ground, in the turn, which is why the 8am–11am window matters as much as it does.
The return leg is a different operation and performs like one: it runs 76.0% on time across 754 flights, 5 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 5 points of difference.
One caution: this is a thin sample. 753 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.
Work out the risk of missing a connection in DCA after this flight
What to do with this
Booking this route
Put together: the delay figures matter less here than the 6.37% cancellation rate. A late arrival costs you an hour and a half; a cancelled flight costs you the day. Book the 8am–11am departure so there is still a schedule behind you if it goes wrong, and treat a same-day connection as optimistic. 704 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
MYR to DCA questions
How often is MYR to DCA delayed?
Roughly one flight in three arrives at least 15 minutes late, which is the Department of Transportation's definition of a delayed arrival. That works out to 29.4% of the 753 flights in this analysis, against 22.7% nationally. Delayed flights are late by an hour and a half on average.
How reliable is MYR to DCA compared with the rest of the country?
70.6% of flights arrive on time here against a national 77.3%, a difference of 7 points against it. That is worth a C− on this site's grading scale.
What time of day has the fewest delays on MYR to DCA?
The 8am–11am departure window is the strongest at 86.0% on time. The 5pm–8pm window is the weakest at 54.6%, 31 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 October delays on MYR to DCA?
October is the weakest month at 50.8% on time, compared with 92.5% in May. Across the year that is 42 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
- DCA to MYR — the return legseparate record
- Ronald Reagan Washington National (DCA) delay statistics
- Republic Airways on MYR to DCA75.7%
- PSA Airlines on MYR to DCA70.1%
- MYR to CLT, a related route84.1%
- BOS to DCA, a related route72.6%
- MYR to ATL, a related route88.6%
- American Airlines on-time record100.0%
- Republic Airways on-time record75.7%
- PSA Airlines on-time record70.1%
- The US routes with the most cancellations
- Why the first flight of the morning is statistically safest
Direction matters. MYR to DCA and DCA to MYR are scored separately because they are separate operations, with different departure banks and different aircraft. Compare the return leg.
Embed MYR to DCA’s on-time badge on your site
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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.