Carrier route record
NKPIT→MCO
Spirit Airlines · Pittsburgh to Orlando
- Flights
- 435
- Period
- July 2025 to June 2026
- Share of route
- 20%
- Carriers
- 4
Historical statistics for July 2025 to June 2026, not live status. For today’s flights, check with Spirit Airlines.
Spirit on PIT to MCO lands a B−, 3 points better than the national rate of 77.6%. 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 is a workable record, not a spotless one. That rests on 435 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 Spirit on PIT to MCO from the country as a whole. The variation that matters here is internal: which carrier, and what time of day.
Key figures
On time
80.4%
Arrivals under 15 minutes late, of 418 completed flights
Avg delay
73 min
Across delayed arrivals only, not all flights
Cancelled
3.68%
National rate is 1.81%
Whole route
79.7%
Every carrier on PIT to MCO, 2,184 flights
These figures cover 435 flights between July 2025 and June 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.
Carrier by carrier
Spirit against every carrier on PIT to MCO
Spirit flew 435 of the 2,184 flights on PIT to MCO, about 20% of it. Its 80.4% on time is about level with the route as a whole at 79.7%. Ranked by on-time rate it is number two of four carriers on the route, where the range runs from Republic at 82.1% to Frontier at 76.4%. Two of those carriers flew fewer than 365 flights here, so treat their positions as rough.
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Republic Airwaysthin sample | 28 | 82.1% | 42 min | 0.00% | B+ |
| Spirit Airlines (this page) | 435 | 80.4% | 73 min | 3.68% | B− |
| Southwest Airlines | 1,592 | 79.8% | 65 min | 0.63% | B+ |
| Frontier Airlinesthin sample | 129 | 76.4% | 71 min | 0.78% | B+ |
Departure window
When Spirit runs best on this route
Departure time matters more here than the choice of carrier. The gap between the best and worst window is 14 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–8am242 flights82.9%
- 8am–11am52 flights88.0%
- 11am–2pm5 flights—
- 2pm–5pm—
- 5pm–8pm93 flights74.2%
- 8pm–5am43 flights73.8%
Scale runs 65% to 95%. Rows with fewer than 30 flights show a dash.
Book the morning departure. Flights leaving between 8am–11am arrive on time 88.0% of the time, against 73.8% for the overnight window. That is 14 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 242 flights scheduled in it.
Across the year
Spirit on PIT to MCO through the year
January is the weak month at 70.0% on time, against 85.7% in February. 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. October was the busiest month here, with 61 flights.
Across the week, Tuesday is the strongest day at 90.6% on time and Sunday the weakest at 66.7%. 24 points is a smaller lever than departure hour, but it is free.
Delay causes
Why Spirit runs late on this route
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 6,004 reported delay minutes.
- 37%National Airspace System
- 32%Carrier
- 31%Late-arriving aircraft
- 0%Extreme weather
37% 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 2,215 minutes out of 6,004, against a national NAS share of 21%. The split is drawn from 6,004 reported delay minutes.
The practical consequence: the 8am–11am departure is the one that starts clean. Its aircraft has no earlier leg to be late from, which is exactly why that window shows 88.0% on time here.
Cancellations run at 3.68%, against 1.81% nationally. That is roughly one flight in 25 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
7.4% 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.
The 834 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 74.6% on time across 432 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. 435 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 Spirit on PIT to MCO
Put together: the delay figures matter less here than the 3.68% cancellation rate. A late arrival costs you a little over an hour; 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. 418 completed flights over 12 months sit behind that.
Related
Where to go next
- PIT to MCO, every carrier
- Spirit on MCO to PIT, the return leg
- Southwest Airlines on PIT to MCO79.8%
- Frontier Airlines on PIT to MCO76.4%
- Spirit Airlines network-wide record
- Pittsburgh International (PIT) delay statistics
- Orlando International (MCO) delay statistics
- The US routes with the most cancellations
- What a cancellation rate actually tells you (and what it hides)
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.