Route reliability record
PDX→EWR
Portland to Newark
- Flights
- 870
- Period
- July 2025 to June 2026
- Distance
- 2,434 mi
- Carriers
- 2
This route lands a B, 6 points better than the national rate of 77.6%. About one flight in six arrives 15 minutes late or worse, and those flights are late by a little over an hour on average. That is a workable record, not a spotless one. That rests on 870 PDX to EWR flights, with a median arrival 13 minutes early.
Best time to fly PDX to EWR: a 5am–8am departure, ideally on a Friday. Flights in that window arrived on time 88.9% of the time and Friday flights 95.1%, against 83.2% for the route overall.
Set against the rest of the country, this route's record is 6 points better than the US average of 77.6%. That gap is worth roughly 56 fewer late arrivals for every thousand flights.
Key figures
On time
83.2%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 850 completed flights
Avg delay
75 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
1.95%
National rate is 1.81%
Best carrier
United
84.1% on time across 521 flights
These figures cover 870 flights between July 2025 and June 2026. The median arrival is 13 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.
Carrier by carrier
Which airline is most reliable on PDX to EWR
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| United Airlines | 521 | 84.1% | 72 min | 1.92% | B |
| Alaska Airlinesthin sample | 349 | 81.9% | 79 min | 2.01% | B |
Flight by flight
Flights on PDX to EWR
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.
Best ways to make this trip
The most reliable ways to fly Portland to Newark
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. PDX → JFKPortland to New York | Delta Air Lines | 84.8% | 86.7% | 2.18% | 5am–8am, Fri | DL 451 07:00 |
| 2. PDX → EWRPortland to Newark | United Airlines | 82.5% | 84.1% | 1.92% | 8pm–5am, Tue | UA 1802 22:52 |
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 is the single lever a traveller controls, and it moves the odds more than most people expect. Each bar below is the on-time rate for flights scheduled to leave inside that window, across 870 flights.
- 5am–8am63 flights88.9%
- 8am–11am420 flights80.0%
- 11am–2pm3 flights—
- 2pm–5pm—
- 5pm–8pm—
- 8pm–5am384 flights86.1%
Scale runs 70% to 95%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
Book the early departure. Flights leaving between 5am–8am arrive on time 88.9% of the time, against 80.0% for the morning window. That is 9 points of difference for no extra money, and it comes from the same aircraft having had no earlier flight to fall behind on. The 8am–11am window is the busiest, with 420 flights scheduled in it.
Across the year
When delays peak on this route
This route's year swings by 23 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, 23 points below February, the best at 95.0%. 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. June was the busiest month here, with 111 flights.
Across the week, Friday is the strongest day at 95.1% on time and Sunday the weakest at 74.6%. 21 points is a smaller lever than departure hour, but it is free.
Delay causes
Why this route gets delayed
One category carries most of the weight here. National Airspace System accounts for 63% of the 11,000 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.
- 63%National Airspace System
- 20%Carrier
- 15%Late-arriving aircraft
- 2%Extreme weather
63% 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 6,797 minutes out of 11,000, against a national NAS share of 21%. The split is drawn from 10,718 reported delay minutes.
Cancellations sit at 1.95% against a national 1.81%, which is ordinary. Diversions add another 0.34%.
Connections and stage length
What a delay here actually costs
6.5% 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 a little over an hour, which a normal layover absorbs.
At 2,434 miles this is transcontinental flying, and long routes get a quiet structural advantage. Scheduled block time on a flight this length carries more padding in absolute minutes, so a twenty-minute late departure often still becomes an on-time arrival. Read the on-time rate here as slightly flattering next to a short-haul route with the same operational quality.
The return leg is a different operation and performs like one: it runs 76.8% on time across 870 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.
One caution: this is a thin sample. 870 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 EWR after this flight
What to do with this
Booking this route
Put together: treat all of this as provisional. 870 flights over twelve months is enough to clear this site's floor and not enough to be confident to better than a couple of points. The 83.2% headline is the most reliable number on the page; the hour and month splits below it are built on a few dozen flights each. 850 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
PDX to EWR questions
How often is PDX to EWR delayed?
About one flight in six arrives at least 15 minutes late, which is the Department of Transportation's definition of a delayed arrival. That works out to 16.8% of the 870 flights in this analysis, against 22.4% nationally. Delayed flights are late by a little over an hour on average.
How reliable is PDX to EWR compared with the rest of the country?
83.2% of flights arrive on time here against a national 77.6%, a difference of 6 points in its favour. That is worth a B on this site's grading scale.
What time of day has the fewest delays on PDX to EWR?
The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 88.9% on time. The 8am–11am window is the weakest at 80.0%, 9 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 PDX to EWR?
July is the weakest month at 72.4% on time, compared with 95.0% in February. Across the year that is 23 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
- EWR to PDX — the return legseparate record
- Portland International (PDX) delay statistics
- Newark Liberty International (EWR) delay statistics
- United Airlines on PDX to EWR84.1%
- Alaska Airlines on PDX to EWR81.9%
- PDX to SEA, a related route84.8%
- MCO to EWR, a related route73.8%
- PDX to LAX, a related route87.4%
- United Airlines on-time record84.1%
- Alaska Airlines on-time record81.9%
- The best time of day to fly, according to 7.04 million flight records
- Worst months to fly in the US, ranked by the data
Direction matters. PDX to EWR and EWR to PDX are scored separately because they are separate operations, with different departure banks and different aircraft. Compare the return leg.
Embed PDX to EWR’s on-time badge on your site
Paste this into a web page. The badge shows the current on-time rate, cancellation rate and grade, and updates every month. Preview it, or build a badge for another route or airport.
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.