Carrier route record
F9ONT→DFW
Frontier Airlines · Ontario to Dallas-Fort Worth
- Flights
- 322
- Period
- July 2025 to June 2026
- Share of route
- 14%
- Carriers
- 2
Historical statistics for July 2025 to June 2026, not live status. For today’s flights, check with Frontier Airlines.
Frontier on ONT to DFW 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 322 flights, with a median arrival 8 minutes early.
The US average over the same twelve months is 77.6%, so there is little to separate Frontier on ONT to DFW 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 311 completed flights
Avg delay
68 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
3.42%
National rate is 1.81%
Whole route
78.2%
Every carrier on ONT to DFW, 2,307 flights
These figures cover 322 flights between July 2025 and June 2026. Beyond the headline rate, 8.7% 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
Frontier against every carrier on ONT to DFW
Frontier flew 322 of the 2,307 flights on ONT to DFW, about 14% of it. Its 75.6% on time is 3 points worse than the route as a whole, which runs 78.2%. Ranked by on-time rate it is last of two carriers on the route, where the range runs from American at 78.6% to Frontier at 75.6%.
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 Airlines | 1,985 | 78.6% | 98 min | 2.97% | B |
| Frontier Airlines (this page)thin sample | 322 | 75.6% | 68 min | 3.42% | B− |
Departure window
When Frontier runs best on this route
Departure time matters more here than the choice of carrier. The gap between the best and worst window is 13 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–8am13 flights—
- 8am–11am110 flights77.6%
- 11am–2pm26 flights—
- 2pm–5pm63 flights72.6%
- 5pm–8pm73 flights67.1%
- 8pm–5am37 flights80.0%
Scale runs 60% to 85%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
The 8pm–5am window is the strongest at 80.0% on time. The full set of windows spans 13 points.
Across the year
Frontier on ONT to DFW through the year
- Jul–Sep 202574 flights74.6%
- Oct–Dec 202589 flights75.3%
- Jan–Mar 202668 flights67.6%
- Apr–Jun 202691 flights82.4%
Scale runs 60% to 90%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
Monthly volumes are too low here to break the year into twelve reliable readings. What the twelve-month total says is 75.6% on time across 322 flights.
Frontier on ONT to DFW did not run the same all year. Its best quarter was Apr–Jun 2026 at 82.4% on time and its weakest Jan–Mar 2026 at 67.6%, a swing of 15 points on roughly 81 flights a quarter. The twelve-month rate averages over that, so if you are flying in a weak quarter the quarter's own figure is the better guide.
Across the week, Thursday is the strongest day at 82.8% on time and Monday the weakest at 66.7%. 16 points is a smaller lever than departure hour, but it is free.
Delay causes
Why Frontier runs late on this route
One category carries most of the weight here. Late-arriving aircraft accounts for 56% of the 5,144 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.
- 56%Late-arriving aircraft
- 27%National Airspace System
- 17%Carrier
56% of delay minutes trace back to a late-arriving aircraft, meaning the plane was already behind before it got here. That is a cascade, and cascades start small and grow through the day. Across 5,144 reported delay minutes here, that single category outweighs weather by 56 to one. It is the strongest argument for booking the first departure of the morning, when the aircraft has been sitting at the gate overnight with nothing to inherit. The split is drawn from 5,144 reported delay minutes.
Cancellations run at 3.42%, against 1.81% nationally. That is about one flight in 30 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 costs
8.7% 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 1,188 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 81.4% on time across 322 flights, 6 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 6 points of difference.
One caution: this is a thin sample. 322 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.
What to do with this
Booking Frontier on ONT to DFW
Put together: the delay figures matter less here than the 3.42% cancellation rate. A late arrival costs you about an hour; a cancelled flight costs you the day. Book the 8pm–5am departure so there is still a schedule behind you if it goes wrong, and treat a same-day connection as optimistic. 311 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Related
Where to go next
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.