Route reliability record
PIT→FLL
Pittsburgh to Fort Lauderdale
- Flights
- 1,102
- Period
- September 2025 to August 2026
- Distance
- 994 mi
- Carriers
- 3
This route lands a B−, 2 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 about an hour on average. That rests on 1,102 PIT to FLL flights, of which Southwest Airlines flew 392 at 78.1% on time.
Best time to fly PIT to FLL: a 5am–8am departure, ideally on a Wednesday. Flights in that window arrived on time 85.6% of the time and Wednesday flights 91.9%, against 78.8% 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
78.8%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 1,066 completed flights
Avg delay
66 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
3.09%
National rate is 1.89%
Best carrier
Southwest
78.1% on time across 392 flights
These figures cover 1,102 flights between September 2025 and August 2026. The median arrival is 7 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 PIT to FLL
The two carriers here are closely matched: about a point 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| JetBlue Airwaysthin sample | 303 | 82.1% | 82 min | 2.31% | B |
| Southwest Airlines | 392 | 78.1% | 55 min | 1.02% | B |
| Spirit Airlines | 407 | 77.0% | 68 min | 5.65% | B− |
Spirit Airlines cancels 5.7% 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 PIT to FLL
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 Pittsburgh to Fort Lauderdale
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 3 use a different airport at one end.
| Option | Airline | Success | On time | Cancelled | Best departure | Most punctual flight |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. PIT → MIAPittsburgh to Miami | American Airlines | 78.5% | 79.4% | 1.10% | 5am–8am, Tue (route) | — |
| 2. PIT → FLLPittsburgh to Fort Lauderdale | Southwest Airlines | 77.3% | 78.1% | 1.02% | 8am–11am, Wed | — |
| 3. PIT → FLLPittsburgh to Fort Lauderdale | Spirit Airlines | 72.6% | 77.0% | 5.65% | 5am–8am, Wed | — |
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 43 points, against about a point between the best and worst carrier.
- 5am–8am656 flights85.6%
- 8am–11am157 flights78.8%
- 11am–2pm88 flights76.2%
- 2pm–5pm56 flights42.9%
- 5pm–8pm95 flights63.4%
- 8pm–5am50 flights64.4%
Scale runs 35% to 90%.
Book the early departure. Flights leaving between 5am–8am arrive on time 85.6% of the time, against 42.9% for the afternoon window. That is 43 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 656 flights scheduled in it.
Explore
Filter PIT to FLL 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 PIT to FLL, the best departure window is 5am–8am at 85.6% on time and the worst is 2pm–5pm at 42.9%, a wide gap of 42.7 points. All US flights leaving 5am–8am ran 89.3%.
- 5–8am85.6%
- 8–11am78.8%
- 11am–2pm76.2%
- 2–5pm42.9%
- 5–8pm63.4%
- 8pm–5am64.4%
best all US flightsScale 35% to 95%.
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.
January is the weak month at 67.5% on time, against 90.0% in October. 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. January was the busiest month here, with 124 flights.
Across the week, Wednesday is the strongest day at 91.9% on time and Sunday the weakest at 67.5%, a spread of 24 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 15,000 reported delay minutes.
- 37%Carrier
- 29%Late-arriving aircraft
- 28%National Airspace System
- 5%Extreme weather
- 0%Security
The largest share of delay minutes, 37%, falls under carrier control: crew scheduling, maintenance, fuelling, baggage. It accounts for 5,529 of the 15,000 delay minutes reported here. The split is drawn from 14,976 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 85.6% on time here.
Cancellations run at 3.09%, against 1.89% 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 actually costs
6.6% 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 about an hour, which a normal layover absorbs.
The 994 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 64.6% on time across 1,107 flights, 14 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 14 points of difference.
The sample behind these figures is 1,102 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 FLL after this flight
What to do with this
Booking this route
Put together: the delay figures matter less here than the 3.09% cancellation rate. A late arrival costs you about an hour; 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. 1,066 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Common questions
PIT to FLL questions
How often is PIT to FLL 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 21.2% of the 1,102 flights in this analysis, against 22.7% nationally. Delayed flights are late by about an hour on average.
Which airline is most reliable on PIT to FLL?
Southwest Airlines leads at 78.1% on time across 392 flights. Spirit Airlines is at the other end on 77.0%, a gap of about a point. 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 PIT to FLL?
The 5am–8am departure window is the strongest at 85.6% on time. The 2pm–5pm window is the weakest at 42.9%, 43 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 January delays on PIT to FLL?
January is the weakest month at 67.5% on time, compared with 90.0% in October. 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
- FLL to PIT — the return legseparate record
- Pittsburgh International (PIT) delay statistics
- Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International (FLL) delay statistics
- JetBlue Airways on PIT to FLL82.1%
- Southwest Airlines on PIT to FLL78.1%
- Spirit Airlines on PIT to FLL77.0%
- PIT to ORD, a related route77.1%
- ATL to FLL, a related route70.7%
- PIT to LGA, a related route79.9%
- JetBlue Airways on-time record82.1%
- Southwest Airlines on-time record78.1%
- Spirit Airlines on-time record77.0%
- The US routes with the most cancellations
- The best time of day to fly, according to 7.05 million flight records
Direction matters. PIT to FLL and FLL to PIT 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.